1108-25 NY Times Crossword 8 Nov 25, Saturday

Bill’s time: 11m 10s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1A Where Caitlin Clark played college hoops : IOWA

Basketball great Caitlin Clark was the first selection in the 2024 WNBA draft, and signed up with the Indian Fever. Her quality of play and success on the court has helped popularize women’s basketball. That boost in popularity has been dubbed “the Caitlin Clark effect”.

17A Accessory with a grid of numbers : BINGO CARD

Our game bingo is a derivative of an Italian lottery game called “Il Giuoco del Lotto d’Italia” that became popular in the 16th-century.

22A Player — or piece of equipment — at Barclays Center : NET

The Barclays Center is an arena in Brooklyn, New York that is home to the Brooklyn Nets of the NBA, and the New York Liberty of the WNBA. Barclays ended up paying over $200 million for the naming rights, even though the London-based banking group has no retail banks or ATMs in the US.

23A Instrument with a neck, informally : UKE

The ukulele (uke) originated in the 1800s and mimicked a small guitar brought to the Hawaiian Islands by Portuguese immigrants.

24A Supreme Court justice Gorsuch : NEIL

Neil Gorsuch was nominated to the Supreme court by the Trump administration, and assumed office in 2017. Gorsuch took the seat on the court that was left vacant with the passing of Justice Antonin Scalia in 2016. Gorsuch is the first Supreme Court justice to serve alongside another justice for whom he once clerked, doing so for Anthony Kennedy from 1993 to 1994.

26A John Coltrane album whose title suggests making major progress : GIANT STEPS

John Coltrane was a jazz saxophonist who also went by the nickname “Trane”. John’s son Ravi Coltrane is also a noted jazz saxophonist.

30A General with orders? : TSO

“The Search for General Tso” is a 2014 documentary about the history of Chinese food in the US. Much of the film explores the life of Zuo Zontang, the Chinese military leader who gave his name to the very American dish known as General Tso’s chicken.

31A “Magnum, P.I.” setting : OAHU

“Magnum, P.I.” is a TV series that aired in the eighties starring Tom Selleck in the title role. The show was incredibly successful, especially during its first five years. Many big names made guest appearances including Vic Morrow, Orson Welles and Frank Sinatra. The series was rebooted in 2018 as “Magnum P.I.” (no comma!) with Jay Hernandez playing the title character.

35A Dude who might be in a row : FRAT BRO

Our term “dude” arose as slang in New York City in the 1880s, when it was used to describe a fastidious man. In the early 1900s, the term was extended to mean “city slickers”, easterners who vacationed in the West. The first use of the term “dude ranch” was recorded in 1921.

39A .pdf alternative : DOC

Microsoft Word documents have the “.doc” file extension, at least those created prior to the introduction of Microsoft Office 2007. The extension used now is “.docx”.

40A City between Sacramento and Salt Lake City on I-80 : RENO

Interstate 80 is the second-longest highway in the US (after I-90). It runs east-west from San Francisco, California to Teaneck, New Jersey. I-80 largely follows the route of the first road across America, the historic Lincoln Highway.

41A With 16-Across, group that began in the 2010s, familiarly : GEN …
16A See 41-Across : … ALPHA

“Generation Alpha” is a term used to describe those born in the years between the mid-2010s and mid-2020s.

42A Roquefort, e.g. : BLUE CHEESE

Roquefort is a cheese made from sheep milk. It comes from the commune of Roquefort-sur-Soulzon in the South of France.

45A Book of Mormon figure : ENOS

According to the Book of Mormon, Enos was a son of Jacob, and the author of the Book of Enos.

The Book of Mormon is a sacred text that was first published in 1830 by founder of the Latter Day Saint movement Joseph Smith. According to the book’s text, the Book of Mormon is a translation made by Smith of a collection of ancient writings engraved on golden plates and buried in a hill in present-day New York State, near where Smith himself was born.

47A C.I.A. forerunner : OSS

The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) was formed during WWII in order to carry out espionage behind enemy lines. A few years after the end of the war the OSS functions were taken up by a new group, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that was chartered by the National Security Act of 1947.

48A ___ Technica (news site) : ARS

Ars Technica is a technology news website that launched in 1998. The site was purchased by Condé Nast Publications in 2008.

49A Something often hit without you seeing it : PINATA

Piñatas originated in Mexico, probably among the Aztecs or Mayans. Today’s piñatas are usually made from cardboard that is brightly decorated with papier-mâché. Traditionally a piñata was made out of a clay pot, adorned with feathers and ribbons and filled with small treasures. During religious ceremonies the clay pots would be suspended and broken open so that the contents would spill out onto the ground at the feet of a god as an offering.

51A Liverpudlians, e.g. : BRITONS

Liverpool is a large port city in the northwest of England located on the estuary of the River Mersey. With a sense of humor that is typical of the area, people from Liverpool are often called “Liverpudlians”. The term comes from the jocular “Liver-puddle”, a diminutive of “Liver-pool”.

58A ___ au poivre (entree that’s often flambéed) : STEAK

The traditional French dish called a “pepper steak” or “steak au poivre” is usually a filet mignon coated with cracked peppercorns prior to cooking. The filet is mostly pan-fried, and often a pan sauce is made to cover the steak by adding Cognac and heavy cream to the residue left in the bottom of the pan after the steak has cooked. “Poivre” is French for “pepper”.

“Flambé” is the French word for “flamed”, and was originally a term used to describe certain types of porcelain. The word “flambé” crept into cookery just after 1900.

59A Mali Empire ruler who single-handedly made the value of gold almost worthless by giving away so much of it : MANSA MUSA

The Mali Empire reigned supreme in West Africa from about 1230 AD to about 1600 AD. Today’s Mandinka people are descended from the people of the Mali Empire.

