LA Times Crossword 27 Jun 19, Thursday

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Constructed by: Bruce Haight
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Theme (according to Bill): Unexpected Practice

Themed answers are common, two-word phrases reinterpreted as wacky enterprises:

  • 16A Place to get gifts? : PRESENT COMPANY
  • 24A Place to get fireplace equipment? : POKER DEALER
  • 35A Place to get movie actors? : EXTRA FIRM
  • 49A Place to get laundry detergent? : ALL BUSINESS
  • 57A Place to get help with estate planning? : PASSING CONCERN

Bill’s time: 6m 03s

Bill’s errors: 2

  • LAMARR (Lemarr!)
  • LORIMAR (Lorimer)

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 “Welcome to Kauai!” : ALOHA!

The Hawaiian word “aloha” has many meanings in English: affection, love, peace, compassion and mercy. More recently, “aloha” has come to mean “hello” and “goodbye”, but only since the mid-1800s.

Because the Hawaiian island of Kauai is one of the wettest places on earth, all the rainfall has helped to carve out magnificent canyons and left superb waterfalls. The island is often used as a backdrop for movies. The facilities at the island’s Lihue Airport reflect the pleasant climate enjoyed by the Hawaiian Islands. Check-in takes place completely outdoors!

13 “Service at the Speed of Sound” fast-food chain : SONIC

SONIC Drive-In is a fast-food restaurant chain that is noted for its carhops who serve patrons on roller skates. SONIC was founded in Shawnee, Oklahoma in 1953 as Top Hat Drive-In. The restaurant introduced curbside speakers to hasten the ordering process. This led to the adoption of the slogan “Service at the Speed of Sound”, and renaming of the chain to SONIC.

14 Tolstoy title name : ANNA

I have to admit to not having read Leo Tolstoy’s “Anna Karenina”, but I did see the excellent 1977 British television adaptation starring Nicola Pagett. I also saw the 2012 film adaptation with a screenplay by Tom Stoppard and found that to be far from excellent, awful in fact. I am no Stoppard fan …

20 Cruet contents : OIL

A cruet is a small glass bottle that holds a condiment or perhaps a dressing. The word “cruet” comes from an Old French word meaning “earthen pot”.

27 Hedy of Hollywood : LAMARR

Hedy Lamarr was an American actress who was actually born in Vienna in modern-day Austria. Not only was Lamarr a successful Hollywood performer, during WWII she was the co-inventor of the frequency-hopping spread-spectrum method of transmitting radio signals that is still used to this day in wireless communication. Impressive …

30 Singer DiFranco : ANI

Ani DiFranco is a folk-rock singer and songwriter. DiFranco has also been labeled a “feminist icon”, and in 2006 won the “Woman of Courage Award” from National Organization for Women.

31 Roman fountain : TREVI

The Trevi Fountain (“Fontana di Trevi”) is a huge fountain in Rome, one that is the largest constructed in the Baroque style. The tradition is that if one throws a coin in the fountain then one is guaranteed a return visit to the city. Tourists throw in an amazing 3,000 euros (over $4,000) every day. The money is collected and is used to stock a supermarket for the needy of the city.

32 “Rebel Yell” singer Billy : IDOL

“Rebel Yell” is a 1983 song by English rock musician Billy Idol. Idol asserts that he was inspired to write the song after seeing three members of the Rolling Stones drinking Rebel Yell bourbon at an event they all attended together.

34 Grasp, in slang : GROK

To grok is to understand. “To grok” is a slang term that’s really only used in “techie” circles. “Grok” is the creation of science fiction author Robert Heinlein, who coined it in his 1961 novel “Stranger in a Strange Land”.

42 Liver spreads : PATES

Pâté is a rich spreadable paste made from a mixture of ground meat and fat, to which various vegetables, herbs and spices may be added. The most famous version of the paste is pâté de foie gras, which is made from the fattened livers of geese (“foie gras” means “fat liver” in French).

47 Online help page : FAQ

Most websites have a page listing answers to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). Even this blog has one!

49 Place to get laundry detergent? : ALL BUSINESS

All is a laundry detergent made by Sun Products.

