Category: Rich Katz

Bill’s time: 35m 16s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1A Caveat ___ (“Buyer beware”) : EMPTOR

“Caveat emptor” is a Latin expression meaning “Let the buyer beware”. It is used when someone buys something, emphasizing that after the deal is closed, there’s no going back.

7A Spice that’s characteristic of Hungarian cooking : PAPRIKA

The wonderful spice paprika is made from dried and ground red peppers. The peppers used are usually quite mild in terms of heat, although hotter varieties of paprika are produced. Even though paprika originated in Mexico, today it is very much associated with Hungarian cuisine.

14A Marvel Comics mutant who can freeze his own body : ICEMAN

The superhero Iceman is a founding member of the X-Men in the Marvel universe. Also known as Bobby Drake, he is a mutant with the ability to manipulate ice and create frozen structures. Iceman first appeared in print in 1963. The storyline in a 2015 comic book revealed that Iceman was gay, the first out gay Marvel superhero.

20A Arizona county or Indigenous people : MOHAVE

Mohave County in the very northwest of Arizona is the fifth largest county in the whole country. It is home part of Grand Canyon NP, as well as part of Lake Mead NRA.

25A Fire starters : FLINTS

Flint is a form of the mineral quartz, and a material that can be used to start a fire. The hard edge of flint when struck against steel can shave off a particle of the metal. The particle of steel contains exposed iron that reacts with oxygen in the air creating a spark that can light dry tinder.

27A Ole Miss athletes, to fans : REBS

“Ole Miss” is the nickname for the University of Mississippi located in Oxford, Mississippi. The name “Ole Miss” dates back to 1897, the first year a student yearbook was published. The graduating class held a competition to name the yearbook and “Ole Miss” emerged as the winner. The name stuck to the yearbook, and also as a nickname for the school itself. The University of Mississippi sports teams have been known as the Rebels since 1936. Prior to 1936, they were known as the Mississippi Flood.

29A X : CHI

The letter chi is the 22nd letter in the Greek alphabet, and the one that looks like our Roman letter X.

30A ___ Scott, whom the Supreme Court said was not free to sue for his freedom : DRED

The landmark case of Dred Scott vs. Sandford came before the US Supreme Court in 1857. Scott had been born a slave, but lived with his owner in a free state for several years before returning to the slave state of Missouri. Scott’s argument was that living in a free state entitled him to emancipation. A divided US Supreme Court sided with Scott’s owner John Sandford. The decision was that no African American, free or enslaved, was entitled to US citizenship and therefore Scott was unable to petition the court for his freedom. The decision heightened tensions between the North and South, and the American Civil War erupted just three years later.

37A Beethoven symphony originally intended to honor Napoleon : EROICA

Beethoven originally dedicated his “Symphony No. 3” to Napoleon Bonaparte. Beethoven admired the principles of the French Revolution and as such respected Bonaparte who was “born” out of the uprising. When Napoleon declared himself Emperor, Beethoven (and much of Europe) saw this as a betrayal to the ideals of the revolution so he changed the name of his new symphony from “Bonaparte” to “Eroica”, meaning “heroic, valiant”.

40A Sprawling Indian metropolis : DELHI

New Delhi is the capital city of India. The city resides within the National Capital Territory of Delhi (otherwise known as the metropolis of Delhi). New Delhi and Delhi, therefore, are two different things.

44A Expiates, with “for” : ATONES

To expiate is to make amends for something. The term “expiate” comes from the Latin verb “expiare”, which has the same meaning.

50A Rap battle participants : MC’S

Battle rapping (also “rap battling”) is a contest in which two or more rappers “fight it out” using opposing, improvised lyrics. I’d be annihilated …

53A Tampa Bay athlete, in brief : BUC

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers joined the NFL in 1976, along with the Seattle Seahawks, as an expansion team. The Bucs had a tough start in the NFL, losing their first 26 games. Things went better in the early eighties, but then the team went through 14 consecutive losing seasons. Their luck changed again though, and they won the Super Bowl at the end of the 2002 season.

54A Twists off course, as a ship : YAWS

The word “yaw” means to deviate from the line of a course and is used mainly at sea and in the air. “Yaw” is derived from the Old Norse word “jaege” which means “to drive, chase”. As such, “yaw” is etymologically related to our word “yacht”.

60A “Weekend Update” co-host Michael : CHE

Michael Che is a standup comedian from New York City. Che had worked as a writer for “Saturday Night Live” (SNL), and then started to appear in front of SNL cameras in September 2014. He became co-anchor for the “Weekend Update” segment of the show, alongside Colin Jost. They make such a great team …

64A Where a hurricane forms : OCEAN

A severe tropical storm is called a hurricane when it occurs in the Atlantic and Northeast Pacific, a typhoon in the Northwest Pacific, and a cyclone in the South Pacific and Indian Ocean. Tropical storms form over warm water, picking up energy from the evaporation from the ocean surface.

