LA Times Crossword Answers 6 Jul 2018, Friday

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Constructed by: Susan Gelfand
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Reveal Answer: Cars

Themed answers are parts of CARS, although are clued as if not:

  • 57D. What the answers to starred clues are part of : CARS
  • 17A. *Footwear that slows you down? : BRAKE SHOES
  • 38A. *Satchels with vents? : AIRBAGS
  • 60A. *Headwear with a power supply? : BATTERY CAP
  • 11D. *Leg covering with a warmer? : HEATER HOSE
  • 29D. *Trouser support with rhythm? : TIMING BELT

Bill’s time: 11m 46s

Bill’s errors: 0

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Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1. Kid : JOSH

When the verb “to josh”, meaning “to kid”, was coined in the 1840s as an American slang term, it was written with a capital J. It is likely that the term somehow comes from the proper name “Joshua”, but no one seems to remember why.

10. Layered hairstyle : SHAG

A shag cut is a layered hairstyle. Actress Meg Ryan famously sported a shag cut for many years.

14. Germany’s von Bismarck : OTTO

Germany first became a country of her own in 1871 when the Princes of the various independent German states met at Versailles outside Paris to proclaim Wilhelm of Prussia as the Emperor of the German Empire. The man behind this historic development was Wilhelm’s Ministerpräsident, Otto von Bismarck. Von Bismarck was a powerful figure in Prussia and indeed on the world stage, earning him the nickname of the “Iron Chancellor”.

15. Capital on the Aar : BERNE

Bern (sometimes “Berne”, especially in French) is the capital city of Switzerland. The official language of the city is German, but the language most spoken in Bern is a dialect known as Bernese German.

The Aar (also called the “Aare” in German) is the longest river entirely in Switzerland. The Aar is a major tributary of the Rhine, and flows through Bern, the nation’s capital.

17. *Footwear that slows you down? : BRAKE SHOES

The drum brake was invented in 1902 by Louis Renault (founder of Renault, the automobile company). In a drum brake, there is a set of brake shoes that usually presses on the inner surface of the drum to slow down rotation. Nowadays, the disc brake system is more popular, a design which uses brake pads instead of brake shoes.

19. Pro __ : RATA

“Pro rata” is a Latin phrase meaning “in proportion”.

20. Fancy pillow material : SATIN

The material known as “satin” takes its name from “Zayton”, the medieval Arabic name for the Chinese port city of Quanzhou. Quanzhou was used for the export of large amounts of silk to Europe.

21. Takes a gander at : EYES

To take a gander is to take a long look. “Gander” is a term we’ve been using in this sense since the 1880s, coming from the idea that in taking a long look one might be craning one’s neck like a goose (or gander).

23. Dutch export : EDAM

Edam cheese takes its name from the Dutch town of Edam in North Holland. The cheese is famous for its coating of red paraffin wax, a layer of protection that helps Edam travel well and prevents spoiling. You might occasionally come across an Edam cheese that is coated in black wax. The black color indicates that the underlying cheese has been aged for a minimum of 17 weeks.

37. Flee : LAM

To be on the lam is to be in flight, to have escaped from prison. “On the lam” is American slang that originated at the end of the 19th century. The word “lam” also means to “beat” or “thrash”, as in “lambaste”. So “on the lam” might derive from the phrase “to beat it, to scram”.

38. *Satchels with vents? : AIRBAGS

A satchel is a soft-sided bag, one usually with a strap that is often worn diagonally across the body. When we were kids in Ireland, we’d carry our books to and from school in a backpack satchel. Virtually every Irish schoolchild had a satchel back then.

40. Big Ten sch. with eight national football championships : OSU

Ohio State University (OSU) in Columbus was founded back in 1870 as the Ohio Agricultural and Mechanical College. The athletic teams of OSU are called the Buckeyes, named after the state tree of Ohio. In turn the buckeye tree gets its name from the appearance of its fruit, a dark nut with a light patch thought to resemble a “buck’s eye”.

