0519-24 NY Times Crossword 19 May 24, Sunday

Bill’s time: 22m 50s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

5 Agnus ___ (motif in Christian iconography) : DEI

“Agnus Dei” is Latin for “Lamb of God”, The expression is used in Christian traditions to describe Jesus Christ, hence symbolizing his role as a sacrificial offering (sacrificial lamb) to atone for the sins of man.

17 Lead-in to marine or marathon : ULTRA-

Ultramarine is a deep blue color. The name was originally applied to a pigment made by grinding the semi-precious stone lapis lazuli into a powder. “Ultramarine” comes from the Latin for “beyond the sea”, a reference to the fact that the pigment was imported into Europe from Afghanistan by Italian traders.

19 The house, to a blackjack player : OPPONENT

Blackjack is one of the few casino games where the player has a decent chance to beat the house. This is because the house edge in blackjack is relatively low, around 1%. That edge can be reduced or overcome by “counting cards”, something that casinos really don’t like …

24 Charades, but not chess : TEAM GAME

In the parlor game known as charades, players take turns acting out words or phrases. “Charade” is a French word describing a literary puzzle that was popular in 18th-century France. In said game, the word or phrase was broken into its constituent syllables, with each syllable being described somewhat enigmatically. This puzzle evolved into “acted charades”, which we now refer to simply as “charades”.

29 Grunting ox, by another name : YAK

The English word “yak” is an Anglicized version of the Tibetan name for the male of the species. Yak milk is much prized in Tibetan culture. It is made into cheese and butter, and the butter is used to make a tea that is consumed in great volume by Tibetans. The butter is also used as a fuel in lamps, and during festivals the butter is even sculpted into religious icons.

31 Show with the Church Lady and Target Lady, for short : SNL

Dana Carvey, along with the likes of Phil Hartman and Kevin Nealon, was part of the new breed of “Saturday Night Live” (SNL) comedians credited with resurrecting the show in the late eighties. One of Carvey’s most popular characters was the Church Lady (“Well, isn’t that special?”), and he became so associated with her that among fellow cast members Carvey was often referred to simply as “the Lady”. Another favorite Carvey character was Garth Algar who went to feature in the “Wayne’s World” movies. Carvey had open-heart surgery in 1997 to clear a blocked artery, but the surgical team operated on the wrong blood vessel. To recover, he had to have five more procedures. He ended up suing for medical malpractice and donated his $7.5 million compensation payment to charity.

32 Bill in a till : TEN

What we usually call a cash register here in North America, we mostly call a “till” in Ireland and the UK. I haven’t heard the word “till” used much here in that sense …

37 Having a studious appearance : OWLISH

The Greek goddess Athena (sometimes “Athene”) is often associated with wisdom, among other attributes. In many representations. Athena is depicted with an owl sitting on her head. It is this linkage of the owl with the goddess of wisdom that led to today’s perception of the owl as being “wise”. Athena’s Roman counterpart was Minerva.

40 Treats that Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith picked as runner-up to Doritos for “best snack in America” : OREOS

Prue Leith is a restaurateur and TV personality from South Africa. She has a very colorful demeanor, which no doubt helped her take over from the marvelous Mary Berry as a judge of the hit UK show “The Great British Bake Off” (“The Great British Baking Show” in the US).

50 Biblical king of Judea : HEROD

Herod Antipas was a ruler of Galilee and Perea in the 1st century CE. Even though he never held the title of “king”, he is referred to in the New Testament of the Christian Bible as “King Herod”. So, it was Herod Anitipas who was so instrumental in the executions of John the Baptist and Jesus of Nazareth.

51 Spice Girl Halliwell : GERI

Geri Halliwell was nicknamed Ginger Spice when she was with the Spice Girls, because of her red hair. Halliwell was quite a bit older than the rest of the group and so sometimes she was less charitably referred to as “Old Spice”. After launching her solo career, Halliwell released a fabulous 2001 version of the song “It’s Raining Men”, which was originally recorded by the Weather Girls in 1982. Great song …

55 Over which announcements about pep rallies might be heard, for short : PAS

Public address (PA) system

56 One of many in the Colosseum : ARCH

The Colosseum of Rome was the largest amphitheater in the whole of the Roman Empire in its day, and could seat about 50,000 people. The structure was originally called the “Amphitheatrum Flavium” but the name changed to “Colosseum” after a colossal statue of Emperor Nero was located nearby.

57 Teacher’s instruction in a class on pointillism? : DO AS I SAY, DOT AS I DO (from “do as I say, not as I do”)

Pointillism is a style of painting that grew out of Impressionism. The pointillist technique calls for the artist to use small, distinct dots of bold color to build up the image. Pointillism was developed in the late 1800s by the great French painter, Georges Seurat. You can go see his magnificent work “A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte” at The Art Institute of Chicago the next time you’re in town.

