LA Times Crossword 17 Sep 26, Thursday

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Constructed by: Katy Steinmetz

Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Theme (according to Bill): Pressing Matters

Themed answers each end with a word from the world of journalism, and start with a word that rhymes with that term:

• 17A Reporter’s approach to a story about a bracelet? : BANGLE ANGLE
• 23A Reporter’s approach to a story about a doppelgänger? : TWIN SPIN
• 35A Reporter’s approach to a story about a male duck? : DRAKE TAKE
• 50A Reporter’s approach to a story about a picnic pest? : ANT SLANT
• 57A Reporter’s approach to a story about a spring bloom? : CROCUS FOCUS

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

Bill’s time: 8m 48s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

14A Tandoor, for one : OVEN

A tandoor is a cylindrical clay or metal oven used in cuisines from several Asian locales, including India.

15A Sub : HOAGIE

“Hoagy” (sometimes “hoagie”) is another name for a submarine sandwich. The term “hoagy” originated in Philadelphia, and was apparently introduced by Italians working in the shipyards during WWI. The shipyards were located on Hog Island, and the sandwich was first called “the Hog Island”, which morphed into “hoagy”.

16A Credit card fig. : APR

Annual percentage rate (APR)

20A “Cheap Thrills” singer : SIA

“Sia” is the stage name of Australian singer Sia Furler from Adelaide. She is a cousin of Australian Christian Rock musician Peter Furler. Sia is a very private person, and even covers her face with a blond wig while performing.

“Cheap Thrills” is a 2015 song that was the first number-one hit in the US for Australian singer/songwriter Sia.

21A Lowe’s purchase : TOOL

Lucius S. Lowe opened the first Lowe’s hardware store in 1921, in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina. Lucius only knew the one store, as it was his family who expanded the company after he passed away in 1940.

22A Lariat : ROPE

Our word “lariat” comes from the Spanish “la reata” meaning “the rope”.

23A Reporter’s approach to a story about a doppelgänger? : TWIN SPIN

A doppelgänger is a ghostly double of a living person. The literal translation of the German word “Doppelgänger” is double (Doppel) walker (Gänger).

26A Workers featured in the opening scenes of “Frozen” : ICEMEN

The 2013 animated Disney film “Frozen” opens with a chorus of burly icemen singing “Frozen Heart” as they harvest blocks of ice from a frozen lake. Back in the day, real-world icemen toiled away in freezing conditions cutting natural ice, storing it in insulated ice houses, and eventually distributing it via horse-drawn wagons. By the late 1800s, households in major cities in the Eastern US were consuming nearly a ton of ice per year, with neighborhood icemen lugging heavy 50-pound blocks directly into their wooden iceboxes.

29A Gets a rise out of, in a way : LEAVENS

Leaven is a substance that causes bread to rise, perhaps yeast or baking powder. The term “leaven” comes into English via French from the Latin “levare” meaning “to rise”.

34A Phoenix team : SUNS

The Phoenix Suns NBA team are in the Pacific Division, and are the only team in that division not based in California.

44A Tap dancer Hines : GREGORY

Maurice and Gregory Hines are a pair of brothers famous for starting out their show business careers as tap dancers. Maurice made one film appearance, in 1984’s “The Cotton Club”. The younger brother, Gregory, has been more visible in front of the camera. Gregory was one of the leads in the movie “The Cotton Club”, and hosted “The Gregory Hines Show” on television.

50A Reporter’s approach to a story about a picnic pest? : ANT SLANT

Our term “picnic” comes from the French word “pique-nique”, which now has the same meaning in French as in English. The original “pique-nique” was a fashionable potluck affair, and not necessarily held outdoors.

53A Lamb wrap with tzatziki : GYRO

A gyro is a traditional Greek dish of meat roasted on a tall vertical spit that is sliced from the spit as required. Gyros are usually served inside a lightly grilled piece of pita bread, along with tomato, onion and tzatziki (a yogurt and cucumber sauce).

