LA Times Crossword 1 Feb 21, Monday

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Constructed by: Rebecca Goldstein
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Reveal Answer: (The) Kids Are All Right

Themed answers are common phrases with a synonym of “KID” at the end (“THE RIGHT”):

  • 61A With “The,” 2010 Annette Bening/Julianne Moore film … and a hint to the ends of 17-, 30- and 45-Across : … KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT
  • 17A Ponce de León’s pursuit : FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH
  • 30A 2009 title chef played by Meryl Streep : JULIA CHILD
  • 45A Collectible ’90s-’00s stuffed toy : BEANIE BABY

Read on, or jump to …
… a complete list of answers

Bill’s time: 5m 37s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

5 Hindu noble : RAJA

“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.

9 Whirlpool brand : AMANA

The Amana Corporation takes its name from the location of its original headquarters, in Middle Amana, Iowa. Today, the Amana name is very much associated with household appliances. The company was founded in 1934 to manufacture commercial walk-in coolers.

Whirlpool is a manufacturer of home appliances that was founded as the Upton Machine Company in 1911. Whirlpool is now the largest manufacturer of home appliances in the world.

14 Trade fair : EXPO

The first “World’s Fair” was held in 1851, known back then as the “Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations”. The fair was the idea of Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria. It was held in a magnificent glass and cast-iron structure called the Crystal Palace that was purpose-built for the occasion. The “Great Exhibition” spawned a tradition of what became known as World’s Fairs, expositions that feature national pavilions created by participating countries. The term “Expo” was coined for Expo 67, a 1967 World’s Fair held in Montreal. Since then, we’ve been using “expo” to describe any large exposition or trade show.

16 Apple’s apple et al. : LOGOS

The logo of Apple, the computer company, is a silhouette of an apple with a bite taken out of it. The company’s original logo featured a picture of Sir Isaac Newton sitting under an apple tree.

17 Ponce de León’s pursuit : FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

The legend of the Fountain of Youth gained a lot of traction in the 1500s. That’s because a story developed that the Spanish explorer Ponce de León traveled to what is now Florida in search of the legendary spring.

20 Second most populous nation : INDIA

The three most populous countries in the world are:

  1. China (1.4 billion)
  2. India (1.3 billion)
  3. United States (0.3 billion)

Together, these three nations account for about 40% of the world’s population.

21 Hereditary unit : GENE

A gene is a section of a chromosome that is responsible for a particular characteristic in an organism. For example, one gene may determine eye color and another balding pattern. We have two copies of each gene, one from each of our parents, with each copy known as an allele.

22 Dark blue shade : NAVY

Navy blue is a dark blue shade that was named for the color of uniforms worn by officers in the British Royal Navy as early as 1748. When the color’s name first took on the association with uniforms in the early 1800s, it was known as “marine blue”, but soon changed to “navy blue”.

23 Org. concerned with reducing emissions : EPA

The air quality index (AQI) is monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

25 Buddhist teachers : LAMAS

“Lama” is a Tibetan word meaning “chief, high priest”.

30 2009 title chef played by Meryl Streep : JULIA CHILD

Julia Child was an American chef who is recognized for bringing French cuisine to the American public. During WWII, Julia Child joined the OSS (Office of Strategic Services), the predecessor to the CIA. She worked for the OSS in Washington, Ceylon and China. While in the OSS, she met her husband Paul Child who was also an OSS employee. Paul joined the Foreign Service after the war, and it was his posting to France that created the opportunity for Julie to learn about French cuisine. If you haven’t seen it, I highly, highly recommend the movie “Julie & Julia”, one of the best films of 2009. Meryl Streep does a fabulous job playing the larger-than-life Julia Child.

“Julie & Julia” is a wonderful 2009 Nora Ephron film that juxtaposes the lives of celebrity chef Julia Childs and home cook/blogger Julie Powell. Childs is played by Meryl Streep, and Powell by Amy Adams. Ephron’s screenplay is based on two nonfiction books: Child’s autobiography “My Life in France”, and Powell’s memoir “Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously”. Highly recommended …

35 Year, in Medellín : ANO

After Bogotá, Medellín is the second-largest city in Colombia. It was named for the small village of Medellín in Spain, which was the birthplace of conquistador Hernán Cortés.

