LA Times Crossword 11 Apr 22, Monday

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Constructed by: Kathy Lowden
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Reveal Answer: PPS

Themed answers each comprise two words beginning with the letter P:

  • 71A Second addendum to a letter … and a hint to 18-, 34-, 44- and 62-across : PPS
  • 18A Petite Mattel doll with her own Netflix TV series : POLLY POCKET
  • 34A Guy featured in “Practical Principles of Plain and Perfect Pronunciation” : PETER PIPER
  • 44A Porky’s girlfriend : PETUNIA PIG
  • 62A Animated feline in Inspector Clouseau films : PINK PANTHER

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

Bill’s time: 4m 45s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Bar passer: Abbr. : ATT

Attorney (att.)

The legal profession is referred to as “the bar”. The term arose in medieval times when European courtrooms were divided into two with “barring” furniture, basically a wooden rail that separated the public from the participants in the trial.

4 Donkeys : ASSES

A hinny is the offspring of a male horse (the “h-” from h-orse) and a female donkey/ass (the “-nny” from je-nny). A mule is more common, and is the offspring of a female horse and male donkey/ass.

14 Heckler’s word : BOO!

Originally, the verb “to heckle” meant “to question severely”, and for many years was associated with the public questioning of parliamentary candidates in Scotland. In more recent times, the meaning has evolved into questioning that is less polite and that is directed at stand-up comics.

16 Luxury watch : ROLEX

My most-prized possession is a beautiful stainless steel Rolex watch that my uncle bought while serving with the RAF in Canada during WWII. Rolex watches were made available to the Canadian servicemen at that time as they were shipping overseas. My uncle brought his Rolex home to Ireland after the war. He needed money one weekend and so sold the watch to my Dad, for five pounds. My Dad gave it to me just before he died, as he knew I loved the watch, and my brothers weren’t interested in it all. Not so long ago I had the watch appraised ($3,000), and my brothers suddenly took a liking to it! Still, it’s not something that will ever be sold, that’s for sure …

17 CPR expert : EMT

An emergency medical technician (EMT) might administer cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

18 Petite Mattel doll with her own Netflix TV series : POLLY POCKET

Polly Pocket is a doll that comes in its own case that serves as the doll’s house. It was the creation in 1983 of Englilshman Chris Wiggs for his daughter Kate. He licensed the concept, and Polly Pockets started to appear on store shelves in 1989.

20 Put on a peg, as a golf ball : TEED

A tee is a small device on which, say, a golf ball is placed before striking it. The term “tee” comes from the Scottish “teaz”, which described little heaps of sand used to elevate a golf ball for the purpose of getting a clean hit with a club.

22 Carp in a pond : KOI

Koi are fish that are also known as Japanese carp. Koi have been bred for decorative purposes and there are now some very brightly colored examples found in Japanese water gardens.

23 WWII subs : U-BOATS

The term “U-boat” comes from the German word “Unterseeboot” (undersea boat). U-boats were primarily used in WWII to enforce a blockade against enemy commercial shipping, with a main objective being to cut off the supplies being transported to Britain from the British colonies and the US. The epic fight for control of the supply routes became known as the Battle of the Atlantic.

24 Rich as Croesus, e.g. : SIMILE

A simile is a figure of speech in which a comparison is made between two things that are unalike. For example, a person might be described as “cute as a kitten” or as “busy as a bee”.

Croesus was the king of Lydia from 560 to 547 BC. He was noted for his fabulous wealth. As a result, the name “Croesus” entered the English language as a synonym for a wealthy man in expressions such as “rich as Croesus” and “richer than Croesus”.

26 Lire replacers : EUROS

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.

30 Irish or English dogs : SETTERS

An Irish setter is a breed of dog …
… or maybe someone from Dublin who sets crosswords …

The English setter is a gun dog. It picks up the scent of its quarry by holding its head high in the air while running, rather than sniffing at the ground. When it picks up a scent, it freezes in a standing position, with its body “set” in the direction of the prey.

34 Guy featured in “Practical Principles of Plain and Perfect Pronunciation” : PETER PIPER

The earliest written version of the “Peter Piper” nursery rhyme and tongue twister dates back to 1813 London:

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked;
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?

A peck is a unit of dry volume, equivalent to two gallons. Four pecks then make up a bushel.

38 MSN competitor : AOL

AOL was a leading Internet Service Provider (ISP) in the 1980s and 1990s. The company does still provide dial-up access to the Internet for some subscribers, but most users now access AOL using faster, non-AOL ISPs.

The Microsoft Network (MSN) used to be an Internet service provider (ISP). These days, MSN is mainly a Web portal.

41 Main blood vessel : AORTA

The aorta originates in the heart and extends down into the abdomen. It is the largest artery in the body.

