Tag: Tying packages securing helium balloons etc.? crossword clue

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Constructed by: Byron Walden
Edited by: Will Shortz

Today’s Theme: Character Building

Themed answers are common phrases in which the first word has had a letter (CHARACTER) inserted. Additionally, altered words BUILD on the prior altered word as we progress from answer to answer, down the grid. We start BUILDING with “IN” and end up with “STARTLING”.

• 23A. Equally pensive? : IN THOUGHT AS MUCH (from “I thought as much”)
• 30A. Commit a peccadillo? : SIN SOME SMALL WAY (from “in some small way”)
• 47A. Perform the hit “Things I Should Have Said”? : SING OF OMISSION (from “sin of omission”)
• 55A. The Police frontman filming a shampoo commercial? : STING IN THE SHOWER (from “sing in the shower”)
• 66A. Tying packages, securing helium balloons, etc.? : STRING OPERATIONS (from “sting operations”)
• 77A. The Beatles showing absolute amazement? : STARING QUARTET (from “string quartet”)
• 93A. First weapons used in a knife fight? : STARTING DAGGERS (from “staring daggers”)
• 105A. Surprising group of suspects? : STARTLING LINEUP (from “starting lineup”)

Bill’s time: 24m 38s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1. Where Napoleon died in exile : ST HELENA

The island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic is one of the most remote islands in the world. It was discovered by Galician explorer João da Nova, who was sailing under the Portuguese flag. He name the island after Helena of Constantinople, mother of Roman Emperor Constantine the Great. Famously, the British opted to exile Napoleon on Saint Helena soon after his defeat at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. The former French emperor died on the island in 1821.

15. Assails with emails : SPAMS

The term “spam”, used for unwanted email, is taken from a “Monty Python” sketch. In the sketch (which I’ve seen) the dialog is taken over by the word Spam, a play on the glut of canned meat in the markets of Britain after WWII. So “spam” is used for the glut of emails that takes over online communication. I can just imagine nerdy Internet types (like me) adopting something from a “Monty Python” sketch to describe an online phenomenon …

21. Demi with the 2012 hit “Give Your Heart a Break” : LOVATO

Pop and R&B singer Demi Lovato started her performing career as a child actress, playing Angela on the kids TV show “Barney & Friends” from 2002 to 2004. When she was all grown up, Levato served as a judge on “The X Factor” from 2012 to 2013, and soon after had the recurring role of Dani on “Glee”.

22. Droid with a holographic projector, informally : ARTOO

Artoo’s proper name is R2-D2. R2-D2 is the smaller of the two famous droids from the “Star Wars” movies. British actor Kenny Baker, who stood just 3 ft 8 ins tall, was the man inside the R2-D2 droid for the first six of the “Star Wars” movies.

In the first “Star Wars” movie, Princess Leia hides plans for the Galactic Empire’s Death Star in the droid named R2-D2. She also records a holographic message, so when it is played we can see Princess Leia as a hologram, asking for help to destroy the Death Star:

I have placed information vital to the survival of the Rebellion into the memory systems of this R2 unit. My father will know how to retrieve it. You must see this droid safely delivered to him on Alderaan. This is our most desperate hour. Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You’re my only hope.

26. Foldable beds : FUTONS

Anyone lucky enough to have visited Japan might be familiar with the traditional Japanese futon. Unlike what we tend to call futon in this country, the Japanese original is a padded mattress and quilt. Japanese futons are usually rolled up in the morning so that the space used for sleeping can be repurposed during the day.

27. Witticism : BON MOT

“Bon mot” translates from French as “good word”. We use “bon mot” (and sometimes just “mot”) to mean “quip, witticism”.

28. Canada’s largest brewer : LABATT

The Labatt Brewing Company is the largest brewer in Canada. The company was founded by John K. Labatt in London, Ontario in 1847.

29. Daschle’s successor as Senate majority leader : FRIST

Bill Frist was Senate Majority Leader for the Republican Party from 2003 to 2007. Prior to becoming a politician, Frist was a heart and lung transplant surgeon. He has also been a pilot since he was 16-years-old, and has run seven marathons.

33. Mo. with Constitution Day : SEP

Constitution Day in the US is observed on September 17 every year. September 17 was the day that the Constitutional Convention signed the Constitution in 1787. Prior to 2004, the holiday was known as Citizenship Day.

