Tag: Snappy put-down crossword clue

Bill’s time: 6m 27s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Indian royal : RAJAH

“Raja” (also “rajah”) is a word derived from Sanskrit that is used particularly in India for a monarch or princely ruler. The female form is “rani” (also “ranee”) and is used for a raja’s wife.

6 Egypt’s pyramids of ___ : GIZA

Giza is located on the west bank of the Nile, about 20 km southwest of Cairo. The nearby Giza Plateau is home to some of the most amazing ancient monuments on the planet, including the Great Pyramid of Giza and the Great Sphinx.

10 Polluted air : SMOG

“Smog” is a portmanteau formed by melding “smoke” and “fog”. The term was first used to describe the air around London in the early 1900s. Several cities around the world have a reputation of being particularly smoggy. For example, the most smog-plagued city in Latin America is Mexico City, which is located in a highland “bowl” that traps industrial and vehicle pollution.

14 Honda luxury brand : ACURA

Acura is the luxury brand of the Honda Motor Company. As an aside, Infiniti is the equivalent luxury brand for the Nissan Motor Company, and Lexus is the more luxurious version of Toyota’s models.

16 Actress Kathryn of “WandaVision” : HAHN

Kathryn Hahn is an actress and comedian who is perhaps best known for playing grief counselor Lily Lebowski on the crime drama show “Crossing Jordan”. In 2002, Hahn married fellow actor Ethan Sandler who is known for playing Assistant District Attorney Jeffrey Brandau on the same show.

18 James who likes his martinis “shaken, not stirred” : BOND

Why have a vodka martini shaken and not stirred (as does James Bond, 007)? For one thing, the shaken drink tends to be colder. And with more melted ice in the drink, it isn’t as strong. These are my personal observations. No need to write in …

19 Woman’s name that anagrams to GOAL : OLGA

Here are some of my favorite anagrams:

• “Dormitory” and “dirty room”
• “Elvis” and “lives”
• “The eyes” and “they see”
• “Eleven plus two” and “twelve plus one”

20 Instagram upload, for short : PIC

Instagram (often abbreviated to “Insta”) is a photo-sharing application, one that is extremely popular. Instagram started in San Francisco in 2010. Facebook purchased Instagram two years later, paying $1 billion. The billion-dollar Instagram company had just 13 employees at the time of the sale …

24 British noble : EARL

In Britain, there are five ranks of peers. They are duke, marquess, earl, viscount and baron, in descending order.

26 Bug spray ingredient : DEET

“DEET” is short for “N,N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide”, an active ingredient in insect repellents. DEET is most often used to repel mosquitoes by applying it to the skin and/or clothing. It is also used to protect against tick bites.

27 Conger, e.g. : EEL

Conger eels can grow to be very, very large, perhaps up to 10 feet in length.

28 Largest speaker in a sound system, usually : SUBWOOFER

In a sound system, the subwoofer produces the very low end of the sound spectrum.

31 Posh : RITZY

The adjective “ritzy” meaning “high quality and luxurious” derives from the opulent Ritz hotels in New York, London, Paris etc.

No one really knows the etymology of the word “posh”. The popular myth that “posh” is actually an acronym standing for “port out, starboard home” is completely untrue, and is a story that can actually be traced back to the 1968 movie “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang”. The myth is that wealthy British passengers travelling to and from India would book cabins on the port side for the outward journey and the starboard side for the home journey. This trick was supposedly designed to keep their cabins out of the direct sunlight.

33 Jack who pioneered late-night talk : PAAR

Jack Paar was most famous as the host of “The Tonight Show”, from 1957 to 1962. When he died in 2004, “Time” magazine wrote that Paar was “the fellow who split talk show history into two eras: “Before Paar and Below Paar”. Very complimentary …

38 ___ Stone (hieroglyphics key) : ROSETTA

Rosetta is a coastal city and port on the Mediterranean coast of Egypt. The Rosetta Stone is an ancient Egyptian artifact of tremendous importance in deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphics. Carvings on the stone are actually three translations of the same passage of prose, one in Egyptian hieroglyphics, one in Egyptian Demotic language, and one in classical Greek. The stone was discovered by the French military during Napoleon’s 1798 campaign in Egypt. Before the French could get it back to France, the stone somehow ended up in enemy hands (the British), so it is now on display in the British Museum. Ownership of the stone is very much in dispute. The French want it and, understandably, the Egyptians would like it back.

44 Org. with 50+ members : AARP

“AARP” is now the official name for the interest group that used to be called the American Association of Retired Persons. The name change reflects the current focus of the group on all Americans aged 50 or over, as opposed to just people who have retired.

48 Longtime host of “The Price Is Right” : BOB BARKER

Bob Barker is a retired TV host of game shows who is most famous for hosting “The Price Is Right” for 35 years from 1972 to 2007. He retired when he was 83½ years old, having secured the record as the oldest man ever to host a regularly scheduled TV game show. Barker is a celebrated animal rights activist, and became a vegetarian in 1979. He donated $2.5 million to PETA to help establish a new office for the organization in Los Angeles, an office that is now called the Bob Barker Building.

50 University of Tennessee athlete, for short : VOL

The Tennessee Volunteers (the Vols) are the men’s sports teams at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. The women’s teams are the Lady Volunteers.

54 Power user of a popular review site, colloquially : ELITE YELPER

yelp.com is a website that provides a local business directory and reviews of services. The site is sort of like Yellow Pages on steroids, and the term “yelp” is derived from “yel-low p-ages”.

