0220-24 NY Times Crossword 20 Feb 24, Tuesday

Bill’s time: 6m 18s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Mail inits. since 1971 : USPS

The national postal agency of the US became the United States Postal Service (USPS) in 1971, as a result of the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970.

5 ___-Carlton (hotel chain) : RITZ

César Ritz was a Swiss hotelier, who had a reputation for developing the most luxurious of accommodations and attracting the wealthiest clientèle. He opened the Hotel Ritz in Paris in 1898 and the second of his most famous hotels, the Ritz Hotel in London, in 1906. Ritz was lucky in his career, as before starting his own hotel chain he had been dismissed from the Savoy Hotel in London, implicated in the disappearance of a substantial amount of wine and spirits. Today’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company was founded in 1983, although the chain has its roots in the properties developed by César Ritz.

9 Lettuce or cabbage : MOOLA

Lettuce, cabbage, kale, dough, bread, scratch, cheddar, simoleons, clams and moola(h) are all slang terms for money.

16 Hero of Narnia in C. S. Lewis novels : ASLAN

In the C. S. Lewis series of books known as “The Chronicles of Narnia”, Aslan is the lion character (as in the title “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”). “Aslan” is actually the Turkish word for lion. Anyone who has read the books will recognize the remarkable similarity between the story of Aslan and the story of Christ, including a sacrifice and resurrection.

19 In a deadpan manner : DRILY

The term “deadpan”, slang for “impassive expression”, comes from “dead” (expressionless) and “pan” (slang for “face”).

20 Spleen : IRE

“To vent one’s spleen” means to vent one’s anger, perhaps by shouting and screaming. This expression is rooted in the humoral medicine of the ancient Greeks. The Greeks believed that a person’s temperament was dictated by the balance of the body’s four “humors”. The spleen produced the humor known as yellow bile, which was associated with an aggressive and energetic personality.

21 Middle of a classic boast from Caesar : … I SAW …

The oft-quoted statement “Veni, vidi, vici” (“I came, I saw, I conquered”) is believed by many to have been written by Julius Caesar. The words date back to 47 BCE and refer to the short war between Rome and Pharnaces II of Pontus.

25 Chocolate confection with a molten core : LAVA CAKE

Molten chocolate cake is chocolate cake with a warm and liquid chocolate center. A dessert often called “lava cake”, it was invented by French chef Michel Bras, and dates back to 1981. It was popularized in the US by French chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten, initially in his New York restaurant Jean-Georges.

33 Tiki bar drink : MAI TAI

The mai tai cocktail is strongly associated with the Polynesian islands, but the drink was supposedly invented in 1944 in Trader Vic’s restaurant in Oakland, California. One recipe is 6 parts white rum, 3 parts orange curaçao, 3 parts orgeat syrup, 1 part rock candy syrup, 2 parts fresh lime juice, all mixed with ice and then a float added of 6 parts dark rum. “Maita’i” is the Tahitian word for “good”.

The world’s first tiki bar was called “Don the Beachcomber”, and was opened in L.A. in 1933 by Ernest Gantt (also known as “Donn Beach”). The bar became famous for its exotic rum cocktails. Gantt was called to serve in WWII, and the business expanded dramatically under his ex-wife’s management so that there was a 160-restaurant chain waiting for Gantt when he returned stateside.

36 Effect of secondhand pot smoke : CONTACT HIGH

“Potiguaya” is the Mexican-Spanish word for “marijuana leaves”. The slang name “pot” comes from “potiguaya”.

39 Uber-fan : STAN

“Stan” is a song by rapper Eminem (featuring Dido) that was recorded in 2000. The title refers to a fictional Eminem fan named “Stan” who becomes obsessed with the rapper, and who grows irate when his letters to his idol go unanswered. Stan’s final act is to make a voice recording as he drives into a river, with his pregnant girlfriend locked in the trunk. One of the legacies of the song is that “stan” is now used as a slang term for an obsessed and maniacal fan.

45 Made an irreverently sarcastic comment : SNARKED

“Snark” is a term that was coined by Lewis Carroll in his fabulous 1876 nonsense poem “The Hunting of the Snark”. Somehow, the term “snarky” came to mean “irritable, short-tempered” in the early 1900s, and from there “snark” became “sarcastic rhetoric” at the beginning of the 21st century.

52 Crooner Mel who was called “The Velvet Fog” : TORME

Mel Tormé was a jazz singer with a quality of voice that earned him the nickname “The Velvet Fog”. Tormé also wrote a few books, and did a lot of acting. He was the co-author of the Christmas classic known as “The Christmas Song”, which starts out with the line “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire …”

57 Signature Obama achievement, in brief : ACA

The correct name for what has been dubbed “Obamacare” is the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act” (ACA).

61 Where it’s at : VENUE

A venue is a specified locale used for an event. The term “venue” came into English via French from the Latin “venire” meaning “to come”. So, a “venue” is a place to which people “come” for an event.

64 Army squad leaders: Abbr. : SSGTS

Staff sergeant (SSgt.)

66 “Toy Story” boy : ANDY

In the 1995 Pixar hit “Toy Story”, the toys are owned by a boy named Andy Davis. Andy’s neighbor is a not-so-nice boy named Sid Phillips. Sid gets a big kick out of destroying and torturing his own toys, and those owned by others.

Down

2 Evening party : SOIREE

“Soir” is the French word for “evening” and a soirée is an evening party. The French word “soirée” has an acute accent over the first “e”, but we tend to drop this when using the word in English.

