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Edited by: Patti Varol
Today’s Reveal Answer: Four Quarters
The FOUR themed answers start with a synonym of “QUARTERS”:
- 56 Change for a dollar, and what can be found at the starts of the answers to the starred clues : FOUR QUARTERS
- 17 *Completely and utterly incorrect : FLAT-OUT WRONG (giving “flat”)
- 24 *Cheat sheets : CRIB NOTES (giving “crib”)
- 35 *Tries to uncover old scandals, say : DIGS UP DIRT (giving “digs”)
- 47 *Thai dish also called “drunken noodles” : PAD KEE MAO (giving “pad”)
Read on, or jump to …
… a complete list of answers
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Bill’s time: 7m 01s
Bill’s errors: 0
Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies
Across
5 Peach __ : MELBA
Peach Melba is a dessert comprising peaches and raspberry sauce with vanilla ice cream. The dish was the creation of chef Auguste Escoffier, who introduced it at the Savoy Hotel in London in the 1890s in honor of Australian soprano Dame Nellie Melba. Escoffier later developed Melba toast, also in honor of the singer.
13 Black bird : RAVEN
Ravens and crows are very similar species, and it can be difficult to tell them apart. Ravens are a little larger and often travel in pairs, whereas crows are a little smaller and are usually seen in larger groups. Crows make a cawing sound, while the raven’s call is more like a croak.
16 German cry : ACH!
The German exclamation “ach!” is usually translated into English as “oh!”
19 Quilting party : BEE
Back in 18th-century America, when neighbors would gather to work for the benefit of one of their group, such a meeting was called a bee. The name “bee” was an allusion to the social nature of the insect. In modern parlance, a further element of entertainment and pleasure has been introduced, for example in a quilting bee, or even a spelling bee.
20 Texas city that forms the Petroplex with Midland : ODESSA
The adjacent cities of Midland and Odessa in Texas are sometimes referred to as the Petroplex. The term “petroplex”, from “petrol” and “complex”, also applies to the Permian Basin in which the cities are located. The Permian Basin is a large sedimentary basin that is the highest producing oil field in the whole country.
21 Activist Yoko : ONO
Artist Yoko Ono operates the website ImaginePeace.com. I checked it out once and found these two lovely quotes:
- Imagine all the people living life in peace … John Lennon
- A dream you dream alone is only a dream, a dream you dream together is reality … Yoko Ono
22 Venue : SITE
A venue is a specified locale used for an event. The term “venue” came into English via French from the Latin “venire” meaning “to come”. So, a “venue” is a place to which people “come” for an event.
23 Worldwide social welfare org. : UNICEF
The United Nations Children’s Fund is known by the acronym UNICEF because the organization’s original name when it was founded in 1946 was the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund. The original focus of the fund was to provide relief to children in countries that had been devastated by WWII. UNICEF is supported by contributions from governments, but also by individual donors. One of the more successful programs for collecting private donations is the Trick-or-Treat UNICEF box that has been a tradition here in North America since 1950.
24 *Cheat sheets : CRIB NOTES
A crib is plagiarism. It is most commonly the copying of an answer in an examination.
30 NFC East team, on scoreboards : NYG
The New York Giants (NYG) football team plays home games in MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, a stadium shared with the New York Jets (NYJ). The Giants are the only team remaining from a group of five that joined the league in 1925. For many years, the Giants shared team names with the New York Giants MLB team, before the baseball franchise moved to San Francisco after the 1957 season.
45 Air marshal’s org. : TSA
The US air marshal program was created by President Kennedy in 1963, with the initial force of only six marshals assigned to flights that were considered at high risk for a hijacking. Just before 9/11, the number of marshals had increased to 33. The exact number of marshals employed today is classified information, but it is thought to be thousands.
47 *Thai dish also called “drunken noodles” : PAD KEE MAO
Drunken noodles is a Thai dish also known as “phat khi mao” and “pad kee mao”. “Khi mao” translates from Thai as “drinkard”. Paradoxically, there is no alcohol in the list of ingredients for drunken noodles. There are suggestions that the meal’s name arose because rice used to be an ingredient, or because whoever created the dish did so when drunk!
50 More svelte : LEANER
“Svelte” comes into English from Latin, via the Italian “svelto” meaning “stretched out”. Something or someone described as svelte would be slender and graceful.
52 Midmonth time : IDES
There were three important days in each month of the old Roman calendar. These days originally depended on the cycles of the moon but were eventually “fixed” by law. “Kalendae” were the first days of each month, originally the days of the new moon. “Nonae” were originally the days of the half moon. And “idus” (the ides) was originally the day of the full moon, eventually fixed at the 15th day of a month. Actually, the ides were the 15th day of March, May, July and October. For all other months, the ides fell on the 13th. Go figure …
56 Change for a dollar, and what can be found at the starts of the answers to the starred clues : FOUR QUARTERS
The American quarter is a little unusual in the world of decimal currency, if you think about it. Most currencies have a “20-cent” coin, which is easier to work with mathematically. The US went for the quarter in deference to the practice of dividing Spanish Milled Dollars into eight wedge-shaped “bits”. That’s also why the quarter is sometimes referred to as “two bits”. We’ve been using the adjective “two-bit” to mean “cheap, tawdry” at least since 1929. State quarters were introduced in 1999.
