Day: September 21, 2024

Bill’s time: 12m 08s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Namesake of the channel separating Madagascar from the African mainland : MOZAMBIQUE

Mozambique is a nation in the southwest of Africa on the Indian Ocean. It was a Portuguese colony for centuries, gaining independence in 1975. The country was named for the Island of Mozambique, which lies a few miles off the coast.

18 Small songbirds : TITS

The birds known as chickadees or titmice in North America, are usually called simply “tits” in the rest of the English-speaking world.

19 The W.N.B.A.’s Wings, on scoreboards : DAL

The Shock were the professional WNBA team based in Tulsa from 2010 to 2015. The team was founded as the Detroit Shock in 1998, and became the Dallas Wings after leaving Tulsa in 2016.

20 Releaser of electrons : ANODE

A battery is a device that converts chemical energy into electric energy. A simple battery is made up of three parts: a cathode, an anode and a liquid electrolyte. Ions from the electrolyte react chemically with the material in the anode producing a compound and releasing electrons. At the same time, the electrolyte reacts with the material in the cathode, absorbing electrons and producing a different chemical compound. In this way, there is a buildup of electrons at the anode and a deficit of electrons at the cathode. When a connection (wire, say) is made between the cathode and anode, electrons flow through the resulting circuit from the anode to cathode in an attempt to rectify the electron imbalance.

25 They might bite the dust : MITES

Mites are tiny arthropods in the arachnid (spider) class. They are (annoyingly!) very successful creatures that have adapted to all sorts of habitats. And being so small, mites generally pass unnoticed. Ick …

27 Florida city where the “The Greatest Show on Earth” was once headquartered : SARASOTA

Sarasota is a city on Florida’s Gulf Coast. The area was noted on maps in the mid-1700s as “Zara Zote”, which was perhaps a local name. The name became “Sara Sota” when European settlers arrived in the late 1840s, and eventually “Sarasota” in 1902.

30 “Apocalypse Now” setting, informally : ‘NAM

The epic war drama “Apocalypse Now” was released in 1979 and starred Martin Sheen as Captain Willard and Marlon Brando as Colonel Kurtz. The premise of the film is that both Willard and Kurtz are special ops officers, with Willard sent into the jungle to assassinate Kurtz who has “gone rogue”. The film is notorious for the trouble that director Francis Ford Coppola had completing the shoot. Brando turned up on set grossly overweight (as a special ops guy!), and poor Martin Sheen had a heart attack during filming.

32 Business with the stock symbol WOOF : PETCO

Petco is a chain of retail stores that sells live animals and pet supplies. The Petco logo includes the two company mascots, Red Ruff the dog and Blue Mews the cat.

33 Jamaican folk song about overnight labor : DAY-O

“Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)” is a traditional folk song from Jamaica. It is sung from the standpoint of dock workers unloading boats on the night shift, so daylight has come, and they want to go home. The most famous version of “Day-O” was recorded by Harry Belafonte, in 1956.

34 Sault ___ Marie International Bridge (Michigan-Ontario connector) : STE

“Sault Ste. Marie” is the name of two cities on either side of the Canada-US border, one in Ontario and the other in Michigan. The two cities were originally one settlement in the 17th century, established by Jesuit Missionaries. The missionaries gave the settlement the name “Sault Sainte Marie”, which can be translated as “Saint Mary’s Falls”. The city was one community until 1817, when a US-UK Joint Boundary Commission set the border along the St. Mary’s River.

35 A whole bunch of people in a row : MELEE

Our term “melee” comes from the French “mêlée”, and in both languages the word means “confused fight”.

39 Sci-fi awards : HUGOS

The Hugo Awards are presented annually for excellence in science fiction and fantasy writing. The awards are named for Hugo Gernsback, founder of the sci-fi magazine “Amazing Stories”.

40 Put on an unconvincing accent or laugh way too hard, perhaps : HAM IT UP

The word “ham”, describing a performer who overacts, is a shortened form of “hamfatter” and dates back to the late 1800s. “Hamfatter” comes from a song in old minstrel shows called “The Ham-Fat Man”. It seems that a poorly performing actor was deemed to have the “acting” qualities of a minstrel made up in blackface.

43 Country with “kreyòl” as an official language : HAITI

The Republic of Haiti occupies the smaller, western portion of the island of Hispaniola in the Caribbean. The rest of the island is taken up by the Dominican Republic. Haiti is one of only two nations in the Americas to have French as an official language, the other being Canada.

45 What Los Angeles and New York are represented in twice: Abbr. : NFL

The Los Angeles Rams are the only franchise to have won NFL championships in three different cities, i.e. Cleveland (1945), Los Angeles (1951 & 2021) and St. Louis (1999). The Rams were based in Cleveland from 1936 to 1945, in Los Angeles from 1946 to 1994, in St. Louis from 1995 to 2015, and returned to Los Angeles in 2016.

The Chargers were an AFL charter team, and so the franchise was founded in 1959. The Chargers played one season in Los Angeles, before moving to San Diego in 1961, and then returning to Los Angeles in 2017.

The New York Giants (NYG) football team plays home games in MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, a stadium shared with the New York Jets (NYJ). The Giants are the only team remaining from a group of five that joined the league in 1925. For many years, the Giants shared team names with the New York Giants MLB team, before the baseball franchise moved to San Francisco after the 1957 season.

Just like the New York Giants, the New York Jets are based in New Jersey, headquartered in Florham Park. The Jets and the Giants have a unique arrangement in the NFL in that the two teams share Metlife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The Jets were an AFL charter team, formed in 1959 as the Titans of New York. The Titans changed their name to the Jets in 1963.