43. Diminish : BATE

To bate is to restrain, as in “with bated breath” meaning “with restrained breath”. The term can also mean to lessen, and is a shortening of “abate”.

45. “Walker, Texas Ranger” star : NORRIS

Chuck Norris is a martial artist and an actor from Ryan, Oklahoma. Norris’s first real exposure to martial arts was in the US Air Force when he was serving in South Korea. When he left the service Norris opened up a chain of karate schools, and among his clients were Steve McQueen and his son, as well as Donny and Marie Osmond.

“Walker, Texas Ranger” is an action TV show starring Chuck Norris in the title role. The TV show was inspired by the 1983 action movie “Lone Wolf McQuade” in which Norris also played a Texas Ranger.

47. Name on the cover of “Death in the Afternoon” : ERNEST

“Death in the Afternoon” is a 1932 non-fiction book by Ernest Hemingway about bullfighting. He was a fan …

51. Furniture giant : IKEA

Every IKEA store features a restaurant that serves traditional Swedish food, including Swedish meatballs and lingonberry jam. Each store also has a Swedish Food Market where customers can purchase specialty foods from Sweden.

55. “But I don’t want to go among mad people” speaker : ALICE

Here are some lines from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”:

“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
Oh, you can’t help that, said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
How do you know I’m mad? said Alice.
You must be, said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”

64. LPGA golfer __ Pak : SE-RI

Se-Ri Pak is a South Korean golfer playing on the LPGA tour. Having a Korean name, we really should be calling her Pak Se-Ri as she is known in her homeland. Korean names always start with the family name.

65. 1974 Peace Nobelist from Japan : SATO

Prime Minister Eisaku Sato of Japan won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1974 (sharing it with Irishman Sean MacBride). He won for “his renunciation of the nuclear option for Japan and his efforts to further regional reconciliation”. Sato defined Japan’s nuclear policy in the sixties by laying out “Three Non-Nuclear Principles”. The principles are that Japan will not possess, nor manufacture nuclear weapons, not permit introduction of nuclear weapons into Japanese territory.

67. Hardy title teenager : TESS

In Thomas Hardy’s novel “Tess of the d’Urbervilles”, the heroine and title character is Tess Durbeyfield. Her father is an uneducated peasant and when he hears that his name is a corruption of the noble name of “D’Urberville”, the news goes to his head.

Down

2. Other, in Oviedo : OTRA

Oviedo is a cathedral city in northern Spain located just over ten miles from the Bay of Biscay coast.

4. Most contrived : HOKIEST

“Hokum” was originally theater slang, meaning “melodramatic, exaggerated acting”. Now the term just means “empty talk”. It is also the root for our word “hokey” meaning “silly, old-fashioned”.

7. Horse victim? : TROY

The ancient city of Troy was located on the west coast of modern-day Turkey. The Trojan War of Greek mythology was precipitated by the elopement of Helen, the wife of the king of Sparta, with Paris of Troy. The war itself largely consisted of a nine-year siege of Troy by the Greeks. We know most about the final year of that siege, as it is described extensively in Homer’s “Iliad”. The city eventually fell when the Greeks hid soldiers inside the Trojan Horse, which the Trojans brought inside the city’s walls. Beware of Greeks bearing gifts …

11. *Leg covering with a warmer? : HEATER HOSE

The word “hose” meaning “covering for the leg” has the same roots as the contemporary German word “Hose” meaning “trousers, pants”.

18. Köln closing : ENDE

Cologne is the fourth largest city in Germany, and is known as “Köln” in German.

24. Hun king, in Norse legend : ATLI

Atli is a character in the Volsunga Saga of 13th century Icelandic lore. It is believed that the Atli character is loosely based on Attila the Hun. According to myth, Atli was murdered by his wife Gudrun.

30. Big brass : TUBAS

The tuba is the lowest-pitched of all the brass instruments, and one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra (usually there is just one tuba included in an orchestral line-up). “Tuba” is the Latin word for “trumpet, horn”. Oom-pah-pah …

35. Medical suffix : -OSIS

The suffix “-osis” is found in medical terms. The suffix indicates a disorder in general, with the prefix providing more specificity. Examples are silicosis (a lung disease caused by the inhalation of silica dust), and psychosis (a serious mental illness). The plural of “-osis” is usually “oses”, but “osises” is out there as well.

