Category: Daniel Grinberg

Bill’s time: 10m 37s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

5 Overly trusting type : NAIF

A naïf is someone who is naive, as “naïf” is the French word for “naive”.

15 Nowhere to be found, in a way : AWOL

AWOL (absent without leave)

16 Jewish wedding staple … and a clue to the circled square in this row : HORA … and H OR A

The hora is a circle dance that originated in the Balkans. It was brought to Israel by Romanian settlers, and is often performed to traditional, Israeli folk songs. The hora (also “horah”) is a regular sight at Jewish weddings. Sometimes the honoree at an event is raised on a chair during the dance.

17 Actor in “Say Anything …” and “High Fidelity” : JOHN CUSACK or JOAN CUSACK

John Cusack is an actor from Evanston, Illinois. John is noted for appearing in several films with his equally-talented actress sister, Joan Cusack. I think the John Cusack film that I most enjoy is 1997’s “Grosse Pointe Blank”.

Joan Cusack is a wonderful actress, I think, although she always seems to be cast in supporting roles. She is the sister of actor John Cusack, and has appeared with him in many films including “Sixteen Candles” and my personal favorite, “Grosse Pointe Blank”.

“Say Anything…” is a much-respected 1989 film, a high-school romantic comedy/drama film starring John Cusack and Ione Skye.

“High Fidelity” is a 2000 comedy-drama film starring John Cusack. “High Fidelity” is based on a novel of the same name by English novelist Nick Hornby (who also wrote the books that inspired the movies “About a Boy” and “Fever Pitch”).

21 Cars whose logo represents the Pleiades star cluster : SUBARUS

Subaru is the automobile division of Fuji Heavy Industries, a Japanese conglomerate. “Subaru” is the Japanese name for the Pleiades star cluster. As a result, the Subaru logo is also a cluster of stars.

The Seven Sisters of Greek mythology are also known as the Pleiades. The Seven Sisters were the daughters of the titan Atlas, who had been forced to carry the heavens on his shoulders. In an act of kindness, Zeus transformed the sisters first into doves, and then into stars so that they could provide comfort for their father. There is indeed a cluster of seven stars in the night sky named for the myth and known as the Pleiades.

22 Aspiring doc’s hurdle : MCAT

Medical College Admission Test (MCAT)

23 Monica in the International Tennis Hall of Fame : SELES

Monica Seles has a Hungarian name as she was born to Hungarian parents in former Yugoslavia. Seles was the World No. 1 professional tennis player in 1991 and 1992 before being forced from the sport when she was stabbed by a spectator at a match in 1993. She did return to the game two years later, but never achieved the same level of success.

The International Tennis Hall of Fame was established in 1954 in Newport, Rhode Island. It is located in the Newport Casino, which was an exclusive resort built in the late 1800s. The Tennis Hall of Fame complex is quite well equipped, and includes several indoor and outdoor tennis courts as well as a museum and theater.

24 Green-skinned Marvel hero : SHE-HULK or THE HULK

“She-Hulk: Attorney at Law” is a TV miniseries in the Marvel Cinematic Universe that originally aired in 2022. The title character is a superhero related to the Hulk. She-Hulk’s alter ego is a lawyer named Jennifer Walters, a cousin to Bruce Banner, alter ego of the Hulk. Walters accidentally gets cross-contaminated with Banner’s blood, resulting in her gaining the superpowers of She-Hulk.

The comic book hero Hulk first made an appearance in 1962. Hulk is the alter ego of reserved and withdrawn physicist Bruce Banner. Banner transforms into the Hulk when he gets angry.

29 Common antiseptic : IODINE

Tincture of iodine is a disinfectant. A “tincture” is a substance used in dyeing. Since the 1600s, “tincture” has also been used for a solution of medicine in an alcohol mixture.

34 Jewish deli order : KNISH

A knish is a snack food from Germany and Eastern Europe that was made popular in the US by Jewish immigrants. A knish has a filling, often made of mashed potato and ground meat, covered by a dough that is baked or fried.

37 Something that may be drawn at night : DRAPE

When I was growing up on the other side of the pond, a drapery was a shop where one could buy cloth for making clothes or curtains. It was only when I came to America that I heard the term “drapes” used for curtains.

40 Singer Ric of the Cars : OCASEK

Ric Ocasek was an American musician of Czech heritage. He was the lead vocalist of the Cars rock band.

