0612-24 NY Times Crossword 12 Jun 24, Wednesday

Bill’s time: 9m 36s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Pop corn? : DAD JOKE

I tell dad jokes all the time, just to annoy the kids …

• I’m reading a book about anti-gravity. It’s impossible to put down!
• If you see a robbery at an Apple Store, does that make you an iWitness?
• A termite walks into a bar and asks, “Is the bar tender here?”
• Two guys walk into a bar, the third one ducks.
• What’s the best part about living in Switzerland? I don’t know, but the flag is a big plus.

8 Home planet of a classic TV alien : ORK

The sitcom “Mork & Mindy” was broadcast from 1978 to 1982. We were first introduced to Mork (played by Robin Williams) in a special episode of “Happy Days”. The particular episode in question has a bizarre storyline culminating in Fonzie and Mork having a thumb-to-finger duel. Eventually Richie wakes up in bed, and alien Mork was just part of a dream! Oh, and “Nanu Nanu” means both “hello” and “goodbye” back on the planet Ork. “I am Mork from Ork, Nanu Nanu”. Great stuff …

11 ___ Ren of “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” : KYLO

Kylo Ren is the son of Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa in the “Star Wars” universe. The character’s birth name was Ben Solo. He was trained as a Jedi knight by his uncle, Luke Skywalker. However, Ben came to embrace the Dark Side, and changed his name to Kylo Ren. Ren is played by actor Adam Driver.

“Star Wars: The Last Jedi” is a 2017 movie from the “Star Wars” film franchise, and the second installment of the “Star Wars” sequel trilogy. The title character is Luke Skywalker, played by Mark Hamill. Ah, but is Luke in fact the “last Jedi”?

15 Brainstormer’s graphic : IDEA MAP

A mind map (also “idea map”) is a great tool (I think) for brainstorming. It’s a tree-like structure with a central idea at the center and various trains of thought branching outwards. In fact, I used a mind map when I was first thinking about blogging, eventually deciding to focus on crosswords.

16 Stooge with the catchphrase “Oh, a wise guy, eh?” : MOE

“Moe Howard” was the stage name of Moses Harry Horwitz. Howard was one of the Three Stooges. In 1925, he married Helen Schonberger, who was a cousin of Harry Houdini.

17 Lighting tubeful : NEON

The basic design of neon lighting was first demonstrated at the Paris Motor Show in 1910. Such lighting is made up of glass tubes containing a vacuum into which has been introduced a small amount of neon gas. When a voltage is applied between two electrodes inside the tube, the neon gas “glows” and gives off the familiar light.

19 Balderdash : NONSENSE

“Balderdash” means “senseless jumble of words”. The original balderdash (back before the late 1600s) was a jumbled mix of liquids like maybe beer and wine, or even beer and milk!

23 “Yesterday, I ___ a clock. It was very time-consuming!” (example of a 1-Across) : ATE
[1A Pop corn? : DAD JOKE]

Here are a few more dad jokes that I use to annoy my kids:

• When does a joke become a “dad joke”? When it becomes apparent.
• I had a happy childhood. My dad used to put me in tires and roll me down hills. Those were Goodyears.
• It’s a shame that the Beatles didn’t make the submarine in that song green. That would’ve been sublime.
• I told your mom she needs to start embracing her mistakes. So she hugged me
• When your mom is depressed, I let her color in my tattoos. She just needs a shoulder to crayon.

25 Set upon en masse : MOB

“En masse” is a French term, one that best translates as “as a group”

30 The U.S. is its southernmost member : NATO

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is an international military alliance that was established in 1949. NATO headquarters was initially set up in London, moved to Paris in 1952, and then to Brussels 1967.

39 Pop song? : THIS OLD MAN

“This Old Man” is an English nursery rhyme that dates back at least as far as the 1870s.

This old man, he played one,
He played knick-knack on his drum;
With a knick-knack paddywhack,
Give the dog a bone,
This old man came rolling home.

