Tag: Data transfer unit crossword clue

Advertisement

Constructed by: Michael B. Berg
Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Reveal Answer: Pillow Talk

Themed answers are common phrases reinterpreted with reference to beds:

• 56A Nighttime heart-to-heart that’s taken literally in this puzzle : PILLOW TALK

• 16A “Don’t switch to memory foam” : KEEP IT DOWN
• 25A “Pray we can hold on to the smaller one, which is more comfortable than the king” : GOD SAVE THE QUEEN
• 42A “Please double-stitch the new sham” : MAKE A STRONG CASE

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

Bill’s time: 8m 39s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 “General Hospital,” for one : SOAP

The daytime soap opera “General Hospital” is the longest-running such drama still in production in the US, and is the second-longest running soap in the world. The first episode of “General Hospital” aired on April 1, 1963. The UK soap “Coronation Street” has been on TV since 9 December 1960.

9 Bogus offer : SCAM

Our word “bogus”, meaning “not genuine” was coined (pun!) in the 1830s, when it applied to counterfeit money.

16 “Don’t switch to memory foam” : KEEP IT DOWN

Memory foam is primarily made from polyurethane, and is used to make mattresses. It was developed by NASA in the mid-1960s with the intent of improving the safety of aircraft cushions.

18 Softball clubs : BATS

The sport we know today as softball was created as an indoor version of baseball. The first game was played on Thanksgiving Day in Chicago. Back then, a “soft” ball was indeed used, but the name “softball” wasn’t adopted until 1926.

19 SASE, perhaps : ENC

A self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) might include an enclosure (enc.).

20 R&B’s __ Hill : DRU

Dru Hill is an R&B singing group from Baltimore, Maryland. Dru Hill was formed in 1992, and is still going strong today. The name “Dru Hill” comes from Druid Hill Park which is found on the west side of Baltimore.

24 Laura of the “Jurassic Park” films : DERN

Actress Laura Dern is the daughter of actors Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd. Among her many notable roles, Laura Dern played the Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris in the 2008 movie “Recount”, and Dr. Ellie Sattler in the 1993 blockbuster “Jurassic Park”.

“Jurassic Park” is a 1993 Steven Spielberg movie that is based on Michael Crichton’s novel of the same name. According to Spielberg, the terrifying Tyrannosaurus Rex is “the star of the movie”. That may be true, but what’s not true is that the creature existed during the Jurassic period. The T. rex roamed the Earth much later, in the late Cretaceous period.

34 Rain-__ gum : BLO

Rain-Blo bubble gum balls were introduced in 1940 by Leaf Confectionery, a company that was then based in the Netherlands.

36 Brunch staple : BAGEL

The bagel was invented in the Polish city of Kraków in the 16th century. Bagels were brought to this country by Jewish immigrants from Poland who mainly established homes in and around New York City.

42 “Please double-stitch the new sham” : MAKE A STRONG CASE

A sham is something that is imitation, fake. In the world of bed linens, a sham is also an imitation or fake, in the sense that it is a decorative cover designed to cover up a regular pillow used for sleeping.

46 Poet of ancient Rome : OVID

For some reason, the Roman poet Ovid fell into disfavor with Emperor Augustus. As a result, Ovid was banished to the island of Tomis in the Black Sea, where he spent the last years of his life. While in exile, Ovid wrote a large collection of poetic letters known as the “Tristia” (also “Sorrows” or “Lamentations”). In the work, Ovid is basically lamenting his situation in exile.

52 Xiao long __: soup dumpling : BAO

Xiaolongbao is a small steamed bun in Chinese cuisine. Outside of China, the term “Xiaolongbao” refers specifically to a kind of soup dumpling.

60 “Finding Dory” setting : OCEAN

Pixar’s 2016 animated feature “Finding Dory” is a sequel to the megahit film “Finding Nemo”. “Finding Dory” seems to have built on the success of its predecessor and had the highest-grossing opening weekend ever in North America for an animated movie.

61 Peru’s capital : LIMA

Lima is the capital city of Peru. It was founded in 1535 by the Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro, who named it “la Ciudad de los Reyes” (the City of Kings). He chose this name because the decision to found the city was made on January 6th, the feast of the Epiphany that commemorates the visit of the three kings to Jesus in Bethlehem. Lima is home to the oldest university in all of the Americas, as San Marco University was founded in 1551 during the days of Spanish colonial rule.

