Tag: Holier-than-thou crossword clue

Bill’s time: 5m 28s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Storied December shelf dweller : ELF

“The Elf on the Shelf” is an illustrated children’s book penned in 2005 by Carol Aebersold and her daughter Chanda Bell. The title character is dispatched by Santa every Thanksgiving to keep an eye on children during the holiday season, and to determine who is naughty and who is nice.

4 Kind of gun that catches speeders : RADAR

Radar speed guns were first used to monitor traffic by Connecticut State Police in the town of Glastonbury, way back in 1947!

14 Pooh pal in a pouch : ROO

Like most of the characters in A. A. Milne’s “Winnie the Pooh”, the kangaroo named “Roo” was inspired by a stuffed toy belonging to Milne’s son Christopher Robin.

15 Spanish month : ENERO

In Spanish, “el primer mes” (the first month) is “enero” (January).

16 Colorful tank fish : TETRA

The neon tetra is a freshwater fish that is native to parts of South America. The tetra is a very popular aquarium fish and millions are imported into the US every year. Almost all of the imported tetras are farm-raised in Asia and very few come from their native continent.

18 Baked mac and cheese, for many : COMFORT FOOD (giving “comfort zone”)

Thomas Jefferson’s name is associated with the dish we know today as “mac ‘n’ cheese”. The future president discovered baked macaroni with Parmesan cheese while in Paris and in northern Italy. He started serving the dish to guests in the US, and even had a machine imported to make the macaroni locally. Whether or not Jefferson was the first to bring mac ‘n’ cheese to America isn’t entirely clear, but it has been popular ever since.

22 Blender maker : OSTER

The Oster brand of small appliances was introduced in 1924 by John Oster. He started out by making manually-powered hair clippers designed for cutting women’s hair, and followed up with a motorized version in 1928. The clippers kept the company in business until 1946 when Oster diversified, buying a manufacturer of liquefying blenders in 1946. The blender was renamed to “Osterizer” and was a big hit. Oster was bought by Sunbeam, which has owned the brand since 1960.

23 Deux halved : UNE

In French, half of “deux” (two) is “un, une” (one).

34 Memo opening words : IN RE

The term “in re” is Latin, and is derived from “in” (in) and “res” (thing, matter). “In re” literally means “in the matter”, and is used to mean “in regard to” or “in the matter of”.

35 Kid’s bear : TEDDY

The stuffed toy known as a teddy bear was introduced in the early 1900s and was named for President Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt. The toy was inspired by a political cartoon that was drawn in 1902 showing President Roosevelt on a bear hunt and refusing to kill a black bear cub.

39 Willy Wonka portrayer Wilder : GENE

Gene Wilder was an actor noted for his comedic roles. Wilder had a successful collaboration with Mel Brooks on three great films: “The Producers”, “Blazing Saddles” and my favorite, “Young Frankenstein”. For a while, Wilder dated his “Young Frankenstein” co-star Teri Garr, but he was married most famously to “Saturday Night Live” star Gilda Radner.

Willy Wonka is the lead character in the 1964 novel by Roald Dahl called “Charlie & the Chocolate Factory”. Willy Wonka has been portrayed on the big screen twice. Gene Wilder was a fabulous Wonka in the 1971 version titled “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory”, and Johnny Depp played him in the Tim Burton movie from 2005 called “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”. I’m not too fond of Tim Burton movies, so I haven’t seen that one …

42 __ avis : RARA

A “rara avis” is anything that is very rare. The Latin term translates as “rare bird”.

47 “Aladdin” song whose title lyric follows “You ain’t never had a” : FRIEND LIKE ME (giving “friend zone”)

“Friend Like Me” is the big production number in the 1992 Disney animated feature “Aladdin”. The song is performed so very ably by Robin Williams, who voiced the Genie in the film.

A person is said to be in the “friend zone” when he or she has a friendly, platonic relationship with someone while secretly preferring a romantic relationship.

50 Social blunders : GAFFES

Our word “gaffe”, meaning “social blunder”, comes from the French “gaffe” meaning “clumsy remark”, although it originally was the word for a boat hook. The exact connection between a boat hook and a blunder seems to be unclear.

53 Carded at the door, briefly : IDED

Identity document (ID)

54 Christian sch. in Tulsa : ORU

Oral Roberts University (ORU) is a private school in Tulsa, Oklahoma. ORU was founded relatively recently, in 1963 by the late televangelist Oral Roberts. The campus includes a Prayer Tower at its center, a spectacular glass and steel structure designed by architect Frank Wallace. The tower includes an observation deck, and is a popular tourist attraction. The school’s sports teams are known as the Oral Roberts Golden Eagles.

