Constructed by: Alexander Liebeskind
Edited by: Joel Fagliano
Not your puzzle? Try today’s …
… syndicated NY Times crossword
Today’s Reveal Answer: You’ll Pay for This
Themed answers each end with something that YOU’LL PAY FOR:
- 59A Cry from someone seeking revenge … or a hint to the ends of 16-, 22-, 37- and 49-Across : YOU’LL PAY FOR THIS
- 16A Sentence that often appears in the first paragraph of an essay : THESIS STATEMENT
- 22A Quick confirmation of feasibility : SANITY CHECK
- 37A Dose for an LSD trip : ACID TAB
- 49A Football player in upstate New York : BUFFALO BILL
Read on, or jump to …
… a complete list of answers
Want to discuss the puzzle? Then …
… leave a comment
Bill’s time: 6m 25s
Bill’s errors: 0
Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies
Across
1 Wheel’s place on a ship : HELM
In its broadest sense, the term “helm” describes the whole of a ship’s steering mechanism, including the rudder and tiller. In a more specific sense, the helm is the handle, tiller or wheel that is used to control the steering gear.
5 It beats a high card but nothing else : PAIR
That would be poker.
9 Activist Parks : ROSA
Rosa Parks was one of a cadre of brave women in days gone by who refused to give up their seats on a bus to white women. It was the stand taken by Rosa Parks on December 1, 1955 that sparked the Montgomery, Alabama Bus Boycott. President Clinton presented Ms. Parks with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996. When she died in 2005, Rosa Parks became the first ever woman to have her body lie in honor in the US Capitol Rotunda.
13 Elder Obama daughter : MALIA
Malia Obama is the eldest of Barack and Michelle Obama’s two daughters. She graduated from the private Sidwell Friends School in Washington, D.C., the same school that Chelsea Clinton attended. Malia took a gap year after leaving high school, and spent the 2016 summer as an intern in the US Embassy in Madrid, before heading off to Harvard in 2017.
14 New York Times opinion writer Klein : EZRA
Ezra Klein is a journalist and blogger who writes for “The Washington Post”, “Bloomberg” and “MSNBC”. Klein’s contribution at “The Washington Post” is the most-read blog that the paper publishes.
15 The “Iliad,” for one : EPIC
“Iliad” is an epic poem by the Greek poet Homer that tells the story of the ten-year siege of “Ilium” (i.e. “Troy”) during the Trojan war. “The Odyssey”, also attributed to Homer, is sometimes described as a sequel to “Iliad”.
19 Mover’s vehicle : VAN
The vehicle we call a “van” takes its name from “caravan”, and so “van” is a shortened version of the older term. Back in the 1600s, a caravan was a covered cart. We still use the word “caravan” in Ireland to describe what we call a “mobile home” or “recreational vehicle” here in the US.
20 Shoe brand named for a Greek goddess : NIKE
Nike was the Greek goddess of victory, and was often referred to as “the Winged Goddess of Victory”. The athletic shoe company Nike uses the “Nike swoosh” as its logo, a logo that is inspired by the goddess’ wing.
21 Loses on purpose, as an N.B.A. team : TANKS
Apparently, the first use of the verb “to tank” to mean “to lose or fail” can be pinpointed quite precisely. Tennis great Billie Jean King used the verb in that sense in an interview with “Life” magazine in 1967, with reference to male players. A more specific use of “tanking” in recent years is “deliberately losing” a contest.
27 Massachusetts college town : AMHERST
The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass) is the largest public university in New England. UMass was founded back in 1863, although it took a while to get the school into service. Construction work was delayed and the college went through two presidents before William S. Clark took charge. He cracked the whip, completed the construction and enrolled the first students in the same year that he took over the reins, in 1867. As a result, although Clark was the third President of UMass, he is regarded by most as the school’s founding father.
37 Dose for an LSD trip : ACID TAB
The drug LSD is often sold impregnated into blotting paper. The paper blotter is usually divided into squares with ¼-inch sides, with each square referred to as a “tab”.
40 Jerry’s foe in old cartoons : TOM
“Tom and Jerry” is a series of cartoons produced by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera starting in 1940. These short films feature Tom Cat and Jerry Mouse who are always going at it, with Jerry usually emerging victorious.
41 Fastidious to a fault : ANAL
The use of the word “anal” to mean “stiffly conventional” is an abbreviated form of “anal-retentive”, a term derived from Freudian psychology. Regardless, I’m not a big fan of the term …
46 Classic ice cream order : VANILLA
The flavor extract that we call “vanilla” comes from the pod-like fruit of climbing orchids belonging to the genus Vanilla. Genuine vanilla is a relatively expensive spice, second only to saffron, due to the amount of work required to grow and harvest the fruit (also called “beans” and “pods”). Spanish and Portuguese explorers came across the Vanilla orchid while exploring the Gulf Coast of Mexico. They gave it the name “vainilla” meaning “little pod”.
