1028-26 NY Times Crossword 28 Oct 26, Wednesday

Bill’s time: 9m 02s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1A “Futurama” robot : BENDER

In the animated sitcom “Futurama”, the character Bender (full name “Bender Bending Rodriguez”) is a robot, one with quite the personality. He swears a lot, drinks heavily, steals what he can, and is very ill-tempered. Paradoxically, he was manufactured by Mom’s Friendly Robot Company.

11A Like some vaccines : ORAL

A vaccine used to be exclusively a modified virus administered to an individual to stimulate the immune system into developing immunity, until mRNA vaccines were introduced to combat COVID-19. British physician Edward Jenner came up with the first vaccine, injecting people with the cowpox virus in order to prevent smallpox. The term “vaccination” comes from the Latin “vaccinus” meaning “from cows”, with “vacca” translating as “cow”.

15A Colored part of an eye : AREOLA

An areola (sometimes “areole”) in anatomy is a small ring of color, as in the areola surrounding the nipple, and the areola surrounding the pupil of the eye. “Areola” (plural “areolae”) comes from Latin, meaning “small open space”, and is a diminutive of the Latin word “area”, meaning “open space”.

16A Fish whose name is a synonym for “complain” : CARP

Carp are freshwater fish that are used as food around the world, although they aren’t very popular in North American kitchens. The ornamental fish that we know as goldfish and koi are all types of carp.

The word “carp” used to mean simply “talk” back in the 13th century, with its roots in the Old Norwegian “karpa” meaning “to brag”. A century later, the Latin word “carpere” meaning “to slander” influenced the use of “to carp” so that it came to mean “to find fault with”.

17A Gullible sort : RUBE

A rube is a person lacking sophistication, someone often described as a country bumpkin. The term derives from the masculine name “Reuben”, which was considered back in the early 1800s to be a typical name used in rural areas.

18A “Jack Torrance, in “The Shining”” : HERE’S JOHNNY!

“Here’s Johnny!” is a famous line spoken by a crazed Jack Torrance (played by Jack Nicholson) as he chops through a bathroom door in “The Shining”. The film is based on the Stephen King novel of the same name. I haven’t seen the whole movie because I can’t cope with Stephen King stories …

20A Machu Picchu constructor : INCA

Machu Picchu is known as “The Lost City of the Incas”, and it can be visited on a mountain ridge in Peru, 50 miles northwest of the city of Cusco in the southeast of the country. The name Machu Picchu means “old peak”. The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu originates about 50 miles from Cusco on the Urubamba River in Peru. It can take travelers about 5 days to trek the full length of the trail, passing through many Incan ruins before reaching the Sun Gate on Machu Picchu mountain. The trail was becoming greatly overused, forcing the Peruvian government to limit the number of people on the trail each day to 500. Book early …

22A Top choices? : BRAS

The brassiere is a relatively modern invention, with the first contemporary bra being patented in 1914. However, there are ancient artifacts that show that women have been wearing garments to support their breasts for thousands of years. One of the most famous examples is a mosaic from Sicily that dates back to the 4th century AD. It depicts women athletes wearing bra-like garments while throwing the discus, lifting weights, and playing ball games.

23A Customary behaviors : WONTS

The adjective “wont” means “accustomed”, as in “I am wont to solving the crossword of an evening”.

24A “Dr. Frankenstein, in 1931’s “Frankenstein”” : IT’S ALIVE, IT’S ALIVE!

The classic 1931 film “Frankenstein” is based on the Mary Shelley novel of the same name, and stars Colin Clive as Henry Frankenstein and Boris Karloff as the Monster. Bela Lugosi was offered the role of Henry Frankenstein first, and then was recast as the Monster. Lugosi tried working with the Monster role but eventually bowed out. Many say that the decision to leave was one of the worst of Lugosi’s career.

29A First in a line of 14 popes : LEO I

The first pope named Leo is now known as Pope Saint Leo the Great. Leo I is famous for meeting with the feared Attila the Hun and persuading him to turn back his invading force that was threatening to overrun Western Europe.

30A Draft cattle : OXEN

Oxen are herbivorous animals that have been domesticated for thousands of years, often used for pulling carts, plowing fields, and carrying heavy loads. They are usually castrated male cattle, castrated so that they are more docile and easier to train.