59 “The Bear” Emmy winner Edebiri : AYO
Actor, comedian and television writer Ayo Edebiri gained prominence for her role as Sydney Adamu, the young sous-chef in the very successful Hulu series “The Bear”.
“The Bear” is a comedy-drama TV show that started airing in 2022. It stars Jeremy Allen White (of “Shameless” fame) as a chef from a Michelin-star restaurant who heads home to Chicago to run his family’s sandwich shop after his brother dies. I really enjoyed this one …
60 “Sense and Sensibility” novelist Jane : AUSTEN
“Sense and Sensibility” is an 1811 novel by Jane Austen, the first of the six novels that she penned. The original printing does not use Austen’s name, and rather was written “By a Lady”.
61 __ Lawrence College : SARAH
Sarah Lawrence College is a private school in Yonkers, New York that was established in 1926 by real-estate mogul William Van Duzer Lawrence. He named the institution in honor of his wife Sarah, who died that same year. The school was originally intended to provide an education in the arts and humanities for women students, although back then the curriculum included modeling, shorthand, typing and applying makeup. Things have changed a little since then …
64 Actor Rogen : SETH
Seth Rogen is a Canadian comedian who got a lot of credit for his supporting role in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin”. That led to him being cast as the lead in the 2007 film “Knocked Up”. Rogen also co-directed and co-starred in “The Interview”, a movie that created a huge ruckus in the North Korean regime.
Down
2 “My eye!” : BALONEY!
“Baloney” is an American English variant of “Bologna” as in the sausage. The term came to be used to mean “nonsense” in the 1920s. “Baloney” was popularized in the 1930s by New York Governor Alfred E. Smith as he used the term quite often.
7 Téa of “Madam Secretary” : LEONI
Téa Leoni is an American actress. One of Leoni’s early parts was in the great film “A League of Their Own” (a minor role: Racine at first base). She also played the fiancée of Sam Malone from “Cheers” on the spin-off sitcom “Frasier”. A leading role on the big screen was opposite Adam Sandler in “Spanglish”. My favorite of her more prominent movie roles was as Jane in “Fun with Dick and Jane”. Leoni started playing the title role in the drama series “Madam Secretary” in 2014, and that’s a show I quite enjoy …
“Madam Secretary” is a TV show that first aired from 2014 to 2019. It is about an ex-CIA analyst who is appointed as US Secretary of State. Téa Leoni plays the title role, ably supported by a favorite actress of mine, Bebe Neuwirth. I like this show …
8 Chimpanzee kin : BONOBO
The bonobo used to be called the pygmy chimpanzee, and is a cousin of the common chimpanzee. The bonobo is an endangered species that is now found in the wild only in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa. Along with the common chimpanzee, the bonobo is the closest species to humans genetically.
9 “Sense and Sensibility” director Lee : ANG
Taiwanese director Ang Lee sure has directed a mixed bag of films, mixed in terms of genre but not in terms of quality. He was at the helm for such classics as “Sense & Sensibility” (my personal favorite), “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”, “Hulk”, “Brokeback Mountain” and “Life of Pi”.
10 Savanna or steppe : HABITAT
A savanna (also “savannah”) is a grassland. If there are any trees in a savanna, by definition they are small and widely spaced so that light can get to the grasses allowing them to grow unhindered.
A steppe is a grassland that is devoid of trees, apart from those growing near rivers and lakes. The term “steppe” is Russian in origin, and is used to describe the geographical feature that extends across Eurasia. In South Africa, the same feature is called a “veld”, and in North America it is called a “prairie”.
11 Lipton offerings : ICE TEAS
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 as his blends of tea became popular in the US. Despite the Lipton roots in the UK, Lipton black tea isn’t available there, so I’ve always thought of it as an American brand.
15 Aryna Sabalenka’s org. : WTA
Former World No. 1 tennis player Billie Jean King founded the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) in 1973.
Aryna Sabalenka is a Belarusian professional tennis player known for her powerful serve and aggressive baseline game. She has achieved a career-high ranking of No. 1 in singles and No. 1 in doubles. Sabalenka has won multiple Grand Slam titles in women’s doubles, including the 2021 US Open, and captured her first Grand Slam singles title at the 2023 Australian Open.
24 Literature Nobelist Albert : CAMUS
Albert Camus was a French author, and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957. Sadly, Camus died in a car accident just two years after he received the prize, at only 46 years of age.
