Tag: Sleight of land? crossword clue

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Constructed by: Ed Sessa

Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Theme: None

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

Bill’s time: 12m 29s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

10A Brightly colored Arita ware : IMARI

Imari is a port city located on the island of Kyushu in Japan. What Europeans know as Imari porcelain actually isn’t made in Imari, but rather in the nearby town of Arita. The name Imari was given to the porcelain because it was the port through which the ceramic ware was shipped. In Japan, the porcelain is called Arita-yaki.

15A Bubble wrap alternative : AIR PILLOW

Bubble wrap was invented in 1957 in an abortive attempt to make a 3-dimensional wall covering. The result was a material that wasn’t suitable as a “wallpaper” but that did make a great packing material. And don’t forget the last Monday of every January … that’s Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day.

17A Memorabilia from the Great White North : CANADIANA

The nickname “Great White North” for Canada was popularized in the 1980s by the SCTV characters Bob and Doug McKenzie. Each word in the phrase has a specific meaning: “Great” for Canada’s status as the world’s second-largest country, “White” for its arctic tundra and ice, and “North” for its geographical position.

18A Guitar legend Van Halen : EDDIE

Edward Lodewijk Van Halen was a Dutch-American musician who was a guitarist and primary songwriter for the rock band Van Halen, which he co-founded with his brother Alex in 1972. Eddie performed an iconic guitar solo on Michael Jackson’s 1983 hit “Beat It”. It was not only uncredited, but he did it as a favor and was never paid for it.

19A Jolly pair? : ELS

There is a pair of letters L in the word “jolly”.

20A “Mad Men” types : AD REPS

“Mad Men” was the flagship show on the AMC television channel for several seasons. Set in the sixties, it’s all about an advertising agency located on Madison Avenue in New York (hence the title). “Mad Men” became the first show created by a basic cable channel to win an Emmy for Outstanding Drama Series.

23A Popeye’s __’Pea : SWEE

Originally Popeye used the nickname “Swee’Pea” to address his girlfriend Olive Oyl. Then along comes a baby, found on Popeye’s doorstep.

26A Bouquets : AROMAS

“Bouquet” comes from the French word for “bunch” in the sense of “bunch of flowers”. In French, the term is derived from an older word describing a little wood or small grove of trees. We started using “bouquet” to mean “perfume from a wine” in the early 1800s.

29A Some military caps : KEPIS

A kepi is a circular cap with a visor, one that’s particularly associated with the French military.

35A Day of March madness : IDES

In Act I of William Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar”, a soothsayer warns the doomed leader to “beware the ides of March”. Caesar ignores the prophecy and is subsequently killed on the steps of the Capitol by a group of conspirators on that fateful day.

37A Sine qua non : NEED

“Sine qua non” is a Latin phrase that we use to mean “the essential element or condition”. The literal translation is “without which not”. One might say, for example, “a challenging crossword is the sine qua non of a good newspaper”. Well, crossword fans might say that …

38A Shelties’ shelters : DOGHOUSES

The Shetland sheepdog (often just “sheltie”) is a herding dog from the Scottish Shetland Islands. It is a relatively small dog, and looks like a miniature rough collie.

40A One-named singer dubbed the “First Lady of Crunk & B” : CIARA

Ciara is a singer-songwriter from Austin, Texas. She used to date rapper Bow Wow, but married Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson in 2016.

42A Software shortcuts : MACROS

A macroinstruction (usually shortened to “macro”) is a set of instructions in a computer program that are abbreviated to one simple command.

43A Figure in the knight time? : SQUIRE

A squire can be an escort, say one attending to a woman. A squire is also a young nobleman who attended a knight in days of yore. A fun example would be Sancho Panza who accompanied the deluded Don Quixote.

49A Tallahassee inst. : FSU

Florida State University (FSU) is located in Tallahassee, the state capital of Florida. The school’s athletic teams are known as the Seminoles (sometimes the “‘Noles”). The team name was chosen in 1947 by the students in a vote, and alludes to the Seminole people of Florida.

52A Argentine dance : TANGO

The dramatic tango dance originated in the late 1800s in the area along the border between Argentina and Uruguay. A popular variant of the ballroom tango is the Argentine tango, which emerged in the late 1800s in Buenos Aires. The Argentine tango is danced to a greater variety of music, and is considered to be more technically demanding. It is also described as being more sensual and intimate. I wish I could dance …

57A Rare blood type : A-NEGATIVE

Here is an approximate distribution of blood types across the US population:

• O-positive: 38 percent
• O-negative: 7 percent
• A-positive: 34 percent
• A-negative: 6 percent
• B-positive: 9 percent
• B-negative: 2 percent
• AB-positive: 3 percent
• AB-negative: 1 percent

59A Floral additive to Turkish delight and gulab jamun : ROSEWATER

Rosewater is a flavoring used in some foods, as well as a component of some cosmetics. It is made by steeping rose petals in water.

Turkish delight is a confection or candy made mainly from a starch gel and sugar. Additional ingredients can include chopped dates and nuts, as well as rosewater, orange or lemon flavoring.