49 Custardy French dessert : POT DE CREME

Our word “custard” evolved from the Middle French “croustade” meaning “meat or fruit pie with a crust”. Over time, the letter R fell away from “croustade” leading to “custard”, possibly due to the influence of the other food item “mustard”.

51 Actor Malek : RAMI

Actor Rami Malek’s big break came with the leading role in the television series “Mr. Robot”. In 2018, Malik gave an Oscar-winning performance playing Freddie Mercury in the hit biopic “Bohemian Rhapsody”. That marked the first time that an actor of Egyptian descent won an Academy Award for Best Actor.

53 Osiris or Isis, e.g. : TWIN

Osiris was the Egyptian god of the underworld. He was the son of Geb the Earth god, and Nut the sky goddess. His wife Isis was also his sister. Osiris was killed and mutilated by Set, his own brother. Isis reassembled Osiris and revived him, just long enough that they could conceive their son Horus.

Isis was the ancient Egyptian goddess of fertility, as well as the protector of the dead and the goddess of children. She was the personification of the pharaoh’s power. The name “Isis” translates as “throne”, and she is usually depicted with a headdress shaped like a throne.

Down

4 First name in Objectivism : AYN

The philosophy of objectivism comes in several forms, all holding that reality is objective and independent of the mind. The emphasis is on reality based on the observation of objects and events rather than feelings or thoughts that grow out of literature or art.

5 Miles ___, Spider-Man’s alter ego in the “Spider-Verse” movies : MORALES

“Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” is an animated superhero film released in 2018 that won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. The animation style of the movie is called “comic book come to life.” The filmmakers wanted to create a movie that felt like a living, breathing comic book, and they achieved that by incorporating comic book elements like thought bubbles and sound effects into the animation.

6 Half a South American capital name : BUENOS

Buenos Aires is the capital of Argentina, and is located on the estuary of the Ria de la Plata. As it is a port city, the people of Buenos Aires are known as porteños (“people of the port”). The name “Buenos Aires” can be translated from Spanish as “fair winds”.

8 Difficult figure-skating jump : QUAD

The first male skater to land a quadruple jump in competition was Canadian Kurt Browning, in 1988 at the World Championships in Budapest. The first female to achieve the same feat was Japanese skater Miki Ando, in 2002 at the Junior Grand Prix Final in the Hague.

11 Instruments with movable frets : SITARS

The sitar has been around since the Middle Ages. It is a stringed instrument that is played by plucking, and is used most often in Hindustani classical music. In the West we have been exposed to the instrument largely through the performances of Ravi Shankar and some music by George Harrison of the Beatles, a onetime student of Shankar.

12 Lover : AFICIONADO

An aficionado is an enthusiast. Imported from Spanish, “aficionado” was originally used in English to describe a devotee of bullfighting.

14 U.S. city with the motto “Where Discoveries are Made” : LOS ALAMOS

The town of Los Alamos, New Mexico takes its name from the Spanish for “the poplars” or “the cottonwoods”. Famously, it is home to Los Alamos National Laboratory which was founded during WWII to work on the Manhattan Project, the development of the first atomic bomb. The town of Los Alamos didn’t exist as such, until it was planned and constructed to support the employees working on development of the bomb.

22 Health class topic, for short : STDS

Sexually transmitted disease (STD)

25 Something invoked in an emergency : MARTIAL LAW

Martial law is military rule imposed usually as a temporary measure when civilian rules appear to be failing. The imposition of martial law often involves curfews, suspension of civil rights and the use of military justice.

26 Major League Soccer team with pink home jerseys : INTER MIAMI

The professional soccer club Inter Miami CF joined the MLS league as an expansion franchise in 2020, having been established in 2018. The club’s president and co-owner is former soccer star David Beckham. One of Inter Miami’s big signings is Lionel Messi, who joined in 2023.

29 Classic party game : TELEPHONE

The party game known as telephone here in the US is also known as Chinese whispers in other nations. The idea of the game is for a message to be whispered from player to player along a line. By the time the message has passed along the whole line, it usually changes due to mishearing. Comparison of the original and final versions of the message can be quite hilarious.

32 Country name that’s also the Portuguese word for “turkey” : PERU

Peru’s name comes from the word “Biru”. Back in the early 1500s, Biru was a ruler living near the Bay of San Miguel in Panama. The territory over which Biru ruled was the furthest land south in the Americas known to Europeans at that time. The Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro was the first European to move south of Biru’s empire and the land that he found was designated “Peru”, a derivative of “Biru”.

35 Start a family, or finish a game : MATE

In the game of chess, when the king is under immediate threat of capture it is said to be “in check”. If the king cannot escape from check, then the game ends in “checkmate” and the player in check loses. In the original Sanskrit game of chess, the king could actually be captured. Then a rule was introduced requiring that a warning be given if capture was imminent (today we announce “check!”) so that an accidental and early ending to the game doesn’t occur.

45 Spoiler alert: He’s found in Sydney Harbour : NEMO

“Finding Nemo” is a 2003 animated blockbuster from Pixar. The film was the winner of the Oscar that year for Best Animated Feature. Believe it or not, “Finding Nemo” is the best-selling DVD of all time and, until 2010’s “Toy Story 3”, it was the highest-grossing, G-rated movie at the box office.

46 Key of Beethoven’s Sixth: Abbr. : F MAJ

Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 is also known as the Pastoral Symphony.

47 Golfer Thompson who qualified for the U.S. Women’s Open at age 12 : LEXI

Lexi Thompson has been a professional golfer since the age of 15, and won her first LPGA tournament at just 16 years of age, which is a record. Thompson had also qualified for the US Women’s Open when she was the ripe old age of 12 years, making her the youngest golfer to play in that tournament.