61 Grass : POT

“Potiguaya” is the Mexican-Spanish word for “marijuana leaves”. The slang name “pot” comes from “potiguaya”.

62 “Bye Bye Birdie” actress ___-Margret : ANN

Ann-Margret is the stage name of Swedish-born American actress, Ann-Margret Olsson. When she isn’t on the stage or screen, Ann-Margret is a motorcycle enthusiast, and broke a few bones coming off a motorcycle in 2000.

63 Salt-N-Pepa hit with the refrain “___, ___ ba-doop” : SHOOP

Salt-N-Pepa are an all-female hip-hop trio from New York made up of “Salt” (Cheryl James), “Pepa” (Sandra Denton) and “DJ Spinderella” (Deidra Roper). The group’s 1991 song “Let’s Talk Sex” created quite a fuss as the lyrics explored the subject of sex, and safe sex in particular. A later version addressed the dangers of AIDS.

65 How one might punnily define “Saran” or “sari”? : IT’S A WRAP

What’s known as plastic wrap in America, we call cling-film in Ireland. The brand name “Saran” is often used generically in the US, while “Glad” wrap is common down under. Plastic wrap was one of those unintended inventions, a byproduct of a development program to create a hard plastic cover for cars.

The item of clothing called a “sari” (also “saree”) is a strip of cloth, as one might imagine, unusual perhaps in that it is unstitched along the whole of its length. The strip of cloth can range from four to nine meters long (that’s a lot of material!). The sari is usually wrapped around the waist, then draped over the shoulder leaving the midriff bare. I must say, it can be a beautiful item of clothing.

74 Actress McDonald : AUDRA

Audra McDonald is an actress and singer best known for her work on the stage. She has won six competitive Tony Awards, which is more than any other actor. McDonald is also the only person to have won Tony Awards in all four categories: featured actress in a play, leading actress in a play, featured actress in a musical, and leading actress in a musical.

77 DHL competitor : UPS

United Parcel Service (UPS) is based in Sandy Springs, Georgia and has its own airline that operates out of Louisville, Kentucky. UPS often goes by the nickname “Brown”, because of its brown delivery trucks and brown uniforms.

80 Stevedore’s complaint? : IT’S A HARD DOCK LIFE (from “it’s a hard-knock life”)

A stevedore, or longshoreman, is someone employed in the loading and unloading of ships at a port. The word “stevedore” comes from the Spanish “estibador”, meaning “one who loads cargo”, with the verb “to steeve” meaning to load cargo in a hold. The word “longshoreman”, is simply from a man who works “alongshore”.

85 Champagne specification : BRUT

Sparkling wines can be classified according to sweetness. These classifications are, from driest to sweetest:

• Brut Nature
• Extra Brut
• Brut
• Extra Dry
• Dry
• Semi-Dry
• Sweet

86 Whitman of TV’s “Parenthood” : MAE

Actress Mae Whitman played “the daughter” in some successful movies early in her career. She was Meg Ryan’s daughter in “When a Man Loves a Woman”, George Clooney’s daughter in “One Fine Day” and Bill Pullman’s daughter in “Independence Day”. More recently, she played the lead in the 2015 teen comedy film “The Duff”.

87 Chocolate mint brand : ANDES

Andes Chocolate Mints were first produced by a company called Andy’s Candies, established in 1921 by Andrew Kanelos in Chicago. Kanelos learned that men didn’t like giving boxes of candy to their wives and girlfriends if there was another man’s name on the box, so he changed his business to Andes Candies, for the South American mountain range.

88 Paper pack : REAM

A ream is 500 sheets of paper. As there were 24 sheets in a quire, and 20 quires made up a ream, there used to be 480 sheets in a ream. Ever since the standard was changed to 500, a 480-sheet packet of paper has been called a “short ream”. We also use the term “reams” to mean a great amount, evolving from the idea of a lot of printed material.

90 South ___, river through Denver : PLATTE

Denver, Colorado is nicknamed “Mile-High City” because its official elevation is listed as exactly one mile. Denver City was founded in 1858 as a mining town. The name was chosen in honor of the Kansas Territorial Governor at the time, James W. Denver.

101 What “Eat” stands for in the mnemonic “Never Eat Soggy Waffles” : EAST

“Never Eat Soggy Waffles” is a mnemonic that gives the cardinal points of the compass in a clockwise direction: North, East, South, West.

