Day: November 10, 2026

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Constructed by: Joe Marquez

Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Theme (according to Bill): Occupational Hazards

Themed answers are common phrases describing a problem, reinterpreted as WORRIES for professionals named in the corresponding clues:

• 19A Worry for a campaign manager? : PRIMARY CONCERN
• 25A Worry for a stunt performer? : DOUBLE TROUBLE
• 43A Worry for a winemaker? : PRESSING ISSUE
• 52A Worry for a dry cleaner? : DELICATE MATTER

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

Bill’s time: 6m 12s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1A Largest of the Three Bears : PAPA

The story of “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” was first recorded in 1837 in England, although the narrative was around before it was actually written down. The original fairy tale was rather gruesome, but successive versions became more family-oriented. The character that eventually became Goldilocks was originally an elderly woman, and the three “nameless” bears became Papa Bear, Mama Bear and Baby Bear.

13A Last (and next) U.S. state to host the Winter Olympics : UTAH

Salt Lake City hosted the XIX Olympic Winter Games in 2002 and was subsequently awarded the 2034 Winter Olympics, making Utah both the most recent and future U.S. home for the event. Uniquely, the current plan is to utilize only pre-existing competition venues from the 2002 games.

15A “Still Alice” Oscar winner Julianne : MOORE

Actress Julianne Moore won her Best Actress Oscar for playing the title role in the 2014 film “Still Alice”, which deals with the subject of Alzheimer’s disease. As well as being a talented actor, Moore is a successful children’s author. Her 2007 book “Freckleface Strawberry” became a New York Times Best Seller, and was inspired by the teasing she received as a child for having freckles.

“Still Alice” is a 2014 film based on a 2007 novel of the same name by Lisa Genova. The title character in both movie and book is a professor of linguistics who develops early-onset Alzheimer’s disease just after she turns 50 years of age. In the film, Alice was portrayed by Julianne Moore, in a performance that won her that season’s Best Actress Oscar.

18A Physicist Newton : ISAAC

Sir Isaac Newton was one of the most influential people in history, and the man who laid the groundwork for all of classical mechanics. The story about an apple falling on his head, inspiring him to formulate his theories about gravity, well that’s not quite true. Newton often told the story about observing an apple falling in his mother’s garden and how this made him acutely aware of the Earth’s gravitational pull. However, he made no mention of the apple hitting him on the head.

19A Worry for a campaign manager? : PRIMARY CONCERN

The US is one of just a few countries that uses primary elections, selections of party candidates by popular vote. In the runup to most national elections outside of the US, political parties select their own candidates.

22A __ and yang : YIN

The yin and yang can be illustrated using many different metaphors. In one, as the sun shines on a mountain, the side in the shade is the yin and the side in the light is the yang. The yin is also regarded as the feminine side, and the yang the masculine. The yin can also be associated with the moon, while the yang is associated with the sun.

23A Day on Mars : SOL

A solar day on Mars is referred to as a “sol” by astronomers. One sol is equivalent to just under 24 hours 40 minutes here on Earth.

24A “Your Song” singer Rita : ORA

“Your Song” is a 2017 song written by Steve Mac and Ed Sheeran for English singer Rita Ora. Sheeran is a personal friend of Ora’s, and provided uncredited backup vocals on the song’s chorus.

32A Quibbles : CARPS

The word “carp” used to mean simply “talk” back in the 13th century, with its roots in the Old Norwegian “karpa” meaning “to brag”. A century later, the Latin word “carpere” meaning “to slander” influenced the use of “to carp” so that it came to mean “to find fault with”.

35A AirPod holder : EAR

AirPods are Apple’s line of Bluetooth earbuds. When AirPods were introduced in 2016, the market reacted with some skepticism. The left and right AirPods are not connected by any wire, so there was concern that individual earbuds could fall out of the ear, and possibly get lost. Another concern was Apple’s stated intent to abandon the wired headphone socket on new iPhone models. That was then, and this is now …

37A Trojan War epic by Homer : ILIAD

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 ten-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 …

40A Froot Loops mascot Toucan __ : SAM

Toucan Sam is the mascot of Kellogg’s Froot Loops breakfast cereal, and he can be seen on the front of every box. Froot Loops have been manufactured by Kellogg’s since 1963. The little loops come in different colors, originally red, orange and yellow, but now there are green, purple and blue loops as well. Notice I said “different colors” not “different flavors”. Each loop tastes the same, so I wonder where the color comes from …?

41A Actor Alda : ALAN

Alan Alda has had a great television career, most notably as a lead actor in “M*A*S*H”. He was born Alphonso D’Abruzzo in the Bronx, New York City. Alda won his first Emmy in 1974, for playing surgeon Hawkeye Pierce on “M*A*S*H”. He also won an Emmy in 2006 for his portrayal of Presidential candidate Senator Arnold Vinick in “The West Wing”. When it comes to the big screen, my favorite of Alda’s movies is the 1978 romantic comedy “Same Time, Next Year” in which he starred opposite Ellen Burstyn.