36 Title for Judi Dench : DAME

Dame Judi Dench is an outstanding English actress who has appeared for decades in her home country on stage and screen. Dench’s film career took off in the nineties with a relatively trivial role as “M” in the James Bond series of films. Since then she has played leading roles in several excellent movies including “Shakespeare in Love”, “Mrs. Brown”, “Notes on a Scandal” and “Philomena”.

37 Cartridge filler : TONER

The key features of a laser printer (or copier) are that it uses plain paper and produces quality text at high speed. Laser printers work by projecting a laser image of the printed page onto a rotating drum that is coated with photoconductors (material that becomes conductive when exposed to light). The areas of the drum exposed to the laser carry a different charge than the unexposed areas. Dry ink (toner) sticks to the exposed areas due to electrostatic charge. The toner is then transferred to paper by contact and is fused into the paper by the application of heat. So, that explains why paper coming out of a laser printer is warm, and sometimes powdery.

45 Collectible ’90s-’00s stuffed toy : BEANIE BABY

There were originally just nine Beanie Babies when Ty Warner introduced the stuffed animal in 1993. In the late nineties the toy became a real fad, largely due to innovative marketing techniques. For example, there was no mass marketing with constant TV ads, and the production volume was limited pushing the line into the realm of collectibles. Beanie Baby models were also “retired” on a regular basis, fueling a “must have” behavior in the market.

52 Wall St. debuts : IPOS

An initial public offering (IPO) is the very first offer of stock for sale by a company on the open market. In other words, an IPO marks the first time that a company is traded on a public exchange. Companies have an IPO to raise capital to expand (usually).

55 Light controller in a lens : IRIS

The iris is the colored part of the eye. It has an aperture in the center that can open or close depending on the level of light hitting the eye.

61 With “The,” 2010 Annette Bening/Julianne Moore film … and a hint to the ends of 17-, 30- and 45-Across : … KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT

“The Kids Are All Right” is an entertaining 2010 movie with a fabulous cast that includes Annette Bening, Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo and Mia Wasikowska. Bening and Moore play a lesbian couple, with each of them having given birth to a child using the same sperm donor. Ruffalo plays the sperm donor, and Wasikowska plays the elder of the two children.

65 Airbnb visit, say : STAY

Airbnb is a website-based service that matches people wanting to rent out short-term living quarters to people seeking accommodation. The company was founded in 2008 as AirBed & Breakfast. The original concept was renting out an “air bed” and providing “breakfast” to someone looking for cheap, temporary accommodation.

66 Chief Greek god : ZEUS

In Greek mythology, Zeus served as the king of the Olympic gods, and the god of the sky and thunder. He was the child of Titans Cronus and Rhea, and was married to Hera. Zeus was the equivalent of the Roman god Jupiter, who had similar realms of influence.

68 Head of the Sorbonne? : TETE

“Sorbonne” is the name usually used for the old University of Paris, and some of the institutions that have succeeded it. The institution was named for French theologian Robert de Sorbonne who founded the original Collège de Sorbonne in 1257. That’s quite a while ago …

Down

1 Lower-APR loan : REFI

Refinance (refi)

Annual percentage rate (APR)

2 Neural transmitter : AXON

A nerve cell is more correctly called a neuron. The branched projections that receive electrochemical signals from other neurons are known as dendrites. The long nerve fiber that conducts signals away from the neuron is known as the axon. A neuron that has no definite axon is referred to as “apolar” or “nonpolar”. In apolar neurons the nerve impulses radiate in all directions.

3 Tater : SPUD

The word “spud”, used as a slang term for “potato”, was first recorded in the mid-1800s in New Zealand would you believe?

5 Color TV pioneer : RCA

Early television programming was broadcast in monochrome, i.e. black-and-white or grayscale. The introduction of color television built on the technology behind monochrome TV in the sense that color television images are a combination of three monochrome images. The colors of these three monochrome signals are red, green and blue (RGB).

6 Sacha Baron Cohen persona : ALI G

Sacha Baron Cohen is a comedian and comic actor from England. Baron Cohen is perhaps most famous for playing the characters Borat and Ali G on the small and large screens. I’m wasn’t a fan, but I must admit that I really enjoyed 2020’s “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm”.

7 “Hidden Figures” co-star __ Monáe : JANELLE

Janelle Monáe is a singer and actress. I’m not familiar with her as a singer, but did see Monáe play NASA engineer Mary Jackson in the excellent 2016 film “Hidden Figures”.

