LA Times Crossword Answers 11 Sep 14, Thursday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Steve Marron
THEME: Missing the Point … each of today’s themed answers needs the word POINT added at the end to match the clue, they’re all MISSING THE POINT:

18A. Zero degrees Celsius, for water FREEZING (POINT)
22A. Capacity limit SATURATION (POINT)
52A. Moment of change TRANSITION (POINT)
58A. Sensitive spot PRESSURE (POINT)

38A. Not getting it, and, in a different way, what 18-, 22-, 52- and 58-Across are MISSING THE POINT

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 9m 10s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

1. Wildlife photographs may be a memento of one SAFARI
“Safari” is a Swahili word, meaning “journey” or “expedition”.

7. Visit Overstock.com, say SHOP
Overstock.com (also called “O.co”) is an online shipping website that has been around since 1999. Launched in 1999, Overstock.com started out by offering surplus and returned merchandise from companies that had failed or companies with excess inventory. YOu can also buy “new” items on the site now, items that were manufactured specifically for Overstock.com.

11. It’s near Miss. ALA
Alabama is known as the Yellowhammer State, in honor of the state bird. Alabama is also called the “Heart of Dixie”.

Mississippi is named for the Mississippi River, which forms most of the state’s western border. In turn, the river’s name comes from the Chippewa “misi-ziibi” meaning “great river”.

14. Reebok rival ADIDAS
The brand name Adidas dates back to when Adolf “Adi” Dassler started making his own sports shoes in his mother’s laundry room in Bavaria after returning from WWI. With his brother, Adi founded Dassler shoes. The companies big break came in 1936 at the Berlin Olympics, when Adi persuaded American sprinter Jesse Owens to use his shoes, and with the success of Jesse Owens came success for the fledgling shoe company. After WWII the brothers split, acrimoniously. Adi’s brother, Ru-dolf Da-ssler, formed “Ruda” shoes (later to become Puma), and Adi Das-sler formed “Adidas”.

The brand name Reebok was adopted as the new company name for Foster Shoes of the UK in 1960. The name Reebok (more commonly “Rhebok”) is an Afrikaans word for an antelope, and comes from the term “roe buck”.

16. “Collages” novelist NIN
Anaïs Nin was a French author, famous for her journals that she wrote for over sixty years from the age of 11 right up to her death. Nin also wrote highly regarded erotica and cited D. H. Lawrence as someone from whom she drew inspiration. Nin was married to banker and artist Hugh Parker Guiler in 1923. Decades later in 1955, Nin married former actor Rupert Pole, even though she was still married to Guiler. Nin and Pole had their marriage annulled in 1966, but just for legal reasons, and they continued to live together as husband and wife until Nin passed away in 1977.

“Collages” is the last novel that French author Anaïs Nin had published, in 1964.

17. Triangular chip DORITO
Doritos are a brand of flavored tortilla chips launched in 1964. The name “Doritos” means “little bits of gold” in Spanish.

18. Zero degrees Celsius, for water FREEZING (POINT)
Anders Celsius was a Swedish astronomer. The temperature scale that Celsius created was the reverse of that used today, with “zero” representing the boiling point of water and “100” representing water’s freezing point. This scale was “upended” (in 1744) just after Celsius died, by the Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus. The resulting temperature scale then became known as the centigrade scale for over 200 years, until in 1948 it was decided to adopt the “degree Celsius”. So, anyone still using “degrees centigrade” is actually way behind the times …

30. Word with ball or cup EYE
An “eyecup” is a container that is used to apply eyewash to the eye. It might also be called an eye bath.

32. Molar mender’s org. ADA
American Dental Association (ADA)

Molars are grinding teeth. The term “molar” comes from the Latin “mola” meaning “millstone”.

33. University of Nevada city RENO
The city of Reno’s economy took off when open gambling was legalized in Nevada in 1931. Within a short time, a syndicate had built the Bank Club in Reno, which was the largest casino in the whole world at the time.

42. Pound and Poe POETS
Ezra Pound was an American poet who spent much of his life wandering the world, spending years in London, Paris, and Italy. In Italy, Pound’s work and sympathies for Mussolini’s regime led to his arrest at the end of the war. His major work was the epic, albeit incomplete, “The Cantos”. This epic poem is divided into 120 sections, each known as a canto.