25 __ Dame : NOTRE
Notre-Dame de Paris is the spectacular Gothic cathedral that sits on the Île de la Cité, one of the islands in the middle of the River Seine in Paris. Notre-Dame is home to many beautiful and significant artifacts, the most famous of which is the Crown of Thorns supposedly worn by Jesus Christ at his execution, placed in the cathedral in 1239. It’s also home to some magnificent gargoyles on the roof, and you can climb up to the roof and take a very close look at them. Well, you used to be able to, until the tragic fire of 2019. The cathedral re-opened at the end of 2014, but I’m not sure about the tour of the roof …
31 Pop singer Mann : AIMEE
Aimee Mann is a rock singer and guitarist from Virginia. Mann is married to Michael Penn, the brother of actor Sean Penn.
33 Old-school organizers, briefly : PDAS
Personal digital assistant (PDA)
36 Roma’s land : ITALIA
In Italian, “Roma” (Rome) and “Firenze” (Florence) are cities in “Italia” (Italy).
38 Procter & Gamble detergent pack : TIDE POD
The dark side of social media struck again in late 2017 when “The Tide Pod Challenge” became an Internet sensation. Participants were eating Tide detergent pods on camera, and getting very sick and dangerously injured.
48 Menu opener : MOUSE
The computer mouse was invented at the Stanford Research Institute in 1963, by one Douglas Engelbart. Sadly for him, his patent ran out before mice became standard equipment on computers, so he never made any money from his amazing invention.
49 Major artery : AORTA
The aorta originates in the heart and extends down into the abdomen. It is the largest artery in the body.
57 Logician’s letters : QED
The initialism “QED” is used at the end of a mathematical proof or a philosophical argument. QED stands for the Latin “quod erat demonstrandum” meaning “that which was to be demonstrated”.
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Complete List of Clues/Answers
Across
1 Reading while propped up by pillows, say : ABED
5 Peach __ : MELBA
10 Casual greetings : HIS
13 Black bird : RAVEN
15 “It’s our time to shine!” : WE’RE ON!
16 German cry : ACH!
17 *Completely and utterly incorrect : FLAT-OUT WRONG
19 Quilting party : BEE
20 Texas city that forms the Petroplex with Midland : ODESSA
21 Activist Yoko : ONO
22 Venue : SITE
23 Worldwide social welfare org. : UNICEF
24 *Cheat sheets : CRIB NOTES
26 Lease : RENT
27 Meadow : LEA
29 Expression of awe : OOH AAH
30 NFC East team, on scoreboards : NYG
31 Pre-GPS navigation aid : AAA MAP
34 Rugrats : TOTS
35 *Tries to uncover old scandals, say : DIGS UP DIRT
37 Wineglass part : STEM
39 Pricey property : ESTATE
40 Gas additive brand : STP
43 Like meat rubs : SPICED
45 Air marshal’s org. : TSA
46 Formal address : SIRE
47 *Thai dish also called “drunken noodles” : PAD KEE MAO
50 More svelte : LEANER
52 Midmonth time : IDES
53 As well : TOO
54 Groom-to-be : FIANCE
55 Knock : RAP
56 Change for a dollar, and what can be found at the starts of the answers to the starred clues : FOUR QUARTERS
59 “The Bear” Emmy winner Edebiri : AYO
60 “Sense and Sensibility” novelist Jane : AUSTEN
61 __ Lawrence College : SARAH
62 Acid : LSD
63 Dough : BREAD
64 Actor Rogen : SETH
Down
1 Sound in a vet’s office : ARF!
2 “My eye!” : BALONEY!
3 Ducking : EVADING
4 Catch a hint of : DETECT
5 Sound in a vet’s office : MEW
6 Blunder : ERROR
7 Téa of “Madam Secretary” : LEONI
8 Chimpanzee kin : BONOBO
9 “Sense and Sensibility” director Lee : ANG
10 Savanna or steppe : HABITAT
11 Lipton offerings : ICE TEAS
12 “Puh-leeze” : SHEESH
14 __ ring : NOSE
15 Aryna Sabalenka’s org. : WTA
18 Pinned item on many a pol’s lapel : US FLAG
22 Übertrendy : SO HOT
23 Continental breakfast vessel : URN
24 Literature Nobelist Albert : CAMUS
25 __ Dame : NOTRE
28 Simplicity : EASE
31 Pop singer Mann : AIMEE
32 Likely will, with “is” : … APT TO
33 Old-school organizers, briefly : PDAS
35 Knocks to the canvas : DECKS
36 Roma’s land : ITALIA
37 Times for pampering : SPA DAYS
38 Procter & Gamble detergent pack : TIDE POD
40 Genuine : SINCERE
41 Squirrel, in slang : TREE RAT
42 Each : PER
43 Feature of a well-thrown football : SPIRAL
44 Way out of the way? : DETOUR
46 Seasonal mall workers : SANTAS
48 Menu opener : MOUSE
49 Major artery : AORTA
51 Corn units : EARS
54 Good times : FUN
56 Terrif : FAB
57 Logician’s letters : QED
58 [Finger on lips] : [SHH]
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