LA Times Crossword 10 Feb 22, Thursday

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Constructed by: Bruce Haight
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Theme (according to Bill): Good News

Themed answers are common phrases reinterpreted as GOOD NEWS for specific people:

  • 18A Good news for the clean-up crew? : TIDY PROFIT
  • 24A Good news for the elephant trainer? : HUGE SUCCESS
  • 40A Good news for the curling team? : SWEEPING VICTORY
  • 53A Good news for the baker? : BREADWINNER
  • 63A Good news for the horror film producer? : MONSTER HIT

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

Bill’s time: 9m 07s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 The Scotch kind might be double-coated : TAPE

Scotch Tape is a brand of adhesive tape made by 3M. “Scotch Tape” is one of those brand names that has become a generic term for the product. The equivalent brand name of the product that we use over in Ireland is Sellotape. This British brand also has become a generic term, and so is our equivalent to “Scotch tape”.

9 Ludwig wrote für her : ELISE

“Für Elise” is a beautiful piece of solo piano music by Beethoven that is also known as “Bagatelle in A Minor”. “Für Elise” simply means “For Elise”, but sadly no one knows for sure the identity of the mysterious dedicatee.

14 Genesis plot : EDEN

According to the Book of Genesis, Adam and Eve lived in a garden “in” Eden, with Eden being geographically located by reference to four rivers, including the Tigris and the Euphrates. Some scholars hypothesize that Eden was located in Mesopotamia, which encompasses much of modern-day Iraq.

16 Places for curlers : RINKS
40A Good news for the curling team? : SWEEPING VICTORY

I think curling is such a cool game (pun!). It’s somewhat like bowls, but played on a sheet of ice. The sport was supposedly invented in medieval Scotland, and is called curling because of the action of the granite stone as it moves across the ice. A player can make the stone take a curved path (“curl”) by causing it to slowly rotate as it slides.

17 Rock’s Lofgren : NILS

Musician Nils Lofgren was a member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band for over 25 years. Lofgren provided vocals and played guitar, and was hired as the replacement for Steven Van Zandt.

20 Get ready to drive : TEE UP

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 Brewery letters : IPA

India pale ale (IPA) is a style of beer that originated in England. The beer was originally intended for transportation from England to India, hence the name.

28 Title for Nick Faldo : SIR

Nick Faldo is an English golfer, a winner of six major tournaments and a former World No. 1. For some years now Faldo has been the lead golf analyst for CBS Sports. In 2009 he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II, so if you’re chatting with him, don’t forget to address him as Sir Nick …

30 Winningest baseball southpaw : SPAHN

Warren Spahn was a left-handed pitcher who won 363 games, more than any other left-handed pitcher in history. The Warren Spahn Award has been presented annually by the Oklahoma Sports Museum since 1999.

32 Delta’s primary hub: Abbr. : ATL

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) is the world’s busiest airport, as measured by passenger traffic. Atlanta has had that distinction since 1998, and was the world’s busiest in terms of take-offs and landings from 2005 until 2013. Over 50% of Atlanta’s traffic comes from Delta Air Lines.

Delta was the world’s largest airline for a while (after merging with Northwest Airlines in 2008) and is the oldest airline still operating in the US. Delta’s roots go back to 1924 before it started carrying passengers when it was Huff Daland Dusters, a crop-dusting company based in Macon, Georgia. The name “Delta Air Service” was introduced in 1928.

35 Taylor of “Mystic Pizza” : LILI

Actress Lili Taylor had supporting roles in films like “Mystic Pizza”, “The Haunting” and “Rudy”. She also had a recurring role in the HBO series “Six Feet Under”.

“Mystic Pizza” is a coming-of-age film released in 1988. Included in the cast are Annabeth Gish and Julia Roberts. If you watch closely, you’ll also see Matt Damon speaking his first line in a movie. The title refers to the name of a pizza restaurant located in Mystic, Connecticut.

44 Quarters with stories : HOTEL

We use the term “quarters” for a place of abode, especially housing for military personnel. Back in the late 16th century, quarters were a portion (quarter) of a town reserved for a military force.

45 Clearance caveat : AS IS

A caveat is a warning or a qualification. “Caveat” is the Latin for “let him beware”.