59 TV host Gibbons : LEEZA

Leeza Gibbons had her own radio show called “Hollywood Confidential”, and her own talk show on NBC television that aired from 1994 to 2000. Gibbons is the founder of a nonprofit group called Leeza’s Place which supports people giving care to patients with memory disorders. Since 2007, she has been a board member of California’s stem cell research agency, appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

62 Buried record for future generations : TIME CAPSULE (giving “time zone”)

Local solar time was replaced with standard time zones due to the increasing use of rail travel and telecommunications as the variations in local solar times became somewhat inconvenient. Time zones in the US vary in hourly increments, but in some parts of the world a 30-minute or even 15-minute difference can apply.

65 OED book, e.g. : VOL

Work started on what was to become the first “Oxford English Dictionary” (OED) in 1857. Several interim versions of the dictionary were published in the coming years with the first full version appearing, in ten bound volumes, in 1928. The second edition of the OED appeared in 1989 and is made up of twenty volumes. The OED was first published in electronic form in 1988 and went online in 2000. Given the modern use of computers, the publishing house responsible feels that there will never be a third print version of the famous dictionary.

67 Big name in racing : UNSER

The Unser family seems to have auto racing in their blood. Al Unser, Sr. won the Indy 500 on four occasions. Al’s brother Jerry was the first of the Unsers to compete at Indianapolis. Al’s other brother Bobby, won the Indy three times. Al’s son, Al Junior, won the Indy twice. Al Junior’s son is also a racing driver who competes at the Indy Speedway.

70 Fills fully : SATES

“Sate” is a variant of the older word “satiate”. Both terms can mean either to satisfy an appetite fully, or to eat to excess.

71 “__ Misérables” : LES

The 1980 musical “Les Misérables” is an adaptation of the 1862 novel of the same name by Victor Hugo. The show opened in London in 1985, and is the longest running musical in the history of London’s West End. My wife and I saw “Les Miz” in the Queen’s Theatre in London many years ago, but were only able to get tickets in the very back row. The theater seating is very steep, so the back row of the balcony is extremely high over the stage. One of the big events in the storyline is the building of a street barricade over which the rebels fight. At the height we were seated we could see the stagehands behind the barricade, sitting drinking Coke, even smoking cigarettes. On cue, the stagehands would get up and catch a dropped rifle, or an actor who had been shot. It was pretty comical. I didn’t really enjoy the show that much, to be honest. Some great songs, but the musical version of the storyline just didn’t seem to hang together for me.

Down

1 Funny Bombeck : ERMA

Erma Bombeck wrote for newspapers for about 35 years. She produced more than 4,000 witty and humorous columns under the title “At Wit’s End”, with all describing her home life in suburbia.

2 Pirate’s take : LOOT

“Loot” is the name given to anything taken by dishonesty or force, particularly during war. The term came into English from the Hindi “lut” meaning “goods taken from an enemy”.

5 15-Across starts it : ANO
(15A Spanish month : ENERO)

In Spanish, “el año” (the year) starts in “enero” (January) and ends in “diciembre” (December).

7 Lab greetings : ARFS

The Labrador (Lab) breed of dog has been around at least since 1814, and the chocolate Labrador appeared over a century later in the 1930s. The name “Labrador Retriever” is simply a reference to the breed’s origin and behavior. Labs originally “retrieved” from the “Labrador Sea”.

10 NBA official : REF

Back in the early 17th century, a referee was someone who examined patent applications. We started using the same term for a person presiding over a sporting event in the 1820s. “Referee” is a derivative of the verb “to refer”, and literally describes someone who has the authority to make a decision by “referring to” a book, archive etc.

11 Dark beer : STOUT

The term “stout” was first used for a type of beer in the 1600s when it was used to describe a “strong, stout” brew, and not necessarily a dark beer as it is today.

12 Maine campus town : ORONO

The town of Orono is home to the University of Maine that was founded in 1862. The college is actually located on an island (Marsh island) lying between the Penobscot and Stillwater rivers. The town of Orono is named after Joseph Orono, a chief of the Penobscot Nation. The school’s athletic teams are named the Maine Black Bears.