40A “With 44-Across, Veronica Quaife, in “The Fly”” : BE AFRAID, BE … “See 40-Across” : … VERY AFRAID

The 1986 sci-fi horror film “The Fly” stars Jeff Goldblum as a scientist who gradually turns into a fly-like creature as the result of a teleportation experiment that goes awry. The 1986 film is loosely based on a 1957 short story by George Langelaan. I saw the original 1958 movie adaptation of that story when I was just a lad, and it really scared me. I’ve managed to avoid the two sequels and the 1986 remake …

43A Light hit at the plate : BUNT

To bunt in baseball is to barely hit the ball, just enough to have it roll slowly in front of the infielders.

54A “Jigsaw, in “Saw”” : I WANT TO PLAY A GAME

The “Saw” franchise of movies is gruesome in the extreme. I’ve only seen a few minutes of “Saw” footage (accidentally). The storylines center on imprisoned victims who are faced with having to mutilate themselves in order to escape. Ugh …

64A Matcha or Darjeeling : TEA

Matcha is a powder made by grinding dried, green tea leaves. The selected tea bushes are heavily shaded for several weeks prior to harvest, which stimulates the production of chlorophyll resulting in darker green leaves. Matcha is used in East Asian cuisines to prepare tea for drinking, and also as an ingredient in dishes such as ice cream, cakes and sushi rolls.

Darjeeling is a town in West Bengal in the east of India in the Lesser Himalayas. Today, Darjeeling is perhaps best known outside India for the black tea that bears its name. In the days of the British Raj, the cooler climate of Darjeeling made it a popular destination for British residents seeking respite from the summer heat at the lower elevations.

65A Affectedly cute : TWEE

In the UK, something “twee” is cutesy or overly nice. “Twee” came from “tweet”, which is the cutesy, baby-talk way of saying “sweet”.

66A Indicators of irony … or a way to describe the answers to 18-, 24-, 40-/44- and 54-Across? : SCARE QUOTES

I must admit, I probably overuse scare quotes in this blog. Scare quotes are quotation marks placed around a word or phrase implying a non-standard usage. Yes, a “non-standard” usage …

Down

1D Religion with the key text Kitáb-i-Aqdas : BAHA’I

The Baha’i Faith is relatively new in the scheme of things, and was founded in Persia in the 1800s. One of the tenets of the religion is that messengers have come from God over time, including Abraham, the Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad, and most recently Bahá’u’lláh who founded the Baha’i Faith. Baha’i scripture specifies some particular architectural requirements for houses of worship, including that the building have a nine-sided, circular shape. It is also specified that there be no pictures, statues or images displayed within a temple.

6D Colonial rule in India : RAJ

The period of colonial rule by the British in South Asia from 1858 to 1947 is referred to as the British Raj. Prior to 1858, the area was ruled by a private enterprise, the British East India Company. “Raj” is the Hindi word for “reign”.

8D Hawaii’s sixth-largest island : LANAI

Lanai is the sixth largest of the Hawaiian Islands. Lanai was first spotted by Europeans just a few days after Captain Cook was killed on the Big Island of Hawaii in 1779. In 1922, the Hawaiian Pineapple Company bought the whole island of Lanai and turned most of it into the world’s largest pineapple plantation. Since then, Lanai has been known as “The Pineapple Island”. Today, 98% of the island is owned by Larry Ellison, the Executive Chairman of Oracle, and 2% is owned by the State of Hawaii.

9D German artist Max : ERNST

Max Ernst was a painter and sculptor, and a pioneer in the Dada movement and Surrealism. He was born near Cologne in Germany in 1891 and he was called up to fight in WWI, as were most young German men at that time. In his autobiography he writes “Max Ernst died the 1st of August, 1914”, which was a statement about his experiences in the war. In reality, Ernst died in 1976 having lived to the ripe old age of 85.

10D Profession in many Hitchcock films : SPY

Alfred Hitchcock was an English film director from Leytonstone, just outside London. A very good friend of mine is a close friend of one of his granddaughters, and met “Hitch” many times in her youth. She tells a very nice story of sitting in a restaurant with the family when someone came over to the table to say “hi”. That was Jimmy Stewart …

11D M.L.B. player whose cap has an orange visor : ORIOLE

The Baltimore Orioles (also the O’s, the Birds) are one of the eight charter teams of MLB’s American League, so the franchise dates back to 1901. Prior to 1901, the team had roots in the Minor League Milwaukee Brewers, and indeed entered the American League as the Brewers. In 1902 the Brewers moved to St. Louis and became the Browns. The team didn’t fare well in St. Louis, so when it finally relocated to Baltimore in the early fifties the team changed its name completely, to the Baltimore Orioles. The owners so badly wanted a fresh start that they traded 17 old Browns players with the New York Yankees. The trade didn’t help the team’s performance on the field in those early days, but it did help distance the new team from its past.