53 Shopkeeper who by his own admission sells “surprisingly expensive” penny candy at the Kwik-E-Mart : APU

The fictional Kwik-E-Mart store is operated by Apu Nahasapeemapetilon on “The Simpsons” TV show. Apu is married to Manjula, and the couple have eight children. The convenience store owner doesn’t seem to be making much use of his Ph.D in computer science that he earned in the US. Apu’s undergraduate degree is from Caltech (the Calcutta Technical Institute), where he graduated top of his class of seven million students …

55 Oz. or lb. : AMT

The unit of mass that we know today as a pound is descended from the old Roman unit of weight known as a “libra”. That “libra” connection is why we abbreviate “pound” to “lb”. The name “pound” comes from the Latin “pondo” meaning “weight”. Our term “ounce” (abbreviated to “oz.”) comes from the Latin “uncia”, which was 1/12 of a Roman “libra”.

56 “Instinct” star Cumming : ALAN

Alan Cumming is a very versatile Scottish actor. Cumming has played some pretty “commercial” roles, like the bad guy Boris Grishenko in “GoldenEye” and Fegan Floop in the “Spy Kids” movies. He also played the unwanted suitor in the fabulous film “Circle of Friends” and won a Tony for playing the emcee in the 1998 Broadway revival of “Cabaret”.

“INSTIИCT” is a police drama that started airing on CBS in 2018. The show is based on James Patterson’s 2017 novel “Murder Games”. Star of the series is Scottish actor Alan Cumming.

64 Pair of allies? : ELS

There is a pair of letters L (el) in the word “allies”.

65 “G’day” addressee : MATE

In Australia, one might say “G’day” to one’s mate/pal.

Down

1 It can cover a lot : ASPHALT

The asphalt surface on roads (or basketball courts) is more properly called asphaltic concrete, because asphalt itself (also known as “bitumen”) is just a sticky black liquid that comes from crude petroleum. Asphalt is used as a binder with aggregate to form asphaltic concrete.

2 “Dallas” production studio : LORIMAR

Lorimar Television was a production company that was active from the sixties through the nineties. The name “Lorimar” is a portmanteau of “Lori” (co-founder Merv Adelson’s wife’s name) and “Palomar Airport” (in San Diego). Lorimar’s first hit show was “The Waltons”, and the company’s most successful show was “Dallas”.

The TV soap “Dallas” revolved around the Ewing family. The show that ran for 13 years was originally intended as a five-part mini-series, with the main characters being newlyweds Bobby and Pam Ewing. But, the devious character in the piece, Bobby’s brother J. R. Ewing, became so popular with audiences that the series was extended with J. R. at the center of the story.

5 Top fighter pilot : ACE

A flying ace is an aviator who has shot down a number of enemy planes during combat. The qualifying number of kills seems to vary, but five is common. The first use of “ace” was during WWI, when the French newspapers dubbed pilot Adolphe Pegoud “l’as” (French for “the ace”) when he shot down his fifth German plane.

6 Dyeing art : BATIK

Genuine batik cloth is produced by applying wax to the parts of the cloth that are not to be dyed. After the cloth has been dyed, it is dried and then dipped in solvent that dissolves the wax. Although wax-resist dyeing of fabric has existed in various parts of the world for centuries, it is most closely associated historically with the island of Java in Indonesia.

7 “I give up!” : UNCLE!

“To say uncle” is an American expression meaning “to submit, yield”. Its usage dates back to the early 1900s, but nobody seems to know how “uncle!” came to mean “stop!”

8 Peace activist Yoko : ONO

The artist Yoko Ono operates the website ImaginePeace.com. I checked it out once and found these two lovely quotes:

  • Imagine all the people living life in peace … John Lennon
  • A dream you dream alone is only a dream, a dream you dream together is reality … Yoko Ono

9 Thanksgiving veggie : YAM

Although in the US we sometimes refer to sweet potatoes as “yams”, the yam is actually a completely different family of plants. True yams are more common in other parts of the the world than they are in this country, and are especially common in Africa.