46 1, 2, 3, etc.: Abbr. : NOS

An integer is a number that does not include a fraction. The word “integer” is Latin for “whole”.

47 Choice cut : FILET

A fillet is a boneless cut of meat or fish. The term “fillet” comes from the Old French “filet” meaning “small thread, filament”. Apparently, we applied the term to food because the piece of fish or meat was tied up with string after it was boned. Here in the US, we tend to use the French spelling “filet”.

62 Prayer hands, e.g. : EMOJI

An emoji is a character found on many cell phones that is much like an emoticon, but is more elaborate. The use of emojis originated in 1997 on mobile phones in Japan, and within a few years spread around the world. “Emoji” is a Japanese word meaning “picture word”.

68 “The __ Holmes Mysteries,” series about Sherlock’s teenage sister : ENOLA

“The Enola Holmes Mysteries” is a series of detective novels for young adults by American author Nancy Springer. The title character is the 14-year-old sister of 34-year-old Sherlock Holmes, the detective created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Springer’s novels were adapted into a 2020 film “Enola Holmes” that Netflix picked up at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Gotta see that one …

70 __ burn: cutting remark, in slang : SICK

A burn is a cutting remark intended to humiliate or hurt. “Sick burn” is slang, and refers to an even more cutting remark.

72 Kindle competitor : NOOK

The Barnes & Noble electronic-book reader is called the Nook. The reader’s name is intended to evoke the usage of “nook” as a familiar place to sit and read quietly.

Amazon’s Kindle line of e-book readers was introduced in 2007. The name “kindle” was chosen to evoke images of “lighting a fire” through reading and intellectual stimulation. I bought myself a Kindle Fire HD several years ago. I started reading e-books for the first time in my life, as well as enjoying other computing options available with the tablet device …

Down

1 Like J, in a way : TENTH

The letter J (jay) is tenth in the alphabet.

2 Sayonara kin : ADIEU

“Adieu” is French for “goodbye, farewell”, from “à Dieu” meaning “to God”. The plural of “adieu” is “adieux”.

“Sayonara” means “farewell” in Japanese.

3 Co-owner of the Pequod : PELEG

The Pequod is the whaling ship that figures in Herman Melville’s classic novel “Moby Dick”. The ship is owned by a consortium of the citizens of Nantucket Island, including Captains Ahab, Bildad and Peleg.

5 Like the name Robin Banks, for a yegg : APT

“Yegg” is a slang word for a burglar and often for a safe-cracker. The origin of the term appears to be unknown.

“Robin Banks” would be an apt name for someone “robbin’ banks”.

6 Hula hoop? : LEI

“Lei” is a Hawaiian word meaning “garland, wreath”, although in more general terms a lei is any series of objects strung together as an adornment for the body.

The hula is a native dance of Hawaii that uses arm movements to relate a story. The hula can be performed while sitting (a noho dance) or while standing (a luna dance).

7 MASH worker : MEDIC

The first Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (MASH) was deployed in August 1945. MASH units really came into the public consciousness after publication of the 1969 Richard Hooker novel “MASH”, which spawned the hit film and TV series that were both titled “M*A*S*H”.

8 FaceTime rival : SKYPE

The main feature of the Skype application when introduced was that it allows voice communication to take place over the Internet (aka VoIP). Skype has other features such as video conferencing and instant messaging, but the application made its name from voice communication. Skype was founded by two Scandinavian entrepreneurs and the software necessary was developed by a team of engineers in Estonia. The development project was originally called “Sky peer-to-peer” so the first commercial name for the application was “Skyper”. This had to be shortened to “Skype” because the skyper.com domain name was already in use.

FaceTime is an Apple video-telephony application. I guess it’s similar to Skype. Personally, I gave up on Skype and am now a loyal user of Google Hangouts and Google Duo …

10 Meaning of “Simba” in Swahili : LION

In the 1994 movie “The Lion King”, the protagonist is Simba, a lion cub born to Mufasa and Sarabi. The main antagonist is Scar, Simba’s uncle and Mufasa’s brother. Simba is voiced by Matthew Broderick, and Scar is voiced by Jeremy Irons. “Simba” is Swahili for “lion, king, strong”.