34. “___ calling” : AVON

In 1886, a young man called David McConnell was selling books door-to-door. To enhance his sales numbers he was giving out free perfume to the ladies of the houses that he visited. Seeing as his perfume was more popular than his books, he founded the California Perfume Company in New York City and started manufacturing and selling across the country. The company name was changed to Avon in 1939, and the famous “Avon Calling” marketing campaign was launched in 1954.

36. Irish “John” : SEAN

The name “John” translates into Scottish as “Ian”, into Russian as “Ivan”, into Italian as “Giovanni”, and into Irish as “Seán”.

37. Part of E.S.L.: Abbr. : ENG

English as a Second Language (ESL) is sometimes referred to as English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and English as a Foreign Language (EFL).

43. 1980s-2000s Texas senator Phil : GRAMM

US Senator Phil Gramm of Texas entered congress in 1979 as a Democratic congressman. Gramm’s voting record was consistently conservative, despite his party affiliation, and this contributed to his being thrown off the House Budget Committee in 1983. Gramm responded by resigning his seat in the House, and then stood as a Republican in a special election for that same seat. Gramm won back his place in Congress, and the following year was elected (again as a Republican) to the US Senate.

52. Symbol over 9 or 0 on a keyboard, for short : PAREN

Parenthesis (paren.)

55. The Police frontman filming a shampoo commercial? : STING IN THE SHOWER (from “sing in the shower”)

“Sting” is the stage name used by Gordon Sumner, who came to fame initially as the lead singer for the Police. Off stage, Sting is an avid chess player, and he once participated in an exhibition game with chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov.

The Police were a trio formed in London in 1977, with Sting being the most famous member and the lead singer. The band’s long list of hits includes “Roxanne” (1977), “Message in a Bottle” (1979), “Walking on the Moon” (1979) and “Every Breath You Take” (1983). The Police broke up in 1986, but their reunion tour of 2007/2008 made them the world’s highest-earning musicians for the year 2008.

60. Golden State, informally : CALI

“Golden State” has been the official nickname of California since 1968. The nickname reflects the expansion of the state’s economy that followed the discovery of gold in 1848, and also the fields of golden poppies seen growing wild across California in the spring.

62. Whimsical : FEY

“Fey” is such a lovely word, meaning magical or fairy-like. It comes from the Middle English word “feie” which has a less pleasant definition, “fated to die”. The term has been extended over the past century to mean “effeminate”.

76. Throng : HORDE

A “horde” is a large crowd. “Horde” ultimately derives from the Turkish “ordu” that means “camp, army”.

77. The Beatles showing absolute amazement? : STARING QUARTET (from “string quartet”)

The Beatles were described on the sleeve notes of their 1963 album “With the Beatles” as the “fabulous foursome”. The press picked up on the phrase and morphed it into “the Fab Four”.

82. Ketel One rival, familiarly : STOLI

Stolichnaya is a brand of Russian vodka made from wheat and rye grain. Well, “Stoli” originated in Russia but now it’s made in Latvia, which is of course a completely different country, so you won’t see the word “Russian” on the label.

Ketel One is a brand of vodka from the Netherlands. The vodka is distilled from wheat in copper pot stills, and “ketel” is Dutch for “pot still”.

85. “The Walking Dead” channel : AMC

“The Walking Dead” is a horror television show that is made by AMC that is based on a comic book series of the same name. There are lots of flesh-eating zombies featured, so I won’t be caught “dead” watching it …

87. Headey of “Game of Thrones” : LENA

English actress Lena Headey is best known for playing Cersei Lannister on the fantasy series “Game of Thrones”. Although a British citizen, Headey was actually born in Bermuda, where her father was stationed as a police officer.

89. Salon offering, familiarly : PEDI

Pedicure (pedi)

99. Yoga pose : ASANA

“Asana” is a Sanskrit word literally meaning “sitting down”. The asanas are the poses that a practitioner of yoga assumes. The most famous is the lotus position, the cross-legged pose called “padmasana”.

101. Oxygen-reliant organism : AEROBE

An aerobe is an organism that lives in an environment rich in oxygen. An anaerobe, on the other hand, does not require oxygen for survival.

103. Jungian souls : ANIMAS

The concepts of anima and animus are found in the Carl Jung school of analytical psychology. The idea is that within each male there resides a feminine inner personality called the anima, and within each female there is a male inner personality known as the animus.

104. Disney bear : BALOO

“The Jungle Book” by Rudyard Kipling was originally published in 1894, and is a collection of adventure stories or fables featuring the animals of the jungle and a young boy named Mowgli. Baloo is a sloth bear who teaches the cubs of a wolf pack the Law of the Jungle. His most challenging pupil however is no lupine, but rather the man-cub Mowgli.