12 Host of a “garage” show since 2014 : JAY LENO

Jay Leno was born James Leno in New Rochelle, New York. Jay’s father was the son of Italian immigrants, and his mother was from Scotland. Leno grew up in Andover, Massachusetts and actually dropped out of school on the advice of a high school guidance counsellor. However, years later he went to Emerson college and earned a Bachelor’s degree in speech therapy. Leno also started a comedy club at Emerson in 1973. Today Jay Leno is a car nut and owns about 200 vehicles of various types. You can check them out on his website: www.jaylenosgarage.com.

17 Jordan’s Queen __ : NOOR

Queen Noor is the widow of King Hussein of Jordan. Queen Noor was born Lisa Halaby in Washington, D.C., the daughter of Najeeb Halaby. Her father was appointed by President Kennedy as the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, and later became the CEO of Pan Am. Lisa Halaby met King Hussein in 1977, while working on the design of Jordan’s Queen Alia Airport. The airport was named after King Hussein’s third wife who had been killed that year in a helicopter crash. Halaby and the King were married the next year, in 1978.

22 Composer Satie : ERIK

Erik Satie was a French composer most famous for his beautiful composition, the three “Gymnopédies”. I have tried so hard to appreciate other works by Satie but I find them so very different from the minimalist simplicity of the lyrical “Gymnopédies”.

24 __ fixe : PRIX

On a restaurant menu, items that are “à la carte” are priced and ordered separately. A menu marked “table d’hôte” (also called “prix fixe”) is a fixed-price menu with limited choice. “Table d’hôte” translates as “table of the host”.

26 Spanish surrealist : DALI

The famous surrealist painter Salvador Dalí was born in Figueres, Spain. I had the privilege of visiting the Dalí Museum in Figueres some years ago, just north of Barcelona. If you ever get the chance, it’s a “must see” as it really is a quite magnificent building with a fascinating collection.

32 Mosul native : IRAQI

Mosul is located in northern Iraq and is the third largest city in the country, after Baghdad and Basra. It is located on the west bank of the Tigris river, opposite the ruins of the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh in the east bank. Mosul was captured by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in 2014. Those residents of Mosul who did not escape suffered under the rule of ISIL until the city’s liberation following the Battle of Mosul in 2016/2017.

33 Calendar square : DAY

The days of the week are named for celestial bodies and gods

  • Sunday — Sun’s Day
  • Monday — Moon’s Day
  • Tuesday — Tiu’s day
  • Wednesday — Woden’s day
  • Thursday — Thor’s day
  • Friday — Freya’s day
  • Saturday — Saturn’s day

34 FBI agent : G-MAN

The nickname “G-men” is short for “government men” and refers to agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

36 Christmas poem contraction : ‘TWAS

The poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas” was published anonymously in 1823, and is better known today by its first line “‘Twas the night before Christmas”. Most scholars believe that the poem was written by Clement Clarke Moore, a theologian from New York City. Others say that it was written by Henry Livingston, Jr., a poet from Upstate New York.

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;
And mamma in her ’kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap,
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash …

37 Tach nos. : RPMS

The tachometer takes its name from the Greek word “tachos” meaning “speed”. A tachometer in a car measures engine revolutions per minute (rpm).

39 Total or partial event : ECLIPSE

A lunar eclipse occurs when the moon passes into the shadow cast by the earth from the light of the sun, in other words when the earth is positioned directly between the sun and the moon. The more spectacular solar eclipse takes place when moon passes in front of the sun, so that the earth falls into the shadow cast by the moon.

40 Outlook alternative : AOL MAIL

Outlook is the email management application that comes with Microsoft Office.

44 One-sided, in legal proceedings : EX PARTE

“Ex parte” is a Latin term using in the law that can be translated as “for one party”. A basic rule of US law is that both parties must be present to witness arguments made before a judge. An “ex parte” decision by a judge benefits just one party, and may be made without the other party being present.

52 One sporting a mic : EMCEE

The term “emcee” comes from “MC”, an initialism used for a Master or Mistress of Ceremonies.