Gulab jamun is a popular dessert from the Indian subcontinent made from fried milk-solid balls soaked in a syrup. The name “gulab jamun” comes from the Persian words for rosewater (“gulab”), which flavors the syrup, and the Hindi word for a black, plum-like fruit it resembles (“jamun”).

Down

2D Capital of Oman : RIAL

The rial is the currency of Oman (as well as Yemen, Iran and Tunisia). Generally, there are 1,000 baisa in one rial.

3D Gray sea eagles : ERNS

The ern (sometimes “erne”) is also known as the white-tailed eagle or the sea eagle.

10D __-de-France : ILE

Île-de-France (literally “Island of France”) isn’t an island at all. Instead, it is the most populous of France’s 26 administrative regions. Île-de-France is roughly equivalent to the Paris metropolitan area.

12D Tree with catkins : ALDER

Alders are deciduous (i.e. not evergreen) trees with fruit called catkins. The tree carries both male and female catkins that look very similar to each other, but the male catkin is longer than the female. Alders are pollinated by wind usually, although bees can play a role.

13D Small wading birds : RAILS

Rails are birds of the family Rallidae (hence their name). Outside of America, the name “rail” tends to be reserved for long-billed species and the term “crake” is used for short-billed species.

21D Former frosh : SOPHS

The term “sophomore” has been used since the 1680s for a student in the second year of university. The original meaning of the word was “arguer”. The term has Greek roots, from two Greek words that have been artificially combined in English. The Greek “sophos” means “wise”, and “moros” means “foolish”.

“Frosh” is a slang term for a college freshperson. We call such an individual a “fresher” back in Ireland …

23D Order that requires a superhot griddle : SMASH BURGER

A smash burger is so called because of its cooking technique, where a ball of ground beef is smashed firmly onto an extremely hot griddle. This method maximizes surface contact with the heat and creates a very flavorful, crispy brown crust. The crust is the result of the Maillard reaction, a chemical reaction between amino acids and reducing sugars that gives browned food its distinctive flavor.

26D Saharan : ARID

The name “Sahara” means “desert” in Arabic. The Sahara is just that, a great desert covering almost 4 million square miles of Northern Africa. That’s almost the size of the United States.

28D Cassini of fashion : OLEG

French-born American fashion designer Oleg Cassini developed a reputation for designing costumes for films, and dressing numerous film stars. He had two big names particularly associated with his designs. In the sixties he produced the state wardrobe for First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. He was also the exclusive designer for Hollywood’s Gene Tierney, who was Cassini’s second wife.

31D Spot to order Kumamotos : OYSTER BAR

Kumamotos are a species of edible oyster originally from the Kumamoto Prefecture in Japan. They are now primarily cultivated on the West Coast of North America, particularly in Washington, Oregon, and California. They are smaller than many other oyster varieties and are prized for their mild and sweet taste.

33D Architect Saarinen : EERO

Eero Saarinen was a Finnish-American architect who was renowned in this country for his unique designs for public buildings such as the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Dulles International Airport Terminal, and the TWA building at JFK. The list of his lesser-known, but still impressive, works includes several buildings erected on academic campuses. For example, the Chapel and Kresge Auditorium on the MIT campus, the Emma Hartman Noyes House at Vassar College, the Law School building at the University of Chicago, and Yale’s David S. Ingalls Rink.

34D Iron reqs., e.g. : RDAS

Recommended Daily Allowances (RDAs) were introduced during WWII, The primary goal wasn’t public health in general, but specifically to ensure that American soldiers and the general population supporting the war effort were getting enough nutrients to be effective.

40D Dupe : CAT’S-PAW

The use of the term “cat’s-paw” to describe a dupe derives from an old folk tale in which a monkey tricks a cat into pawing chestnuts from a fire. The monkey gets the chestnuts, and the cat gets a burnt paw.

42D Sleight of land? : MIRAGE

A mirage occurs when light rays are bent by passing from cold air to warmer air. The most often cited mirage is a “lake” seen in a desert, which is actually the blue of the sky and not water at all. The word “mirage” comes to us via French from the Latin “mirare” meaning “to look at in wonder”. “Mirage” has the same root as our words “admire” and “mirror”.

48D Baja bath : BANO

Baja California is both the most northern and the most western of the Mexican states. The name translates from Spanish as “Lower California”.

49D Move like a monarch : FLIT

The monarch butterfly has very recognizable orange and black wings, and is often seen across North America. The monarch is the state insect of several US states and was even nominated as the national insect in 1990, but that legislation was not enacted.

50D Golf legend Ballesteros : SEVE

Seve Ballesteros was a very entertaining golfer from Spain who was once ranked as the world’s number-one player. Sadly, Ballesteros died from brain cancer in 2011, at the age of 54.

53D Scrubs ctrs. : ORS

The term “scrubs” originates from the “scrubbing in” process that surgeons and staff perform before entering an operating room to ensure a sterile environment. The simple, sanitary garments worn for surgery became known as “scrubs”, a name that has since expanded throughout the healthcare sector.