44 Long Islander of literature : GATSBY

“The Great Gatsby” is a 1925 novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald that tells of the prosperous life of Jay Gatsby during the Roaring 20s. Gatsby develops an obsessive love for Daisy Fay Buchanan, a girl he met while serving during WWI, and meets again some years later after he has improved his social standing.

East Egg is a fictional location in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel “The Great Gatsby”. It is an exclusive residential area located on Long Island’s north shore, across from another fictional area called West Egg. East Egg is said to be based on the real-life location of Sands Point, Long Island.

48 Old French coin : SOU

A sou is an old French coin. We use the term “sou” to mean “practically worthless amount”.

52 “___ et Blanche” (Man Ray’s study in contrast) : NOIRE

Man Ray was an American modernist artist who spent most of his working life in Paris. Man Ray was born in South Philadelphia in 1890, and his real name was Emmanuel Radnitzky. His family shortened “Radnitzky” to “Ray” in response to the anti-Semitic feeling that was prevalent at the time. Emmanuel was known as “Manny”, and he decided to assume the name Man Ray and use it for his work.

70 Obstacle to change : INERTIA

Newton’s first law of motion states that a body that is moving maintains the same velocity unless it is acted upon by an external force. That resistance to changing velocity is known as inertia. Johann Kepler introduced the Latin word “inertia” to describe the physical phenomenon in the 17th century. The Latin term translates as “apathy, inactiveness”. We started using the Latin “inertia” in English to mean the same thing only in the 19th century, after the term had bopped around in science texts for a couple of centuries.

71 Poem about pastoral life : IDYL

An idyll (also “idyl”) is a short poem with a pastoral theme, usually depicting the scene in romantic and idealized terms. The word “idyl” comes from the Greek “eidyllion”, which literally translates to “little picture” but was a word describing a short poem with a rustic theme.

72 Major employer in Maryland whose employee count is classified, for short : NSA

The National Security Agency (NSA) was set up in 1952 by President Truman, a replacement for the Armed Forces Security Agency that had existed in the Department of Defense (DoD) since 1949. The NSA has always been clouded in secrecy and even the 1952 letter from President Truman that established the agency was kept under wraps from the public for over a generation. I really like the organization’s nickname … “No Such Agency”.

73 Pop art? : DADAISM

Dadaism thrived during and just after WWI, and was an anti-war, anti-bourgeois and anti-art culture. The movement was launched in Zurich, Switzerland by a group of artists and writers who met to discuss art and put on performances in the Cabaret Voltaire. The same group frequently expressed disgust at the war that was raging across Europe.

Down

1 Crudité go-with : DIP

Crudités are a French appetizer made up of sliced and whole raw vegetables that are dipped into a sauce. The French word “crudité” simply means “raw vegetable”, and derives from the Latin word “crudus” meaning “raw”.

4 Island on which the Dutch introduced coffee in the 1600s : JAVA

Java is a large island in Indonesia that is home to the country’s capital, Jakarta. With a population of over 130 million, Java is the most populous island in the world, with even more people than Honshu, the main island of Japan.

6 Casey of radio countdowns : KASEM

Not only was Casey Kasem closely associated with the radio show “American Top 40”, but he was also well known for playing the voice of Shaggy Rogers on the “Scooby-Doo” animated series.

7 “Sleepless in Seattle” director : EPHRON

Nora Ephron had many talents, including writing film scripts and novels. Many of the movies that she wrote, she also directed. These would include some of my favorite movies of all time like “Sleepless in Seattle”, “You’ve Got Mail” and most recently, the wonderful “Julie & Julia”. And, did you know that Nora Ephron’s second marriage was to journalist Carl Bernstein of Watergate fame? She wrote an autobiographical novel based on her life with Bernstein, which deals in particular with Bernstein’s affair with the daughter of British Prime Minister James Callaghan.

“Sleepless in Seattle” is a lovely romantic comedy directed and co-written by Nora Ephron, released in 1993. The film’s storyline is based on the excellent 1957 movie “An Affair to Remember”, and there are numerous direct references to the Cary Grant/Deborah Kerr classic throughout the “remake”. The lead roles in “Sleepless …” are played by Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

10 Distance running powerhouse : KENYA

Kenya lies on the east coast of Africa, right on the equator. The country takes its name from Mount Kenya, the second-highest peak on the continent (after Kilimanjaro). The official languages of Kenya are English and Swahili.

