LA Times Crossword 26 Jul 23, Wednesday

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Constructed by: Alan Olschwang
Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Reveal Answer: Long-Winded

Themed answers each include circled letters, with a LONG gap between them, that spell out the word “WIND”:

  • 61A Verbose, and what the circled letters in this puzzle literally are? : LONG-WINDED
  • 17A Watch straps : WRISTBANDS
  • 27A Chardonnay-based wine : WHITE BURGUNDY
  • 45A Reverse chin lock, for one : WRESTLING HOLD

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

Bill’s time: 5m 38s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Moving at a snail’s pace : SLOW

Snails and slugs are referred to collectively as gastropods. There are many, many species of gastropods, found both on land and in the sea. Gastropods with shells are generally described as snails, and those species without shells are referred to as slugs.

5 Wedding invite enclosures : RSVPS

“RSVP” stands for “répondez s’il vous plaît”, which is French for “answer, please”.

10 “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Oscar winner Michelle : YEOH

Michelle Yeoh is an actress from Malaysia who appeared in several Hong Kong action films in which she did her own stunts and martial arts scenes. Her most famous action performance was in the 2000 movie “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”, although I best know her for playing opposite Pierce Brosnan in the Bond film “Tomorrow Never Dies”.

“Everything Everywhere All at Once” is a 2022 comedy-drama movie starring Michelle Yeoh as a woman undergoing an IRS audit. That mundane storyline gets lost completely in a film full of science-fiction, fantasy, animation and martial arts. The screenplay was originally written for Jackie Chan, but it was reworked intentionally so that a female lead carried the plot.

19 A-line line : SEAM

An A-line skirt is one that fits snugly at the hips and flares towards the hem. The term “A-line” was first used in fashion by French designer Christian Dior in his 1955 spring collection.

20 Ed Asner’s “Elf” role : SANTA

“Elf” is a comedy movie that was released for the 2003 Christmas season. It was directed by Jon Favreau and stars Will Ferrell in the title role, with James Caan supporting and Ed Asner playing Santa Claus. It’s all about one of Santa’s elves who finds out he is human and goes to meet his father in New York City. The film was adapted into a stage musical that premiered on Broadway during the Christmas season of 2010.

21 Outdoor gear co-op : REI

REI is a sporting goods store, with the initialism standing for Recreational Equipment Inc. REI was founded in Seattle by Lloyd and Mary Anderson in 1938 as a cooperative that supplies quality climbing gear to outdoor enthusiasts. The first full-time employee hired by the Andersons was Jim Whittaker, who was the first American to climb Mount Everest.

23 __ and cheese : MAC

Thomas Jefferson’s name is associated with the dish we know today as “mac ‘n’ cheese”. The future president discovered baked macaroni with Parmesan cheese while in Paris and in northern Italy. He started serving the dish to guests in the US, and even had a machine imported to make the macaroni locally. Whether or not Jefferson was the first to bring mac ‘n’ cheese to America isn’t entirely clear, but it has been popular ever since.

25 Baja vacation spot, familiarly : CABO

Cabo San Lucas is a major tourist destination at the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula in Mexico. “Cabo” is sometimes referred to as the “Fort Lauderdale of Mexico”.

27 Chardonnay-based wine : WHITE BURGUNDY

The Burgundy region of France is famous for its wine production. If you’re looking at a label that isn’t translated into English though, you’ll see Burgundy written in French, namely “Bourgogne”.

36 “You Only Love Me” singer Rita : ORA

Rita Ora is a British singer who was born Rita Sahatçiu in Pristina, Yugoslavia to Albanian parents. The family name “Sahatçiu” comes from a Turkish word meaning “watchmaker”. Rita’s parents changed their name to make it easier to pronounce. So, the family name morphed from “watchmaker” to “time”, which is “ora” in Albanian.

37 Oboe insert : REED

A double-reed instrument is one in which two pieces of cane vibrate against each other to produce sound. In a single-reed instrument, just one piece of cane vibrates the mouthpiece. The best-known examples of double-reed instruments are the oboe and the bassoon.

40 Eurasia’s __ Mountains : URAL

The eastern side of the Ural Mountains in Russia and Kazakhstan is generally regarded as the natural divide between the continents of Europe and Asia.