62 Stretches between forces, briefly : DMZS

A demilitarized zone (DMZ) is usually a border between two countries where military activity is banned according to some treaty between interested parties. The most famous DMZ today has to be the buffer zone between North and South Korea. The Korean DMZ snakes right across the Korean peninsula near the 38th parallel. The centerline of the DMZ is where the front was when the ceasefire came into effect in 1953 after the Korean War. According to the armistice signed, all troops had to move back 2,000 meters from the front line on both sides, creating the DMZ that is in place today. Paradoxically perhaps, the areas on either side of the DMZ form the most heavily militarized border in the world.

64 Sculpting material : CLAY

Clay is a naturally-occurring soil material that becomes moldable when wet, and hardens when fired in a kiln. That makes it a ceramic material, the oldest known ceramic used by humans.

Down

1 Quaff with sushi : SAKE

We refer to the Japanese alcoholic beverage made from rice as “sake”. We’ve gotten things a bit mixed up in the West. “Sake” is actually the word that the Japanese use for all alcoholic drinks. What we know as sake, we sometimes refer to as rice wine. Also, the starch in the rice is first converted to sugars that are then fermented into alcohol. This is more akin to a beer-brewing process than wine production, so the end product is really a rice “beer” rather than a rice “wine”.

2 Rice paddy team : OXEN

A paddy field is a flooded piece of land used to grow rice, or perhaps taro. The water reduces competition from weeds allowing the rice to thrive. The word “paddy” has nothing to do with us Irish folk, and is an anglicized version of the word “padi”, the Malay name for the rice plant.

3 Oscar winner Guinness : ALEC

Sir Alec Guinness played many great roles over a long and distinguished career, but nowadays is best remembered (sadly, I think) for playing the original Obi-Wan Kenobi in “Star Wars”. He won his only Best Actor Oscar for playing Colonel Nicholson in the marvelous 1957 WWII movie “The Bridge on the River Kwai”. Guinness did himself serve during the Second World War, in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve. He commanded a landing craft during the Allied invasion of Sicily in 1943.

6 Wall St. announcement : IPO

An initial public offering (IPO) is the very first offer of stock for sale by a company on the open market. In other words, an IPO marks the first time that a company is traded on a public exchange. Companies have an IPO to raise capital to expand (usually).

7 Packaging meas. : NT WT

Net weight (nt. wt.)

9 Outback maker : SUBARU

The Subaru Outback is a station wagon with off-road capability that is made by Japan’s Fuji Heavy Industries.

10 Cosmic cloud that resembles a crustacean : CRAB NEBULA

The Crab Nebula is located in the constellation of Taurus. It was discovered in 1731 by English astronomer John Bevis, although it appears to correspond to a bright supernova reported by Chinese astronomers in 1054.

Crustaceans are a subphylum of animals that are quite closely related to insects. Crustaceans all have exoskeletons, and most live in aquatic environments.

12 Sloop pole : MAST

Sloops and cutters are sailboats, and each has just one mast. One major difference between the two types of vessel is that the mast on a cutter is set much further aft than the mast on a sloop.

17 Dot journal entries : IDEAS

A dot journal is a journal containing pages that aren’t lined or gridded, but rather have dots placed where grid lines would intersect. Such pages are designed to help keep writings and drawing aligned, without hampering creativity due to the business of blank pages.

25 64-Across creature of Jewish folklore : GOLEM

“Golem” is Yiddish slang for “dimwit”. In Jewish folklore, a golem is an anthropomorphic being made out of inanimate matter, and is somewhat like an unintelligent robot.

26 Word with glasses or gloves : OPERA …

Opera glasses are relatively small, and low-power binoculars designed for use at theater performances. The compact size makes the instruments convenient to carry into a theater, and the low magnifying power means that the user gets a large enough field of view without image shake.

Formal gloves designed for ladies come in varying lengths: wrist, elbow, opera (over-the elbow) and full-length.

27 Novelist who wrote the “Odd Thomas” thrillers : DEAN KOONTZ

Dean Koontz is an American author of mainly suspense-thriller and horror novels. He is a prolific author, and published up to eight books a year during the 1970s. He used a series of pen names, as well as his own.

28 Big cat in “Life of Pi” : TIGER

The 2012 movie “Life of Pi” is based on a 2001 novel of the same name by Yann Martel. The “Pi” in the title is an Indian boy named Pi Patel who finds himself adrift for 227 days in a small boat with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.

29 Otto I’s realm: Abbr. : HRE

Otto I the Great ruled the Holy Roman Empire (HRE) in the 10th century, from 962 until his death in 973.