43 World Wide __ : WEB

In essence, the World Wide Web (WWW) is a vast collection of documents that is accessible using the Internet, with each document containing hyperlinks which point to other documents in the collection. So the “Web” is different from the Internet, although the terms are often used interchangeably. The Web is a collection of documents, and the Internet is a global network of computers on which the documents reside. The Web was effectively the invention of British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee. The key to Berner-Lee’s invention was bringing together two technologies that already existed: hypertext and the Internet. I, for one, am very grateful …

44 Porky’s girlfriend : PETUNIA PIG

Petunia Pig is a cartoon character in the “Looney Tunes” and “Merrie Melodies” universes. Petunia is the girlfriend of Porky Pig and has been around since 1937.

46 Wand symbolizing royal authority : SCEPTER

A scepter (“sceptre” in Britain and Ireland) is a ceremonial staff, one often held by a monarch.

49 Snow pea holders : PODS

The snow pea lives up to its name. It continues to grow when it is snowing.

50 __ & Young: accounting firm : ERNST

Ernst & Young is one of the Big Four accountancy firms, alongside Deloitte, KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers. Ernst & Young is headquartered in London. The company was founded in 1989 with the merger of Ernst & Whinney with Young & Co.

56 Séance contact : SPIRIT

“Séance” is a French word meaning “sitting”. We use the term in English for a sitting in which a spiritualist tries to communicate with the spirits of the dead.

62 Animated feline in Inspector Clouseau films : PINK PANTHER

Apparently, some people think that the Inspector Clouseau character (played originally by Peter Sellers) is “The Pink Panther”. It’s actually the jewel that was stolen in the original movie. Would you believe there are eleven “Pink Panther” movies in the whole series?

65 “… butterfly … bee” boxer : ALI

Muhammad Ali first used his famous catchphrase “float like a butterfly and sting like a bee” before his world title fight against Sonny Liston in 1964. Back then Ali still went by his birth name of Cassius Clay.

66 Broadway backer : ANGEL

An angel investor is one who provides capital very early in a business’s life cycle. The term “angel” is borrowed from Broadway, where angels are wealthy people who provide funds to stage theatrical productions.

67 Road one-eighty : U-TURN

Hang a “uey” or “uie”, make a u-turn, make a 180.

68 Dangerous tide : RIP

Riptides are stretches of turbulent water caused by the meeting of different currents in the ocean.

69 Aptly named novelist : READE

Charles Reade was an English author who came to public attention with a two-act comedy play called “Masks and Faces”. Reade turned the play into a prose story in 1852 that he called “Peg Woffington”. Reade also wrote a historical novel called “The Cloister and the Hearth” about a married man who becomes a Dominican friar on hearing that his wife has died. Years later he discovers that his wife is in fact still living and a struggle develops between the man’s obligation to family and his obligation to the Roman Catholic Church.

70 Digital units : BYTES

In the world of computing, a bit is the basic unit of information. It has a value of 0 or 1. A “byte” is a small collection of “bits” (usually 8), the number of bits needed to uniquely identify a character of text. The prefix mega- stands for 10 to the power of 6, so a megabyte (meg) is 1,000,000 bytes. The prefix giga- means 10 to the power of 9, and so a gigabyte (gig) is 1,000,000,000 bytes. Well, those are the SI definitions of megabyte and gigabyte. The purists still use 2 to the power of 20 for a megabyte (i.e. 1,048,576), and 2 to the power of 30 for a gigabyte.

71 Second addendum to a letter … and a hint to 18-, 34-, 44- and 62-across : PPS

One adds a PS (post scriptum, or simply “postscript”) at the end of a letter (ltr.). A second postscript is a post post scriptum, a PPS.

Down

1 Aids in illegal activity : ABETS

The word “abet” comes into English from the Old French “abeter” meaning “to bait” or “to harass with dogs” (literally “to make bite”). This sense of encouraging something bad to happen morphed into our modern usage of “abet” meaning to aid or encourage someone in a crime.

2 Actress Marisa : TOMEI

Marisa Tomei’s first screen role was in the daytime soap “As the World Turns”, but her break came with a recurring role in “The Cosby Show” spin-off “A Different World”. Tomei won an Oscar for her delightful performance in “My Cousin Vinny” in 1992.

3 Tribal symbol : TOTEM

“Totem” is a word used to describe any entity that watches over a group of people. As such, totems are usually the subjects of worship. Totem poles are really misnamed, as they are not intended to represent figures to be worshiped, but rather are heraldic in nature, and often celebrating the legends or notable events in the history of a tribe.

