Day: January 9, 2026

Bill’s time: 10m 15s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

10A They get picked up at clubs : TABS

When we run a “tab” at a bar, we are running a “tabulation”, a listing of what we owe. Such a use of “tab” is American slang that originated in the 1880s.

15A Surfing destinations, for short : URLS

Uniform resource locator (URL)

16A Places many Cubans are found : CIGAR BOXES

The production of all cigars and cigarettes in Cuba is managed by a state tobacco company called Cubatabaco. The marketing and distribution of all Cuban tobacco products is handled by Habanos, which is a subsidiary of Cubatabaco. Habanos works with just one company in each country where it markets products. As a result, customers seeking out genuine Cuban cigars know that there is a limited and defined list of suppliers around the world.

18A Noggin : BEAN

Slang terms for “head” include “bean”, “coconut”, “gourd”, “noodle” and “noggin”.

26A Apple core? : CPU

The central processing unit (CPU) is the main component on the motherboard of a computer. The CPU is the part of the computer that carries out most of the functions required by a program. Nowadays you can get CPUs in everything from cars to telephones.

28A Confirmation from a maître d’ : OUI

The full title of a maître d’ is “maître d’hôtel”, which means “master of the hotel”.

34A Stealthy flier : AIR MARSHAL

The US air marshal program was created by President Kennedy in 1963, with the initial force of only six marshals assigned to flights that were considered at high risk for a hijacking. Just before 9/11, the number of marshals had increased to 33. The exact number of marshals employed today is classified information, but it is thought to be thousands.

39A Bummer at a casino game : CRAP

To crap out is to make a losing roll on the first throw in a game of craps. A losing roll (aka “a crap”) is a roll of 2, 3 or 12. The slang usage of “to crap out” describes the failing to carry out an obligation.

44A Old-timey oath : NERTS!

“Nerts” is a slang term, a corruption of “nuts!”

52A “Weed ‘Em and ___,” gardening book whose title is a spoonerism : REAP

Spoonerisms are errors in speech in which letters or sounds are switched from one word to another. Famous examples are “Three cheers for our queer old dean” (dear old Queen … Victoria) and “Is it kisstomary to cuss the bride?” (customary to kiss …). Spoonerisms are named after an Oxford don William Archibald Spooner, who was notorious for his tendency to pepper his speech with “spoonerisms”.

54A Led the charge : CRUSADED

The Crusades were a series of religious wars fought between the 11th and 15th centuries. The term “crusade” came into English via French and Spanish from the Latin “crux” meaning “cross”. The use of the term was retrospective, with the first recorded use in English in 1757. The relevance of “crux” is that most crusaders swore a vow to reach Jerusalem from Europe, and then received a cloth cross that was then sewn into their clothing. The term “crusade” persists to this day, and is now used figuratively to describe any vigorous campaign in pursuit of a moral objective.

60A Monopoly token retired in 2017 : BOOT

The tokens included with a game of Monopoly have changed over the years. Two of the more interesting tokens are the battleship and cannon. These were created by Hasbro for a board game called Conflict. When Conflict failed in the market, the excess tokens were recycled and included with Monopoly.

66A Jazz coda? : ZEES

The end (coda) of the word “jazz” comprises two letters Z (zees).

In music, a coda is primarily a passage that brings a movement to a conclusion. “Coda” is Italian for “tail”.

Down

1D Small bit, in Bogotá : POCO

Bogotá is the capital city of Colombia. Noted for having many libraries and universities, Bogotá is sometimes referred to as “The Athens of South America”.

2D Windows alternative : UNIX

Unix is a computer operating system that was developed at Bell Labs in 1969. The initial name for the project was Uniplexed Information and Computing Service (Unics), and this evolved over time into “Unix”.

5D The Beatles’ “___ Blues” : YER

“Yer Blues” is a John Lennon song, credited to Lennon and McCartney, that is a track on “The White Album”, recorded in 1968. Lennon recorded the song while the band was on retreat in Rishikesh, India, and while he was “trying to reach God and feeling suicidal”.

6D Varieties of this include chocolate and yellow : LAB

The Labrador (Lab) breed of dog has been around at least since 1814. The breed comes in three registered colors: black, yellow and chocolate.