49 Football player in upstate New York : BUFFALO BILL
The Buffalo Bills NFL team, founded in 1959, was named after an earlier team with the same name that had merged with the Cleveland Browns back in 1950. The “Bills” name was obviously popular with fans, as the name was chosen in a public contest. The older team had been named for “Buffalo Bill” Cody. The team mascot is Billy Buffalo, and the cheerleaders are known as the Buffalo Jills.
53 Animal in “Happy hump day!” memes : CAMEL
Perhaps the most distinctive feature of a camel is the large deposit of fatty tissue on its back. The dromedary is the most common camel, and has one hump of fatty tissue on its back. The Bactrian camel has two humps, and makes up just 6% of the world’s camel population. Those fatty humps are useful if no food or water is available, as fat can be broken down into water and energy.
The phrase “hump day” is very North American. It refers to Wednesday, which is the middle day (the hump) of a typical work week.
57 Not worth a ___ : SOU
A sou is an old French coin. We use the term “sou” to mean “practically worthless amount”.
64 A panda’s is 99% bamboo : DIET
The giant panda is a bear, and so has the digestive system of a carnivore. However, the panda lives exclusively on bamboo, even though its gut is relatively poorly adapted to extract nutrients from plants per se. The panda relies on microbes in its gut to digest cellulose, and consumes 20-30 pounds of bamboo each day to gain enough nourishment.
67 The “A” of M.F.A. : ARTS
Master of Fine Arts (MFA)
Down
2 Supreme Court justice appointed by Barack Obama : ELENA KAGANElena Kagan was the Solicitor General of the United States who replaced Justice John Paul Stevens on the US Supreme Court. That made Justice Kagan the first female US Solicitor General and the fourth female US Supreme Court justice. I hear she is a fan of Jane Austen, and used to reread “Pride and Prejudice” once a year. Not a bad thing to do, I’d say …
3 Fleur-de-___ : LIS
“Lys” (sometimes “lis”) is the French word for “lily” as in “fleur-de-lys”, the heraldic symbol often associated with the French monarchy.
6 Empire whose capital city was Tenochtitlán : AZTEC
The Aztec people of Central America dominated the region in the 14th – 16th centuries. Two traits of the Aztec people are oft cited today. They built some magnificent pyramids, and they also engaged in human sacrifice. The two traits were linked in a way … for the consecration of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan, 84,400 prisoners were sacrificed over a period of four days.
7 NPR host Glass : IRA
Ira Glass is a well-respected presenter on American Public Radio who is perhaps best known for his show “This American Life”. I was interested to learn that one of my favorite composers, Philip Glass, is Ira’s first cousin.
8 Tattle (on) : RAT
Something described as tattletale is revealing, it gives away a secret. The term is a combination of “tattle” and “tale”, and is probably patterned on the similar word “telltale”. “To tattle” means “to tell secrets”, and the noun “tattletale” applies to someone who tells secrets and informs.
13 Cable channel that first showed “Beavis and Butt-head” : MTV
“Beavis and Butthead” is an animated TV show, one that I don’t watch …
18 ___ A Sketch (classic toy) : ETCH
Etch A Sketch was introduced in 1960. The toy was developed in France by inventor André Cassagnes, who initially named it “L’Écran Magique” (The Magic Screen).
23 Zilch : NIL
We use the term “zilch” to mean “nothing”. Our current usage evolved in the sixties, before which the term was used to describe “meaningless speech”. There was a comic character called Mr. Zilch in the 1930s in “Ballyhoo” magazine. Mr. Zilch’s name probably came from the American college slang “Joe Zilch” that was used in the early 1900s for “an insignificant person”.
25 Actress Watson : EMMA
Actress Emma Watson is best known for her role as Hermione Granger in the “Harry Potter” film series, which she started at the age of 11. Watson is a highly educated individual, having graduated from Brown University with a bachelor’s degree in English literature. She has also studied at Oxford University and has been recognized for her academic achievements. She is also a talented musician and has played the guitar and the piano in several films.
29 Pollution that can change the colors of a sunset : 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.
31 Balkan native : SLAV
The Slavic peoples are in the majority in communities covering over half of Europe. This large ethnic group is traditionally broken down into three smaller groups:
- the West Slavic (including Czechs and Poles)
- the East Slavic (including Russians and Ukrainians)
- the South Slavic (including Bulgarians, Croats and Serbs)
The Balkan Peninsula in Southeast Europe is usually referred to as “the Balkans”. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains located in present-day Bulgaria and Serbia. “Balkan” is Bulgarian for “mountain”.
32 Yellowfin or bluefin : TUNA
There are 15 species of tuna, the size of which varies greatly. The smallest is the bullet tuna, which can grow to about 4 pounds in weight and just over 1½ feet in length. The Atlantic bluefin tuna can weigh over 1,500 pounds, and reach about 15 feet in length. That’s a lot of tuna …
33 Rice dish : PILAF
“Pilaf” is a Persian word, one that we use to describe rice that is browned in oil and then cooked in a seasoned broth. It can also be called “pilau”.
