LA Times Crossword 9 Nov 26, Monday

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Constructed by: Robin Stears

Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Reveal Answer: Starts with a Bang

Themed answers each START WITH A synonym of “BANG”:

• 63A Has a thrilling opening, or what the answer to each starred clue does : STARTS WITH A BANG

• 17A *Spinach eater who’s smitten with Olive Oyl : POPEYE THE SAILOR
• 26A *”I Don’t Like Mondays” new wave band : BOOMTOWN RATS
• 48A *”Mighty Morphin” heroes of 1990s television : POWER RANGERS

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

Bill’s time: 4m 26s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1A “Forever Your Girl” singer Abdul : PAULA

“Forever Your Girl” is the title track from Paula Abdul’s debut album, released in 1988. The accompanying music video is a little strange. It parodies the music video of Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love”, with three children acting as Palmer’s robotic backup dancers. Oh, and an 8-year-old Elijah Wood makes his first on-screen appearance, playing a boy dressed in a natty suit.

17A *Spinach eater who’s smitten with Olive Oyl : POPEYE THE SAILOR

Popeye first appeared in 1929 in a comic strip called “Thimble Theatre”. The strip, created by E. C. Segar, ran for ten years before Popeye made an appearance. Popeye received such a great welcome from readers that he soon “took over” the strip, and eventually even hogged the strip’s title. Before Popeye turned up, Olive Oyl was the main character.

25A Short choral compositions : MOTETS

A motet is a simple musical composition based on a sacred text that is usually sung without accompaniment. The term “motet” is a diminutive form of “mot”, the French for “word”.

26A *”I Don’t Like Mondays” new wave band : BOOMTOWN RATS

The Boomtown Rats is a new wave group formed in Dublin in 1975. They made music history in 1978 when their single “Rat Trap” became the very first rock song by an Irish band to reach number one on the UK Singles Chart. Even though they had a string of hits in Europe, they are primarily remembered in the US for their 1979 song “I Don’t Like Mondays”. This is a bleak track that was written after lead vocalist Bob Geldof heard teenage shooter Brenda Spencer use the song’s title phrase to casually explain her motives for firing upon a California elementary school.

31A Official state sport of Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, and Texas : RODEO

“Rodeo” is a Spanish word that is usually translated into English as “round up”.

32A Lithium-__ battery : ION

John B. Goodenough, one of the key developers of the lithium-ion battery, was awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work at the age of 97, making him the oldest Nobel laureate in history.

38A “The __ of the Opera” : PHANTOM

I’m a bit jaded with big stage musicals I must admit, but I will always have time for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s masterpiece “The Phantom of the Opera”. “Phantom …” is the longest running musical in the history of Broadway, and deservedly so. There is a sequel, titled “Love Never Dies”, that opened in London’s West End in March 2010. But, it hasn’t been well received.

43A Skater Lipinski : TARA

When American skater Tara Lipinski won the figure skating gold medal at the 1998 Winter Olympics, she was only 15 years old. To this day, Lipinski is the youngest person to win an individual gold at the Winter Games.

48A *”Mighty Morphin” heroes of 1990s television : POWER RANGERS

The American “Power Rangers” franchise originated from the Japanese “Super Sentai” series, adapting the original, Japanese-made action footage with American actors for dialogue and character development.

66A Heavy book : TOME

“Tome” first came into English from the Latin “tomus” which means “section of a book”. The original usage in English was for a single volume in a multi-volume work. By the late 16th century, “tome” had come to mean “large book”.

68A Student of Socrates : PLATO

Plato was a Greek philosopher and mathematician. He was a student of the equally famous and respected Socrates, and Plato in turn was the teacher and mentor of the celebrated Aristotle.

70A Pundit piece : OP-ED

A pundit is a learned person to whom one might turn for an opinion. “Pundit” is derived from the Hindi word “pandit” meaning “learned man”.

71A Mexican bucks : PESOS

The Mexican peso is the most traded currency from Latin America. It is also the third most traded currency in the Americas (after the US dollar and the Canadian dollar).

Down

1D Smurf with a white beard and red hat : PAPA

The Smurfs are little blue people created in 1958 by the Belgian cartoonist who went by the pen name Peyo. The Smurfs became famous in the US when Hanna-Barbera used them in a children’s cartoon series. The characters are largely a group of males. The original lineup included just one “Smurfette”, who is wooed by almost all of the boy Smurfs. Later, another female was introduced into the mix named Sassette, and still later along came Nanny Smurf.

8D Ridge on a guitar fingerboard : FRET

A fret is a metal strip embedded in the neck of a stringed instrument, a guitar perhaps. The fingers press on the frets, shortening a string and hence changing the note played. The note increases by one semitone as a finger shortens a string by one fret.