The author and poet Edgar Allan Poe lived a life of many firsts. Poe is considered to be the inventor of the detective-fiction genre. He was also the first notable American author to make his living through his writing, something that didn’t really go too well for him as he was always financially strapped. In 1849 he was found on the streets of Baltimore, delirious from either drugs or alcohol. Poe died a few days later in hospital at 39 years of age.

43. Bounders CADS
Our word “cad”, meaning “a person lacking in finer feelings”, is a shortening of the word “cadet”. “Cad” was first used for a servant, and then students at British universities used “cad” as a term for a boy from the local town. “Cad” took on its current meaning in the 1830s.

A “bounder” is a man deemed to be ill-bred and obtrusive. The term was originally slang in England, and probably came from the sense of someone acting outside the bounds of acceptable behavior.

44. Santa __, California ANA
Santa Ana is the county seat of Orange County, California and takes its name from the Santa Ana River that runs through the city.

45. Attorney’s thing RES
“Res” is the Latin for “thing”. “Res” is used in a lot of phrases in the law, including “res ipsa loquitur”. The literal translation of “res ipsa loquitur” is “the thing speaks for itself”. It refers to situations when there is an injury, and the nature of the injury is such that one can assume that negligence had to have taken place.

47. I-5, for one HWY
I-5 is the main interstate out here on the West Coast, running from the Canada to Mexico, inland and parallel to the Pacific coastline. I-5 is the only Interstate that runs uninterrupted from the Canadian to the Mexican border.

48. Salt Lake City Winter Olympics year MMII
The last Olympic Games held in the US was in Salt Lake City in 2002, a winter games. That made Utah the fifth US state to host the Olympics.

The list of US-hosted Olympic Games is:

– Los Angeles, California (Summer 1932 & 1984)
– Squaw Valley, California (Winter 1960)
– Atlanta, Georgia (Summer 1996)
– Saint Louis, Missouri (Summer 1904)
– Lake Placid, New York (Winter 1932 & 1980)
– Salt Lake City, Utah (Winter 2002)

49. Abbey recess APSE
The apse of a church or cathedral is a semicircular recess in an outer wall, usually with a half-dome as a roof and often where there resides an altar. Originally apses were used as burial places for the clergy and also for storage of important relics.

55. Viruses, worms, etc. MALWARE
“Malware” is a collective term for software and program code that is created to intentionally disrupt and exploit computer systems. Viruses, worms, trojan horses and spyware are all covered by the term. “Malware” is short for “malicious software”.

A computer worm is form of malware that replicates itself to spread to other computers, usually over a computer network. A worm differs from a virus in that a virus is transmitted as an attachment to say an email, whereas a worm can do its nasty deed all on its own.

57. Bk. after Ezra NEH
In the Hebrew Bible, the Book of Ezra was originally combined with the Book of Nehemiah, with the two being separated in the early days of the Christian Era.

63. Squeeze (out) EKE
To “eke out” means to “make something go further or last longer”. For example, you could eke out your income by cutting back on expenses. I always have a problem with the commonly cited definition of “eke out” as “barely get by” …

64. Govt. agent T-MAN
A T-man is a law-enforcement agent of the US Treasury (the “T” stands for Treasury).

66. Who __ Nation: New Orleans Saints fans DAT
The entire community of fans of the New Orlean Saints are sometimes referred to as the “Who Dat Nation”. The name comes from a popular chant heard at a Saints game:

Who dat?
Who dat?
Who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints?

Down
1. In a funk SAD
“Funk” is ill-humor, a word that dates back to the mid-1700s and is probably a term that came from Scottish and northern English.

4. Parting words ADIEUS
“Adieu” is the French for “goodbye, farewell” from “à Dieu” meaning “to God”. We’ve absorbed the term into English. The plural can be either “adieus” or “adieux”, the latter being faithful to the original French.