111. “Walk Away ___” (1966 hit) : RENEE

“Walk Away Renée” is a hit song by the band called the Left Banke that was released in 1966. It was composed by the band’s keyboard player, Michael Brown, when he was just 16-years-old.

113. “The 15:17 to Paris” director, 2018 : EASTWOOD

The actor and director Clint Eastwood is a native of San Francisco, California. As many of us perhaps remember, Eastwood’s big break was playing the supporting role of Rowdy Yates in the TV show “Rawhide” in the late fifties and early sixties. He then became the face of the spaghetti western genre of movie in the sixties, most notably in the classic “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”. In later years Eastwood has branched out into directing and producing with remarkable success. And of course in the late eighties he also served as mayor of his hometown, Carmel-by-the-Sea.

Down

6. Tridactyl birds : EMUS

An animal that is tridactyl has three fingers or three toes.

7. Blood type modifier, for short : NEG

The most important grouping of blood types is the ABO system. Blood is classified as either A, B, AB or O, depending on the type of antigens on the surface of the red blood cells. A secondary designation of blood is the Rh factor, in which other antigens are labelled as either positive or negative. When a patient receives a blood transfusion, ideally the donor blood should be the same type as that of the recipient, as incompatible blood cells can be rejected. However, blood type O-neg can be accepted by recipients with all blood types, A, B, AB or O, and positive or negative. Hence someone with O-neg blood type is called a universal donor.

9. Astronauts Bean and Shepard : ALANS

Alan Bean is a former astronaut. Bean was the fourth man to walk on the moon, roaming the moon’s surface with Pete Conrad as part of the Apollo 12 mission. Bean resigned from NASA in 1981 and turned to painting. He is the only artist in the world to have incorporated real moon dust into his works.

Alan Shepard was the first American in space. Shepard’s flight was originally scheduled for October 1960 but a series of delays pushed it out till May 5, 1961. Yuri Gagarin made his celebrated flight on April 12, 1961, just one one month earlier, winning that part of the Space Race for the Soviets. A decade later, Shepard went into space again at the age of 47, as commander of Apollo 14. He was the fifth man to walk on the moon, and indeed the oldest. Shepard was also the only one of the Mercury Seven team to make it to the moon. Famously, he drove two golf balls while on the lunar surface.

10. Mag featuring “Fun Fearless Females” : COSMO

“Cosmopolitan” magazine was first published way back in 1886! It started out life as a family magazine, then as a literary publication. “Cosmo” took its present form as a women’s magazine in the sixties.

11. Clair Huxtable or Peg Bundy : TV MOM

Phylicia Rashād is an actress, best-known for playing Clair Huxtable (wife of Cliff Huxtable, Bill cosby’s character) on “The Cosby Show”.

Katey Sagal played Peggy Bundy on “Married … with Children”. Later she took over as star of the show “8 Simple Rules” in the middle of its run, when John Ritter passed away unexpectedly in 2003. More recently, Sagal appeared on the FX drama “Sons of Anarchy”. In 2004, she married Kurt Sutter who created the “Sons of Anarchy” series.

12. Browns : SAUTES

“Sauté” is a French word. The literal translation from the French is “jumped” or “bounced”, a reference to the tossing of food while cooking it in a frying pan.

13. Nonprescription, briefly : OTC

Over-the-counter (OTC) drugs don’t need a prescription (Rx).

14. Drama with many fans : NOH

Noh is a form of musical drama in Japan that has been around since the 14th century. Many of the Noh performers are masked, allowing all the roles to be played by men, including the female parts.

18. Beginning of the German workweek : MONTAG

In Germany, the workweek begins on “Montag” (Monday) and ends on “Freitag” (Friday).

28. Island veranda : LANAI

A lanai is a type of veranda, and a design that originated in Hawaii. A kind blog reader tells me that the etymology of “lanai” seems unclear, but that the island name of “Lana’i” is not related.

30. Barfly : SOT

Our word “sot” comes from the Old English “sott”, meaning “fool”. The word “sot” started to be associated with alcohol and not just foolery in the late 1500s.

31. Kind of lily : SEGO

The sego lily is the state flower of Utah, and is a perennial plant found throughout the Western United States.

32. School closing? : -MARM

“Marm” is short for “schoolmarm”, a quaint term for a female teacher.