7D “Then again …,” to a texter : OTOH

On the other hand (OTOH)

27D Ballade or étude : PIECE

Our “ballad”, meaning “narrative song”, came into English from the French “ballade”, meaning “dancing song”. The French term derives from the Latin verb “ballare” meaning “to dance”.

An étude is a short instrumental composition that is usually quite hard to play and is intended to help the performer master a particular technique. “Étude” is the French word for “study”. Études are commonly performed on the piano.

31D Raccoon, humorously : TRASH PANDA

The raccoon is native to North America. In captivity, raccoons can live to over 20 years of age, but in the wild they only live two or three years. The main causes for the shorter lifespan are hunting and road traffic.

32D It’s bubbling below the surface : MAGMA

Magma is the molten material below the Earth’s surface. When magma cools, it forms igneous rock. “Magma” is a Greek term that describes a thick ointment.

35D Rom-com plot points : MEET-CUTES

“Meet-cute” is a term used since the 1930s or 1940s for a scene in a film or TV show in which a future couple have an amusing first encounter.

36D Channel offering deals : HSN

The Home Shopping Network (HSN) was the first national shopping network, and was launched locally as the Home Shopping Club in Florida in 1982. Its first product was a can opener.

37D There are more than 2.3 million in N.Y.C.: Abbr. : APTS

The terms “condominium” and “apartment” tend to describe the same type of residential property, namely a private living space with facilities shared with others residing in the same building or complex. The difference is that a condominium is usually owned, and an apartment is rented. At least that’s how it is in the US. The word “condominium” comes from the Latin “com-” (together) and “dominum” (right of ownership).

41D Oscar winner Blanchett : CATE

Cate Blanchett is a great actress from Australia, and a winner of an Academy Award for playing Katharine Hepburn in “The Aviator”. Winning for that role made Blanchett the first person to win an Academy Award for playing an actor (Hepburn) who had also won an Oscar. Now that is trivial information …

45D Shady, in modern parlance : SUS

The slang term “sus” is a shortened form of “suspicious” or “suspect”.

49D Flat hat : TAM

A tam o’shanter is a man’s cap worn traditionally by Scotsmen. “Tams” were originally all blue (and called “blue bonnets”) but as more dyes became readily available they became more colorful. The name of the cap comes from the title character of the Robert Burns poem “Tam o’ Shanter”. A pom-pom adorning a tam is known as a toorie.

50D Elba who portrayed Nelson Mandela : IDRIS

“Long Walk to Freedom” is a 1994 autobiography by the revolutionary and eventual statesman Nelson Mandela. The book was adapted into a very successful film entitled “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom”, with English actor Idris Elba in the title role. The movie was released in South Africa at the end of November 2013, and Nelson Mandela passed away just a few days later.

53D Shenanigan : ANTIC

I suppose one might be forgiven for thinking that “shenanigan” is an Irish term, as it certainly sounds Irish. Usually written in the plural, shenanigans are acts of mischief, pranks. Apparently the word is of uncertain derivation, but was coined in San Francisco or Sacramento, California in the mid-1800s.

54D Java ingredient? : CODE

Java is a programming language that was developed by Sun Microsystems. It was originally designed for interactive television, but it didn’t fit the needs at the time. Back then, the language was called Oak, named after an oak tree that stood outside the designer’s office. Later it was called Green, and finally named Java, which was simply picked out of a list of random words.

58D Wilde thing : POEM

Oscar Wilde was an Irish writer who led a very public life in his adopted home of London. Although he was a prolific writer of many forms of literature, Wilde penned only one novel, “The Picture of Dorian Gray”. He was perhaps more renowned in his own time as a dramatist. Several of his plays are performed regularly today, including “Lady Windermere’s Fan”, “An Ideal Husband” and “The Importance of Being Earnest”. Wilde’s last work was a poem titled “The Ballad of Reading Gaol”, which recounted his time in prison after being convicted of homosexual offenses in 1895 and sentenced to two years’ hard labor. Oscar Wilde died in 1900 at the age of 46 in Paris, destitute.

62D African grazer : GNU

The gnu is also known as the wildebeest, and is an antelope native to Africa. “Wildebeest” is a Dutch word meaning “wild beast”.