Category: Ricky Cruz

Bill’s time: 12m 30s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

17 Key signature with zero sharps or flats, followed by “Some energy drinks” : MONSTERS IN C (looks like “Monsters, Inc.”)

The animated feature “Monsters, Inc.” was released in 2001, and was Pixar’s fourth full-length movie. It’s about cute monsters, and that’s all I know other than that the voice cast included the likes of John Goodman, Billy Crystal and Steve Buscemi.

19 ___ Tour : PGA

The Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) was founded in 1916 and today has its headquarters (unsurprisingly) in Florida, where so many golfers live. Back in 1916, the PGA was based in New York City.

22 Ending with Wikipedia : DOT ORG

Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia, and is the most-used reference site on the Internet. The site was launched by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger in 2001. I, for one, am very grateful …

29 Stand in a studio : EASEL

The term “easel” comes from an old Dutch word meaning “donkey”, would you believe? The idea is that an easel carries its load (an oil painting, say) just as a donkey would be made to carry a load.

32 Baylor University’s city : WACO

Baylor is a private Baptist university in Waco, Texas that was founded in 1845, making it the oldest continuously-operating university in the state. Baylor is named for US Congressman and Baptist minister Robert Emmett Bledsoe Baylor, who co-founded the school. The list of Baylor’s past presidents includes Ken Starr, the independent counsel whose investigation led to the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.

38 Martial arts rank : DAN

The dan ranking system is used in several Japanese and Korean martial arts. The ranking indicates a level of proficiency, and often only applies to practitioners who have already earned a black belt.

Martial arts are various fighting traditions and systems used in combat or simply to promote physical well-being. The term “martial” ultimately derives from Latin and means “Arts of Mars”, a reference to Mars, the Roman god of war.

39 ___ Jones : DOW

Dow Jones & Company was founded as a publishing house in 1882 by three newspaper reporters, Charles Dow, Edward Jones and Charles Bergstresser. Today, the company’s most famous publication has to be “The Wall Street Journal”. In 1884, Charles Dow started reporting the average dollar value of the stock of eleven companies, an index which spawned a whole host of metrics that carry the Dow Jones name to this day. The most famous of these metrics is the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), also known as “the Dow 30” or simply “the Dow”.

41 Assistant in ministry : ACOLYTE

The word “acolyte” comes from the Greek “akolouthos” meaning “companion, attendant, helper”. In the Christian tradition, an acolyte is an individual who assists some way in a ceremony, by lighting candles for example. In more general terms, an acolyte is a devoted follower or attendant.

51 Pasta ___ Norma : ALLA

Pasta alla Norma is an Italian dish from Sicily. It comprises pasta in a tomato sauce covered with slices of fried eggplant. The dish is named for the opera “Norma” by Sicilian composer Vincenzo Bellini.

53 Setting for a teacup, maybe : DOILY

There was a draper in London in the seventeenth century named Doiley, and he gave his name to the lace fabric that he sold. The fabric in turn gave its name to the ornamental mat that we call a “doily”. I can’t abide doilies …

56 Texter’s indication of uncertainty : IDK

I don’t know (IDK)

60 Zippo alternative : BIC

Société Bic is a company based in Clichy in France. The first product the company produced, more than fifty years ago, was the Bic Cristal ballpoint pen that is still produced today. Bic also makes other disposable products such as lighters and razors.

The first Zippo lighter was made in 1933, in Bradford, Pennsylvania. The name “Zippo” was simply a word invented by the company founder, George Blaisdell, as he liked the word “zipper”. You can buy one today for $12.95, or if you want the solid gold model … for $8,675.95.

61 Key signature with three sharps, followed “Leaf-raking time” : FALL IN G-FLAT (looks like “falling flat”)

Here in the US, we tend to refer to the season following summer as “fall”. This name is short for “fall of the leaf”, referring to the loss of leaves by deciduous trees. The term “autumn” is a more common name used in Britain and Ireland instead of “fall”. However, back before the mid-1600s the term “fall” was in common use on the other side of the pond.

68 Holder of a record 21 Oscar nominations for acting : STREEP

Meryl Streep has had more Academy Award nominations and more Golden Globe nominations than any other actor, which is both a tribute to her talent and the respect she has earned in the industry. I am not a huge fan of her earlier works but some of her recent movies are now on my list of all-time favorites. I recommend “Mamma Mia!” (you’ll either love it or hate it!), “Julie & Julia”, “It’s Complicated” and ”Hope Springs”.

69 Aziz Ansari’s “Parks and Recreation” role : TOM

Aziz Ansari is an actor and comedian from Columbia, South Carolina who is best known for playing Tom Haverford on the sitcom “Parks and Recreation”. He also stars in the Netflix comedy-drama series “Master of None”.

Down

2 Work considered by some to be the first Romantic-era symphony : 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”.

3 Wii Sports sport : TENNIS

Players of the Wii Sports video game can simulate five sports: tennis, baseball, bowling, golf and boxing.

6 Princess Fiona, for one : OGRE

Princess Fiona is the title character’s love interest in the “Shrek” series of films.

7 New Hampshire city : NASHUA

The New Hampshire city of Nashua was named for the Nashaway people who inhabited the upstream portions of the Nashua River Valley. The name “Nashaway” translates as “river with a pebbled bottom”.