5 Hank Aaron holds the M.L.B. record for these, for short (2,297) : RBIS

Hank Aaron hit his 715th career home run on 8th April 1974, breaking the record of 714 career home runs held by Babe Ruth. Aaron went on to hit 755 home runs prior to his retirement from the game in 1976.

6 Smidgen : IOTA

Our word “smidgen” (sometimes shortened to “smidge”) is used to describe a small amount. The term might come from the Scots word “smitch” that means the same thing or “a small insignificant person”.

8 Mindfulness-based practice : ZEN

Zen is a Buddhist school that developed its own tradition in China back in the 7th century AD. “Zen” is a Japanese spelling of the Chinese word “chan”, which in turn derives from the Sanskrit word “dhyana” meaning “meditation”.

9 Cop-turned-vigilante in a postapocalyptic film : MAD MAX

“Mad Max” is a series of Australian movies starring Mel Gibson in the title role. Well, Gibson plays the lead in the first three films (“Mad Max”, “The Road Warrior” and “Beyond Thunderdome”) and Tom Hardy plays Max in the fourth movie, “Fury Road”.

10 Courtier who oversees Hamlet’s duel with Laertes : OSRIC

In William Shakespeare’s play “Hamlet”, Osric is the courtier that Claudius dispatches to invite Hamlet to participate in a duel.

11 Member of a powerful ruling elite : OLIGARCH

An oligarchy is a form of government in which power rests with the few, perhaps with royalty or with the wealthy. The term derives from the Greek “oligos” meaning “few”.

12 B-baller in California : LA LAKER

The Los Angeles Lakers (LAL) basketball team started out in 1947 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The team chose the Lakers name in honor of the nickname of Minnesota, “Land of 10,000 Lakes”. The Lakers moved to Los Angeles in 1960.

18 Altima maker : NISSAN

Nissan has been making the Altima since 1993. In 2007, the company started to produce a hybrid version, Nissan’s first foray into the hybrid market and a successful one by all accounts. Altima hybrids are even used as police cruisers by the New York Police Department.

22 “___ Maria” : AVE

“Ave Maria” (“Hail Mary” in English) is the prayer at the core of the Roman Catholic Rosary, which itself is a set of prayers asking for the assistance of the Virgin Mary. Much of the text of the “Hail Mary” comes from the Gospel of Luke. The words in Latin are:

AVE MARIA, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc, et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.

The prayer has been adapted as a hymn. The two most famous musical versions of “Ave Maria” are by Charles Gounod (based on a piece by Bach) and by Franz Schubert.

24 Shakespeare’s “___ of Athens” : TIMON

Timon of Athens was noted for renouncing society, for being someone who despised mankind. Timon started out life as a wealthy man, but he lost all his money by pandering to the needs of his friends. Without money, Timon’s friends deserted him. Timon became rich again when he found a pot of gold, and so his friends sought him out once more. Timon was very embittered and so drove everyone away and lived the rest of his life as a hermit. Centuries after he died, Timon of Athens was to become the title character in “Timon of Athens”, a play by William Shakespeare.

30 Upper part of a Vandyke beard, informally : STACHE

The style of facial hair known as a Van dDyke is made up of a mustache and a goatee, with the cheeks fully shaven. The style takes its name from the 17th century Flemish painter Anthony van Dyck who wore such a beard, as did many of the men whose portrait he painted.

36 Swiss founder of analytical psychology : CARL JUNG

Carl Jung was a Swiss psychiatrist, and the founder of analytical psychology. Jung was very much associated with the analysis of dreams, and also introduced us to the psychological concepts of introversion and extroversion.

37 Largest Chinese ethnic group : HAN

The Han Chinese people are the largest ethnic group in the world, and comprise 18% of the planet’s population. The 1.3 billion Han also make up 92% of China’s population. The group takes its name from the Han dynasty that ruled much of modern day China from roughly 200 BCE to 220 CE.

38 Like “three men” of nursery rhyme : IN A TUB

The nursery rhyme “Rub-a-Dub-Dub” dates back to at least 1798 when it was first published in London:

Rub-a-dub-dub,
Three men in a tub,
And how do you think they got there?
The butcher, the baker,
The candlestick-maker,
They all jumped out of a rotten potato,
‘Twas enough to make a man stare.

43 Funereal compositions : DIRGES

A dirge is a slow and mournful piece of music, like perhaps a funeral hymn.

46 N.H.L. team with a mythological eponym : KRAKEN

The Kraken are an NHL team based in Seattle. The Krakens played their first league game in Seattle in 2021, marking the first time that Seattle hosted a professional hockey team since the days of the Seattle Totems in 1975.

Kraken are huge sea monsters of legend that were reputed to live off the coasts of Iceland and Norway. It’s possible that the kraken legend was inspired by real-life giant squid.

55 Nobelist Wiesel : ELIE

Elie Wiesel was a holocaust survivor, and is best known for his book “Night” that tells of his experiences in Auschwitz and Buchenwald. Wiesel was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986. He was also the first recipient of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum Award, which was later renamed the Elie Wiesel Award in his honor.

58 Big name in pharmacies : CVS

The name of the drugstore chain CVS once stood for “Consumer Value Stores”, although these days the company uses the initialism to denote “Convenience, Value and Service”.

59 One of Islam’s Five Pillars : HAJ

Followers of the Muslim tradition believe in the Five Pillars of Islam, five obligatory acts that underpin Muslim life. The Five Pillars are:

1. The Islamic creed
2. Daily prayer
3. Almsgiving
4. Fasting during the month of Ramadan
5. The pilgrimage to Mecca (haj, hajj, hadj) once during a lifetime