42 Continental currency : EURO

The euro sign (€) looks like a letter C, but with two horizontal lines drawn across the middle. Inspiration for the design comes from the Greek letter epsilon.

43 Many a chalet : A-FRAME

An A-frame house is one that has a steeply-angled roof, one forming the shape of the letter “A”. The A-frame design is popular in snowy regions, as the roof is so steeply pitched that it does not collect snow.

“Chalet” is a Swiss-French name for an alpine cottage.

49 __ Center: Chicago skyscraper : AON

The Aon Center in Chicago is the third-tallest building in the city. There is also an Aon Center in Los Angeles that is the second-tallest building in that city.

50 Old photo finish : SEPIA

Sepia is that rich, brown-gray color so common in old photographs. “Sepia” is the Latinized version of the Greek word for cuttlefish, as sepia pigment is derived from the ink sac of the cuttlefish. Sepia ink was commonly used for writing and drawing as far back as ancient Rome and ancient Greece. The “sepia tone” of old photographs is not the result of deterioration over time. Rather, it is the result of a deliberate preservation process which converts the metallic silver in the photographic image to a more stable silver sulfide. Prints that have been sepia-toned can last in excess of 150 years.

55 Quai d’Orsay’s river : SEINE

The Quai d’Orsay in Paris is a quay and street along the left bank of the River Seine. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is located there, and the French commonly use “Quai d’Orsay” as a nickname for the Ministry.

66 Vehicle pulled by huskies : SLED

The Siberian Husky is one of the oldest breeds of dog, and originated in northern Asia. Siberian Huskies were imported into Alaska in great numbers in the early 1900s for use as sled dogs during the gold rush.

67 Data for sabermetricians : STATS

“Sabermetrics” is the name given to the statistical analysis of the sport of baseball. The term comes from the acronym SABR, standing for the Society for American Baseball Research.

68 Singer-songwriter Bareilles : SARA

Sara Bareilles achieved success with her 2007 “Love Song” with the help of the iTunes online store. In one week in June of that year, iTunes offered the song as “free single of the week” and it quickly became the most downloaded song in the store, and from there climbed to the number spot in the charts.

Down

2 Italian 42-Across predecessor : LIRA
[42A Continental currency : EURO]

The word “lira” is used in a number of countries for currency. “Lira” comes from the Latin for “pound” and is derived from the British pound sterling, the value of a Troy pound of silver. For example, the lira (plural “lire”) was the official currency of Italy before the country changed over to the euro in 2002.

3 Norse god played by Anthony Hopkins : ODIN

The marvelous actor Anthony Hopkins got his big break in movies playing Richard the Lionheart in the 1968 historical drama “The Lion in Winter”. Hopkins hails from the south coast of Wales, and was encouraged in his early career by fellow Welshman Richard Burton, whom he met when he was a teenager. I’d say that Hopkins’ best-known film role was Hannibal Lecter in “The Silence of the Lambs”.

4 “__ Side Story” : WEST

Leonard Bernstein’s musical “West Side Story” is based on William Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”. The musical is set in New York City and features two rival gangs: the Sharks from Puerto Rico and the Jets with working-class, Caucasian roots. Tony from the Jets (played by Richard Beymer) falls in love with Maria (played by Natalie Wood) from the Sharks. All this parallels Romeo from the House of Montague falling for Juliet from the House of Capulet in the Italian city of Verona. The stage musical was adapted into a very successful 1961 movie with the same title.

5 Barbecue bone : RIB

It is believed that our word “barbecue” (BBQ) comes from the Taíno people of the Caribbean in whose language “barbacoa” means “sacred fire pit”.

8 Spa menu item : PEDICURE

The word “spa” migrated into English from Belgium, as “Spa” is the name of a municipality in the east of the country that is famous for its healing hot springs. The name “Spa” comes from the Walloon word “espa” meaning “spring, fountain”.

11 Corp. bigwig : EXEC

A bigwig is someone important. The use of the term “bigwig” harks back to the days when men of authority and rank wore … big wigs.