49A “Notorious” SCOTUS justice : RBG

The 2015 book “Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg” was co-written by Shana Knizhnik and Irin Carmon. Knizhnik had previously authored a “Notorious R.B.G” blog. The moniker “Notorious RBG” is reminiscent of the name of rap star the Notorious B.I.G.

57A Taylor Swift album with the hit “Cruel Summer” : LOVER

2019’s “Lover” was the seventh album released by Taylor Swift, and the first under Republic Records. It marked her pivot away from Big Machine Records and the start of a very public dispute over ownership of the masters of her first six albums.

58A Grumpy sort : CRAB

We’ve been describing grouchy people as crabby since the 1700s, mainly in North America. The term “crabby” possibly arose from the perceived combative nature of “crabs”.

59A Source of misery : BANE

Today, we tend to use the word “bane” to mean “anathema, source of persistent annoyance”. A few centuries ago, a bane was a cause of harm or death, perhaps a deadly poison.

63A Shoulder muscles, briefly : DELTS

The deltoid “muscle” is actually a group of muscles, the ones that cover the shoulder and create the roundness under the skin. The deltoids (delts) are triangular in shape resembling the Greek letter delta, hence the name.

64A PC file suffix : EXE

In the Windows operating system, a file with the extension “.exe” is an “executable” file.

Down

2D Video game pioneer : ATARI

The logo for now defunct gaming and computer company Atari has a very simple design. It has been interpreted as a letter A, or perhaps a representation of Mount Fuji. There is also evidence that the designer intended it to evoke the graphics in Atari’s first game: “Pong”.

3D Eve, but not Adam : PALINDROME

The three most famous palindromes in English have to be:

• Able was I ere I saw Elba
• A man, a plan, a canal, Panama!
• Madam, I’m Adam

One of my favorite terms is “Aibohphobia”, although it doesn’t appear in the dictionary and is a joke term. “Aibohphobia” is a great way to describe a fear of palindromes, by creating a palindrome out of the suffix “-phobia”.

5D “__ Never Catch Us”: Jessica Goodman bestseller : THEY’LL

Jessica Goodman is a New York Times bestselling author known for her young adult thriller novels, including “They Wish They Were Us”, “They’ll Never Catch Us”, and “The Counselors”. Before shifting to fiction full-time, Goodman worked as the op-ed editor at “Cosmopolitan” magazine.

6D Actor Stoltz : ERIC

Eric Stoltz is an actor from Whittier, California who is best known for playing the disfigured Rocky Dennis in the 1985 movie “Mask”. In 1984, Stoltz spent weeks playing Marty McFly for the film “Back to the Future” before producers concluded that he was miscast and gave the role to Michael J. Fox.

7D French money : EURO

The French franc was made up of 100 centimes, before being replaced by the euro.

8D Letter between xi and pi : OMICRON

The name of the Greek letter omicron means “little O” (O-micron) in Greek. This is in contrast to omega, which literally means “great O” (O-mega).

9D Capital of Dominica : ROSEAU

Roseau is the capital and largest city of the Caribbean island nation of Dominica. It is located on the island’s western leeward coast, and was built on the site of the ancient Kalinago (Island Carib) indigenous settlement of Sairi. The city’s name translates from French as “reeds”, and is a reference to the dense river reeds that historically grew along the local riverbanks.

Dominica is an island nation in the Caribbean, one not to be confused with the Dominican Republic. Christopher Columbus and his crew first spotted the island on a Sunday. Columbus named it “Dominica”, as “dominica” is Latin for “Sunday”.

10D Wild hog with tusks : BOAR

Tusks are the front teeth of certain animals that grow continuously. The tusks of wild pigs, hippos and walruses are elongated canine teeth. The tusks of elephants are elongated incisors.

11D Tehran’s country : IRAN

Tehran is the capital of Iran and one of the largest cities in the Middle East, with a population of about 8.5 million. Iran has been around a really long time and Tehran is actually the country’s 32nd national capital.

12D Sleuth, in old slang : TEC

The word “sleuth” came into English from Old Norse as far back as 1200 when it meant the “track or trail of a person”. In the mid-1800s, the term “sleuthhound” described a keen investigator, a “hound” close on the trail of the suspect. Sleuthhound was shortened to “sleuth” and was used for a detective in general.

20D Tech giant based in Taiwan : ASUS

Asus is a Taiwanese manufacturer of computing and networking hardware. The company name was chosen as the last four letters of “Pegasus”, the winged horse of Greek mythology.