7. Beach lotion letters SPF
In theory, the sun protection factor (SPF) is a calibrated measure of the effectiveness of a sunscreen in protecting the skin from harmful UV rays. The idea is that if you wear a lotion with say SPF 20, then it takes 20 times as much UV radiation to cause the skin to burn than it would take without protection. I say just stay out of the sun …

8. Horn honker of classic comedy HARPO
Harpo Marx was the second oldest of the Marx brothers. Harpo’s real name was Adolph, and he earned his nickname because he played the harp. Famously he didn’t speak on screen, a routine he developed after reading a review that he performed really well when he just didn’t speak!

11. Cartoon genre ANIME
Anime is cartoon animation in the style of Japanese Manga comic books.

The Japanese word “manga” means “whimsical pictures” and is an apt term to describe the Japanese style of comic book. Manga publications are more diverse than American comic books and have a larger audience. Manga cover many subjects including romance, sports, business, horror, and mystery.

19. Louisiana music style ZYDECO
Zydeco is a style of folk music that evolved from Creole music in Louisiana. The name “Zydeco” is imitative of the French word for green beans, “les haricots”. The term arose from a popular dance tune called “Les Haricots Sont Pas Salés” (“The Green Beans Ain’t Salty”).

22. Forever __ STAMP
The “forever stamp” for first-class postage was introduced in 2006 (and about time!). Now we have stamps that are good for first-class postage forever, no matter how the rates change.

24. Hymn ender AMEN
The word “amen” is translated as “so be it”. “Amen” is said to be of Hebrew origin, but it is likely to be also influenced by Aramaic and Arabic.

A “hymn” is a song of praise or thanksgiving to a deity. The term comes into English via Old French and is ultimately derived from the Greek “hymnos”, the word for an ode or song in praise of the gods. The Greek term is possibly a variant of “hymenaios” meaning “wedding song”, derived from Hymen, the Greek god of marriage.

25. Cranberry quality TANG
A “tang” is a strong taste or flavor.

When early European settlers came across red berries growing in the bogs of the northern part of America, they felt that the plant’s flower and stem resembled the head and bill of a crane. As such, they called the plant “craneberry”, which later evolved into “cranberry”.

33. Opposite of set RISE
The sun rises in the morning, and sets in the evening.

35. American Airlines Arena team MIAMI HEAT
The Miami Heat basketball team debuted in the NBA in the 1988-89 season. The franchise name was chosen in a competitive survey, with “Miami Heat” beating out “Miami Vice”.

American Airlines purchased the naming rights for two NBA venues: The AmericanAirlines Arena (home to Miami Heat) and the American Airlines Center (home to the Dallas Mavericks).

36. Film composer Morricone ENNIO
Ennio Morricone is an Italian composer best known for writing music for films and television shows. It was Morricone who wrote the fabulous scores for the Spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone, including the theme for “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”.

40. “Private Benjamin” star HAWN
I remember watching the ditsy Goldie Hawn character on “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In”. Hawn used to give great performances on the show, convincing everyone that she was the stereotypical dumb blonde. Well, what a career she was to carve out for herself!

“Private Benjamin” is an entertaining comedy movie that features Goldie Hawn in the title role. Private Benjamin is a new recruit in the US Army who joins under a misapprehension about the army lifestyle. She gets a rude awakening, and hilarity ensues …

41. Nestlé ice cream brand EDY’S
Dreyers’ ice cream sells its products under the name Dreyers in the Western United States, and Edy’s in the Eastern states. The company’s founders were William Dryer and Joseph Edy. Dreyer’s was purchased by Nestlé in 2006, making Nestlé the world’s largest supplier of ice cream.

48. Medit. hot spot MT ETNA
Mt. Etna is the largest of three active volcanoes in Italy. Mt Etna is about 2 1/2 times the height of its equally famous sister, Mt. Vesuvius. The third of the trio is Stromboli.

49. Unlike rock bands on MTV’s “Unplugged” AMPED
“MTV Unplugged” is a show on MTV that features performances by popular artists playing acoustic instruments. The term “unplugged” is commonly used for music played on acoustic instruments that is usually played on amplified instruments, often electric guitars.

50. Insulated jacket PARKA
A parka is a hooded, often fur jacket that is worn in cold weather. The original parka was a pullover design, but nowadays it is usually zipped at the front. “Parka” is the Russian name for the garment , absorbed into English in the late 1700s via the Aleut language.