12 Fall birthstone : OPAL

Here is the “official” list of birthstones, by month, that we tend to use today:

  • January: Garnet
  • February: Amethyst
  • March: Bloodstone or Aquamarine
  • April: Diamond
  • May: Emerald
  • June: Pearl or Moonstone
  • July: Ruby
  • August: Sardonyx or Peridot
  • September: Sapphire or Lapis Lazuli
  • October: Opal or Pink Tourmaline
  • November: Topaz or Citrine
  • December: Turquoise or Zircon (also now, Tanzanite)

13 “__ Front”: Kristin Hannah novel about a military family : HOME

Kristin Hannah is a lawyer turned novelist who has written several bestsellers including “The Nightingale” (2015), “Firefly Lane” (2008), “The Great Alone” (2018), and “The Four Winds” (2021).

18 Sri Lankan language : TAMIL

Tamils are a large ethnic group of almost 80 million people who speak Tamil as their mother tongue. Despite the large Tamil population, there is no Tamil state. The highest concentration of Tamils is in Sri Lanka, where they make up about 25% of the population.

The island nation of Sri Lanka lies off the southeast coast of India. The name “Sri Lanka” translates from Sanskrit into English as “venerable island”. Before 1970, Sri Lanka was known as Ceylon, a name given to the country during British rule.

22 Bygone NYC punk venue : CBGB

The music club known as CBGB opened in 1973 intending to feature country, bluegrass and blues music (hence the name “CBGB”, Country, BlueGrass and Blues). The club developed an association in the eighties with New York’s underground hardcore punk music.

26 Indigenous people of Colorado and Wyoming : ARAPAHO

The Arapaho Native-American people lived on the eastern plains of Colorado and Wyoming. They traditionally wintered in small camps in the foothills of the Rockies, and then relocated to plains in the spring where they hunted the buffalo that were gathering to give birth to their young.

29 Noble rank below viscount : BARON

In Britain, there are five ranks of peers. They are duke, marquess, earl, viscount and baron, in descending order.

30 U.S./Canada defense letters : 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 into 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.

31 Small drink : DRAM

I think that the dram is a confusing unit of measurement. It has one value as an ancient unit of mass, and two different values as a modern unit of mass, another value as a unit of fluid volume, and yet another varying value as a measure of Scotch whisky!

32 New Haven university : YALE

The city of New Haven, Connecticut was founded in 1638 by Puritan immigrants from England. Famously, it is home to Yale University. The city also initiated the first public tree planting program in the country. The large elms included in the program led to New Haven being called “the Elm City”.

34 Calendar interval : YEAR

A year is defined as the time it takes for the Earth to orbit the Sun. The other planets in our solar system take varying lengths of time to complete their orbits:

  1. Mercury: ~ 3 Earth months
  2. Venus: ~ 7 Earth months
  3. Earth: 1 Earth year
  4. Mars: ~ 2 Earth years
  5. Jupiter: ~ 12 Earth years
  6. Saturn: ~ 30 Earth years
  7. Uranus: ~ 84 Earth years
  8. Neptune: ~ 165 Earth years

40 Link letters : URL

An Internet address (like NYXCrossword.com and LAXCrossword.com) is more correctly called a uniform resource locator (URL).

42 Sicilian peak : ETNA

Italy is home to three active volcanoes:

  • Stromboli (in the Tyrrhenian Sea, off the north coast of Sicily)
  • Vesuvius (overlooking Naples)
  • Etna (on the island of Sicily)

44 “Despacito” singer Luis : FONSI

“Despacito” is a 2017 song released by Puerto Rican singer Luis Fonsi, featuring Puerto Rican rapper Daddy Yankee. The song’s accompanying music video was the most-viewed video of all time on YouTube from 2017 to 2020.

52 Mushroom spread : PATE

Pâté is a rich spreadable paste made from a mixture of ground meat and fat to which various vegetables, herbs and spices may be added. The most famous version of the paste is pâté de foie gras, which is made from the fattened livers of geese (“foie gras” means “fat liver” in French).

54 Paquin of “The Irishman” : ANNA

Anna Paquin is an actress from New Zealand who won an Oscar as an 11-year-old for her role in “The Piano”. In the HBO series “True Blood” she plays Sookie Stackhouse, a role for which she won a Golden Globe. Paquin married her “True Blood” co-star Stephen Moyer in 2010.