13 Consumer advocate Ralph : NADER

Ralph Nader has run as a third-party candidate for the office of President of the United States four times now, in every election from 1996 to 2008. Nader’s name was first first linked with the presidential race in 1971, when the famous Dr. Benjamin Spock offered to stand aside as candidate in the 1972 race if Nader would agree to run, but he declined.

19 APR-reducing loan : REFI

Annual percentage rate (APR)

21 Bad loan, to an accountant : WRITE-OFF

To an accountant, a write-off is an investment that is unlikely to realize a return. That anticipated return is removed from (“written off”) a company’s balance sheet.

25 Cinco y uno : SEIS

In Spanish, “cinco y uno” (five and one) adds up to “seis” (six).

27 Nation within Oklahoma : CHEROKEE

The Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma are descended from the Old Cherokee Nation that was forced to relocate from the Southeast in the late 1830s on the infamous Trail of Tears. Today’s Cherokee Nation numbers about 300,000 people, with almost two thirds of that population living in Oklahoma.

28 Utah lily : SEGO

The sego lily is the state flower of Utah, and is a perennial plant found throughout the Western United States.

29 IRS enforcers : T-MEN

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

37 Wee bit o’ whisky, say : DRAM

I think that the dram is a confusing unit of measurement. It has one value as an ancient unit of mass, and two different values as a modern unit of mass, another value as a unit of fluid volume, and yet another varying value as a measure of Scotch whisky!

38 Clinton’s alma mater : YALE

President Bill Clinton was born not as a Clinton, but as William Jefferson Blythe. Bill’s father was killed in a car accident just three months before he was born. His mother remarried a few years later, to Roger Clinton. Bill didn’t formally adopt the Clinton name until he was fourteen years old, although he used it as he was growing up.

When Hillary Rodham Clinton was appointed US Secretary of State, she became the first former First Lady to serve in a president’s cabinet. Hillary met her husband, President Bill Clinton, when the two were studying at Yale law school.

48 Puerto Rico, por ejemplo : ISLA

In Spanish, Puerto Rico “por ejemplo” (for example), is an “isla” (island).

Puerto Rico (PR) is located in the northeastern Caribbean (in the Atlantic Ocean), east of the Dominican Republic. The name “Puerto Rico” is Spanish for “rich port”. The locals often call their island Borinquen, the Spanish form of “Boriken”, the original name used by the natives.

50 “I __ go!”: “Ciao!” : GOTTA

“Ciao” is Italian for “‘bye”. “Arrivederci” is more formal, and translates as “goodbye”.

51 Astrological Ram : ARIES

Aries the Ram is the first astrological sign in the Zodiac, and is named after the constellation. Your birth sign is Aries if you were born between March 21 and April 20, but if you are an Aries you would know that! “Aries” is the Latin word for “ram”.

56 Numbered work : OPUS

The Latin for “work” is “opus”, with the plural being “opera”. We sometimes also use the plural “opuses” in English.

57 Ensign-in-training inst. : USNA

The United States Naval Academy (USNA) is located in Annapolis, Maryland. The USNA was founded in 1845 and educates officers for both the US Navy and the US Marine Corps. The motto of the USNA is “Ex Scientia Tridens”, which translates as “From Knowledge, Sea Power”.

63 LAX calculation : ETA

Los Angeles International Airport is the sixth busiest airport in the world in terms of passenger traffic, and the busiest here on the West Coast of the US. The airport was opened in 1930 as Mines Field and was renamed to Los Angeles Airport in 1941. On the airport property is the iconic white structure that resembles a flying saucer. This is called the Theme Building and I believe it is mainly used as a restaurant and observation deck for the public. The airport used to be identified by the letters “LA”, but when the aviation industry went to a three-letter standard for airport identification, this was changed to “LAX”. Apparently, the “X” has no significant meaning.

64 “To Kill a Mockingbird” author Harper : LEE

Nelle Harper Lee was an author from Monroeville, Alabama. For many years, Lee had only one published novel to her name, i.e. “To Kill a Mockingbird”. That contribution to the world of literature was enough to earn her the Presidential Medal of Freedom and a Pulitzer Prize. Harper Lee was a close friend of fellow author Truman Capote who was the inspiration for the character named “Dill” in her novel. Lee was all over the news in 2015 as she had published a second novel, titled “Go Set a Watchman”. The experts seem to be agreeing that “Go Set a Watchman” is actually the first draft of “To Kill a Mockingbird”. Lee passed away less than a year after “Go Set a Watchman” hit the stores.