71A Mammal with long whiskers : WALRUS

Walruses are large marine mammals with very prominent tusks. Their natural habitat is in and around the northern hemisphere’s Arctic Ocean.

77A ___ Day, Billie Holiday’s portrayer in “The United States vs. Billie Holiday” : ANDRA

“The United States vs. Billie Holiday” is a 2021 biopic based on a 2015 book by Johann Hari called “Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs”. The film mainly deals with her performances of the song “Strange Fruit”, with its references to racial prejudice and lynching, and Holiday’s arrest and incarceration for drug possession. Soul singer and actress Andra Day plays Holiday, for which performance she won a Golden Globe.

78A Celebrity chef Ina : GARTEN

Ina Garten is an author as well as the host of a cooking show on the Food Network called “Barefoot Contessa”. She is a mentee of Martha Stewart, and indeed was touted as a potential “successor” to the TV celebrity when Stewart was incarcerated in 2004 after an insider trading scandal. Garten has no formal training as a chef, and indeed used to work as a nuclear policy analyst at the White House!

82A He was né Clay : 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).

86A Outback baby : JOEY

A male kangaroo is known as a buck, jack or boomer. A female is called a jill, flyer or doe. A young kangaroo is a joey, and a group of kangaroos is a mob or troop.

87A Familiar initialism coined by a U.S. Air Force captain : UFO

Disc-shaped flying objects have been reported in the sky since the Middle Ages. In the modern era, the event that launched the term “flying saucer” was a UFO sighting in 1947, which was covered widely in the media. Kenneth Arnold reported seeing nine unidentified flying objects in formation near Mount Rainier in Washington. In describing the objects, he repeatedly used the words “saucer”, “disc” and “pie-plate”. Newspapers latched onto the terminology, and we’ve been seeing flying “saucers” ever since.

88A Do-over at Wimbledon : LET

The Wimbledon Championships of tennis are held at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club located in Wimbledon, a district of London. The Wimbledon Championships started in 1877, and have been played on grass since day one.

90A Sewer in American history : ROSS

Legend has it that Betsy Ross made the first American flag for General George Washington. However, this story only surfaced during the centennial celebrations of 1876, and although Betsy Ross was indeed one of several flag makers in Philadelphia in the days of George Washington, sadly there’s no definitive evidence that Ross provided that first Stars and Stripes.

91A “Weekend Update” show, for short : SNL

“Weekend Update” is the longest-running of any recurring sketch on “Saturday Night Live” (SNL). In fact, the segment made its debut on the very first show, back in 1975. The first “anchor” at the “Weekend Update” desk was Chevy Chase.

96A Foreign policy grp. : NSC

The National Security Council (NSC) was created by President Harry S. Truman in 1947. It is chaired by the sitting president and meets in the White House Situation Room.

97A Brezhnev of the Soviet Union : LEONID

Leonid Brezhnev was Soviet leader from 1964 until his death in 1982. Under Brezhnev, Soviet spending on the military grew to about 12.5% of the nation’s Gross National Product. This level of spending, without effective economic reform, led to the USSR’s “Era of Stagnation” that started in the mid-seventies. His large major political decision was to invade Afghanistan, a move that placed further strain on the fragile Soviet economy.

108A Starbucks competitor : PEET’S

Peet’s is a chain of coffee houses based in the San Francisco Bay Area. It was founded in 1966 by Dutch immigrant Alfred Peet. Peet served as a mentor to Jerry Baldwin, who co-founded Starbucks in 1971.

110A Giants in California and New York : TEAMS

Today’s San Francisco Giants baseball team was founded in 1883 as the New York Gothams. The team’s name was changed to the Giants in 1885, and the franchise moved to San Francisco in 1958.

The New York Giants (NYG) football team plays home games in MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, a stadium shared with the New York Jets (NYJ). The Giants are the only team remaining from a group of five that joined the league in 1925. For many years, the Giants shared team names with the New York Giants MLB team, before the baseball franchise moved to San Francisco after the 1957 season.

112A “Beat it!” : AMSCRAY!

Pig Latin is in effect a game. One takes the first consonant or consonant cluster of an English word and moves it to the end of the word, and then adds the letters “ay”. So, the Pig Latin for the word “nix” is “ixnay” (ix-n-ay), and for “scram” is “amscray” (am-scr-ay).