103 NASA shorthand for a spacewalk : EVA

Extravehicular activity (EVA) is the name given to any work done by an astronaut outside of his or her spacecraft. The term would encompass walking on the moon, as well as making a space walk i.e. floating around in space tethered to spacecraft.

107 ___-weekly : ALT

An alt-weekly is an alternative newspaper that circulates on a weekly schedule. Famous examples would be the “Village Voice” and “New York Press” in New York City, both of which stopped publishing a few years ago.

110 Tour guide’s remark at the challah factory? : THAT’S A DOUGH BRAIDER (from “that’s a no-brainer”)

Challah is a special braided bread that is eaten by Ashkenazi Jews on the Sabbath. The bread is served to commemorate the manna that fell from the heavens as the Israelites wandered around the desert after the Exodus from Egypt.

116 Out the ___ : WAZOO

The slang term “up the wazoo” means “to have plenty”. It’s pretty vulgar slang and is a specific anatomical reference, so I don’t think it really belongs in a crossword …

120 Fictional dog with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame : SNOOPY

Snoopy is a central and much-loved character in the Charles M. Schulz comic strip “Peanuts”. He is Charlie Brown’s pet beagle, and first appeared in “Peanuts” just two days after the strip’s debut in 1950. He was identified as “Snoopy” a month later, and first “spoke” (in a thought balloon) in 1952. Initially depicted as a more traditionally dog-like figure, Schulz started to anthropomorphize Snoopy in 1952, first drawing him upright on his hind legs in 1952, while ice-skating on a frozen lake.

Down

1 1991 crime drama starring Warren Beatty and Annette Bening : BUGSY

“Bugsy” is a 1991 biographical drama about the life of mobster Bugsy Siegel, and his relationship with mob courier Virginia Hill. The roles of Siegel and Hill are played by Warren Beatty and Annette Bening. Beatty and Bening became romantically involved soon after filming completed and the couple married the following year.

2 Luau greeting : ALOHA

The Hawaiian party or feast known as a “luau” really dates back to 1819, when King Kamehameha II removed religious laws that governed the eating of meals. These laws called for women and men to eat separately. At the same time as he changed the laws, the king initiated the luau tradition by symbolically eating with the women who moved in his circle.

8 “And Still I Rise” writer : ANGELOU

“And Still I Rise” is a 1978 volume of poetry by Maya Angelou. The collection’s title poem is “Still I Rise”, which ends with:

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

9 Drink for which Pliny the Elder recorded a recipe : MEAD

Pliny the Elder and Pliny the Younger were important figures in Ancient Rome. Pliny the Elder was a scientist and historian, the author of “Naturalis Historia”, commonly referred to as “Pliny’s Natural History”. Pliny died in the year 79 AD in an attempt to rescue friends during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Pliny the Younger was the nephew and adopted son of Pliny the Elder. Pliny the Younger was a noted Roman statesman, orator and writer.

15 Kaitlin Olson’s role on “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” : DEE

Deandra “Sweet Dee” Reynolds is a character played by Kaitlin Olson on the sitcom “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”. Ronald “Mac” McDonald is also a character on the show, played by Rob McElhenney. Olson and McElhenney met on set, and married in 2008.

18 Kosher : ALLOWED

According to Jewish dietary laws, kosher food is fit to eat, and food that is not fit to eat is referred to as treif (or “tref”). The usage of “kosher” has extended to include anything considered legitimate.

23 Wide receiver ___ Beckham Jr. : ODELL

Odell Beckham Jr. is a National Football League wide receiver from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. In 2014, “OBJ” made a much-applauded, one-handed catch while falling backwards to score a touchdown for the New York Giants against the Dallas Cowboys, a move that some have dubbed the greatest catch ever made.

27 Certain arm muscles, in brief : TRIS

The triceps brachii muscle is found at the back of the upper arm. The muscle’s name translates from Latin to “three-headed arm muscle”, fitting as it is actually made up of three bundles of muscles.

35 Morgan Stanley subsidiary : E-TRADE

E-Trade is mainly an online discount brokerage. It was founded in 1982 in Palo Alto, California, and I used to drive by its headquarters almost every day. The company is now run out of New York City. E-Trade used to produce those famous Super Bowl ads with the talking babies staring into a webcam.

38 Video game company that published Frogger : SEGA

Sega is a Japanese video game company headquartered in Tokyo. Sega actually started out in 1940 as Standard Games and was located in Honolulu, which at that time was a city in the US Territory of Hawaii. The owners moved the operation to Tokyo in 1951 and renamed the company to Service Games. The name “Sega” is a combination of the first two letters of the words “Se-rvice” and “Ga-mes”.