56 “Back forty” unit : ACRE

In the Public Land Survey System, land right across the country is divided into townships and sections. A section is roughly equivalent to a square mile, 640 acres. It became the practice to refer to quarter-quarter divisions of a section, with a quarter of a quarter of a section being equal to 40 acres (check the math!). From this sprung phrases like “lower 40” (nominally the lowest elevation 40 acres on a property) and the “back 40” (nominally a 40 acre parcel that was undeveloped on a property, “out the back”).

58 Tech giant that sold its PC division to Lenovo : IBM

Lenovo is a Chinese manufacturer of computers. The company is very successful, and sold more personal computers in 2013 than any other vendor worldwide. IBM sold off its personal computer division to Lenovo in 2005.

59 New Deal agcy. : NRA

The National Recovery Administration (NRA) was one of the first agencies set up under President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal program. On the one hand the NRA help set minimum wages and maximum working hours for workers in industry, and on the other hand it helped set minimum prices for goods produced by companies. The NRA was very popular with the public, and businesses that didn’t opt to participate in the program found themselves boycotted. The NRA didn’t survive for long though, as after two years of operation it was deemed to be unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court and so it ceased operations in 1935.

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 “Welcome to Kauai!” : ALOHA!
6 Channel bobber : BUOY
10 Persian for “crown” : TAJ
13 “Service at the Speed of Sound” fast-food chain : SONIC
14 Tolstoy title name : ANNA
15 Moment or way lead-in : IN A …
16 Place to get gifts? : PRESENT COMPANY
19 Web statistic : HITS
20 Cruet contents : OIL
21 “Yay me!” : I RULE!
23 French friend : AMI
24 Place to get fireplace equipment? : POKER DEALER
27 Hedy of Hollywood : LAMARR
29 Stick with a boat? : OAR
30 Singer DiFranco : ANI
31 Roman fountain : TREVI
32 “Rebel Yell” singer Billy : IDOL
34 Grasp, in slang : GROK
35 Place to get movie actors? : EXTRA FIRM
38 Put up with : BEAR
41 Techniques : WAYS
42 Liver spreads : PATES
46 Prefix with catastrophe : ECO-
47 Online help page : FAQ
48 “My turn” : I’M NEXT
49 Place to get laundry detergent? : ALL BUSINESS
53 Shopkeeper who by his own admission sells “surprisingly expensive” penny candy at the Kwik-E-Mart : APU
54 Silent performers : MIMES
55 Oz. or lb. : AMT
56 “Instinct” star Cumming : ALAN
57 Place to get help with estate planning? : PASSING CONCERN
61 Park it, so to speak : SIT
62 Slope overlooking a loch : BRAE
63 Speak formally : ORATE
64 Pair of allies? : ELS
65 “G’day” addressee : MATE
66 Put on the back burner : DEFER

Down

1 It can cover a lot : ASPHALT
2 “Dallas” production studio : LORIMAR
3 Former : ONE-TIME
4 Sound neither an actor nor a hiker wants to hear : HISS
5 Top fighter pilot : ACE
6 Dyeing art : BATIK
7 “I give up!” : UNCLE!
8 Peace activist Yoko : ONO
9 Thanksgiving veggie : YAM
10 Royal topper : TIARA
11 Ring-shaped : ANNULAR
12 Host of a “garage” show since 2014 : JAY LENO
17 Jordan’s Queen __ : NOOR
18 Berth place : PIER
22 Composer Satie : ERIK
24 __ fixe : PRIX
25 They may be pitched : ROOFS
26 Spanish surrealist : DALI
28 Say with conviction : AVER
32 Mosul native : IRAQI
33 Calendar square : DAY
34 FBI agent : G-MAN
36 Christmas poem contraction : ‘TWAS
37 Tach nos. : RPMS
38 Ray : BEAM
39 Total or partial event : ECLIPSE
40 Outlook alternative : AOL MAIL
43 One steeping in a cup : TEA LEAF
44 One-sided, in legal proceedings : EX PARTE
45 Huge surprise : STUNNER
47 Complain : FUSS
48 Analogy words : IS TO
50 Conquers : BESTS
51 Pester : NAG AT
52 One sporting a mic : EMCEE
56 “Back forty” unit : ACRE
58 Tech giant that sold its PC division to Lenovo : IBM
59 New Deal agcy. : NRA
60 Drift (off) : NOD