35. Snapchat posting, for short : VID

Snapchat is a messaging system that allows users to send photos and video clips to a limited list of recipients. The photos and clips, called “snaps”, can be viewed for only a few seconds before they are deleted from the recipient’s device, and from the Snapchat servers.

38. One seeing ghosts : EBENEZER SCROOGE

Jacob Marley is a character appearing in the wonderful novella by Charles Dickens called “A Christmas Carol”. Marley is the deceased business partner of Ebenezer Scrooge who appears to him as a ghost.

40. Michael who wrote “The Neverending Story” : ENDE

Michael Ende was a children’s author from Germany. His most famous novel is the fantasy work titled “The Neverending Story”, first published in 1979.

41. Things that clash in Washington : EGOS

True that …

44. “No ___” : MSG

Monosodium glutamate (MSG) is the sodium salt of a naturally-occurring,non-essential amino acid called glutamic acid. It is used widely as a flavor enhancer, particularly in many Asian cuisines. Whether or not it is harmful seems to be still under debate. I say that something produced in a test tube shouldn’t be in our food …

46. The 48th star : ARIZONA

Arizona was admitted as a Confederate Territory in February 1862, in a declaration signed by Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Almost exactly 50 years later, Arizona became the 48th state of the Union, on Valentine’s Day in 1912.

47. Woodland god : SATYR

The satyrs of Greek mythology came with a very high sex drive. They are the “rude” male subjects drawn on the side of old Greek vases. The nubile maidens known as nymphs were often an object of attention for the satyrs.

50. The Theme Park Capital of the World : ORLANDO

Orlando in Central Florida is the largest inland city in the state. Orlando was the most visited cities in the US in 2009. That’s mainly because it is home to many theme parks, including Walt Disney World, Universal Studios Florida and SeaWorld. Orlando has a few nicknames, including “O-Town” and “Theme Park Capital of the World”.

51. German border river : NEISSE

There are three significant rivers with the name Niesse in Europe. The longest of these is referred to as the Lusatian Neisse as it passes through the region of Lusatia. The river was used to define part of the border between Germany and Poland after WWII in the Potsdam Agreement of 1945.

The Oder-Neisse line is the border between Germany and Poland, a border that was established at the end of WWII. The border runs along the Oder and Lusatian Neisse rivers.

53. Tech news website : CNET

c|net is an excellent technology website. c|net started out in 1994 as a television network specializing in technology news. The host of “American Idol”, Ryan Seacrest, started off his career as host of a c|net show.

57. Take with force : WREST

The verb “to wrest” can mean to obtain by violent twisting and pulling. The term comes from the Middle English “wresten” meaning “to twist”. Our word “wrestling” has the same etymology.

59. Messenger ___ : RNA

Ribonucleic Acid (RNA) is an essential catalyst in the manufacture of proteins in the body. The genetic code in DNA determines the sequence of amino acids that make up each protein. That sequence is read in DNA by messenger RNA, and amino acids are delivered for protein manufacture in the correct sequence by what is called transfer RNA. The amino acids are then formed into proteins by ribosomal RNA.

67. Post-op stop : ICU

Many a hospital (hosp.) includes an intensive care unit (ICU).

68. One releasing a dove in the Bible : NOAH

According to the Book of Genesis, Noah lived to a ripe old age. Noah fathered his three sons Shem, Ham and Japheth when he was 500 years old, and the Great Flood took place when he was 600.

69. Food truck menu item : GYRO

A gyro is a traditional Greek dish of meat roasted on a tall vertical spit that is sliced from the spit as required. Gyros are usually served inside a lightly grilled piece of pita bread, along with tomato, onion and tzatziki (a yogurt and cucumber sauce).

72. Film for which Adrien Brody won Best Actor : THE PIANIST

“The Pianist” is a memoir of Wladyslaw Szpilman, a Polish musician of Jewish heritage and a survivor of the Holocaust. The memoir was not written by Szpilman himself, but by author Jerzy Waldorff who interviewed him and became his friend. The memoir was first published in 1946 in Poland under the title “Death of a City”, but lay unnoticed for decades. It was republished in English in 1998 under the title “The Pianist”, and became widely read. Roman Polanski then directed a 2002 screen version using “The Pianist” as a title. Sadly, Szpilman died during the making of the film and never saw the great success the movie achieved, including three Academy Awards.

Adrien Brody won an Oscar for Best Actor for his performance in the Roman Polanski masterpiece “The Pianist”. Brody won the award in 2003 at the age of 29, making him the youngest person ever to receive the Best Actor Oscar.