115A Actor Wilson of “The Office” : RAINN

Rainn Wilson is an actor best known for playing Dwight Schrute on the US version of the sitcom “The Office”.

120A Furniture retailer owned by Williams-Sonoma : WEST ELM

West Elm is an upscale furniture store that is owned by Williams-Sonoma. The West Elm chain was founded in 2002.

122A Iditarod transports : SLEDS

The Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race covers an incredible 1,161 miles, from Anchorage to Nome in Alaska. The race starts every year on the first Saturday in March, with the first race having been held in 1973. Finishing times range from over 8 days to 15 days or more. The first few races only used a northern route, but then a southern route was added to the roster every second year. It’s kind of a good thing, because when the racers take the northern route they don’t even pass through the town of Iditarod!

Down

1D Title heroine described as “handsome, clever and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition” : EMMA

Jane Austen’s novel “Emma” (1815) is her last novel published during her lifetime. Unlike many of her other heroines, Emma Woodhouse is a wealthy, privileged young woman who is not concerned with finding a husband but rather delights in matchmaking for others, often with disastrous and comedic results. A favorite of mine …

3D Fly-catching bird with a name derived from Greek : PHOEBE

The phoebe is a small, insect-eating bird that is native to North and South America.

4D Driveway goo : TAR

The terms “tarmac” and “macadam” are short for “tarmacadam”. In the 1800s, Scotsman John Loudon McAdam developed a style of road known as “macadam”. Macadam had a top-layer of crushed stone and gravel laid over larger stones. The macadam also had a convex cross-section so that water tended to drain to the sides. In 1901, a significant improvement was made by English engineer Edgar Purnell Hooley who introduced tar into the macadam, improving the resistance to water damage and practically eliminating dust. The “tar-penetration macadam” is the basis of what we now call “tarmac”.

7D Tenured profs, often : PHDS

A job in a university that is described as “tenure-track” is one that can lead to a tenured position. A tenured position is a “job for life”. A person with tenure can only be dismissed for cause.

10D Mother of Joseph and Benjamin, in the Bible : RACHEL

According to the Bible, Rachel was one of the two wives of Jacob, the other being Rachel’s sister Leah. Jacob’s intention had been to marry Rachel, but Leah and Rachel’s father “switched” his daughters and provided Leah as the veiled bride. Jacob married Rachel a week later, and lived with the two wives concurrently.

11D Book after Song of Solomon : ISAIAH

The Book of Isaiah is part of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. It is not mentioned in the Qur’an, but many Muslim scholars consider Isaiah a prophet. Isaiah is widely regarded as the most eloquent of the prophets, earning him the moniker “Shakespeare of the Prophets”.

12D French cocktail made with crème de cassis : KIR

Kir is a French cocktail made by adding a teaspoon or so of crème de cassis (blackcurrant liqueur) to a glass, and then topping it off with white wine. The drink is named after Felix Kir, the Mayor of Dijon in Burgundy, who used to offer the drink to his guests. My wife is particularly fond of a variant called a kir royale, in which the white wine is replaced with champagne.

16D Bulldog fan in Connecticut : ELI

The Yale Bulldogs are the athletic teams of Yale University. The Yale school mascot is “Handsome Dan”, the Yale bulldog. The Bulldogs’ logo features a bulldog in front of a letter Y.

17D Santa ___ : MONICA

Santa Monica, California lies on Santa Monica Bay and is in Los Angeles County. The city is home to the world-famous Santa Monica Pier, which opened in 1909.

28D Minds one’s P’s and Q’s : BEHAVES

There isn’t really a clear derivation of the phrase “mind your Ps and Qs”, an expression meaning “mind your manners” or “mind your language”. One story that I like is that it originated in the wonderful pubs of England. Innkeepers would watch how much their thirsty patrons consumed, recording each pint (P) and quart (Q) that was downed on a board using Ps and Qs as shorthand. The more rowdy drinkers would be asked to “mind their Ps and Qs”.

35D Texter’s “Beats me” : IDK

I don’t know (IDK)

43D One-named singer born in Nigeria : SADE

Singer Sade’s real name is Helen Folasade Adu. Although born in Nigeria, Sade grew up and lives in the UK. She was the lead vocalist for the English group Sade, and adopted the name of the band. The band’s biggest hits were “Smooth Operator” (1984) and “The Sweetest Taboo” (1985).

45D Skier’s conveyance : T-BAR

A T-bar is a ski lift on which the skiers are pulled up the hill in pairs, with each pair standing (not sitting!) either side of a T-shaped metal bar. The bar is placed behind the thighs, pulling along the skiers as they remain standing on their skis (hopefully!). There’s also a J-bar, which is a similar device but with each J-shaped bar used by one skier at a time.