34 Early computer scientist Lovelace : ADA
Ada Lovelace’s real name and title was Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace. She was the only legitimate child of Lord Byron, the poet. Lovelace was fascinated by mathematics and wrote about the work done by Charles Babbage in building his groundbreaking mechanical computer. In some of her notes, she proposed an algorithm for Babbage’s machine to compute Bernoulli numbers. This algorithm is recognized by many as the world’s first computer program and so Lovelace is sometimes called the first “computer programmer”. There is a computer language called “Ada” that was named in her honor. The Ada language was developed from 1977 to 1983 for the US Department of Defense.
45 Sat. preceder : FRI
The name “Friday” comes from an Old English word meaning “day of Frigg”. Frigg was a goddess from Norse mythology who was usually depicted as the wife of Odin.
53 The “C” of a printer’s CMYK : CYAN
“Cyan” is short for “cyan blue”. The term comes from the Greek word “kyanos” meaning “dark blue, the color of lapis lazuli”.
Four-color printing uses four different color inks: cyan, magenta, yellow and black. The black ink is also known as the “key”. The first letter of the colors (with black being ”key”) give the more common name for four-color printing, namely CMYK.
60 Kissing on the street, e.g., for short : PDA
Public display of affection (PDA)
61 It’s almost 80% nitrogen : AIR
The chemical element nitrogen (atomic number 7) was first isolated and discovered by Scottish physician and chemist Daniel Rutherford in 1772. Rutherford did not identify nitrogen as an element, but isolated it as a gaseous component of air that did not support combustion, and that he called “noxious air”.
Read on, or …
… return to top of page
Complete List of Clues/Answers
Across
1 Wheel’s place on a ship : HELM
5 It beats a high card but nothing else : PAIR
9 Activist Parks : ROSA
13 Elder Obama daughter : MALIA
14 New York Times opinion writer Klein : EZRA
15 The “Iliad,” for one : EPIC
16 Sentence that often appears in the first paragraph of an essay : THESIS STATEMENT
19 Mover’s vehicle : VAN
20 Shoe brand named for a Greek goddess : NIKE
21 Loses on purpose, as an N.B.A. team : TANKS
22 Quick confirmation of feasibility : SANITY CHECK
26 Jokes around : KIDS
27 Massachusetts college town : AMHERST
31 Overused and uncreative : STALE
33 Part of the hand : PALM
35 Kinda : SEMI
36 Carry (around) : LUG
37 Dose for an LSD trip : ACID TAB
40 Jerry’s foe in old cartoons : TOM
41 Fastidious to a fault : ANAL
43 “Sadly …” : ALAS …
44 Old enough : OF AGE
46 Classic ice cream order : VANILLA
48 Doughnut shapes : TORI
49 Football player in upstate New York : BUFFALO BILL
53 Animal in “Happy hump day!” memes : CAMEL
56 iPhone assistant : SIRI
57 Not worth a ___ : SOU
59 Cry from someone seeking revenge … or a hint to the ends of 16-, 22-, 37- and 49-Across : YOU’LL PAY FOR THIS!
63 Poker buy-in : ANTE
64 A panda’s is 99% bamboo : DIET
65 Remote-controlled flier : DRONE
66 Must have : NEED
67 The “A” of M.F.A. : ARTS
68 Little drinks : SIPS
Down
1 Laughing sounds : HA HAS
2 Supreme Court justice appointed by Barack Obama : ELENA KAGAN
3 Fleur-de-___ : LIS
4 Key point : MAIN IDEA
5 Irksome : PESKY
6 Empire whose capital city was Tenochtitlán : AZTEC
7 NPR host Glass : IRA
8 Tattle (on) : RAT
9 2023’s “Fatal Attraction” and “The Little Mermaid” : REMAKES
10 Word before ended, handed or minded : OPEN-
11 Drop in the ocean? : SINK
12 Laws passed by Congress : ACTS
13 Cable channel that first showed “Beavis and Butt-head” : MTV
17 Plops oneself down : SITS
18 ___ A Sketch (classic toy) : ETCH
23 Zilch : NIL
24 Ceases : HALTS
25 Actress Watson : EMMA
28 Mom-and-pop store, e.g. : RETAIL SHOP
29 Pollution that can change the colors of a sunset : SMOG
30 Stat of interest to a competitive crossword solver : TIME
31 Balkan native : SLAV
32 Yellowfin or bluefin : TUNA
33 Rice dish : PILAF
34 Early computer scientist Lovelace : ADA
38 Baby cow : CALF
39 Loud and unhappy sports fans, in slang : BOOBIRDS
42 Defamed in print : LIBELED
45 Sat. preceder : FRI
47 Temporarily calm period : LULL
48 Spanish bull : TORO
50 Thus far : AS YET
51 Pumps iron at the gym : LIFTS
52 Some cuts of pork : LOINS
53 The “C” of a printer’s CMYK : CYAN
54 Top-notch : A-ONE
55 Button to press when stepping away from a Zoom meeting : MUTE
58 Employ : USE
60 Kissing on the street, e.g., for short : PDA
61 It’s almost 80% nitrogen : AIR
62 Quadri- minus one : TRI-
Leave a comment (below), or …
… return to top of page