Tag: Big brothers? crossword clue

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 “There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious ___”: Arthur Conan Doyle : FACT

According to author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, his character Sherlock Holmes was based on a Dr. Joseph Bell for whom Doyle worked in Edinburgh. That said, Bell actually wrote a letter to Doyle in which he said “you are yourself Sherlock Holmes and well you know it”.

11 Potsticker vessel : WOK

“Wok” is a Cantonese word, and is the name for the frying pan now used in many Asian cuisines.

14 French bread : EURO

The French franc was made up of 100 centimes, before being replaced by the euro.

15 Co-star of Netflix’s “The Umbrella Academy” : ELLIOT PAGE

Canadian actor Elliot (formerly “Ellen”) Page came to prominence playing the female lead in the 2007 hit film “Juno”. Page also played the female lead in one of my favorite films of recent time, namely 2010’s “Inception”. Elliot came out as a gay woman in 2014, and then as a trangender man in 2020.

“The Umbrella Academy” is a superhero television show based on Gerard Way’s comic book series of the same name. The title refers to a group of seven children adopted by a billionaire and trained as a crime-fighting team of superheroes.

19 Sitcom that popularized the phrase “What’choo talkin’ ’bout, Willis?” : DIFF’RENT STROKES

The sitcom “Diff’rent Strokes” originally ran from 1978 until 1986. Stars of the show were Gary Coleman and Todd Bridges, who played two relatively poor brothers from Harlem taken in by a wealthy businessman. “Diff’rent Strokes” was known in its day as one of the first comedy shows to tackle so-called “difficult” subjects such as racism, illegal drugs, alcoholism, kidnapping and sexual abuse.

22 Spoken-word performer ___ Scott-Heron : GIL

Gil Scott-Heron was a jazz poet and musician who is best remembered as a spoken word performer from the seventies and eighties. Scott-Heron’s most famous work is the poem and song “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”, the title of which became a popular slogan for the Black Power movements in the sixties.

32 Retailer with the tagline “A Life Outdoors Is a Life Well Lived” : REI

REI is a sporting goods store, with the initialism standing for Recreational Equipment Inc. REI was founded in Seattle by Lloyd and Mary Anderson in 1938 as a cooperative that supplies quality climbing gear to outdoor enthusiasts. The first full-time employee hired by the Andersons was Jim Whittaker, who was the first American to climb Mount Everest.

37 “Lord of the Flies” boy : PIGGY

“Lord of the Flies” is such a great story! William Golding wrote the novel as an allegory of society. The most famous screen adaptation was made in 1963, directed by Peter Brook.

38 Pizza topping : BASIL

Traditionally, basil is considered “the king of herbs”. In fact, the herb’s name comes from the Greek “basileus” meaning “king”.

39 Robin Williams called it “a hideous, gaudy place; it may not be the end of the world per se, but you can certainly see it from there” : LAS VEGAS

Actor and comedian Robin Williams started his performing career as a standup in the San Francisco Bay Area. His big break came when he was cast as an alien named Mork in a 1978 episode of the sitcom “Happy Days”. That led to the spinoff sitcom “Mork & Mindy” that aired from 1978 to 1982. Williams’ first major film role was as the title character in 1980’s “Popeye”. Sadly, Williams committed suicide in 2014.

43 Bump above a belt : OUTIE

The navel is essentially the scar left behind when the umbilical cord is removed from a newborn baby. One interesting use of the umbilicus (navel, belly button) is to differentiate between identical twins, especially when they are very young.

44 One working on a long-distance relationship : CULTURAL ATTACHE

“Attaché” is a French term which literally means “attached”, and is used for a person who is assigned to the administrative staff of some agency or other service. The term is most recognized as it applies to someone assigned to an Ambassador’s staff at an embassy. The word was extended to “attaché case” at the beginning of the twentieth century, meaning a leather case used for carrying papers. I guess that an attaché case might be “attached” to an attaché at an embassy …

55 Windows forerunner, in brief : DOS

MS-DOS (short for “Microsoft Disk Operating System”) was the main operating system used by IBM-compatible PCs in the eighties and for much of the nineties. Microsoft introduced the Windows operating environment in 1985 to sit above MS-DOS as a graphical user interface (GUI). That move was made in response to the success of Apple’s GUI released with the Lisa and Macintosh platforms. A court case ensued, one that was eventually settled in court in favor of Microsoft.