79. Verdant spot : GLEN

Back in the late 1500s, “verdant” simply meant “green”, but we now tend to use the term to mean “green and lush with vegetation”. “Viridis” is the Latin for “green”.

80. Last Chinese dynasty : QING

The Qing Dynasty, also known as the Manchu Dynasty, lasted from 1644 to 1912. By the early 1900s, civil unrest was growing. Empress Dowager Cixi made changes in government designed to improve the social situation in China, but it was too late. The Wuchang Uprising of 1911 led to the formation of a new central government called the Republic of China, and over the coming months provinces switched their loyalty from the Qing Empire to the new Republic.

84. “___ Just Not That Into You” (2009 rom-com) : HE’S

“He’s Just Not That Into You” is a line of dialog from the HBO television series “Sex and the City”. The line was lifted and used as the title of a self-help book published in 2004. The book was adapted into a 2009 romantic comedy film with an ensemble cast that includes Ben Affleck, Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore and Scarlett Johansson. Haven’t seen it …

86. Catch in “The Old Man and the Sea” : MARLIN

The fish called a marlin takes its name from the sailor’s took called a marlinspike. The long nose of the marlin might indeed be described as a “spike”. A marlinspike is used by sailors when working with rope, untying knots or perhaps splicing. The name of the tool comes from the practice of “marling”, which is the winding of twine around the ends of a larger piece of rope to prevent it from unravelling.

If you’ve read Ernest Hemingway’s “The Old Man And The Sea” (maybe first at school, like me!) you’ll likely remember it as a quick read as it is a novella, although it might be better described as a “long short story”. It was first published in 1952, the last major work that Hemingway had published in his lifetime. That first publication was as a story in “Life Magazine”, and it was such a hit that the magazine sold 5 million copies in the first two days. “The Old Man and the Sea” won a Pulitzer in 1952 and two years later the title was cited when Hemingway was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

88. Title family name in old TV : ADDAMS

Chas Addams was a cartoonist. Addams didn’t draw a cartoon strip but rather individual cartoons, although many of his cartoons did feature regular characters. His most famous characters were the members of the Addams Family, who were published in single-panel cartoons between 1938 and 1988 in “The New Yorker”. The Addams Family moved onto the small and big screens starting in 1964.

89. Hawthorne heroine : PRYNNE

The main character in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel “The Scarlet Letter” is Hester Prynne. After the birth of her illegitimate daughter Pearl, she is convicted by her puritanical neighbors of the crime of adultery. Hester is forced to wear a scarlet “A” (for “adultery”) on her clothing for the rest of her life, hence the novel’s title “The Scarlet Letter”.

93. Cossack weapon : SABER

The cossacks are a people who lived in communities that are now in Southern Russia and Ukraine.

94. Crash into the side of, informally : T-BONE

A broadside collision between two cars is also known as a right-angle or t-bone collision. The side of one vehicle is impacted by the front of another, often leaving the vehicles locked in a T-formation.

97. Fancy soirees : GALAS

“Soir” is the French word for “evening” and a “soirée” is an “evening party”. The French word “soirée” has an acute accent over the first “e”, but we tend to drop this when using the word in English.

98. Old record co. conglomerate : EMI

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

100. Strength : 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.

103. Celebrated boxing family : ALIS

Muhammad Ali won 56 professional fights, 37 of which were knockouts. He lost 5 fights, 4 being decisions and one being a technical knockout (TKO). The TKO-loss was Ali’s second-last fight, against Larry Holmes. By the time Ali took on Holmes, he was already showing signs of Parkinson’s Syndrome, although the diagnosis would not come until four years later.

Laila Ali is the daughter of the great Muhammad Ali and is a very capable boxer in her own right. Laila’s professional record is an impressive 24 wins, including 21 knockouts. Now retired, she never lost a fight, and nor did she ever draw. One of those victories was against Jackie Frazier-Lyde, daughter of her father’s nemesis Joe Frazier. Laila is not a bad dancer either, coming in third place in the fourth season of “Dancing with the Stars”.

105. Edamame source : SOY

Edamame is a simple dish made of immature soybeans still in the pod. The pods are boiled and then salted before serving, usually as a snack or side dish. The name “edamame” translates as “twig bean”.

106. Alternative to café : THE

In French, a “tasse” (cup) might contain perhaps “thé” (tea) or “café” (coffee).