60 Classic theater name : ROXY

The original Roxy Theater opened in 1927 in New York City, and was designed to be the biggest and best “motion picture palace” of the day. The first theater operator was Samuel “Roxy” Rothafel, someone who had a lot of experience in the industry. As part of the deal to entice Rothafel to take the job, the owners offered to name the theater after him.

61 Careen : VEER

The term “careen” dates back to 1590 when it meant “to turn a ship on its side, exposing the keel”. The word evolved from the Middle French word “carene” meaning “keel”. Our modern usage, meaning to lean or tilt, only dates back as far as the 1880s. Careen should not be confused with “career”, a verb meaning to move rapidly. One has to “career” from side-to-side in order to “careen”.

65 Book after II Chronicles : EZRA

Ezra the Scribe, also called “Ezra the Priest”, is the central character in the Book of Ezra in the Hebrew Bible.

66 Oblong tomatoes : ROMAS

The Roma tomato isn’t considered an heirloom variety but it is very popular with home gardeners, especially those gardeners that don’t have a lot of space. It is a bush type (as opposed to vine type) and needs very little room to provide a lot of tomatoes.

67 Fiona or Shrek : OGRE

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

Down

1 A.D.A.-compliant entrance feature : RAMP

Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA)

2 Smoothie berry : ACAI

Açaí (pronounced “ass-aye-ee”) is a palm tree native to Central and South America. The fruit has become very popular in recent years and its juice is a very fashionable addition to juice mixes and smoothies.

5 Big name in board games : HASBRO

The Hasbro toy company was founded in 1923, to sell textile remnants. The founders were Herman, Hillel and Henry Hassenfeld, three brothers and hence the name “Hasbro”. The company diversified into toys in the early forties, with the first real market success being Mr. Potato Head.

6 Comedy’s Kaplan or baseball’s Kapler : GABE

Comedian and actor Gabe Kaplan is known more for his poker playing these days. As an actor, he played the title character in the seventies sitcom “Welcome Back, Kotter”. He started winning poker tournaments in the 1980s, and started working as a TV commentator for poker events in the 1990s.

Gabe Kapler was an MLB outfielder who played professional ball for 13 seasons. He also spent one season playing in Japan, and in 2013 coached the Israeli national baseball team.

9 ___ 3000, one half of rap’s Outkast : ANDRE

André 3000 is the stage name of rap star André Lauren Benjamin from Atlanta, Georgia. André 3000 used to use the name Dré, and was part of the hip-hop duo called OutKast with fellow rapper Big Boi. In 2004 PETA named André 3000 the “World’s Sexiest Vegetarian Celebrity”.

11 Whack-a-mole whacker : MALLET

The Whac-A-Mole arcade game was invented in 1976. Players use a mallet to force five plastic moles back into their holes. Whacking the moles can be so frustrating that we sometimes use the term “whac-a-mole” to describe a repetitive and futile task.

23 Others, in Oaxaca : OTRAS

Oaxaca is a state in the southern part of Mexico on the Pacific coast. The state takes the name of Oaxaca, its largest city.

29 Country with the world’s tallest building, for short : UAE

Burj Khalifa is a spectacular skyscraper in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. It is the tallest man-made structure in the world, and has been so since the completion of its exterior in 2009. The space in the building came onto the market at a really bad time, during the global financial crisis. The building was part of a US$20 billion development of downtown Dubai that was backed by the city government which had to go looking for a bailout from the neighboring city of Abu Dhabi. The tower was given the name Burj Khalifa at the last minute, apparently as a nod to UAE President Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan who helped to broker the bailout.

30 Furbys or fidget spinners, once : FAD

Furbys are little electronic robot toys that were all the rage around Christmas 1998 and the following year. Furbys retailed at about $35 but folks often paid several hundred dollars to get a hold of one.

A fidget spinner is a toy that supposedly can be used for stress relief. Sales of fidget spinners really took off in 2017, although versions of the toy existed back in the early nineties.

41 Earth Day’s mo. : APR

Earth Day was founded in the US, where it was introduced by Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin. Earth Day was designed to increase awareness and appreciation of our planet’s natural environment. The original Earth Day was on April 22nd, 1970. Decades later, the day is observed in over 175 countries.

46 Run out to catch a deep pass : GO LONG

That would be football.

47 Magic potion : ELIXIR

An elixir is a solution of alcohol and water that is used to deliver a medicine. The term “elixir” can also be used to mean a medicine that has the power to cure all ills.

49 Northern lights phenomenon : AURORA

The spectacular aurora phenomenon is seen lighting up the night sky at both poles of the earth (the Aurora Borealis in the north, and the Aurora Australis in the south). The eerie effect is caused by charged particles colliding with atoms at high latitudes.

56 Baby carriage, to Brits : PRAM

Another word used in the UK that’s rarely used over here is “pram”, which in my day was the most common term for what is called a “baby carriage” in the US. “Pram” is short for “perambulator”.

58 Country across the Persian Gulf from the 29-Down : IRAN
(29D Country with the world’s tallest building, for short : UAE)

The Persian Gulf is in effect an inland sea, although it technically is an offshoot of the Indian Ocean. The outlet from the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean is one of the most famous maritime “choke points” in the world, and is known as the Strait of Hormuz. About 20% of the world’s supply of petroleum passes through the Strait of Hormuz.