39. Computer whiz : GEEK

Originally, a geek was a sideshow performer, perhaps one at a circus. We use the term today for someone regarded as foolish or clumsy, or for someone who is technically driven and expert, but often socially inept.

44. Wall Street figure : ANALYST

New York’s famous Wall Street was originally named by the Dutch “de Waalstraat”.

50. Ancient Greek region : IONIA

Lydia and Ionia were ancient territories in a part of the world now covered by modern-day Turkey. Both territories eventually fell under Greek and then Roman rule.

58. Christian denom. : EPIS

The Episcopal Church in the US is a branch of the Anglican Communion, and so is associated with the Church of England. The Episcopal Church is descended from the Church of England’s presence in the American colonies, prior to the American Revolution. The American Anglicans split with mother church, largely because the clergy of the Church of England are required to swear allegiance to the British monarch. Members of the Episcopal Church are known as Episcopalians. “Episcopal” is an adjective and “Episcopalian” is a noun.

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Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1. Kid : JOSH
5. Affected : ARTSY
10. Layered hairstyle : SHAG
14. “The Simpsons” bus driver : OTTO
15. Capital on the Aar : BERNE
16. Relate : TELL
17. *Footwear that slows you down? : BRAKE SHOES
19. Pro __ : RATA
20. Fancy pillow material : SATIN
21. Takes a gander at : EYES
22. Urban extensions? : -ITES
23. Dutch export : EDAM
25. Backpack features : ZIPPERS
27. Prepare : GET SET
30. Clipped to a greater extent : TERSER
31. Ramp sign : EXIT
32. Glorify : LAUD
34. Virtually can’t be beaten : IS HOT
37. Flee : LAM
38. *Satchels with vents? : AIRBAGS
40. Big Ten sch. with eight national football championships : OSU
41. Request before a shot : SMILE
43. Diminish : BATE
44. “In your dreams!” : AS IF!
45. “Walker, Texas Ranger” star : NORRIS
47. Name on the cover of “Death in the Afternoon” : ERNEST
49. Goes overboard, in a way : PIGS OUT
51. Furniture giant : IKEA
52. Jewelry location : LOBE
53. Muffin choice : BRAN
55. “But I don’t want to go among mad people” speaker : ALICE
59. Singles : ONES
60. *Headwear with a power supply? : BATTERY CAP
62. What flowers may do : WILT
63. Kitchen additions? : -ETTES
64. LPGA golfer __ Pak : SE-RI
65. 1974 Peace Nobelist from Japan : SATO
66. Passes out cards : DEALS
67. Hardy title teenager : TESS

Down

1. Positions : JOBS
2. Other, in Oviedo : OTRA
3. Stolen bases, e.g. : STAT
4. Most contrived : HOKIEST
5. Hunk’s pride : ABS
6. Bring up again? : REHEM
7. Horse victim? : TROY
8. Treated as unimportant : SNEEZED AT
9. Polite affirmation : YES, SIR
10. Highway markings : STRIPES
11. *Leg covering with a warmer? : HEATER HOSE
12. Make changes to : ALTER
13. Wine __ : GLASS
18. Köln closing : ENDE
24. Hun king, in Norse legend : ATLI
26. Pitchfork-shaped letters : PSIS
27. Some goop : GELS
28. Knowledge determinant : EXAM
29. *Trouser support with rhythm? : TIMING BELT
30. Big brass : TUBAS
33. Resolve, in a way : ARBITRATE
35. Medical suffix : -OSIS
36. Clump : TUFT
38. Space beginning : AERO-
39. Computer whiz : GEEK
42. Finishes behind : LOSES TO
44. Wall Street figure : ANALYST
46. Massaged : RUBBED
48. Tail : REAR
49. Farm equipment : PLOWS
50. Ancient Greek region : IONIA
51. Debriefing info : INTEL
54. “__ girl!” : ATTA
56. Cold drink brand : ICEE
57. What the answers to starred clues are part of : CARS
58. Christian denom. : EPIS
61. Curved shape : ESS