43 Alma mater of Ian Fleming (as well as James Bond) : ETON

The world-famous Eton College is just a brisk walk from Windsor Castle, which itself is just outside London. Eton is noted for producing many British leaders, including prime ministers David Cameron and Boris Johnson. The list of Old Etonians also includes Princes William and Harry, the Duke of Wellington and George Orwell. Author Ian Fleming was also an Eton alumnus, as was Fleming’s iconic character James Bond, although 007 was expelled by the school.

45 Urban area associated with gaming : SIMCITY or SIN CITY

SimCity is a very clever computer game. Players build and grow cities and societies by creating the conditions necessary for people (the Sims) to move in and thrive. SimCity was launched in 1989, and to this day it is consistently ranked as one of the greatest computer games of all time.

“What Happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas” is a marketing campaign slogan created for the city in 2004. The slogan helped bring a record 37.4 million visitors to Las Vegas in the year it was launched.

47 Former world capital that’s an anagram of its country’s current capital : KYOTO

The city of Kyoto was once the capital of Japan. Indeed, the name “Kyoto” means “capital city” in Japanese. Kyoto is sometimes referred to as the City of Ten Thousand Shrines.

49 Prom attendee, typically : TEEN

A prom is a formal dance held upon graduation from high school (we call them “formals” over in Ireland). The term “prom” is short for “promenade”, the name given to a type of dance or ball.

59 County north of San Francisco : NAPA

The history of winemaking in Napa Valley dates back to the mid-19th century, when European settlers first began planting vineyards in the region. However, the industry did not become widely popular until the 1960s and 1970s, when a group of winemakers began producing high-quality wines that gained international recognition.

61 Gmail button : SEND

Gmail users (like me) have the advantage of a 10-second grace period in which one can decide to undo the send command for a specific email. I like that “undo send” feature …

63 [Don’t delete this] : [STET]

“Stet” is a Latin word meaning “let it stand”. In editorial work, the typesetter is instructed to disregard any change previously marked by writing the word “stet” and then underscoring that change with a line of dots or dashes.

Down

2 Restaurant chain acronym : IHOP

The International House of Pancakes (IHOP) was founded back in 1958. IHOP was originally intended to be called IHOE, the International House of Eggs, but that name didn’t do too well in marketing tests.

5 Onetime queen of Jordan : NOOR

Queen Noor is the widow of King Hussein of Jordan. She was born Lisa Halaby in Washington, D.C., the daughter of Najeeb Halaby. Her father was appointed by President Kennedy as the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, and later became the CEO of Pan Am. Lisa Halaby met King Hussein in 1977, while working on the design of Jordan’s Queen Alia Airport. The airport was named after King Hussein’s third wife who had been killed that year in a helicopter crash. Halaby and the King were married the next year, in 1978.

9 Product of hardened lava : BASALT

Basalt is a volcanic rock that is created when lava cools rapidly at the earth’s surface.

11 Defined set of points : LOCUS

In mathematics, a locus (plural “loci”) is the set of all points that satisfy a given requirement. For example, the locus called a circle is the set of all points equidistant from a single point.

12 Group that once included the members Babe Ruth and Harry Houdini : ELKS

The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks (BPOE) was founded in 1868, and is a social club that has about a million members today. It started out as a group of men getting together in a “club” in order to get around the legal opening hours of taverns in New York City. The club took on a new role as it started to look out for poor families of members who passed away. The club now accepts African Americans as members (since the seventies) and women (since the nineties), but atheists still aren’t welcome. The list of US presidents that have been members of the BPOE includes Presidents Eisenhower, Harding, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Ford.

Baseball legend George Herman Ruth, Jr. had several nicknames, the best known being “Babe”. He was also called “the Bambino” and “the Sultan of Swat”.

“Harry Houdini” was the stage name of Hungarian-born escapologist and magician Erik Weisz (later changed to “Harry Weiss”). Many people are under the impression that Houdini died while performing an escape that went wrong, an impression created by the storyline in a couple of movies about his life. The truth is that he died of peritonitis from a burst appendix. It is also true that a few days prior to his death Houdini took a series of punches to his stomach as part of his act, but doctors believe that his appendix would have burst regardless.

17 Martial arts champion who co-starred in 2020’s “Mulan” : JET LI

Actor Jet Li’s real name is Li Jian Jie. Jet Li is a martial artist and international film star from Beijing, China. Li played a villain in “Lethal Weapon 4”, and had a leading role in the 2000 movie “Romeo Must Die”.