12D Shuffling dance move popular in the 1990s : RUNNING MAN

The running man is a street dance move that has been around since the 1980s. In the move, the dance is stationary, but makes a running motion with the legs while pushing and pulling their fists horizontally in front of them.

13D “Abbott Elementary” airer : ABC TV

“Abbott Elementary” is a sitcom in the mockumentary genre. The show was created by and stars Quinta Brunson as a cup-half-full second-grade teacher in a Philadelphia public school. The premise of “Abbott Elementary” is that a film crew is making a documentary about the lives of teachers working in underfunded schools.

26D King who disowns Cordelia : LEAR

William Shakesepeare’s play “King Lear”, the title character disowns Cordelia, his youngest and most faithful daughter, using the words:

… for we
Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see
That face of hers again.

28D San José sun : SOL

San José is the capital of Costa Rica. Costa Rica is in Central America, bordered by Nicaragua in the north and Panama to the south. It is a remarkable country in my opinion, a leader on the world stage in many areas. It has been referred to as the “greenest” country in the world, the “happiest” country in the world, and has a highly educated populace. In 1949, the country unilaterally abolished its own army … permanently!

31D Popular band that had a 40-year gap (1981-2021) between its last two studio albums : ABBA

“Voyage” is a 2021 album released by ABBA, the first collection of new songs recorded by the group since “The Visitors” in 1981. The album’s release was much anticipated all around the world, and sold one million units in the first week.

32D Fight à la the Capulets and Montagues : FEUD

William Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” is all about the love between the two title characters, which is forbidden as the pair come from two families who are sworn enemies. Early in the play, Romeo (a Montague) sneaks into a masquerade ball being held by the Capulets in the hope of meeting a Capulet girl named Rosaline. Instead, he meets and falls for Juliet, also a Capulet. Tragedy ensues …

34D Site of a tempting offer : EDEN

In the Christian tradition, the “fall of man” took place in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve succumbed to the temptation of eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This went against the bidding of God, and was at the urging of the serpent. As a result, Adam and Eve were banished from Eden to prevent them from becoming immortal by eating from the tree of life. The first humans had transitioned from a state of innocent obedience to a state of guilty disobedience.

35D Pokémon critter with a yellow snout and short, pointed ears : ABRA

In the “Pokémon” universe, the species known as “Abra” can evolve into “Kadabra”, and then into “Alakazam”.

36D Jedi of “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” : REY

“Star Wars: The Last Jedi” is a 2017 movie from the “Star Wars” film franchise, and the second installment of the “Star Wars” sequel trilogy. The title character is Luke Skywalker, played by Mark Hamill. Ah, but is Luke in fact the “last Jedi”?

42D Member of the genus Pongo, informally : ORANG

Orangutans (also “orangs”) are arboreal creatures, the largest arboreal animals known to man. They are native to Indonesia and Malaysia, and live in rainforests. Like most species in rainforests these days, orangutans are endangered, with only three species surviving. The word “orangutan” is Malay, meaning “man of the forest”.

56D ___ Isaac, Dr. Frankenstein portrayer in Guillermo del Toro’s “Frankenstein” : OSCAR

Oscar Isaac is an actor from Guatemala who was raised in Miami. Before acting, Isaac played lead guitar in his own band called the Blinking Underdogs. Isaac portrayed X-wing pilot Poe Dameron in several of the “Star Wars” movies.

2025’s “Frankenstein” is yet another adaptation of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel of the same name, this time produced, written, and directed by Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro. By all accounts, this was a lifelong passion project for the Mexican filmmaker, He cast Oscar Isaac in the title role, and Jacob Elordi as the Creature, with Mia Goth and Christoph Waltz in supporting roles. The film was well received, but it’s not on my watchlist (I’m too scared …).

57D City square : PLAZA

“Plaza” is a Spanish word meaning “square, place”.

58D They might be shaped like minnows or flies : LURES

Minnow are small fish that are often used as bait when fishing. The term “minnow” is also used figuratively to describe someone who is comparatively insignificant or perhaps small in stature.

66D The Beatles’ “___ Came in Through the Bathroom Window” : SHE

“She Came In Through the Bathroom Window” is a Beatles song from their “Abbey Road” album. It was composed by Paul McCartney, and was inspired by the hordes of ardent fans who hung around the recording studios and homes of the band members. There actually was a case of one fan climbing a ladder, entering McCartney’s home, and opening the front door to let in some of her fellow “Beatle manics”.

69D Sí, across the Pyrenees : OUI

The Pyrenees is a mountain range that runs along the border between Spain and France. Nestled between the two countries, high in the mountains, is the lovely country of Andorra, an old haunt of my family during skiing season …