56 Lowdown : SKINNY

The use of the word “skinny”, meaning “information”, comes from WWII military slang for “the truth”. The term is probably a derivative of the expression “the naked truth”, which is evocative of “skinny-dipping”.

57 Man, for one : ISLE

The Isle of Man is a large island located in the middle of the Irish Sea between Great Britain and Ireland. I used to spend a lot of time there in my youth, and find it a very interesting place indeed. The Isle of Man is classed as a British Crown Dependency and isn’t part of the United Kingdom at all. It is self-governing and has its own parliament called the Tynwald. The Tynwald was created in AD 979 and is arguably the oldest continuously-running parliament in the world. The inhabitants of the island speak English, although they do have their own language called Manx, which is very similar to Irish Gaeilge and Scottish Gaelic. And then there are those Manx cats, the ones without any tails. I’ve seen lots of them, and can attest that they are indeed found all over the island.

Down

2 Parent company of Bentley : AUDI

The Bentley is a luxury car that is built in the UK. Bentley Motors was founded in 1919 by W. O. Bentley, and taken over by Rolls Royce in 1931. The company has been owned by Volkswagen since 1998.

4 Doofuses : TOMFOOLS

In Middle English, in the mid-14th century, a mentally deficient man might be referred to as a “Thom Foole”. We retain the old pejorative term in our contemporary word “tomfoolery” meaning “clowning around”.

“Doofus” (also “dufus”) is student slang that has been around since the sixties. Apparently the word is a variant of the equally unattractive term “doo-doo”.

9 Turn upside down, as a Monopoly deed card : MORTGAGE

Our word “mortgage” comes from the Old French “mort gaige” which translated as “dead pledge”. Such an arrangement was so called because the “pledge” to repay “dies” when the debt is cleared.

23 Cinematic friend of Scuttle, Flounder and Sebastian : ARIEL

“The Little Mermaid” is a 1989 animated feature from Disney that is based on the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale of the same name. It tells the story of a mermaid princess named Ariel who falls in love with the human Prince Eric. Ariel’s father is chief merman King Triton. Her best friend is Flounder, who despite his name is not a flounder at all and is actually a tropical fish. Ariel is also friends with Sebastian, a red Jamaican crab whose full name is Horatio Thelonious Ignacious Crustaceous Sebastian.

24 “A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore” quipper : BERRA

Yogi Berra is regarded by many as the greatest catcher ever to play in Major League Baseball, and has to be America’s most celebrated “author” of malapropisms. Here are some great “Yogi-isms”:

• It ain’t over till it’s over.
• 90% of the game is half mental.
• Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.
• When you come to a fork in the road, take it.
• It’s déjà vu all over again.
• Always go to other people’s funerals, otherwise they won’t go to yours.
• A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.

26 Risqué : EDGY

“Risqué” is a French word, the past participle of the verb meaning “to risk”. So in English we use “risqué” to mean “racy”, but in French it means “risky”.

27 Dairy-heavy dessert popular throughout Latin America : TRES LECHES

A tres leches cake is a type of sponge cake that has been soaked in three kinds of milk, in heavy cream, condensed milk and evaporated milk.

31 Baltic capital : RIGA

Riga is the capital city of Latvia. The historical center of Riga is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, declared as such because of the city’s magnificent examples of Art Nouveau architecture. In fact, Riga has the largest collection of Art Nouveau buildings in the world, with over 750 buildings in the city center designed in the style.

35 Style of music with a vihuela and guitarrón : MARIACHI

The name “mariachi”, used for a typically Mexican popular band, is said to be a corruption of the French word for “marriage” (i.e. “mariage”). This perhaps dates back to the times of Napoleon II when France had political and cultural influence over Spain.

A vihuela is a stringed instrument that dates back to the 15th and 16th centuries. The most common vihuela was played in Spain. Shaped like a guitar, the player strummed and plucked six pairs of double-strings. There is a contemporary instrument known as a Mexican vihuela that has five strings and is often featured in mariachi bands.

A guitarrón mexicano is a large guitar that is traditionally played in Mariachi bands. “Guitarrón” is Spanish for “big guitar”.

47 When Macbeth becomes Thane of Cawdor : ACT I

Thanes were Scottish aristocrats. The most famous thanes have to be the Shakespearean characters Macbeth (Thane of Glamis, later “Thane of Cawdor”, and still later “King of Scotland”) and MacDuff (Thane of Fife). Other thanes in “Macbeth” are Ross, Lennox and Angus, as well as Menteith and Caithness.