“The Irishman” is a 2019 Martin Scorsese crime movie starring the usual Scorsese suspects, namely Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci. Interestingly, comic actor Ray Romano has a significant supporting role in this film. “The Irishman” follows the life of a truck driver (De Niro) and his interaction with a mobster (Pesci) and Teamster kingpin Jimmy Hoffa (Pacino).

59 Novelist Ferber : EDNA

Edna Ferber was a novelist and playwright from Kalamazoo, Michigan. Ferber won a Pulitzer for her novel “So Big”, which was made into a film a few times, most famously in 1953 starring Jane Wyman. Ferber also wrote “Show Boat”, “Cimarron” and “Giant”, which were adapted successfully for the stage and/or big screen.

61 Mil. officers : LTS

Lieutenant (lt., and “looie” in slang).

62 OED entries : WDS

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines a lot of words (wds.).

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Moving at a snail’s pace : SLOW
5 Wedding invite enclosures : RSVPS
10 “Everything Everywhere All at Once” Oscar winner Michelle : YEOH
14 Campaign staffer : AIDE
15 Not as sweet : ICIER
16 Event with demos : EXPO
17 Watch straps : WRISTBANDS
19 A-line line : SEAM
20 Ed Asner’s “Elf” role : SANTA
21 Outdoor gear co-op : REI
22 Go by bike : CYCLE
23 __ and cheese : MAC
25 Baja vacation spot, familiarly : CABO
27 Chardonnay-based wine : WHITE BURGUNDY
33 Too clever __ : BY HALF
35 Many a Mideast native : ARAB
36 “You Only Love Me” singer Rita : ORA
37 Oboe insert : REED
38 TV spot seller : AD REP
40 Eurasia’s __ Mountains : URAL
41 Paddle kin : OAR
42 Continental currency : EURO
43 Many a chalet : A-FRAME
45 Reverse chin lock, for one : WRESTLING HOLD
48 Poker stake : ANTE
49 __ Center: Chicago skyscraper : AON
50 Old photo finish : SEPIA
53 Pa : DAD
55 Quai d’Orsay’s river : SEINE
60 Zero-shaped : OVAL
61 Verbose, and what the circled letters in this puzzle literally are? : LONG-WINDED
63 Modest meal : BITE
64 Accurately pitched : TUNED
65 University list-maker : DEAN
66 Vehicle pulled by huskies : SLED
67 Data for sabermetricians : STATS
68 Singer-songwriter Bareilles : SARA

Down

1 Tree topplers : SAWS
2 Italian 42-Across predecessor : LIRA
3 Norse god played by Anthony Hopkins : ODIN
4 “__ Side Story” : WEST
5 Barbecue bone : RIB
6 Hard to find : SCARCE
7 Climbing plant : VINE
8 Spa menu item : PEDICURE
9 Next year’s alums : SRS
10 “Who else would I be talking to?” : YES, YOU
11 Corp. bigwig : EXEC
12 Fall birthstone : OPAL
13 “__ Front”: Kristin Hannah novel about a military family : HOME
18 Sri Lankan language : TAMIL
22 Bygone NYC punk venue : CBGB
24 Guilty : AT FAULT
26 Indigenous people of Colorado and Wyoming : ARAPAHO
27 “__ was I?” : WHERE
28 Owned : HAD
29 Noble rank below viscount : BARON
30 U.S./Canada defense letters : NORAD
31 Small drink : DRAM
32 New Haven university : YALE
33 Forehead : BROW
34 Calendar interval : YEAR
39 Dehydrated : DRIED OUT
40 Link letters : URL
42 Sicilian peak : ETNA
44 “Despacito” singer Luis : FONSI
46 Breezed (through) : SAILED
47 Thingamajig : GADGET
50 Blubbers : SOBS
51 Malicious : EVIL
52 Mushroom spread : PATE
54 Paquin of “The Irishman” : ANNA
56 Wraps up : ENDS
57 Concept : IDEA
58 In the area : NEAR
59 Novelist Ferber : EDNA
61 Mil. officers : LTS
62 OED entries : WDS