30 New York Harbor’s __ Island : ELLIS

In the 1998 Supreme Court case New Jersey v. New York, New Jersey ended up owning about 90% of Ellis Island, land that had belonged to New York. New York and New Jersey signed an agreement in 1834 granting New Jersey half of the water channel between the two states, but giving New York the islands the New Jersey side of the channel (mainly Ellis Island and Staten Island). At issue was the land that New York added to Ellis Island by means of reclamation (ultimately 90% of the island’s land mass). The court decided that the land reclaimed belonged to New Jersey because it was located within the New Jersey-controlled water channel.

31 “Tropic Thunder” actor : NOLTE

Actor Nick Nolte got his big break playing opposite Jacqueline Bisset and Robert Shaw in “The Deep”, a film released in 1976.

“Tropic Thunder” is a satirical action movie written, produced and directed by Ben Stiller. On top of all that, he stars in the film alongside Jack Black and Robert Downey, Jr.

36 Place to watch Greyhounds : BUS DEPOT

Our term “depot”, meaning “station, warehouse”, comes from the French word “dépôt”. The French term translates into English as “deposit” or “place of deposit”.

Speaking as someone who lived much of my life outside of the US, I have to say that the Greyhound bus is a real symbol of America. I grew up seeing Greyhound buses in so many old movies. In Ireland the official provincial bus service “stole” the famous logo that gracefully adorns the sides of these buses, but uses a running Irish Setter in place of the iconic greyhound.

37 Actor’s rep : AGT

Agent (agt.)

38 Background figures in video games, for short : NPCS

Non-player character (NPC)

40 Actor Corey : HAIM

Corey Haim was a Canadian actor and teen idol. His breakthrough role was in the 1987 film “The Lost Boys”, in which he starred alongside Corey Feldman. The pair appeared together in several films, earning them the nickname “the Two Coreys”. Haim had found success in Hollywood while he was still young, but he also discovered drugs at a very early age and was using by the time he was fifteen years old. Haim died when he was 38, in 2010.

41 Vice president under 45-Down : AGNEW
[45D President who resigned in 1974 : NIXON]

Spiro Agnew served as Vice-President under Richard Nixon, before becoming the only VP in American history to resign because of criminal charges (there was a bribery scandal). Agnew was also the first Greek-American to serve as US Vice President as he was the son of a Greek immigrant who had shortened the family name from Anagnostopoulos.

44 Beck album with the single “Where It’s At” : ODELAY

“Odelay” is a 1996 studio album released by musician Beck. Apparently, the title is a pun on the phrase “Oh delay”, and a reference to how long the album took to record.

45 President who resigned in 1974 : NIXON

At the height of the Watergate Scandal in November 1973, President Nixon conducted a televised hour-long question-and-answer session with 400 Associated Press managing editors. The president was under intense pressure, but maintained his innocence in the Watergate case. The lines most remembered from that session are:

And in all of my years of public life I have never obstructed justice. People have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I’m not a crook.

49 Actor Neeson : LIAM

Irish actor Liam Neeson’s big break came with the role of Oskar Schindler in the Spielberg epic, “Schindler’s List”. Neeson was in the news some years later when he lost his wife, actress Natasha Richardson, in a tragic skiing accident in 2009. Earlier in his life, in the 1980s, Neeson lived for several years with Oscar-winning actress Helen Mirren.

52 Cut out early : BAIL

The phrase “to bail out” (sometimes just “to bail”) means to leave suddenly. We’ve been using the term since the early thirties, when it originated with airline pilots. To bail out is to make a parachute jump.

53 __ mater : ALMA

The literal translation for the Latin term “alma mater” is “nourishing mother”. The phrase was used in ancient Rome to refer to mother goddesses, and in Medieval Christianity the term was used to refer to the Virgin Mary. Nowadays, one’s alma mater is the school one attended, either high school or college, usually one’s last place of education.

57 Director Spike : LEE

Film director Spike Lee was born in Atlanta, Georgia but has very much made New York City his home and place of work. Most of Lee’s films are set in New York City, including his first feature film, 1986’s “She’s Gotta Have It”. That film was shot over two weeks with a budget of $175,000. “She’s Gotta Have It” grossed over $7 million at the US box office.

58 “Waterfalls” trio : TLC

“Waterfalls” was a hit in 1995 for girl group TLC. It was to become the band’s signature song, and is notable in that it is the first number-one song to reference AIDS. In fact, “Waterfalls” also mentions the illegal drug trade and promiscuity.