“Hidden Figures” is an excellent 2016 film based on a book of the same name by Margot Lee Shetterly. Both book and film tell the story of female African-American mathematicians who worked for NASA during the Mercury and Apollo programs in the 1960s.

9 American gymnast Raisman with three Olympic gold medals : ALY

Aly Raisman is a retired gymnast. She captained the US gold-winning teams in the Olympics in 2012 (“The Fierce Five”) and in 2016 (“The Final Five”).

10 Apollo launch : MOONSHOT

The Apollo program is very much associated with President Kennedy, as he gave NASA the challenge to land men on the moon by the end of the sixties. However, the Apollo program was conceived during the Eisenhower administration as a follow-up to Project Mercury that put the first Americans in space.

11 Río contents : AGUA

In Spanish, “agua” (water) is found in a “río” (river), and around an “isla” (island).

19 Disaster relief org. : FEMA

Federal emergency management has been structured for over 200 years, but what we know today as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was created in 1979 in an Executive Order issued by President Jimmy Carter.

24 Open a bit : AJAR

Our word “ajar” is thought to come from Scottish dialect, in which “a char” means “slightly open”.

27 Skewered meat : KABOB

The term “kebab” (also “kabob”) covers a wide variety of meat dishes that originated in Persia. In the West, we usually use “kebab” when talking about shish kebab, which is meat (often lamb) served on a skewer. “Shish” comes from the Turkish word for “skewer”.

29 Justice Sotomayor : SONIA

Sonia Sotomayor was the first Hispanic justice appointed to the US Supreme Court, and the third female justice. Sotomayor was nominated by President Barack Obama to replace the retiring Justice David Souter.

32 Popular video-sharing app, familiarly : INSTA

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 …

33 Ring-tailed primate : LEMUR

Lemurs are unusual-looking creatures native to the island of Madagascar off the east coast of Africa. With their white fur and dark eyes that are very reflective at night, they have a “ghostly” appearance. Indeed, the animals take their name from Roman mythology in which “lemures” were spirits of the restless dead.

34 Bottom-of-the-barrel stuff : DREGS

The dregs in wine, the sediment that settles during fermentation (and sometimes in the bottle), are also called “lees”.

36 Jeans fabric : DENIM

Nîmes is a lovely city in the south of France. One of the claims to fame of the city is the invention of denim fabric. The French phrase “de Nîmes” (from Nimes) gives us the word “denim”. Also, the French phrase “bleu de Gênes” (blue of Genoa) gives us our word “jeans”.

40 Short hairdo : BOB

A bob cut is a short hairstyle in which the hair is cut straight around the head, at about the line of the jaw. Back in the 1570s, “bob” was the name given to a horse’s tail that was cut short, and about a century later it was being used to describe short hair on humans. The style became very popular with women in the early 1900s (as worn by actress Clara Bow, for example), with the fashion dying out in the thirties. The style reemerged in the sixties around the time the Beatles introduced their “mop tops”, with Vidal Sassoon leading the way in styling women’s hair in a bob cut again. Personally, I like it …

41 “Grand” ice cream brand : EDY’S

Dreyer’s ice cream sells its products under the name Dreyer’s in the Western United States, and Edy’s in the Eastern states. The company’s founders were William Dreyer and Joseph Edy.

46 Mideast leader : EMIR

An emir is a prince or chieftain, one most notably from the Middle East in Islamic countries. In English, “emir” can also be written variously as “emeer, amir, ameer” (watch out for those spellings in crosswords!).

47 Most spartan : BAREST

Sparta was a city-state in ancient Greece that was famous for her military might. Spartan children had a tough upbringing, and newborn babies were bathed in wine to see if the child was strong enough to survive. Every child was presented to a council of elders that decided if the baby was suitable for rearing. Those children deemed too puny were executed by tossing them into a chasm. We’ve been using the term “spartan” to describe something self-disciplined or austere since the 1600s.

48 Central American country bordering Mexico : BELIZE

Belize was formerly known as British Honduras, which explains why English is the country’s official language. Belize is located on the northeastern coast of Central America, and borders Mexico and Guatemala.

52 Swedish superstore : IKEA

The IKEA furniture stores use the colors blue and yellow for brand recognition. Blue and yellow are the national colors of Sweden, where IKEA was founded and is headquartered.

