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Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

10 Unwanted emails, e.g. : SPAM

The term “spam”, used for unwanted email, is taken from a “Monty Python” sketch. In the sketch (which I’ve seen) the dialog is taken over by the word Spam, a play on the glut of canned meat in the markets of Britain after WWII. So “spam” is used for the glut of emails that takes over online communication. I can just imagine nerdy Internet types (like me) adopting something from a “Monty Python” sketch to describe an online phenomenon …

14 Source of the fables “The Fox and the Lion” and “The Lion and the Mouse” : AESOP

Aesop is remembered today as a fabulist, a writer of fables. Aesop lived in ancient Greece, probably around the sixth century BC. Supposedly he was born a slave, somehow became a free man, but then met with a sorry end. Aesop was sent to the city of Delphi on a diplomatic mission but instead insulted the Delphians. He was tried on a trumped-up charge of stealing from a temple, sentenced to death and was thrown off a cliff.

16 Language of Pakistan : URDU

Urdu is one of the two official languages of Pakistan (the other being English), and is one of the 22 scheduled languages in India. Urdu partly developed from Persian and is written from right to left.

18 Noise that accompanies a shock wave : SONIC BOOM

As a plane flies through the air, it creates pressure waves in front (and behind) rather like the bow and stern waves of a boat. These pressure waves travel at the speed of sound, so as an aircraft itself accelerates towards the speed of sound it catches up with the pressure waves until they cannot “get out of the way”. When the aircraft reaches the speed of sound, the compressed waves merge into one single shock wave, creating a sonic boom.

21 Two-stripe mil. rank : CPL

Corporal (cpl.)

22 Does a step in origami : FOLDS

Origami is the traditional Japanese art form of paper folding. The best-known example of the craft is the paper crane (“orizuru“). The word “origami” is derived from “ori“ (folding) and “kami” (paper).

25 Brightly colored rock : AGATE

Agate is a micro-crystalline form of quartz (and so is related to sand/silica). Some agate samples have deposited layers that give a striped appearance, and these are called “banded agate”.

29 Sauce made with basil and pine nuts : PESTO

Pesto sauce is more completely called “pesto alla genovese”, i.e. pesto from Genoa. A traditional recipe calls for crushed garlic, pine nuts, salt, basil leaves, parmesan cheese and olive oil. Yum …

35 Sleek fabric : SATEEN

Sateen is a cotton fabric. It has a weave that is “four over, one under”, meaning that most of the threads come to the surface to give it a softer feel.

37 Neighborhood in London or New York City : SOHO

The area of London called Soho had a very poor reputation for most of the 20th century as it was home to the city’s red-light district. Soho went through a transformation in recent decades, and has been a very fashionable neighborhood since the 1980s.

The Manhattan neighborhood known today as SoHo was very fashionable in the early 1900s, but as the well-heeled started to move uptown the area became very run down and poorly maintained. Noted for the number of fires that erupted in derelict buildings, SoHo earned the nickname “Hell’s Hundred Acres”. The area was then zoned for manufacturing and became home to many sweatshops. In the mid-1900s artists started to move into open loft spaces and renovating old buildings as the lofts were ideal locations in which an artist could both live and work. In 1968, artists and others organized themselves so that they could legalize their residential use of an area zoned for manufacturing. The group they formed took its name from the name given to the area by the city’s Planning Commission i.e “South of Houston”. This was shortened from So-uth of Ho-uston to SoHo as in “SoHo Artists Association”, and the name stuck.

44 Wipe away : EFFACE

To efface is to erase or obliterate, with the term “efface” coming from the Middle French “effacer” meaning “to wipe out”, or more literally “to remove the face”.

46 Hole-punching tool : AWL

An awl is a pointed tool used for marking a surface or for piercing small holes. The earliest awls were used to pierce ears, apparently. The tool then became very much associated with shoemakers.

49 Some salty Greek cheeses : FETAS

Feta is a Greek cheese made from sheep’s milk, or a mixture of sheep and goat’s milk. The cheese is salted and cured in a brine solution for several months before it is eaten.

50 Many I.C.U. workers: Abbr. : RNS

A registered nurse (RN) might work in an intensive care unit (ICU).

51 “___ Game,” most-watched Netflix series of all time : SQUID

“Squid Game” is a brutal survival drama TV series made in South Korea for Netflix. The title refers to a Korean children’s game, and the show itself features a series of children’s games. The players are adults, all of whom are in debt. They play a deadly series of games in the hope of surviving, and winning a multimillion-dollar prize. As I said, brutal …

53 Bisque or borscht : SOUP

A traditional bisque is a creamy soup made from crustaceans such as lobster, crab or shrimp. The term “bisque” probably comes from the Bay of “Biscay” off the west coast of France, a nod to the French origin of the soup and its seafood content. So, if you see a vegetable “bisque” in a restaurant, you’ll know that the term is being misused …

Borscht is a beetroot soup that originated in Ukraine. Borscht can be served both hot and cold.

62 Glass containers often used for preserves : MASON JARS

Mason jars were invented in 1858 in Philadelphia by a tinsmith, a tinsmith named John Landis Mason.

64 North Pole bigwig : SANTA

If you want to send a note to Santa from Canada, he has his own special postal code: “North Pole, HOH OHO”. The US Postal Service suggests that we send mail for Santa to zip code 99705, which directs it to the city of North Pole, Alaska.

69 Soybean paste in Japanese cuisine : MISO

Miso is the name of the seasoning that makes miso soup. Basic miso seasoning is made by fermenting rice, barley and soybeans with salt and a fungus to produce a paste. The paste can be added to stock to make miso soup, or perhaps to flavor tofu.