51. Winter fall SLEET
Apparently “sleet” is a term used to describe two weather conditions. One is a shower of ice pellets, smaller than hail, and the second is a mixture of rain and snow, with the snow melting as it falls. It’s the second definition that I have always used …

56. Wine from Italy ASTI
Asti is a sparkling white wine from the Piedmont region of Italy, and is named for the town of Asti around which the wine is produced. The wine used to be called Asti Spumante, and it had a very bad reputation as a “poor man’s champagne”. The “Spumante” was dropped in a marketing attempt at rebranding associated with a reduction in the amount of residual sugar in the wine.

59. Otitis-treating MD ENT
Ear, Nose and Throat specialist (ENT)

Otitis is inflammation of the ear.

60. Uno y uno DOS
In Spanish, one and one (uno y uno) makes two (dos).

61. Law firm office, perhaps: Abbr. STE
Suite (ste.)

62. Journalist Koppel TED
The broadcast journalist Ted Koppel is most associated with his long run as anchor for the “Nightline” program on ABC. Koppel was actually born in England, to a Jewish family that had fled from Germany. He emigrated with his family to the US when he was 13 years old. Koppel is great friends with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger who was a frequent guest on his television show.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Wildlife photographs may be a memento of one SAFARI
7. Visit Overstock.com, say SHOP
11. It’s near Miss. ALA
14. Reebok rival ADIDAS
15. Piece of glass PANE
16. “Collages” novelist NIN
17. Triangular chip DORITO
18. Zero degrees Celsius, for water FREEZING (POINT)
20. Go out with SEE
21. Synthetic rubber, for one POLYMER
22. Capacity limit SATURATION (POINT)
27. Turn down DENY
28. Bathroom fixtures TUBS
29. Airline seat pocket item, briefly MAG
30. Word with ball or cup EYE
32. Molar mender’s org. ADA
33. University of Nevada city RENO
34. Pinnacles ACMES
38. Not getting it, and, in a different way, what 18-, 22-, 52- and 58-Across are MISSING THE POINT
42. Pound and Poe POETS
43. Bounders CADS
44. Santa __, California ANA
45. Attorney’s thing RES
47. I-5, for one HWY
48. Salt Lake City Winter Olympics year MMII
49. Abbey recess APSE
52. Moment of change TRANSITION (POINT)
55. Viruses, worms, etc. MALWARE
57. Bk. after Ezra NEH
58. Sensitive spot PRESSURE (POINT)
60. Be unable to stand DETEST
63. Squeeze (out) EKE
64. Govt. agent T-MAN
65. Like most wedding cakes ORNATE
66. Who __ Nation: New Orleans Saints fans DAT
67. Exists no more ISN’T
68. Said STATED

Down
1. In a funk SAD
2. Stir ADO
3. Diamond corner FIRST BASE
4. Parting words ADIEUS
5. Olympic judge, e.g. RATER
6. Equi- kin ISO-
7. Beach lotion letters SPF
8. Horn honker of classic comedy HARPO
9. Score that often requires overtime ONE-ONE
10. Spa treatment PEEL
11. Cartoon genre ANIME
12. Hotel housekeeping supply LINEN
13. Fuming ANGRY
19. Louisiana music style ZYDECO
22. Forever __ STAMP
23. TV feed component AUDIO
24. Hymn ender AMEN
25. Cranberry quality TANG
26. Practical joker’s cry I GOTCHA!
31. Kennel sounds YAPS
33. Opposite of set RISE
35. American Airlines Arena team MIAMI HEAT
36. Film composer Morricone ENNIO
37. Carpet blemish STAIN
39. Scatters, as petals STREWS
40. “Private Benjamin” star HAWN
41. Nestlé ice cream brand EDY’S
46. Plays chords, in a way STRUMS
48. Medit. hot spot MT ETNA
49. Unlike rock bands on MTV’s “Unplugged” AMPED
50. Insulated jacket PARKA
51. Winter fall SLEET
53. Aired again RERAN
54. Not reactive INERT
56. Wine from Italy ASTI
59. Otitis-treating MD ENT
60. Uno y uno DOS
61. Law firm office, perhaps: Abbr. STE
62. Journalist Koppel TED

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