LA Times Crossword 11 Sep 24, Wednesday

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Constructed by: Taylor Johnson
Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Reveal Answer: Step on It!

Themed answers are things one may, or may not, want to STEP ON:

• 37D “Go, go, go!,” or an instruction one may or may not want to follow for the answers to the starred clues : STEP ON IT!

• 19A *Withings product : BATHROOM SCALE
• 22A *Construction toy piece : LEGO BLOCK
• 25D *Entryway rug : WELCOME MAT
• 28D *One of three under a baby grand : PIANO PEDAL

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

Bill’s time: 6m 46s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

5 Post-WWII alliance : OAS

The Organization of American States (OAS) was founded in 1948, and has its headquarters in Washington, D.C. Not all of the independent states in the Americas are members. Cuba was barred from participation in the organization after a vote in 1962. Honduras had her membership suspended after the country’s 2009 coup.

8 Q-tip, e.g. : SWAB

Cotton swabs were originally marketed under the name “Baby Gays”. This was changed in 1926 to “Q-Tips”, with the Q standing for “quality”.

13 Fold animals : SHEEP

The word “fold” describes an enclosure for sheep, and is also an alternative name for a flock, a group of sheep. Both “flock” and “fold” are used figuratively to describe a church’s congregation.

19 *Withings product : BATHROOM SCALE

Withings is a manufacturer of consumer electronics based in France that is best known for making smart devices for the healthcare market.

22 *Construction toy piece : LEGO BLOCK

Lego produces some wonderful specialized sets with which you can build models of celebrated structures, including:

• The Statue of Liberty (2,882 pieces)
• The Sydney Opera House (2,989 pieces)
• The Eiffel Tower (3,428 pieces)
• Tower Bridge (4,295 pieces)
• The Taj Mahal (5,922 pieces)

26 Susan of “The Partridge Family” : DEY

Actress Susan Dey first appeared on “The Partridge Family” when she was 17-years-old when she had no acting experience. Years later, Dey won a Golden Globe for playing the leading role of Grace Van Owen in “L.A. Law”.

The 1970s musical sitcom “The Partridge Family” stars Shirley Jones as a widowed mother of five children who launch a musical career as a family. The show’s storyline is loosely based on the careers of the real-life singing family The Cowsills.

27 Fatty acid, e.g. : LIPID

Lipids are a group of naturally occurring molecules including fats, waxes and fat-soluble vitamins (like A, D and E). Sometimes we use the words “fat” and “lipid” interchangeably but fats are a subgroup of lipids, specifically a group best called triglycerides.

The chemicals known as fatty acids may be classified in several different ways. We are probably most familiar with the designations “saturated” and “unsaturated”. Most animal fats are saturated, meaning that they have no carbon-to-carbon double bonds. Most fats found in plants are unsaturated, with carbon-to-carbon double bonds that limit the ability of the fat molecules to pack densely, and reduce the tendency to solidify at room temperature. Unsaturated fats can be further categorized into cis fats and trans fats. The configuration of the double bonds in trans fats causes them to behave less like (healthy) unsaturated fats, and more like (unhealthy) saturated fats. Trans fats are rarely found in nature, and are usually the result of industrial processing of (healthy) unsaturated fats to make them behave more like animal fats (to solidify at room temperature, for example).

31 Made to resemble soft leather : SUEDED

Suede is leather made from the underside of an animal’s skin, usually the skin from a lamb. As such it is very soft, although not as durable as leather made from the exterior skin. The soft leather was, and is still used for making gloves. Back in 1859 these gloves were called “gants de Suede” in France, or “gloves of Sweden”. So, the name “suede” comes from the French word for Sweden.

34 Southern city where Cartoon Network has its HQ : ATL

The Cartoon Network (CN) is a cable TV channel headquartered in Atlanta, and launched in 1992. It was founded by Ted Turner as a division of TBS, primarily to broadcast footage from the company’s expanding animation library.

40 Arena concert genre : ROCK

Arena rock (also “stadium rock” and “dad rock”) is rock music played in large arenas. It is a phenomenon that dates back to the British Invasion when successful bands like the Beatles played to large audiences in places such as Shea Stadium in New York.

42 The first “M” of MGM : METRO

The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) film studio was founded in 1924 by Marcus Loew. Loew was already a successful movie theater owner when he purchased Metro Pictures Corporation in 1919, and then Goldwyn Pictures in 1924. Later in 1924, Loew also purchased Louis B. Mayer Pictures, mainly so that Louis B. Mayer could merge all three studios and run them himself as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

44 Fencing blade : FOIL

Before the foil was introduced as a sporting weapon, it was used as a blunted weapon for sword practice. It has been suggested that the sword was blunted by wrapping metal foil around the tip, hence the name.