70 This accent mark: ∼ : TILDE

The tilde diacritical mark (~) is very much associated with the Spanish language. We use the name “tilde” in English, taking that name from Spanish. Confusingly, the word “tilde” in Spanish is used more generally to mean “accent mark, diacritic”, of which a “~” is just one. What we call a “tilde” in English is usually referred to as a “virgulilla” or “tilde de la eñe” in Spanish.

Down

1 Rude dudes : CADS

Our word “cad”, meaning “person lacking in finer feelings”, is a shortening of the word “cadet”. “Cad” was first used for a servant, and then students at British universities used “cad” as a term for a boy from the local town. “Cad” took on its current meaning in the 1830s.

2 Kind of year with an extra day in February : LEAP

Leap day is February 29th in a leap year, which is usually a year that is divisible by 4. My baby brother was born on February 29th, in 1968. A woman in Utah gave birth on February 29th in 2004, on February 29th in 2008, and once more on February 29th, 2012. That’s in the Guinness Book of World Records …

6 Yellow jacket, e.g. : WASP

“Yellowjacket” is a name commonly used in North America for what are often referred to simply as “wasps” in other English-speaking parts of the world. Both terms describe several different species.

9 Israeli port city : HAIFA

Haifa is the third-largest city in Israel and the largest city in the north of the country. It is built on the slopes of Mount Carmel, and is a Mediterranean seaport.

12 Kerfuffles : ADOS

“Kerfuffle” comes from the Scottish “curfuffle”, with both words meaning “disruption”.

13 The word, in a saying : MUM

The phrase “mum’s the word” has been around since the early 1700s. “Mum” has been used to mean “silent” for centuries, the idea being that “mum” is the sound made when the lips are tightly sealed.

21 Split, as with an axe : CLEAVE

I’ve always found “to cleave” an interesting verb. When used with an object, to cleave something is to split it, as when using a cleaver. When used without an object, to cleave is to cling, to adhere, as in “to cleave to one’s principles in the face of adversity”. Although not exactly so, the two definitions seem to have opposite meanings to me …

24 ___ facto : IPSO

“Ipso facto” is Latin, a phrase meaning “by the fact itself”. It describes something that is a direct consequence of a particular act, as opposed to something that is the result of some subsequent event. For example, my father was born in Dublin and was an Irish citizen, ipso facto. My son was born in California and is an Irish citizen by virtue of being the son of an Irish citizen (i.e. “not” ipso facto).

30 Tennis great Graf : STEFFI

Steffi Graf is a former World No. 1 professional tennis player from Germany. Graf won 22 Grand Slam singles titles, which was more than any other man or woman until Serena Williams came along. Graf is married to another former World No. 1, namely Andre Agassi.

32 Component of a green house? : SOLAR PANEL

Solar panels are arrays of solar cells that make use of what’s known as the photovoltaic effect. We are more likely to have learned about the photoelectric effect in school, in which electrons were ejected from the surface of some materials when it was exposed to light or other forms of radiation. The photovoltaic effect is related but different. Instead of being electrons ejected from the surface, in the photovoltaic effect electrons move around in the material creating a difference in voltage.

38 Birds that hunt at night : OWLS

Much of an owl’s diet consists of small mammals. As a result, humans have used owls for centuries to control rodent populations, usually by placing a nest box for owls on a property. Despite the fact that owls and humans live together in relative harmony, owls have been known to attack humans from time to time. Celebrated English bird photographer Eric Hosking lost an eye when attacked by a tawny owl that he was trying to photograph. Hosking wrote a 1970 autobiography with the wry title “An Eye for a Bird”.

45 Signature hats for Indiana Jones : FEDORAS

A fedora is a lovely hat, I think. It is made of felt, and is similar to a trilby, but has a broader brim. “Fedora” was a play written for Sarah Bernhardt and first performed in 1889. Bernhardt had the title role of Princess Fedora, and on stage she wore a hat similar to a modern-day fedora. The play led to the women’s fashion accessory, the fedora hat, commonly worn by women into the beginning of the twentieth century. Men then started wearing fedoras, but only when women gave up the fashion …

The title character in the “Indiana Jones” series of movies was born Henry Jones, Junior in Princeton, New Jersey. He adopted the nickname “Indiana” because that was the name of his dog when he was growing up. George Lucas, who created the character, used to have an Alaskan malamute dog named Indiana.

54 Savory taste : UMAMI

Umami is one of the five basic tastes, along with sweet, sour, bitter and salty. “Umami” is a Japanese word used to describe “a pleasant savory taste”. Umami was proposed as a basic taste in 1908, but it wasn’t until the mid-1990s that the scientific community finally accepted it as such.

55 Island east of Java : BALI

Bali is an Indonesian island located in the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, lying between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. It is known as the “Island of the Gods” due to its rich and unique culture, which is steeped in religious and spiritual beliefs.

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.

56 Taiwanese tech company : ASUS

Asus is a Taiwanese manufacturer of computing and networking hardware. The company name was chosen as the last four letters of “Pegasus”, the winged horse of Greek mythology.

58 ___ buco (veal dish) : OSSO

Osso buco is a traditional Italian dish that is typically made with veal shanks that are braised with vegetables and herbs. The name “osso buco” means “bone with a hole” in Italian, which refers to the marrow-filled bone in the center of the veal shank. The marrow is considered a delicacy and is often scooped out and served with the dish.

61 A horse’s might be braided for a dressage show : MANE

The equestrian sport of dressage involves demonstration of how well a horse responds to training. “Dressage” is a French word meaning “training”.

63 Boxer Muhammad : ALI

Boxer Muhammad Ali was born Cassius Mercellus Clay Jr. in Louisville, Kentucky in 1942. Clay joined the Nation of Islam in the early sixties, at which point he changed his name to Muhammad Ali. The name he chose translates into “one who is worthy of praise” (Muhammad) and “most high” (Ali).