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22 thoughts on “LA Times Crossword Answers 6 Jul 2018, Friday”

  1. LAT: 13:32, no errors. Newsday: 13:00, no errors.

    WSJ: 16:27 as I finished the puzzle (or so I thought) and got distracted by working out some minor details of the meta; 19:21 after finishing that, realizing that I had left a square unfilled, and filling it; no errors (but I hope that the meta doesn’t involve a malicious twist that I’ve missed – it almost seemed too easy).

    @Carrie and @Vidwan … Thanks for checking in yesterday. (I was beginning to worry … 😜.)

    1. Today’s Tim Croce puzzle was a difficult one, I thought. About an hour and ten minutes into it, I had finished the entire thing, but there was a three-letter entry, an initialism, that I was almost certain was wrong, even though all the crossing entries made sense, and, after fifteen minutes of looking at it, I was exhausted, so I caved in and verified that, indeed, the initialism was unknown to Google, and then … I suddenly realized what letter of it was wrong and why. So … a cheat … but a cheat of a minor variety, in my opinion … and everything else was okay. A blemished semi-victory … 😳

  3. LAT: 27 minutes, no errors. About what I expected – a good match to Wechsler’s in difficulty. WSJ: 43 minutes, 4 errors. A lot that I didn’t know, especially connected to the theme. Got the meta, if like Dave says, there isn’t a twist in there somewhere. Still got the third one to figure out (if I can get its theme), but 2/3 isn’t too bad of a record with how these things usually go for me.

  4. Got about 2/3 of it in our usual comparatively slow time. Just way too hard.
    I don’t like the trick words that are known only to the author’s mindset. The
    clues can’t clearly describe these. Just a bummer, after a pretty good week.
    Come on, Monday, and be easier.

  5. I have been doing crosswords for about 25 yrs and unfortunately do not have an identic memory so l have been keeping notes which over the years have become quite significant. I refer to them when l get stuck. Am l cheating? I hope not.i did this puzzle in 29 min with no errors but clues like L.P.G.A golfer Pak just aren’t in my memory bank

  6. I’m with you Jack re: “cheat notes” as I refer to them. I still work hard at completing the puzzles, and I’m a bad speller, so that’s my excuse for using them.

    This was hard today. Had trouble with the NW and finally gave up.

  7. Nice puzzle. Almost got hung up on that golfer, but got through it when I finally got “Alice”. Got the meta on the WSJ. 100% certain.

    1. @Heidi … Before starting the WSJ, I glanced at the words “fall reading” and “famous literary work” and jotted down what turned out to be my final answer. My uncertainty is based on two things: a rather cryptic comment from Al Sisti that I saw later on the WSJ blog and, given what little I know of Matt Gaffney’s mind, the existence of the old saw, “Pride Goeth Before a Fall”. I’m hoping that there is an “obvious” first guess that never occurred to me and that my first guess is the same as other people’s second guess.

      BTW (assuming that you are the “Heidi” on the WSJ blog), I saw all of your messages over there, some of which you apparently were not seeing. (I don’t look at that blog until I’ve either gotten the meta or given up on it, but I do find it interesting, and sometimes astonishing, to read about all the things that the creative people there are able to see in the puzzles.)

  8. @John, et al.
    I’ve tried to mention this previously (with it being different days, I’m not sure anyone sees all the responses people get). It wasn’t too long ago (about 3 years or so) I was struggling to get any of these done. I’d love to be able to help people out here if I could, but it’s hard to give generic advice without an example of solving one.

    I don’t really know a whole lot right out of the gate on any of these puzzles, but I do tend to “know” more towards the Monday direction and rarely “know” things towards this end of the week. I find later week puzzles to be more “puzzle” than whether you know the word from the clue.