46 Hoops stat : REB

In basketball, a rebound (REB) is retrieval of the ball after it “rebounds” (usually off the backboard) following a missed field goal or free throw. If the offensive side recovers the ball, it’s known as an offensive rebound. If the defensive side recovers it, it is a defensive rebound.

50 Construction __ : PAPER

Construction paper is card stock that comes in a variety of colors and is often used for arts and crafts in schools. It is also known as sugar paper, due to the traditional use in making bags to contain sugar.

52 Keats piece : ODE

English poet John Keats died in Rome in 1821, and is buried there in the Protestant Cemetery. His last wish was that his grave be marked with a tombstone bearing just the words “”Here lies One whose Name was writ in Water”, and no name nor a date. Keats’ friends honored his request to some extent, as the words were included on the stone and no name is given. The full epitaph reads:

This Grave
contains all that was Mortal
of a
Young English Poet
Who
on his Death Bed, in the Bitterness of his Heart
at the Malicious Power of his Enemies
Desired
these Words to be
engraven on his Tomb Stone:
Here lies One
Whose Name was writ in Water.
24 February 1821

53 Musket attachment : BAYONET

A bayonet is a blade that is attached to the muzzle end of a rifle. It’s thought that the term “bayonet” derives from the French city of Bayonne in Gascony, where perhaps bayonets were first made.

56 Quarterback Manning : ELI

Eli Manning is a retired footballer who played quarterback for the New York Giants. Eli’s brother Peyton Manning retired from football as the quarterback for the Denver Broncos in 2015. Eli and Peyton’s father is Archie Manning, who was also a successful NFL quarterback. Eli, Peyton and Archie co-authored a book for children titled “Family Huddle” in 2009. It describes the Mannings playing football together as young boys.

57 Missing clownfish in a Pixar film : NEMO

“Finding Nemo” is a 2003 animated blockbuster from Pixar. The film was the winner of the Oscar that year for Best Animated Feature. Believe it or not, “Finding Nemo” is the best-selling DVD of all time and, until 2010’s “Toy Story 3”, it was the highest-grossing, G-rated movie at the box office.

Clownfish are very colorful, attractive-looking fish. They are orange and often have broad strips of white and black on their bodies depending on species. Clownfish spend their lives in a symbiotic relationship with sea anemones.

60 Some handheld organizers, briefly : PDAS

Personal digital assistant (PDA)

61 Bread served with saag paneer : NAAN

Palak paneer is a dish from Indian cuisine. It consists mainly of paneer (a freshly-made cheese) in a puréed spinach paste. Saag paneer is a more generic form of the dish, one in which other leafy vegetables can be used to make the paste, e.g. mustard greens, collard greens or broccoli.

62 “Seven Samurai” and “Rashomon” director Kurosawa : AKIRA

Akira Kurosawa was an Oscar-winning Japanese film director. His most famous movie to us in the West has to be “The Seven Samurai”, the inspiration for “The Magnificent Seven” starring Yul Brynner, and indeed a basis for “Star Wars: The Clone Wars”.

“Rashomon” is a period drama film directed by Akira Kurosawa that was released in 1950. “Rashomon” was the movie that first introduced Kurosawa to western audiences. The film’s title refers to the huge gate to the city of Kyoto.

Down

2 Many a Yemeni : ARAB

Yemen is a country located in the southwestern part of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, Oman to the east, the Red Sea to the west, and the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian Sea to the south. Yemen has a population of over 30 million people and its capital and largest city is Sana’a.

3 “Voilà!” : TA-DA!

The French word “voilà” means “there it is”, and “voici” means “here it is”. The terms come from “voi là” meaning “see there” and “voi ici” meaning “see here”.

4 Picked up the pace : HUSTLED

Back in the 1680s, “to hustle” meant “to shake to and fro”. The term particularly referred to shaking money in a cap as part of the game “hustle-cap”. “Hustle” seems to have evolved from the Dutch “hutselen” meaning “to shake”. Byt the end of the 1820s, to hustle was to bustle, to move quickly.

6 Oxygen-dependent 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.

9 Fenway’s Green Monster, for one : WALL

The left field wall in Fenway Park, the home of the Boston Red Sox baseball team, is the tallest encountered in Major League ballparks. The wall was built that high to prevent viewing of games from outside of the park for free. The height also prevents home runs that would be possible in other ballparks, and so, given its color and reputation, it is called the Green Monster.

10 Basilica area : APSE

In its modern usage, the term “basilica” applies to a Roman Catholic church that has been given special ceremonial rights by the Pope.

11 Drone, e.g. : BEE

Drone bees (and ants) are fertile males of the species, whose sole role in life seems to be to mate with a queen. Given that drone bees make no honey, we sometimes use the term “drone” figuratively, to describe a lazy worker, or someone who lives on the labors of others.