4 Cleopatra’s snake : ASP

The asp is a venomous snake found in the Nile region of Africa. It is so venomous that the asp was used in ancient Egypt and Greece as a means of execution. Cleopatra observed such executions noting that the venom brought on sleepiness without any painful spasms. When the great queen opted to commit suicide, the asp was therefore her chosen method.

Cleopatra was the last pharaoh to rule Egypt. After she died, Egypt became a province in the Roman Empire.

6 Cylindrical barn neighbor : SILO

“Silo” is a Spanish word that we absorbed into English. The term ultimately derives from the Greek “siros”, which described a pit in which one kept corn.

7 Kimmy Schmidt player __ Kemper : ELLIE

Actress Ellie Kemper’s big break came with the role of Erin Hannon, a receptionist on the sitcom “The Office”. More recently, Kemper played the title role in the Netflix comedy series “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt”.

“Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” is a Netflix-made sitcom that was created by Tina Fey and Robert Carlock (the latter worked with Fey on “30 Rock”). The title character, played by Ellie Kemper, is a young woman adjusting to life in New York City after she was rescued from an underground bunker in Indiana where she had been held for 15 years. I tried a few episodes and found that it didn’t really hold my attention. But, I may give it another go one day, as I hear good things …

9 Will Smith film suggested by an Asimov classic : I, ROBOT

Science fiction author Isaac Asimov wrote a marvelous collection of short stories titled “I, Robot” that were first published together in 1950. In the stories, he makes repeated reference to the Three Laws of Robotics, which he introduced in the story “Runaround”, first published in 1942. The three laws are:

  1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
  2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
  3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

“I, Robot” is an interesting 2004 science fiction film starring Will Smith that is loosely based on the excellent collection of short stories of the same name by Isaac Asimov.

11 __-Seltzer : ALKA

Alka-Seltzer is a brand of fizzy antacid that has been marketed since 1931. In terms of ingredients, it is a mix of sodium bicarbonate, aspirin and anhydrous citric acid.

12 Nair rival, once : NEET

The hair removal product “Neet” was launched in Canada in 1901, and was also sold as “Immac”. Today, it is sold under the name “Veet”.

13 Phone no. go-withs : EXTS

Extension (ext.)

29 NorCal NFL team : NINERS

The 49ers football team in San Francisco takes its name from the gold prospectors who flooded into Northern California around 1849 during the California Gold Rush. These “1849 prospectors” became known as the “49ers”.

31 Wyatt of Dodge City : EARP

Wyatt Earp is famous as one of the participants in the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. Earp was a city policeman in Wichita, Kansas and also in Dodge City, Kansas. Earp was also deputy sheriff in Tombstone, Arizona where the O.K. Corral gunfight took place. Years later, Earp joined the Alaska Gold Rush and with a partner built and operated the Dexter Saloon in Nome.

Fort Dodge was in Kansas, on the Santa Fe Trail (connecting Missouri with Santa Fe, New Mexico). The fort was named after Major General Grenville M. Dodge, who was in charge of the army presence in the area. Fort Dodge gave its name to Dodge City, which grew up near the fort.

32 Naan relative : ROTI

In an Indian restaurant, naan bread is very popular. Roti is an unleavened cousin of naan.

33 Refinery by-product : SLAG

The better ores are processed in a blast furnace, to extract the metal. The waste from this process is called “slag”. Slag does contain some residual metal and it can be processed further in a slag furnace to extract the balance. Slag furnaces also accept lower-quality ores as a raw material.

34 Church benches : PEWS

A pew is a church bench, usually one with a high back. The original pews were raised and sometimes enclosed seats in the church used by women and important men or families. “Pew” comes from the Old French “puie” meaning “balcony, elevation”.

35 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.

36 Boob __: TV : TUBE

Television (TV, teevee, the tube, the boob tube)

37 “… like the __ calling the kettle black” : POT

One might cite the idiom “the pot calling the kettle balck” when pointing out a hypocrisy. The phrase is first seen in English in a 1620 translation of the Spanish novel “Don Quixote” by Miguel de Cervantes. The wording in the novel is:

You are like what is said that the frying-pan said to the kettle

41 Verdi opera set in Egypt : AIDA

“Aida” is a celebrated opera by Giuseppe Verdi that is based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette. Mariette also designed the costumes and stages for the opening performance. The opera was first staged in 1871 in an opera house in Cairo. In the storyline, Aida is an Ethiopian princess brought into Egypt as a slave. Radamès is an Egyptian commander who falls in love with her, and then complications arise!

42 Watering place : OASIS

An isolated area of vegetation in a desert is called an oasis (plural “oases”). As water is needed for plant growth, an oasis might also include a spring, pond or small lake. We often use the term “oasis” more generally to describe a haven, a place of rest.