21D Santa-tracking org. : NORAD

The North American Defense Command (NORAD) isn’t just a US operation but is a cooperative arrangement between Canada and the United States. The two countries entered into an agreement to establish NORAD in 1958, mainly due to the concern that there would be little or no warning of a missile attack from the Soviet Union that came over the North Pole. NORAD also tracks Santa Claus coming from the North Pole every Christmas, and these days publishes Santa’s location on Christmas Eve on its website. The tracking of Santa started in 1955 when a local Sears store placed an advertisement in a Colorado Springs newspaper with a phone number that could be used to call Santa Claus. The newspaper accidentally printed the number for the Continental Air Defense Command (a precursor to NORAD). The officer on duty instructed his staff to give all children who called a “current location” for Santa. Today, NORAD gets about 120,000 phone queries about Santa’s location every year, and the website gets about 20 million visitors.

26D Photo __: some PR events : OPS

Public relations (PR)

27D Basketball Hall of Famer Patrick : EWING

Patrick Ewing is a former NBA player, and a two-time inductee into the Basketball Hall of Fame, having been inducted in 2008 for his individual career and in 2010 as a member of the 1992 Olympic team. Ewing is Jamaican-born, and moved with his family to the US in 1975. He was actually born in the British Colony of Jamaica, as Jamaica became independent from the UK the day after his birth.

28D Lipton product : TEA

Sir Thomas Lipton was a grocer in Glasgow, Scotland. He founded a tea packing company in North America in 1893, in Hoboken, New Jersey. He was very successful, primarily due to his blends of tea becoming popular in the US.

29D Canadian treat that resembles a certain animal part : BEAVER TAIL

Beaver tails are fried dough pastries hand-stretched to resemble the broad, flat tail of the namesake animal. They were first introduced to the public in 1978 when husband-and-wife team Grant and Pam Hooker began selling them at the Killaloe Craft and Community Fair in Ontario. Beaver tails achieved international fame in 2009 when U.S. President Barack Obama made a highly publicized stop at Ottawa’s ByWard Market to purchase a classic cinnamon-and-sugar variation.

30D Lingerie trim : LACE

“Lingerie” is a French term. As used in France, it describes any underwear, worn by either males or females. In English we use “lingerie” to describe alluring underclothing worn by women. The term “lingerie” comes into English via the French word “linge” meaning “washables”, and ultimately from the Latin “linum”, meaning “linen”. We tend not to pronounce the word correctly in English, either here in the US or across the other side of the Atlantic. The French pronunciation is more like “lan-zher-ee”, as opposed to “lon-zher-ay” (American) and “lon-zher-ee” (British).

31D Greek Cupid : EROS

Cupid was the god of love in Roman mythology. Cupid’s name comes from the Latin verb “cupere” meaning “to desire”. Cupid’s Latin name was “Amor”, and his Greek counterpart was Eros.

37D Hipbone-related : ILIAC

The ilium (plural “ilia”) is the upper portion of the hipbone.

38D PC-to-PC hookup : LAN

You may have a Local Area Network (LAN) in your house. If you’ve got a computer and a router or switch, likely attached to some modem, then you have a LAN.

39D Letter between sigma and upsilon : TAU

Tau is the 19th letter of the Greek alphabet, and the letter that gave rise to our Roman “T”. Both the letters tau (T) and chi (X) have long been symbolically associated with the cross.

42D “¿Cómo __ usted?” : ESTA

“¿Cómo está usted?” is a more formal way of asking “How are you?” in Spanish.

45D Stretch of glacial growth : ICE AGE

Ice ages are periods in the Earth’s history when there are extensive ice sheets present in the northern and southern hemispheres. One might argue that we are still in an ice age that began 2.6 million years ago, as evidenced by the presence of ice sheets covering Greenland and Antarctica.

46D Brazilian dance : SAMBA

The samba is a Brazilian dance that is very much symbolic of the festival of Carnival. Like so much culture around the world, the samba has its roots in Africa, as the dance is derived from dances performed by former slaves who migrated into urban Rio de Janeiro in the late 1800s. The exact roots of the name “samba” seem to have been lost in the mists of time. However, my favorite explanation is that it comes from an African Kikongo word “semba” which means “a blow struck with the belly button”. We don’t seem to have a need for such a word in English …

50D Japanese box lunch : BENTO

A bento is a single-person meal that is eaten quite commonly in Japan. It can be purchased as a take-out meal, or it may be packed at home. A bento is usually sold as a “bento box”.

51D Avarice : GREED

Our word “avarice”, meaning “desire for wealth”, ultimately derives from the Latin word “avere” meaning “to crave”.

52D Mete (out) : DOLE

To mete out is to distribute by allotments. The verb comes from the Old English word “metan” meaning “to measure”, which is also believed to be the root of our word “meter”.

53D Like Doctor Doom : EVIL

Doctor Doom is a supervillain in the Marvel Comics universe. He is an archenemy of the Fantastic Four.

55D Sue at Chicago’s Field Museum, e.g. : T-REX

The largest and best-preserved dinosaur fossil ever found can be seen on display at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. The fossil is a Tyrannosaurus rex that is thought to have weighed over 7 tons when alive. It was discovered in South Dakota in 1990 by paleontologist Sue Hendrickson. The specimen is nicknamed “Sue” after Hendrickson.