Day: February 6, 2025

Bill’s time: 9m 35s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Damsel in distress in Donkey Kong: PAULINE

The first video game featuring the ape named Donkey Kong was created in 1981. That same game introduced the world to the character known as Mario, four years before the game Super Mario Bros became such a big hit.

15 Sources of fine wool: ALPACAS

Alpacas are like small llamas, but unlike llamas were never beasts of burden. They were bred specifically for the fleece. As such, there are no known wild alpacas these days, even in their native Peru.

16 Ijeoma ___, author of 2018’s “So You Want to Talk About Race”: OLUO

“So You Want to Talk About Race” is a 2018 book by Ijeoma Oluo in which she explores race in the US today. She also offers advice on how to talk about the issues surrounding race. Soon after publication, “So You Want to Talk About Race” made it onto the New York Times Best Seller List, but just for one week. After the murder of George Floyd in 20200, the book re-entered the list, and stayed there for a lot more than a week.

17 Air quality org.: EPA

The air quality index (AQI) is monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

18 Identity?: RUSSET POTATO (Idaho entity)

The full name of the potato that we commonly refer to as a “russet” is a “russet Burbank”. The russet is probably a mutation of the Burbank potato. One Luther Burbank developed the Burbank potato as a disease-resistant Irish potato, and gave the strain its name. The russet Burbank is a relatively large potato. As such, it is the favored potato for restaurant chains like McDonald’s as it can produce long French fries.

22 Catherine ___, surviving wife of King Henry VIII: PARR

Henry VIII was the English King with the most wives. Well, something rubbed off on his last wife Catherine Parr. She was to become the English Queen with the most husbands! By the time she married Henry, she had been widowed twice. After Henry died, Parr married once again, racking up four husbands in all.

23 Platform that might update while you sleep: IOS

iOS is what Apple now calls its mobile operating system. Previously, it was known as iPhone OS.

28 Eschew carbs, maybe: DIET

“To eschew”, meaning “to avoid, shun”, comes from the Old French word “eschiver” that means the same thing.

30 NASA probe named for a Roman goddess: JUNO

Juno is a space probe launched by NASA in 2011 that has been orbiting the planet Jupiter since 2016. It was the first spacecraft sent to an outer planet that is powered by solar panels. Previous missions, including the Galileo space probe that orbited Jupiter, were nuclear-powered.

35 Arrange?: OZARKS (Arkansas range)

The Ozark Mountains aren’t really mountains geographically speaking, and so are better described by the alternate name, the Ozark Plateau. It’s not really certain how the Ozarks got their name, but my favorite theory is that “Ozarks” is the phonetic spelling of “aux Arks”, short for “of Arkansas” in French.

37 Canine?: PADRES (California nine)

The San Diego Padres baseball team was founded in 1969, and immediately joined the ranks of Major League Baseball as an expansion team. The Padres took their name from a Minor League team that had been in the city since 1936. The name is Spanish for “fathers” and is a reference to the Franciscan Friars from Spain who founded San Diego in 1769.

44 Darth Sidious, e.g., in the “Star Wars” universe: SITH

Palpatine is the Dark Lord of the Sith in the “Star Wars” universe. He is also known as “Darth Sidious” and “the Emperor”. In most of the films in the series, Palpatine is played by Scottish actor Ian McDiarmid. In “The Empire Strikes Back”, he was actually played by a woman. Palpatine was portrayed physically by the wife of special makeup effects artist Rick Baker, and voiced by New Zealand actor Clive Revill.

49 Hiking?: KAMEHAMEHA (Hawaii king)

King Kamehameha I Day is celebrated annually on June 11, and is a public holiday in Hawaii. The holiday was established in 1871 by Kamehameha V to honor his grandfather Kamehameha I (aka “Kamehameha the Great”), the founder of the Kingdom of Hawaii.

51 Abraham Van Helsing and John Seward in “Dracula”: Abbr.: DRS

In Bram Stoker’s novel “Dracula”, Professor Abraham Van Helsing is the man who goes up against the title character. Van Helsing also appears in many derivative works as the archetypal vampire hunter.

52 Zelda console, in brief: NES

“The Legend of Zelda” is a whole series of video games. First released in 1986, I hear that it is very successful …

53 ___ Lum a.k.a. Awkwafina: NORA

“Awkwafina Is Nora from Queens” is a sitcom that first aired in 2020. It stars actress, rapper and comedian Awkwafina as a woman named Nora Lin who is spreading her wings in Queens, New York. “Awkwafina” is the stage name of Nora Lum.

54 Sources of soft wool: LLAMAS

The wool from a llama is much softer than that from a sheep, and it is also free from lanolin.

58 Fledge?: GULF OF MEXICO (Florida edge)

The Gulf States are the US states bordering on the Gulf of Mexico, i.e. Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas.