50D Clown around with food? : MCDONALD

“Fast Food Nation” is an expose by investigative journalist Eric Schlosser that reveals in the inner workings of the US fast food industry. One of Schlosser’s more controversial findings was the deliberate targeting of children by the marketing folks at McDonald’s. McDonald’s copied the marketing plans of Walt Disney to attract not only children, but also their parents and grandparents. That’s how Ronald McDonald was born …

51D City SE of Phoenix : CHANDLER

The Arizona city of Chandler was founded as Chandler Ranch by Canadian Alexander John Chandler, who was the first veterinary surgeon to do business in the Arizona Territory.

56D Holistic contentment : WELLNESS

A holistic approach to medicine emphasizes not only physical symptoms but also social considerations and the environment.

59D “E pluribus ___” : UNUM

From 1776, “E pluribus unum” was the unofficial motto of the United States. The phrase translates from Latin as “Out of many, one”. It was pushed aside in 1956 when an Act of Congress designated “In God We Trust” as the country’s official motto. “In God We Trust” had appeared on US coins since 1864, but was only introduced on paper currency in 1957.

67D Sun bloc? : NBA

The Phoenix Suns NBA team are in the Pacific Division, and are the only team in that division not based in California.

81D Error message on a Blu-ray device : NO DISC

A CD player reads the information on the disc using a laser beam. The beam is produced by what’s called a laser diode, a device similar to a light-emitting diode (LED) except that a laser beam is emitted. That laser beam is usually red in CD and DVD players. Blu-ray players are so called as they use blue lasers.

95D Liberal-leaning : LEFTIST

The concept of left-right politics started in France during the French Revolution. When members of France’s National Assembly convened in 1789, supporters of the King sat to the President’s right, and supporters of the revolution to the President’s left. The political terms “left” and “right” were then coined in the local media, and have been used ever since.

97D Chinese “nut” that’s really a fruit : LITCHI

Litchis are better known in English as “lychees”. We can’t eat the skin of the lychee fruit, which is why you’ll notice that you are only served the sweet flesh. If you’ve never tried them, you should do so as they’re delicious. Even though there is a nut-like seed within the edible flesh of the lychee fruit, I wouldn’t eat it, as it is poisonous …

99D Government debt obligations, familiarly : T-BONDS

A Treasury note (T-note) is a government debt that matures in 1-10 years. A T-note has a coupon (interest) payment made every six months. The T-note is purchased at a discount to face value, and at the date of maturity can be redeemed at that face value. A Treasury bill (T-bill) is a similar financial vehicle, but it matures in one year or less, and a T-bond matures in 20-30 years.

100D 40 winks : SIESTA
102D Gets 40 winks : RESTS

We use the word “siesta” to describe a short nap in the early afternoon, and imported the word into English from Spanish. In turn, the Spanish word is derived from the Latin “hora sexta” meaning “the sixth hour”. The idea is that the nap is taken at the sixth hour after dawn.

Back in the early 1800s, folks took “nine winks” when getting a few minutes of sleep during the day. Dr. William Kitchiner extended this concept in his 1821 self-help book “The Art of Invigorating and Prolonging Life”. He suggested “A Forty Winks Nap”, which we seem to have been taking ever since. Mind you, I’m up to about eighty winks most days …

101D ___ fatale : FEMME

A “femme fatale” is a dangerously seductive woman. “Femme fatale” is French for “deadly woman”.

104D “To ___ own self be true” : THINE

Polonius is an important character in William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”. Polonius is eventually killed by Hamlet, albeit in a case of mistaken identity. Polonius has several memorable lines in the play that are oft-quoted today, including “To thine own self be true”, “Brevity is the soul of wit”, and “Neither a borrower nor a lender be”.

106D George of “Star Trek” : TAKEI

Actor George Takei is known for his presence on social media platforms like Twitter, YouTube and Facebook. He explores that presence in a 2012 memoir “Oh Myyy! There Goes the Internet”.

107D Bad thing to discover in the pantry : SMELL

The word “pantry” dates back to 1300, when it came into English from the Old French “panetrie” meaning a “bread room”. Bread is “pain” in French, and “panis” in Latin.

111D Jazz singer Sylvia ___ : SYMS

Sylvia Syms was a jazz singer from New York. Frank Sinatra called Syms the “world’s greatest saloon singer”, and gave her the nickname “Buddha”. Syms actually died on stage, suffering a heart attack at the age of 74.

116D Org. that merged with the U.F.C. in 2023 : WWE

World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) is a company promoting professional wrestling as a form of entertainment.