13 Puppeteer Tony : SARG

Tony Sarg was a German-American puppeteer and illustrator. He was hired by Macy’s in 1928 to build helium-filled “puppets” for their Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City, a tradition that was to last a long time. In 1935 he designed and built the puppets and displays in Macy’s windows for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

14 Mexican money : PESO

The peso is used in many Spanish-speaking countries around the world. The coin originated in Spain where the word “peso” means “weight”. The original peso was what we know in English as a “piece of eight”, a silver coin of a specific weight that had a nominal value of eight “reales”.

20 Hunt of “Twister” : HELEN

Helen Hunt is a very talented actress who first came to national attention playing opposite Paul Reiser in TV’s hit sitcom “Mad About You”. Hunt then starred in some major films including “As Good as It Gets” (for which she won the Best Actress Oscar), “Twister”, “Cast Away”, “What Women Want” and more recently “The Sessions”. Offscreen, Hunt was married for a while to Hank Azaria, a favorite actor of mine.

“Twister” is a 1996 film about a group of storm chasers in Oklahoma. Stars of the movie are Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt. A lot of scenes were shot in a particular farmhouse in Fairfax, Oklahoma. That same farmhouse was destroyed by an actual tornado in 2010.

21 Symbol seen on viola sheet music : C-CLEF

“Clef” is the French word for “key”. In music, a clef is used to indicate the pitch of the notes written on a stave. The bass clef is also known as the F-clef, the alto clef is the C-clef, and the treble clef is the G-clef.

The viola looks like and is played like a violin, but is slightly larger. It is referred to as the middle voice in the violin family, lying between the violin and the cello.

28 *One of three under a baby grand : PIANO PEDAL

Most modern pianos have three pedals. The soft pedal (also “una corda”), sostenuto pedal, and sustaining pedal (also “damper pedal”).

30 From South Asia, perhaps : DESI

People from the Indian subcontinent might refer to themselves as “desi”.

32 Many a blue state sen. : DEM

On political maps, red states are predominantly Republican and blue states predominantly Democrat. The designation of red and blue states is a very recent concept, only introduced in the 2000 presidential election by TV journalist, the late Tim Russert. In retrospect, the choice of colors is surprising, as in other democracies around the world red is usually used to describe left-leaning socialist parties (the reds under the bed!), and blue is used for conservative right-wing parties. In election cycles, swing/battleground states are often depicted in purple.

36 Glaze made with soy sauce and mirin : TERIYAKI

Teriyaki is a Japanese technique of cooking in which the foods are grilled in a sweet soy sauce marinade. The marinade may or may not include ginger.

41 First name of bassists Gordon and Deal : KIM

Musician and singer Kim Gordon is perhaps best known as the bass guitar player for the rock band Sonic Youth. She formed the group in 1981 with fellow guitarist and singer Thurston Moore. Gordon and Moore married three years later, but divorced in 2013.

Singer-songwriter Kim Deal was the bass player for the alternative rock band Pixies. After the Pixies broke up in 1993, she devoted her time to the band the Breeders, which she co-founded in 1989.

43 Poet laureate Limón : ADA

Ada Limón was named US Poet Laureate in 2022. Here is her poem “Field Bling”, which comes from her 2015 collection “Bright Dead Things”:

Nights when it’s warm
and no one is watching,
I walk to the edge
of the road and stare
at all the fireflies.
I squint and pretend
they’re hallucinations,
bright made-up waves
of the brain.
I call them,
field bling.
I call them,
fancy creepies.
It’s been a long time
since I’ve wanted to die,
it makes me feel
like taking off
my skin suit
and seeing how
my light flies all
on its own, neon
and bouncy like a
wannabe star.

45 Syr. neighbor : LEB

The Lebanon–Syria border runs almost 250 miles from the Mediterranean coast in the north, down to a point shared with Israel in the south.

54 Composer Khachaturian : ARAM

Aram Khachaturian was a Soviet-Armenian composer who created many works that were influenced by Armenian culture. Khachaturian’s most famous piece of music is the frenetic “Saber Dance” from the ballet “Gayane”. My favorite composition though is the “Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia”. It was used as the theme for a BBC drama called “The Onedin Line” and will always evoke for me images of tall ships and vast oceans.

58 Singer Yoko : ONO

Yoko Ono was born in 1933 in Tokyo into a prosperous Japanese family, and is actually a descendant of one of the emperors of Japan. Yoko’s father moved around the world for work, and she lived the first few years of her life in San Francisco. The family returned to Japan, before moving on to New York, Hanoi and back to Japan just before WWII, in time to live through the great firebombing of Tokyo in 1945. Immediately after the war the family was far from prosperous. While Yoko’s father was being held in a prison camp in Vietnam, her mother had to resort to begging and bartering to feed her children. When her father was repatriated, life started to return to normal and Yoko was able to attend university. She was the first woman to be accepted into the philosophy program of Gakushuin University.