Tzatziki (also “tarator”) is a sauce made from cucumbers mixed into yogurt with other flavorings. It is primarily associated with Greece, although variants are found in cuisines of other parts of Southeastern Europe and the Middle East.

56A Tennessee athlete, for short : VOL

The Tennessee Volunteers (the Vols) are the men’s sports teams at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. The women’s teams are the Lady Volunteers.

57A Reporter’s approach to a story about a spring bloom? : CROCUS FOCUS

The crocus (plural “croci”) is a plant genus in the iris family. The term “crocus” ultimately derives from the Sanskrit word for “saffron”. Saffron spice comes from Crocus sativus, the “saffron crocus”.

63A Subway Series squad : METS

The term “Subway Series” has been used to describe World Series baseball games when both participating teams are based in New York.

65A __-sense : SPIDEY

“Spidey-sense” is a term used to describe one’s intuition or instinct, especially when sensing something that might be dangerous. The term arises from the comic book hero Spider-Man’s ability to sense danger before others.

66A River through Flanders : YSER

The Yser is a river that originates in northern France and flows through Belgium into the North Sea. The Yser is often associated with WWI as it figured in a major battle early in the conflict. In the first three months of the war, the German Army pushed almost completely through Belgium, inflicting heavy losses on the Belgian Army as the defenders were forced to fight a fast-moving rearguard action. The Germans were intent on pushing right through Belgium and across France in a “race to the sea”. But the Belgians, with the help of their Allies, decided to make a final stand at the Yser Canal in an effort to prevent the Germans reaching the French ports of Calais and Dunkirk. The 22-mile long defensive line was chosen at the Yser because the river and canal system could be flooded to create a barrier that might be defended. The plan was successful and the front was “stabilized”. As we now know, millions of lives were lost over the coming years with very little movement of that battle line.

Flanders is a region in northern Belgium that includes the Belgian capital of Brussels. The Flemish population are Dutch-speaking, although the residents of Brussels tend to speak French, or are bilingual.

Down

1D San Francisco’s __ Hill : NOB

Nob Hill is a very elevated and central location in the city of San Francisco. Because of its views of the surrounding city and environs, Nob Hill became a desirable place to live for the wealthy in the 1800s. The area is still one of San Francisco’s most affluent neighborhoods and is home to upscale hotels as well as the magnificent Grace Cathedral. The name “Nob Hill” comes from the slang term for someone who is well-to-do, a “nob”.

2D Janelle’s “Abbott Elementary” role : AVA

Janelle James is a comedian and actress who is perhaps best known to TV audiences for playing Ava Coleman, the school’s inept principal in the mockumentary sitcom “Abbott Elementary”.

5D “__ sells seashells … ” : SHE

The classic tongue-twister, “She sells seashells by the seashore” was first published in 1908. The subject “she” is sometimes said to be Mary Anning, an early 19th-century British fossil collector, dealer, and paleontologist who gained fame for her discoveries on the Jurassic Coast of southern England.

6D Tropical ring-tailed mammal : COATI

The coati is a member of the raccoon family that is native to Central and South America, but can also be found in the southwest of the United States. You can read online, everywhere, that it is also known as the Brazilian aardvark. Not true. A 17-year-old student inserted the name into a Wikipedia article about the coati in 2008, resulting in the term being used everywhere: tons of websites, newspapers, academic books on natural history, and even this blog (said he, shamed).

8D Breakfast brand : EGGO

Eggo is a brand of frozen waffles that was introduced by the Dorsa brothers in 1953 and later acquired by Kellogg in 1968. The brand experienced a surge in popularity in the 1980s due to a successful ad campaign featuring a family sitting down to breakfast together and enjoying Eggo waffles. The tagline of the commercials, “Leggo my Eggo”, is still recognized today.

9D Country great Nelson : WILLIE

Country singer, actor and activist Willie Nelson was born during the Great Depression in Abbott, Texas. He wrote his first song at the age of seven and joined his first band at the age of ten, and he is still going strong. Nelson has a ranch in Texas but now spends most of his time in Maui, where he lives in a largely self-sustaining community alongside neighbors such as Kris Kristofferson, Woody Harrelson and Owen Wilson.