60A Largest Bengali-speaking city in the world : DHAKA

Dhaka (once “Dacca”) is the capital city of Bangladesh. Dhaka is known for many things, including production of the finest muslin in the world. It’s also the rickshaw capital of the world, with about 400,000 rickshaws running each day.

61A Financial report abbr. : YTD

Year-to-date (YTD)

62A Exam with a max score of 1520 : PSAT

Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT)

Down

1D Library fig. : ISBN

The International Standard Book Number (ISBN) was invented by one Gordon Foster who was a professor at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland. The code was originally developed for booksellers, so that they had a unique number (and now a barcode) for each publication. ISBNs are ten digits long if assigned before 2007. Since the start of 2007, ISBNs have been thirteen digits long.

2D Red state? : OHIO

When the Cincinnati Reds were a dominating force in the National League in the seventies, the team was given the nickname “the Big Red Machine”.

4D Cephalopods with a name derived from Greek mythology : ARGONAUTS

Cephalopods are a class of molluscs with arms or tentacles, a prominent head and a body with bilateral symmetry. Most cephalopods have the ability to squirt ink as a defensive mechanism. Examples of the class are the octopus, squid and cuttlefish. The name “cephalopod” comes from the Greek for “head-feet”.

6D Shortening for a city that omits “onto” : TOR

Beautiful Toronto, Ontario is the largest city in Canada, and the fourth most populous city in North America (after Mexico City, New York and Los Angeles).

7D John who won a National Book Award for his novel “The Centaur” : UPDIKE

The novelist John Updike’s most famous work is the Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom series of books. Updike is one of only three authors who has won more than one Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and he did so for two of his “Rabbit” books.

9D Elizabeth of “WandaVision” : OLSEN

“WandaVision” is a TV miniseries featuring characters from Marvel Comics. The title characters are Wanda Maximoff (aka Scarlet Witch) played by Elizabeth Olsen and Vision played by Paul Bettany. I am by no means a fan of screen adaptations of comic characters, but I might take a look at “WandaVision”. Wanda and Vision are living in suburbia, trying to conceal their superhero identities. Each episode progresses the storyline through several decades, using situations encountered in sitcoms of the day. Episodes use the format of shows such as:

• The Dick Van Dyke Show
• I Love Lucy
• Bewitched
• I Dream of Jeannie
• The Brady Bunch
• Good Times
• The Mary Tyler Moore Show
• Full House
• Malcolm in the Middle
• Modern Family
• Out of this World
• The Twilight Zone

Sounds very intriguing …

11D Phrase spoken by a dog in a burning room, in a 2010s meme : THIS IS FINE

A meme (from “mineme”) is a cultural practice or idea that is passed on verbally or by repetition from one person to another. The term lends itself very well to the online world where links, emails, files etc. are so easily propagated.

21D Football roster planning documents : DEPTH CHARTS

Our word “roster”, meaning “list, register”, actually comes from the same root as our word “roast”, would you believe? “Roster” came into English from the Dutch “rooster”, meaning “table, list”. An alternative use of the Dutch “rooster” was “gridiron”, from the “roosten” meaning “to roast”. The connection is that a roster of names is often listed on a sheet of paper that has grid lines resembling the marks left by a gridiron on roasted meat. Quite interesting …

25D Game that aptly draws millions each day? : LOTTO

Originally, lotto was a type of card game, with “lotto” being the Italian for “a lot”. We’ve used “lotto” to mean a gambling game since the late 1700s.

28D Sellout letters : SRO

Standing room only (SRO)

29D 2019 Harry Styles song whose subject “lives in daydreams with me” : SHE

Harry Styles is a singer from England who got his big break when he appeared on the British version of “The X Factor”, from which he was selected as an original member of the boy band One Direction. Styles turned to acting, and had a significant role in the 2017 war movie “Dunkirk”. Reading the gossip columns reveals that he dated Taylor Swift for a while in 2012.

34D Philatelist’s prize : RARE STAMP

Philately is the practice of collecting postage stamps. The term “philately” was coined (in French, as “philatélie”) in 1864 by French collector Georges Herpin. He came up with it from the Greek “phil-” meaning “loving” and “ateleia” meaning “exemption from tax”. Apparently “exemption from tax” was the closest thing Herpin could find to “postage stamp”.

37D Games-organizing org. : IOC

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was founded in 1894, and has its headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.

43D Outfit for G.I. Joe : US ARMY

G.I. Joe was the original “action figure”, the first toy to carry that description. G.I. Joe first hit the shelves in 1964. There have been a few movies based on the G.I. Joe figure, but, more famous than all of them I would say is the 1997 movie “G.I. Jane” starring Demi Moore in the title role. I thought that “G.I. Jane” had some potential, to be honest, but it really did not deliver in the end.

44D Lucas’s younger sister on “Stranger Things” : ERICA

“Stranger Things” is a sci-fi horror TV show made for Netflix that aired its first season in 2016. I don’t do horror, and so haven’t seen it …

50D Singer Paul : ANKA

Canadian-born Paul Anka’s big hit was in 1957, the song entitled “Diana”. Another oft-heard Anka composition started out life as his 1959 composition “Toot Sweet”. He rearranged “Toot Sweet” and renamed it as “Johnny’s Theme”, the jazz instrumental played as the opening theme of “The Tonight Show Starry Johnny Carson”.

53D Overseer of Artemis : NASA

NASA’s Artemis program is an initiative aimed at returning humans to the Moon, with the long-term goal of establishing a sustainable lunar presence and paving the way for future human exploration of Mars.

55D The F.D.A. approved a form of this to treat anxiety in 2024, for short : LSD

Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)

57D Kind of milk : OAT

Oat milk is one of the alternatives to cow’s milk, and is lactose free. I’m a huge fan …