12 Command to bypass pre-TV-episode material : SKIP INTRO

I love the “skip intro” command …

13 Aromatic compound : ESTER

Esters are very common chemicals. The smaller, low-molecular weight esters are usually pleasant smelling and are often found in perfumes. At the other end of the scale, the higher-molecular weight nitroglycerin is a nitrate ester and is very explosive, and polyester is a huge molecule and is a type of plastic. Fats and oils found in nature are fatty acid esters of glycerol known as glycerides.

21 Chi follower : PSI

Psi is the 23rd and penultimate letter of the Greek alphabet, and the one that looks a bit like a trident or a pitchfork.

25 Not-so-cute fruit : UGLI

The ugli fruit is a hybrid of an orange and a tangerine that was first discovered growing wild in Jamaica where most ugli fruit comes from today. “UGLI” is a trademark name that is a variant of “ugly”, a nod to the fruit’s unsightly wrinkled rind.

26 Table tennis powerhouse : CHINA

Ping-Pong is called table tennis in the UK, where the sport originated in the 1880s. Table tennis started as an after-dinner activity among the elite, and was called “wiff-waff”. To play the game, books were stacked in the center of a table as a “net”, two more books served as “”rackets” and the ball used was actually a golf ball. The game evolved over time with the rackets being upgraded to the lids of cigar boxes and the ball becoming a champagne cork (how snooty is that?). Eventually the game was produced commercially, and the sound of the ball hitting the racket was deemed to be a “ping” and a “pong”, giving the sport its alternative name. The name “Ping-Pong” was trademarked in Britain in 1901, and eventually sold to Parker Brothers in the US.

31 Oz. or lb. : AMT

Amount (amt.)

34 When tripled, a holiday song : LET IT SNOW

“Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” is a holiday song written by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne. Perhaps a little ironically, the pair wrote the song in Hollywood, California in July 1945, on one of the hottest days of the year.

36 Some smartphones : LGS

LG is a very large South Korean manufacturer of electronics, chemicals and telecom products. The company used to be known as Lucky-Goldstar, whence the initialism “LG”.

37 Like Wrigley Field’s walls : IVIED

The famous ballpark that is home to the Chicago Cubs was built in 1914. Back then it was known as Weeghman Park, before becoming Cubs Park when the Cubs arrived in 1920. It was given the name Wrigley Field in 1926, after the owner William Wrigley, Jr. of chewing gum fame. Wrigley Field is noted as the only professional ballpark that has ivy covering the outfield walls. The ivy is a combination of Boston Ivy and Japanese Bittersweet, both of which can survive the harsh winters in Chicago.

39 __ admin: computer boss : SYS

A system administrator (in the field of information technology) might be referred to as a “sysadmin”.

41 Unadon fish : EEL

“Unadon” is the Japanese word for “eel bowl”. “Unadon” is actually a contraction of “unagi no kabayaki” (grilled eel) and “donburi” (rice bowl dish).

42 Working-class Roman : PLEB

In ancient Rome, the patricians were the members of the families in the ruling classes. Those Romans who were not patricians by birth were known as plebs.

43 “__ the Light”: 1972 hit : I SAW

“I Saw the Light” is a 1972 song written and recorded by Todd Rundgren. Rundgren has shared that he wrote the song in about 20 minutes. He also shared that he attributed his ability to churn out songs so quickly to stimulants like Ritalin.

52 Lakes mnemonic : HOMES

A well-known mnemonic for remembering the names of the Great Lakes is HOMES, an acronym standing for Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior.

54 2001 bankruptcy : ENRON

After all the trials following the exposure of fraud at Enron, several of the key players ended up in jail. Andrew Fastow was the Chief Financial Officer. He plea-bargained and received ten years without parole, and became the key witness in the trials of others. Even Fastow’s wife was involved and she was sentenced to one year for helping her husband hide money. Jeffrey Skilling (ex-CEO) was sentenced to 24 years and 4 months. Kenneth Lay (CEO) died in 2006 after he had been found guilty but before he could be sentenced. The accounting firm Arthur Andersen was found guilty of obstruction of justice for shredding thousands of pertinent documents and deleting emails and files (a decision that the Supreme Court later overturned on a technicality). But still, Arthur Andersen collapsed under the weight of the scandal and 85,000 people lost their jobs (despite only a handful being directly involved with Enron).