9D Rx writers : MDS

There seems to be some uncertainty about the origin of the symbol “Rx” that’s used for a medical prescription. One explanation is that it comes from the astrological sign for Jupiter, a symbol put on prescriptions in days of old to invoke Jupiter’s blessing to help a patient recover.

10D Japanese massage technique whose name means “finger pressure” : SHIATSU

Shiatsu is a therapeutic massage technique that was developed in early 20th-century Japan. It was created by blending traditional Japanese “anma” massage practices with modern Western concepts of anatomy and physiology.

11D Heart rate : PULSE

One’s pulse is the rhythmic throbbing of arteries that is usually detected at the wrist or the neck. The contraction of the heart creates a pressure wave in the blood that moves the arterial walls, which is detected as the pulse.

18D Continental currency : EURO

The reverse side of euro coins features a common design, a design that includes the 12 stars featured on the Flag of Europe. The number of stars is not related to the number of states in the European Union, nor has it ever been. The number of stars in the design was the subject of much debate prior to its adoption in 1955 by the Council of Europe. Twelve was a deliberate choice, as at that time there was no political connotation, and twelve was considered to be a symbol of unity.

26D Dry, as champagne : BRUT

Sparkling wines can be classified according to sweetness. These classifications are, from driest to sweetest:

• Brut Nature
• Extra Brut
• Brut
• Extra Dry (Or Extra Sec)
• Dry (or Sec)
• Semi-Dry (or Demi-Sec)
• Sweet (or Doux)

27D Actress Chaplin : OONA

Oona Chaplin is an actress from Madrid in Spain. She is getting a lot of airtime these days as she plays Talisa Maegyr on HBO’s hit fantasy series “Game of Thrones”. Oona is the granddaughter of Charlie Chaplin, and is named for her maternal grandmother Oona O’Neill, the daughter of playwright Eugene O’Neill.

28D Febreze target : ODOR

The odor-eliminating product we know today as Febreze was developed in the early nineties. It is produced by Procter & Gamble.

29D Bay Area NFLer : NINER

The San Francisco 49ers of the NFL have been playing their home games in Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara since 2014. The team moved from the famous Candlestick Park, which they had been using since 1971. Levi’s Stadium, the team’s new home, got a big boost in February 2016 when it was used as the venue for the Super Bowl. Given the sponsorship by Levi Strauss, the jeans manufacturer, the venue has the nickname “Field of Jeans”, a play on the movie title “Field of Dreams”.

35D Penultimate word in many fairy tales : EVER

The stock phrase “Once upon a time …” has been used in various forms as the start of a narrative at least since 1380. The stock phrase at the end of stories such as folktales is often “and they all lived happily ever after”. The earlier version of this ending was “happily until their deaths”.

41D Stereo alternative : MONO

Monophonic sound (“mono”) is sound reproduced using just one audio channel, which is usually played out of just one speaker. Stereophonic sound is reproduced using two audio channels, with the sound from each channel played out of two different speakers. The pair of stereo speakers are usually positioned apart from each other so that sound appears to come from between the two. Quadraphonic sound (4.0 surround sound) uses four audio channels with the sound played back through four speakers that are often positioned at the corners of the room in which one is listening.

47D Dishonorable : IGNOBLE

Something or someone described as ignoble is low or mean. “Ignoble” originally described someone of low birth, from the Latin “ignobilis” meaning “unknown, not noble”. The word is used “punnily” in the name of the Ig Nobel Prizes, a satirical awards ceremony held annually at Harvard University. The honors are bestowed upon genuine but bizarre scientific achievements, ranging from levitating frogs to studying the friction of banana peels.

51D Egyptian cross with a top loop : ANKH

The ankh was the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic character for “eternal life”. The ankh wasn’t just used in inscriptions but was often fashioned into amulets and as surrounds for mirrors (perhaps symbolizing a view into another world). The ankh is also known as “the key of the Nile” and “crux ansata” (Latin for “cross with a handle”).

53D Threepio pal : ARTOO

Artoo’s proper name is R2-D2 (also “Artoo-Detoo”). R2-D2 is the smaller of the two famous droids from the “Star Wars” movies. British actor Kenny Baker, who stood just 3 feet 8 inches tall, was the man inside the R2-D2 droid for the first six of the “Star Wars” movies.

C-3PO (or “Threepio”) is the protocol droid that appears in the “Star Wars” movie franchise.

54D “The Golden Girls” city : MIAMI

“The Golden Girls” is a sitcom that originally aired in the eighties and nineties. The show features Bea Arthur, Betty White, Rue McClanahan and Estelle Getty as four older women who share a house in Miami.

64D Bay Area hub, for short : SFO

The San Francisco Bay Area is served by three major airports: San Francisco (SFO), Oakland (OAK) and San Jose (SJC).