8 Bygone owner of Capitol Records : EMI

EMI was a British music company, with the initialism standing for Electric and Musical Industries.

9 Weed in some medicinal wine : DANDELION

The name “dandelion” comes from the French “dent de lion” meaning “lion’s tooth”. The name is a reference to the coarse, tooth-like edges of dandelion leaves.

11 Cocktails with orange peel garnishes : NEGRONIS

The negroni is a lovely cocktail, one that hails from Italy. A classic recipe calls for equal parts gin, sweet vermouth and Campari. According to legend, the drink was first made by bartender Fosco Scarselli at the request of Count Camillo Negroni, hence the name. The count wanted a stronger version of an Americano, and so Scarselli dropped the Americano’s soda water and replaced it with gin!

18 Raw power : SINEW

“Sinew” is another name for “tendon”. Tendons are bands of collagen that connect muscle to bone. Tendons are similar to ligaments and fasciae, which are also connective tissue made out of collagen, but ligaments join bone to bone, and fasciae connect muscle to muscle. We also use the term “sinew” to mean muscular power.

23 Certain subtracted weight : TARE

Tare is the weight of a container that is deducted from the gross weight to determine the net weight, the weight of the container’s contents.

25 Knight on the Hollywood Walk of Fame : GLADYS

Gladys Knight & the Pips performed together from 1953 to 1989. The Pips were founded around Gladys Knight, originally featuring her brother, sister and two cousins. The group took its name from yet another cousin, a cousin named “Pip”.

The Hollywood Walk of Fame is a series of sidewalks taking up 15 blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and 3 blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood. The Walk of Fame is an ever-changing monument dedicated to those who have achieved greatness in the entertainment industry, both in front of and behind the camera. The first stars installed in the sidewalk were a group of eight, officially laid in 1960. That group consisted of:

• Joanne Woodward (actor)
• Olive Borden (actor)
• Ronald Colman (actor)
• Louise Fazenda (actor)
• Preston Foster (actor)
• Burt Lancaster (actor)
• Edward Sedgwick (director)
• Ernest Torrence (actor)

27 Heavy tool : SLEDGE

A sledgehammer is a big hammer, one used to apply a lot of force. The word “sledgehammer” comes from the Anglo-Saxon “Slaegan” meaning “to strike violently”. “Slaegan” is also the root of the words “slag”, “slay” and “slog”.

33 Some Friskies offerings : CAT TREATS

The Friskies brand is known today as a cat food, although it was first introduced as a dry dog food in 1930.

35 Place to order patatas bravas : TAPAS BARS

Patatas bravas is a Spanish dish comprising fried white potatoes served with a spicy sauce. The name “patatas bravas” translates as “spicy potatoes”. The dish is common in tapas restaurants.

36 Green onion : SCALLION

Scallions are edible plants with a mild onion flavor. They are also called green onions or spring onions.

37 Some splattery paintings at MoMA : POLLOCKS

Jackson Pollock was an abstract expressionist painter who famously used a “drip painting” style. Pollock was married to Lee Krasner, herself an influential abstract expressionist.

42 Toronto athlete, familiarly : LEAF

The Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team was founded way back in 1917. As members of the National Hockey League, the Maple Leafs have won the Stanley Cup championships thirteen times, the second best record in the league. Having said that, the last championship the team won was in 1967, and the resulting “drought” is the longest in the NHL.

44 Big name in stream-of-consciousness writing : WOOLF

Virginia Woolf was an English author who was active in the period between the two World Wars. Woolf’s most famous novels were “Mrs. Dalloway”, “To the Lighthouse” and “Orlando”. She also wrote a long essay entitled “A Room of One’s Own” in which she states “A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.”

48 Common five-petaled flower : VIOLET

The common violet is a flowering plant that is native to Europe and Asia. It is a hardy perennial that is often found growing in the wild near the edges of forests and in clearing. The same species is also referred to as the wood violet, sweet violet and garden violet.The color violet is named for the plant, and not the other way round.

49 City connected to Ciudad Juárez by the Bridge of the Americas : EL PASO

Although there have been human settlements in the El Paso area for thousands of years, the first European settlement was founded in 1659 by the Spanish. That first community was on the south bank of the Rio Grande, and was called El Paso del Norte (the North Pass). Most of the urban development under Spanish rule took place on the south side of the river, with El Paso del Norte acting as the center of governance for the Spanish for the territory of New Mexico. The Rio Grande was chosen as the border between Mexico and the US in 1848, so most of the city of El Paso del Norte became part of the Mexican state of Chihuahua (and is now called Ciudad Juárez ). The area north of the river developed as a US military post, eventually becoming the modern city of El Paso, Texas.

58 Hacky Sack hitter : KNEE

A footbag is a small bag used to play games that involve kicking it in the air repeatedly, usually in an attempt to prevent the footbag landing on the ground. Although footbags have been around for a long time, the most famous one today is the Hacky Sack, made by Wham-O.

63 Econ. stat : GDP

A country’s Gross National Product (GNP) is the value of all services and products produced by its residents in a particular year. GNP includes all production wherever it is in the world, as long as the business is owned by residents of the country concerned. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is different, although related, and is the value of all services and goods produced within the borders of the country for that year.