53 Bowling targets : PINS

Bowling has been around for an awfully long time. The oldest known reference to the game is in Egypt, where pins and balls were found in an ancient tomb that is over 5,000 years old. The first form of the game to come to America was nine-pin bowling, which had been very popular in Europe for centuries. In 1841 in Connecticut, nine-pin bowling was banned due to its association with gambling. Supposedly, an additional pin was added to get around the ban, and ten-pin bowling was born.

60 Site offering handmade crafts : ETSY

Etsy.com is an e-commerce website where you can buy and sell the kind of items that you might find at a craft fair.

63 Caustic cleaner : LYE

What we call “lye” is usually sodium hydroxide, although historically the term “lye” was used for potassium hydroxide. Lye has many uses, including to cure several foodstuffs. Lye can make olives less bitter, for example. The chemical is also found in canned mandarin oranges, pretzels and Japanese ramen noodles. More concentrated grades of lye are used to clear drains and clean ovens. Scary …

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Stone-shaping tool : RASP
5 Hindu noble : RAJA
9 Whirlpool brand : AMANA
14 Trade fair : EXPO
15 Dressed (in) : CLAD
16 Apple’s apple et al. : LOGOS
17 Ponce de León’s pursuit : FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH
20 Second most populous nation : INDIA
21 Hereditary unit : GENE
22 Dark blue shade : NAVY
23 Org. concerned with reducing emissions : EPA
25 Buddhist teachers : LAMAS
27 Smooch : KISS
30 2009 title chef played by Meryl Streep : JULIA CHILD
35 Year, in Medellín : ANO
36 Title for Judi Dench : DAME
37 Cartridge filler : TONER
38 Big signs hung in arenas : BANNERS
40 “I dunno” : BEATS ME
42 Bagel flavoring : ONION
43 Fishing sticks : RODS
44 Pull hard : TUG
45 Collectible ’90s-’00s stuffed toy : BEANIE BABY
48 Measures of cell reception : BARS
49 [Scowl] : [I’M MAD]
50 Pronoun with 51-Down : SHE
52 Wall St. debuts : IPOS
55 Light controller in a lens : IRIS
57 Overjoy : ELATE
61 With “The,” 2010 Annette Bening/Julianne Moore film … and a hint to the ends of 17-, 30- and 45-Across : … KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT
64 Turn out to be : END UP
65 Airbnb visit, say : STAY
66 Chief Greek god : ZEUS
67 Positive feature : ASSET
68 Head of the Sorbonne? : TETE
69 Whirlpool : EDDY

Down

1 Lower-APR loan : REFI
2 Neural transmitter : AXON
3 Tater : SPUD
4 Youngsters’ zoo rides : PONIES
5 Color TV pioneer : RCA
6 Sacha Baron Cohen persona : ALI G
7 “Hidden Figures” co-star __ Monáe : JANELLE
8 God, in Hebrew : ADONAI
9 American gymnast Raisman with three Olympic gold medals : ALY
10 Apollo launch : MOONSHOT
11 Río contents : AGUA
12 Imp’s punishment : NO TV
13 Like used fireplaces : ASHY
18 Bar beer source : TAP
19 Disaster relief org. : FEMA
24 Open a bit : AJAR
26 Portray : ACT AS
27 Skewered meat : KABOB
28 Silly : INANE
29 Justice Sotomayor : SONIA
31 Verbal hesitations : UMS
32 Popular video-sharing app, familiarly : INSTA
33 Ring-tailed primate : LEMUR
34 Bottom-of-the-barrel stuff : DREGS
36 Jeans fabric : DENIM
39 Topic of little importance : NONISSUE
40 Short hairdo : BOB
41 “Grand” ice cream brand : EDY’S
43 Give off : RADIATE
46 Mideast leader : EMIR
47 Most spartan : BAREST
48 Central American country bordering Mexico : BELIZE
51 Pronoun with 50-Across : HER
52 Swedish superstore : IKEA
53 Bowling targets : PINS
54 Numbers that may be long or stacked : ODDS
56 Fence piece : SLAT
58 Improved in a barrel : AGED
59 Hitting-the-ground sound : THUD
60 Site offering handmade crafts : ETSY
62 Fitting : APT
63 Caustic cleaner : LYE