12 Symbol on the Nikkei 225 : YEN SIGN

The Japanese yen (JPY) is the third-most traded currency in the world, after the US dollar and the euro.

The Nikkei is a stock market index for the Tokyo Stock Exchange that has been published by the “Nihon Keizai Shimbun” newspaper since 1950. The “Nihon Keizai Shimbun” has the largest circulation of any financial newspaper in the world, and is read by over 3 million people daily.

22 Jazz grp. : NBA

The Utah Jazz professional basketball team moved to Salt Lake City in 1979. As one might guess from the name, the team originated in New Orleans, but only played there for five seasons. New Orleans was a tough place to be based because venues were hard to come by, and Mardi Gras forced the team to play on the road for a whole month.

37 Tandoor-baked bread : NAAN

A tandoor is a cylindrical clay or metal oven used in cuisines from several Asian locales, including India.

41 Big name in nail polish : OPI

Opi (originally “Odontorium Products Inc.”) is a manufacturer of nail polish based in North Hollywood, California. One of Opi’s marketing coups was the introduction of a line of Legally Blonde 2 polishes, which featured in the film.

48 Wild trip? : SAFARI

“Safari” is a Swahili word meaning “journey” or “expedition”.

50 Snoopy group, for short : CIA

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is the successor to the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) formed during WWII. The CIA was chartered by the National Security Act of 1947. The organization is often referred to familiarly as “the Company”.

55 Newspaper editor Bradlee : BEN

Ben Bradlee served as executive editor for “The Washington Post” from 1968 until 1991. Famously, Bradlee was at the helm of the paper when the Pentagon Papers were published, and when reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein investigated the Watergate scandal. His son, Ben Bradlee Jr., was the editor in charge of the Spotlight team at the “Boston Globe” when they broke the story of the Catholic Church covering up sexual abuse of children by priests. Ben senior was played by actor Jason Robards in the film “All the President’s Men”, and by Tom Hanks in “The Post”. Ben Jr. was played by John Slattery in the movie “Spotlight”.

56 Elizabeth with millions of made-up customers : ARDEN

“Elizabeth Arden” was the business name used by Canadian-American Florence Nightingale Graham. Arden built a cosmetics empire that made her one of the wealthiest women in the world. Arden had a famous rivalry with fellow cosmetics entrepreneur Helena Rubinstein, and that rivalry even spawned a 2016 stage musical called “War Paint”.

58 Divorcée in 1990s New York tabloids : IVANA

Ivana Zelníčková was born in Czechoslovakia. She married an Austrian named Alfred Winklmayr, in an arrangement that allowed her to leave Communist Czechoslovakia. The marriage was dissolved within two years, and Zelníčková settled in Canada. She was an excellent skier, and was named as an alternate for the 1982 Czech Olympic Team. She was promoting the Montreal Olympics in New York in 1976 when she met Donald Trump. Ivana and Donald’s marriage was very public and well-covered by the media, but not nearly as well-covered as their very litigious divorce in the early nineties.

61 Place for swimming lessons, in brief : YMCA

The YMCA (the Y) is a worldwide movement that has its roots in London, England. There, in 1844, the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) was founded with the intent of promoting Christian principles through the development of “a healthy spirit, mind and body”. The founder, George Williams, saw the need to create YMCA facilities for young men who were flocking to the cities as the Industrial Revolution flourished. He saw that these men were frequenting taverns and brothels, and wanted to offer a more wholesome alternative.

63 Supermodel Delevingne : CARA

Cara Delevingne is a model and actress from England. One might say that Delevingne was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. She is descended from two Lord Mayors of London, her maternal grandmother was lady-in-waiting to Princess Margaret, and her godmother is actress Joan Collins.

66 Prefix with gender : CIS-

The term “cisgender” is used as the opposite of “transgender”. Cisgender people have a gender identity that matches the sex they were assigned at birth. A transgender person is someone with a gender identity that is different from that assigned at birth.