60 Tire inflation abbr.: PSI

Pounds per square inch (PSI) is a measure of pressure.

61 Leave a review of, as an Airbnb: RATE

Airbnb is a website-based service that matches people wanting to rent out short-term living quarters to people seeking accommodation. The company was founded in 2008 as AirBed & Breakfast. The original concept was renting out an “air bed” and providing “breakfast” to someone looking for cheap, temporary accommodation. That’s right; the “Air” in “Airbnb” has nothing to do with “air” travel …

62 Banquet hiree: CATERER

A banquet is an elaborate feast. “Banquet” is a term that seems to have reversed in meaning over time. Coming into English via French from Old Italian, “banquet” is derived from “banco” meaning “bench”. The original “banco” meal was simply a snack eaten on a bench, rather than at a table. I guess we eat more these days …

63 Fuji, e.g.: Abbr.: MTN

Mount Fuji is Japan’s highest and most famous mountain. Located just west of Tokyo, Mount Fuji is an active volcano, although its last eruption took place in 1707/1708.

Down

1 Deconstructed, in a way: PARSED

The verb “to parse” means “to state the parts of speech in a sentence”. “Parse” comes from the Latin word “pars” meaning “part”.

6 Capital ball club, familiarly: NATS

The Washington Nationals (“Nats”) started out life as the Montreal Expos in 1969, and were the first Major League Baseball team in Canada. The Expos moved to Washington in 2005 becoming the Nats.

7 Medium strength?: ESP

Extrasensory perception (ESP)

14 Become fuller, in a way: WAX

The verb “to wax”, in phrases like “wax lyrical” and “wax poetic”, means “to grow”. “To wax” is the opposite of “to wane”, which means “to decrease”. We are probably most familiar with the “waxing and waning” of the moon.

19 Serve hot takes: OPINE

The term “hot take” is from the world of journalism, and was coined relatively recently. It describes the shabby technique of making a provocative comment about a news event, usually with the intent of encouraging angry responses from readers or listeners.

26 Wonks… or a candy once owned by the Willy Wonka Candy Company: NERDS

The Willy Wonka Candy Company brand is owned by Nestle, and operates using licensed materials from the Roald Dahl book “Charlie & the Chocolate Factory”. “Nerds” is a name on a whole line of candy produced within the brand’s portfolio.

27 “Street Dreams” rapper: NAS

Rapper Nas used to go by an earlier stage name “Nasty Nas”, and before that by his real name “Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones”. Nas released his first album “Illmatic” in 1994, and inventively titled his fifth studio album “Stillmatic”, released in 2001.

29 Obsequious sorts: TOADIES

A toady is someone who is very servile, and somewhat of a parasite. Derived from “toad-eater” the term originally applied to the assistant of a quack, a seller of useless potions that had no actual benefit to health. The toady would eat an apparently poisonous toad in front of an audience, so that the charlatan could “cure” him or her with one of the potions for sale.

30 #35: JFK

President John F. Kennedy was often referred to by his initials JFK, the F standing for Fitzgerald, his mother’s maiden name. The president’s brother Robert F. Kennedy was also referred to using his initials, RFK, with the F standing for his middle name Francis.

33 Smart-alecky: FRESH

Apparently, the original “smart Alec” (sometimes “Aleck”) was one Alec Hoag, a pimp, thief and confidence trickster who plied his trade in New York City in the 1840s.

37 Org. that sells “Go Vegan and Nobody Gets Hurt” T-shirts: PETA

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is a large animal rights organization, with about 300 employees and two million members and supporters worldwide. Although the group campaigns for animal rights across a broad spectrum of issues, it has a stated focus in opposition of four practices:

• Factory farming
• Fur farming
• Animal testing
• Use of animals in entertainment

54 “OMG, I’m dying over here”: LMAO

Laughing my a** off (LMAO)

55 Mother to Apollo and Artemis: LETO

In Greek mythology, the goddess Leto and her sister Asteria are daughters of the Titans Coeus and Phoebe. Leto’s twin children Apollo and Artemis were fathered by Zeus, the king of the gods.

56 One-footed jump: AXEL

An axel is a forward take-off jump in figure skating. The maneuver was first performed by Norwegian Axel Paulsen at the 1882 World Figure Skating championships.

57 Record player speed, for short: RPM

The first standard for the rotational speed of gramophone records was 78 rpm. Like so many things it seems, the US version of “78” was slightly different from that for the rest of the world. The US record was designed to play at 78.26 rpm, whereas the standard in the rest of the world was 77.92 rpm. So, imported records playing on American equipment didn’t sound quite as they were intended.

58 Test for an M.B.A. seeker: GRE

Passing the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) is usually a requirement for entry into graduate school here in the US.

59 Air quality org.?: FCC

Radio and TV broadcasting is monitored by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FCC has been around since 1934, when it replaced the Federal Radio Commission.