12D Camp nurse’s supply : EPIPENS

EpiPen is a brand of epinephrine auto-injector. An EpiPen delivers a measured dose of epinephrine, which is a common treatment for an extreme allergic reaction.

13D Salad leaves : GREENS

Our word “salad” comes from the Latin “salare” meaning “to salt”. The Latin “herba salata” translates as “salted vegetables”, which I guess could be a salad …

18D Mascara target : LASH

Variants of mascara have been around a long time, and certainly there was a similar substance in use in ancient Egypt. “Mascara” is a Spanish word meaning “stain, mask”.

22D Variety show : REVUE

“Revue” is the French word for “review”.

24D Modus operandi : WAY

“Modus operandi” (plural “modi operandi”) is the Latin for “mode of operating”, a term we’ve been using since the mid-1600s. It’s often used by the police when referring to the methods typically employed by a particular perpetrator of a crime, and is usually abbreviated to “M.O.”

29D Mandolin kin : LUTE

The lute is a stringed instrument with a long neck and usually a pear-shaped body. It is held and played like a guitar, and was popular from the Middle Ages right through to the late Baroque era. A person who plays the lute can be referred to as a “lutenist”.

A mandolin is a stringed instrument in the lute family. There is also a mandola, a similar instrument that is a little larger. In fact, “mandolin” comes from the Italian word for “little mandola”.

33D Shortest mo. : FEB

The name of the month February comes from the Latin word “februum” meaning “purification”. The Romans had a ritual named Februa (purification) on February 15th every year. I don’t think many people pronounce the first letter R in “February”, leaving it silent, but I could be wrong …

36D Some big hoppers : ROOS

Marsupials are mammals that carry their young in a pouch called a marsupium. Better-known marsupials are kangaroos, koalas, wombats and Tasmanian devils. As you can probably tell from this list, most marsupials are native to the Southern Hemisphere.

41D Three-time Best Actress Oscar winner McDormand : FRANCES

Frances McDormand is a favorite actress of mine. She belongs to an exclusive club, being one of only two women in history to win the Best Actress Oscar three or more times (the other club member is Katharine Hepburn). McDormand won for her roles in “Fargo” (1996), “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” (2017), and “Nomadland” (2020). The latter won that season’s Best Picture Academy Award, making McDormand the first person ever to win Oscars for both acting and producing on the exact same film.

42D Driver’s “Star Wars” role : REN

Kylo Ren is the son of Han Solo and Princess Leia Organa in the “Star Wars” universe. The character’s birth name was Ben Solo. He was trained as a Jedi knight by his uncle, Luke Skywalker. However, Ben came to embrace the Dark Side, and changed his name to Kylo Ren. Ren is played by actor Adam Driver.

Adam Driver is an actor perhaps best known to TV audiences for playing Adam Sackler on the show “Girls” that airs on HBO. Driver’s movie career got a huge boost in 2015 when he played villain Kylo Ren in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”.

44D Rough road surface : GRAVEL

Gravel is a loose mixture of rock fragments. It is classified by the size of those fragments. For example, pea gravel comprises pea-size, rounded stones.

54D Asana expert : YOGI

The word “asana” comes from the Sanskrit root “as”, which means “to sit” or “to be present”. In ancient yogic texts, “asana” primarily referred to a stable and comfortable seated position for meditation, rather than the array of physical postures that we associate with modern yoga practice today.

59D Great Basin native : UTE

The Great Basin is a large region of the US covering most of Nevada, much of Utah and some parts of Idaho, Wyoming, Oregon and California. The 200,000 square mile area drains internally, with all precipitation sinking underground or flowing into lakes. Most of the lakes in the Great Basin are saline, including the Great Salt Lake, Pyramid Lake and the Humboldt Sink.

60D Georgia, once: Abbr. : SSR

The former Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) of Georgia is now an independent country. Supposedly, the Georgian people were given their name because they especially revered St. George. The flag of Georgia does indeed feature a St. George’s cross (as well as four Bolnisi crosses).