2020’s “Mulan” is a live-action remake of the 1998 animated Disney film of the same name. Chinese-American actress Liu Yifei plays the title character, a woman from Chinese legend. The movie was received well by the critics, but fans of the animated original were largely unimpressed.

20 T : TAU

Tau is the 19th letter of the Greek alphabet, and the letter that gave rise to our Roman “T”. Both the letters tau (T) and chi (X) have long been symbolically associated with the cross.

24 Hot ___ : SAKE or TAKE

We refer to the Japanese alcoholic beverage made from rice as “sake”. We’ve gotten things a bit mixed up in the West. “Sake” is actually the word that the Japanese use for all alcoholic drinks. What we know as sake, we sometimes refer to as rice wine. Also, the starch in the rice is first converted to sugars that are then fermented into alcohol. This is more akin to a beer-brewing process than wine production, so the end product is really a rice “beer” rather than a rice “wine”.

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 Source of the quote “Allah doesn’t task a soul beyond its capacity” : KORAN

The Koran is also known as the “Qur’an” and “Quran” in English. “Qur’an” a transliteration of the Arabic name for the holy text of the Muslim faith. The literal translation of “Koran” is “the recitation”.

31 The word “aquarium” has one : LATIN ROOT

“Aquarium” is a Latin word meaning “pertaining to water”, although in Latin the word only existed as a noun with the meaning “drinking place for cattle”. Before the use of the noun “aquarium” (plural “aquaria”) in the context of fish, a tank was sometimes referred to as a marine vivarium.

35 Heckle loudly : HOOT AT

Originally, the verb “to heckle” meant “to question severely”, and for many years was associated with the public questioning of parliamentary candidates in Scotland. In more recent times, the meaning has evolved into questioning that is less polite and that is directed at stand-up comics.

44 Covered with a green growth : MOSSED

There is a traditionally-held belief that in the northern hemisphere there is a heavier growth of moss on the north-facing side of trees. The assumption is that the sun creates a drier environment on the south side of the tree, an environment that is less conducive to the growth of moss.

46 New York pro athlete : MET or NET

The New York Mets (NYM) baseball team was founded in 1962 as a replacement for two teams that the city had lost, namely the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants. For several years the Mets played very poorly, finishing no better than second-to-last in their division. Then along came the “Miracle Mets” (aka “Amazin’ Mets”) who beat the Baltimore Orioles in 1969 to claim the World Series in a huge upset.

The NBA’s Brooklyn Nets were the New Jersey Nets until 2012, and were based in Newark. Prior to 1977, the team was known as the New York Nets and played in various locations on Long Island. Ten years earlier, the Nets were called the New Jersey Americans and were headquartered in Teaneck, New Jersey.

47 N.F.L. star Travis : KELCE

NFL tight end (TE) Travis Kelce was selected by the Kansas City Chiefs in the third round of the 2013 draft. Kelce’s life off the field garners as much attention as his playing career. He is quite an accomplished golfer, and participates regularly in celebrity tournaments. Oh, and rumor is that he started dating Taylor Swift in 2023.

53 City on a lake of the same name : ERIE

Erie is a port city in the very north of Pennsylvania, sitting on the southern shore of Lake Erie. The city takes its name from the Erie Native American tribe that resided in the area. Erie is nicknamed the Gem City, a reference to the “sparkling” water of Lake Erie.

54 Arm-raising muscle, informally : DELT

The deltoid “muscle” is actually a group of muscles, the ones that cover the shoulder and create the roundness under the skin. The deltoids (delts) are triangular in shape resembling the Greek letter delta, hence the name.

56 Porter or pilsner alternative, in brief : IPA

India pale ale (IPA) is a style of beer that originated in England. The beer was originally intended for transportation from England to India, hence the name.

Porter is a dark beer that originated in London in the 1700s. It is named for the street and river porters with whom it was very popular. Porter is a well-hopped beer made using brown malt, which gives it the dark color.

Pilsener (also “pilsner” or “pils”) is a pale lager. The name “pilsener” comes from the city of Pilsen, now in the Czech Republic. It was in Pilsen, in 1842, that the first bottom-fermented lager was produced. A bottom-fermented beer is much clearer than a top-fermented beer, and has a crisper taste. The “top” and “bottom” refers to where the yeast gathers during the brewing process.