56 Finnish tech giant : NOKIA

I do enjoy classical guitar music, but there isn’t a huge choice on CD. There is one very special piece called “Gran Vals” by Francisco Tárrega, written in 1902. This piece has a unique reputation as it contains a phrase that was once the most listened-to piece of music in the whole world. Just a few bars into the work one can hear the celebrated Nokia ringtone!

60 1952 Olympics host : OSLO

The 1952 Winter Olympic Games took place in Oslo, Norway. One of the firsts at the 1952 games was the first use of a purpose-built athletes’ village. The 1952 Games also marked the return of Japan and Germany to the Olympic family after being excluded from the 1948 games following WWII.

64 Color like khaki : TAN

“Khaki” is an Urdu word that translates literally as “dusty”. The word was adopted for its current use as the name of a fabric by the British cavalry in India in the mid-1800s.

65 Wall St. event : 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).

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 The Scotch kind might be double-coated : TAPE
5 Poor benefits : ALMS
9 Ludwig wrote für her : ELISE
14 Genesis plot : EDEN
15 Christmas Eve no-no : PEEK
16 Places for curlers : RINKS
17 Rock’s Lofgren : NILS
18 Good news for the clean-up crew? : TIDY PROFIT
20 Get ready to drive : TEE UP
22 Brewery letters : IPA
23 Scruff : NAPE
24 Good news for the elephant trainer? : HUGE SUCCESS
28 Title for Nick Faldo : SIR
29 [Ah, me!] : [SIGH!]
30 Winningest baseball southpaw : SPAHN
32 Delta’s primary hub: Abbr. : ATL
35 Taylor of “Mystic Pizza” : LILI
38 Sends out : EMITS
40 Good news for the curling team? : SWEEPING VICTORY
44 Quarters with stories : HOTEL
45 Clearance caveat : AS IS
46 1, 2, 3, etc.: Abbr. : NOS
47 Choice cut : FILET
49 Water-diverting feature : EAVE
52 Word with tip or tub : HOT …
53 Good news for the baker? : BREADWINNER
59 Thereabouts : OR SO
61 Ma’s his sis : UNC
62 Prayer hands, e.g. : EMOJI
63 Good news for the horror film producer? : MONSTER HIT
67 Scrapes (out) : EKES
68 “The __ Holmes Mysteries,” series about Sherlock’s teenage sister : ENOLA
69 Accident report? : OOPS!
70 __ burn: cutting remark, in slang : SICK
71 Attach, as a patch : SEW ON
72 Kindle competitor : NOOK
73 Roles, metaphorically : HATS

Down

1 Like J, in a way : TENTH
2 Sayonara kin : ADIEU
3 Co-owner of the Pequod : PELEG
4 Comes later : ENSUES
5 Like the name Robin Banks, for a yegg : APT
6 Hula hoop? : LEI
7 MASH worker : MEDIC
8 FaceTime rival : SKYPE
9 Stumble : ERR
10 Meaning of “Simba” in Swahili : LION
11 Trendy : IN FASHION
12 Command to bypass pre-TV-episode material : SKIP INTRO
13 Aromatic compound : ESTER
19 Mountain __ : PASS
21 Chi follower : PSI
25 Not-so-cute fruit : UGLI
26 Table tennis powerhouse : CHINA
27 Bit of design info : SPEC
31 Oz. or lb. : AMT
32 Firing result : ASH
33 Sale phrase : TWO FOR ONE
34 When tripled, a holiday song : LET IT SNOW
36 Some smartphones : LGS
37 Like Wrigley Field’s walls : IVIED
39 __ admin: computer boss : SYS
41 Unadon fish : EEL
42 Working-class Roman : PLEB
43 “__ the Light”: 1972 hit : I SAW
48 Loyal : TRUE
50 Battle : VIE
51 Tangle up : ENMESH
52 Lakes mnemonic : HOMES
54 2001 bankruptcy : ENRON
55 Blessing lead-in : ACHOO!
56 Finnish tech giant : NOKIA
57 Oust : EJECT
58 Hazards : RISKS
60 1952 Olympics host : OSLO
64 Color like khaki : TAN
65 Wall St. event : IPO
66 Scolding syllable : TSK!