    You use what you can generically know from the clues, and get letter possibilities which help you suggest things. In other words, you learn how words work and then use those things as cues to try to get other words. For instance, a large majority of the time U comes after Q. Of course, when you get into a grid, you can use partials and crosses to suggest words, much like playing Hangman.

    Then with the themes, a lot of times they’re pretty useless, but late week puzzles sometimes make it useful to figure out the theme. If you get enough to know what the constructor did to get their theme entries, you can use that to figure out the rest from any partials you might have. Like with this one, I figured out pretty early that the constructor was re-purposing car parts, so I used that knowledge in figuring out the rest. Word addition/substitution/subtraction themes are especially useful to reverse-engineer like this. If you can’t figure out the answer, if you can figure out the original base phrase, you can apply whatever rules the constructor used to get the answer.

    Finally, sometimes you have to guess, especially if you’re stuck or if it’s something you don’t know. This can be letters or you can “trial balloon” words. Fortunately, you can make educated guesses given knowledge of how words work. You can figure out that certain letters don’t work together (i.e. given this letters I see, this next one I don’t know must be a vowel), or if you see a high Scrabble point (rare) letter you can start working with that as there’s few combinations.

    Unfortunately, there’s sometimes that all one can do is guess letters and hope for the best – that’s where I usually get most of my errors these days. Then sadly, with where I’m at, where I am in a position where I have to actually “know” something I don’t know, I still have trouble completing the puzzle. As I’ve noted, my trouble spots are usually getting into a part of a grid and finishing things out.

    Finally, there’s no substitution for knowing words, so it’s always good to be well-read and up on things (especially music/sports/movies/etc, how editors work these days). In addition, crosswords have a lot of vowel-heavy words unique to them (generally referred to as “crosswordese”), which pays off to learn, if you don’t put your effort towards anything else.

    I don’t know if any of that helped, but I can’t say I didn’t try.

    1. @ Glenn. Thank you for taking so much time to write all that and the suggestions. I will try to keep it all in mind as I forage through these puzzles!!

  9. I believe it was Farrah Fawcett who was famous for her shag haircut. Not that it matters as to solving the puzzle.

    I don’t know which is worser – Berne with an E or terser.

      1. Actually, from the first I felt terser was worser. I do agree that HOKIEST was most contrived.

  10. What’s the deal with PSIS? Got the puzzle, but can’t discern the clue.

    1. The Greek letter psi is one that looks like a pitchfork (well, really more like a trident)

  12. 25:38. At the end of a truly exhausting 13 day trip. Back home tomorrow.

    While in Florida, I was introduced to an absolutely awful creature called a yellow fly. Sallee probably knows what they are, but I didn’t. Their bite is worse than 10 mosquito bites. I’m ready to go back to the desert.

    Best –

    1. @ Jeff Enjoyed that comment. And that’s why we have screened in lanais all over our back yards and pools!!!!

  13. Moderately hard Friday for me; took about an hour, with a break to extract some honey…no errors.

    re Köln – definitely one of the coolest and friendliest city in Germany.

    @Carrie – Wow, what a match between Belgium and Brazil! I was half asleep and watching it in bed on my cell phone. I was thinking that France would probably beat Uruguay and it was way too early for me. Tomorrow is a toss up but I’m thinking Sweden and Croatia.

  14. Hey folks!! 🙃
    No errors on an interesting Friday. Pretty good grid, and the theme helped a bit.
    @Dave, thanks for the shout-out! Glad to be here 😊
    Hey Jack! I had a list of crosswordese, and my idea was to review it from time to time rather than refer to it for a specific puzzle clue. This I didn’t think of as cheating….the only problem is that I forgot where I put the list!! I did start a new one, but I guess I’m not sure where that one is either….🤔
    Dirk!! Yes, I’m liking Croatia and Sweden for Saturday!! All due respect to Brazil, but I was REALLY happy to see Belgium win. Good game — really I thought both sides played well, but Belgium played better.
    Hope Saturday’s grid is kind to us!! …especially with This brutal heat here in L.A. 110 degrees today!! 😣
    Be well ~~⚽️

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