45 Remote area known for its middle? : NOWHERE

A remote area is said to be in the middle of nowhere.

48 Almost a homer : TRIPLE

That would be baseball.

53 Musical symbol : SHARP

On a musical score, a note to be played that is not a member of the scale called out by the key signature, is known as an accidental. The sharp (♯), flat (♭), and natural (♮) symbols are used to modify the relevant note from the scale. It is also quite common to refer to the symbols themselves collectively as accidentals.

54 Dutch flower : TULIP

We usually associate the cultivation of tulips with the Netherlands, but they were first grown commercially in the Ottoman Empire. The name “tulip” ultimately derives from the Ottoman Turkish word “tulbend” that means “muslin, gauze”.

57 Tree with needles : PINE

There are many species of pine tree (well over 100). The smallest is probably the Siberian dwarf pine, which usually grows to less than 10-feet tall. The tallest is the ponderosa pine, which regularly grows to over 200-feet tall.

58 “Young Frankenstein” Fräulein : INGA

I am not really a big fan of movies by Mel Brooks, but “Young Frankenstein” is the exception. I think the cast has a lot to do with me liking the film, as it includes Gene Wilder (Dr. Frankenstein), Teri Garr (Inga), Marty Feldman (Igor) and Gene Hackman (Harold, the blind man).

In German, a “Fräulein” is an unmarried woman.

64 OR attendants : RNS

A registered nurse (RN) might work in an operating room (OR).

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Bar passer: Abbr. : ATT
4 Donkeys : ASSES
9 Silly : INANE
14 Heckler’s word : BOO!
15 Kind of milk one shouldn’t cry over : SPILT
16 Luxury watch : ROLEX
17 CPR expert : EMT
18 Petite Mattel doll with her own Netflix TV series : POLLY POCKET
20 Put on a peg, as a golf ball : TEED
22 Carp in a pond : KOI
23 WWII subs : U-BOATS
24 Rich as Croesus, e.g. : SIMILE
26 Lire replacers : EUROS
28 Person, place or thing, in grammar : NOUN
30 Irish or English dogs : SETTERS
34 Guy featured in “Practical Principles of Plain and Perfect Pronunciation” : PETER PIPER
38 MSN competitor : AOL
39 Ooze with : EXUDE
40 Silent assent : NOD
41 Main blood vessel : AORTA
43 World Wide __ : WEB
44 Porky’s girlfriend : PETUNIA PIG
46 Wand symbolizing royal authority : SCEPTER
49 Snow pea holders : PODS
50 __ & Young: accounting firm : ERNST
52 Places for belts : WAISTS
56 Séance contact : SPIRIT
59 Firepit residue : ASH
61 Avoid completely : SHUN
62 Animated feline in Inspector Clouseau films : PINK PANTHER
65 “… butterfly … bee” boxer : ALI
66 Broadway backer : ANGEL
67 Road one-eighty : U-TURN
68 Dangerous tide : RIP
69 Aptly named novelist : READE
70 Digital units : BYTES
71 Second addendum to a letter … and a hint to 18-, 34-, 44- and 62-across : PPS

Down

1 Aids in illegal activity : ABETS
2 Actress Marisa : TOMEI
3 Tribal symbol : TOTEM
4 Cleopatra’s snake : ASP
5 Did not remain silent : SPOKE UP
6 Cylindrical barn neighbor : SILO
7 Kimmy Schmidt player __ Kemper : ELLIE
8 Hog’s home : STY
9 Will Smith film suggested by an Asimov classic : I, ROBOT
10 Free, after “at” : … NO COST
11 __-Seltzer : ALKA
12 Nair rival, once : NEET
13 Phone no. go-withs : EXTS
19 More pristine : PURER
21 Had an evening meal : DINED
25 Stuff of legends : LORE
27 Depleted : USED UP
29 NorCal NFL team : NINERS
31 Wyatt of Dodge City : EARP
32 Naan relative : ROTI
33 Refinery by-product : SLAG
34 Church benches : PEWS
35 Corp. bigwig : EXEC
36 Boob __: TV : TUBE
37 “… like the __ calling the kettle black” : POT
41 Verdi opera set in Egypt : AIDA
42 Watering place : OASIS
44 Prefix for “five” : PENTA-
45 Remote area known for its middle? : NOWHERE
47 Livened (up) : PERKED
48 Almost a homer : TRIPLE
51 Badly worn : TATTY
53 Musical symbol : SHARP
54 Dutch flower : TULIP
55 Little scissors cuts : SNIPS
56 Box for practice : SPAR
57 Tree with needles : PINE
58 “Young Frankenstein” Fräulein : INGA
60 Close, as a door : SHUT
63 Well-worn pencil : NUB
64 OR attendants : RNS