45 Prey of polar bears : ARCTIC SEALS

Polar bears are close cousins of brown bears, and are thought to have evolved from a population of brown bears that became isolated during a period of glaciation. Most polar bears live north of the Arctic Circle, and live mainly on seals that they capture near the edge of ice floes.

46 ___ Lanka : SRI

The island nation of Sri Lanka lies off the southeast coast of India. The name “Sri Lanka” translates from Sanskrit into English as “venerable island”. Before 1970, Sri Lanka was known as Ceylon, a name given to the country during British rule.

47 “You have a face for radio,” for one : DISS

“Dis” (also “diss”) is a slang term meaning “insult” that originated in the eighties. It is a shortened form of “disrespect” or “dismiss”.

49 Cause to rise : LEAVEN

Leaven is a substance that causes bread to rise, perhaps yeast or baking powder. The term “leaven” comes into English via French from the Latin “levare” meaning “to rise”.

57 Makeup of a tiny twisting ladder : DNA

Francis Crick and James Watson discovered that DNA had a double-helix, chain-like structure, and published their results in Cambridge in 1953. To this day the discovery is mired in controversy, as some crucial results collected by fellow researcher Rosalind Franklin were used without her permission or even knowledge. In 1962, along with molecular biologist Maurice Wilkins, Watson and Crick were awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine.

62 Nincompoop, more vulgarly : ASSHAT

The word “nincompoop”, meaning “fool”, seems to have been around for quite a while. It has been used since the 1670s, but no one appears to know its origins.

66 Matcha, e.g. : TEA

Matcha is a powder made by grinding dried, green tea leaves. The selected tea bushes are heavily shaded for several weeks prior to harvest, which stimulates the production of chlorophyll resulting in darker green leaves. Matcha is used in East Asian cuisines to prepare tea for drinking, and also as an ingredient in dishes such as ice cream, cakes and sushi rolls.

72 Golf ball indentation : DIMPLE

The first golf balls had smooth surfaces. The idea of adding dimples grew out of the empirical observation that used balls flew further. These older balls were beaten up and had nicks in the surface. The nicks, and the dimples in a modern ball, create a turbulent layer of air that “sticks” to the surface of the ball, and this sticky layer of turbulent air has less drag as it slices through the rest of the air between the golfer and the ball’s destination.

73 Home to Firenze : ITALIA

Florence is the capital city of the Tuscany region in Italy. Something from or related to Florence is described as “Florentine”. The city is known as “Firenze” in Italian.

75 About 40% of a hectare : ACRE

The hectare is a non-SI unit of area that is mainly used to measure land. One hectare is equal to 10,000 square meters (100 meters x 100 meters), and equivalent to 2.47 acres. And, coincidentally, “hectare” is an anagram of “the acre”. And further, 100 square meters is equal to one “are”.

78 Knitting stitch : PURL

As all of us knitters know, the purl stitch and knit stitch are very similar, one being sort of the inverse of the other. Yes, I’ve knitted a few sweaters in my day …

79 Small, painful bump : STYE

A stye is a bacterial infection of the sebaceous glands at the base of the eyelashes, and is also known as a hordeolum.

81 Lack of energy : ANEMIA

The term “anemia” (or “anaemia”, as we write it back in Ireland) comes from a Greek word meaning “lack of blood”. Anemia is a lack of iron in the blood, or a low red blood cell count. Tiredness is a symptom of the condition, and so we use the term “anemic” figuratively to mean “lacking in vitality or substance”.

83 Country that becomes a language if you remove its last letter : LAOS

Lao, the language of Laos, does not use spaces between words (or periods!), although this is apparently changing. Spaces are used between sentences and clauses.

93 Stored for the night, as a bus : SHEDDED

We use the term “bus” for a mode of transportation as it is an abbreviated form of the original “omnibus”. We imported “omnibus” via French from Latin, in which language it means “for all”. The idea is that an omnibus is a carriage “for all”.

94 One of the Starks on “Game of Thrones” : ROBB

Robb Stark is a prominent character in George R. R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” novels, and in the TV adaption of the books “Game of Thrones”. He is portrayed by Scottish actor Richard Madden in the show.

98 Masters of underwater camouflage : OCTOPI

The term “octopus” comes from the Greek for “eight-footed”. The most common plural used is “octopuses”, although the Greek plural form “octopodes” is also quite correct. The plural “octopi” isn’t really correct as the inference is that “octopus” is like a second-declension Latin noun, which it isn’t. That said, dictionaries are now citing “octopi” as an acceptable plural. Language does evolve, even though it drives me crazy …

Our word “camouflage” (often abbreviated to “camo”) evolved directly from a Parisian slang term “camoufler” meaning “to disguise”. The term was first used in WWI, although the British navy at that time preferred the expression “dazzle-painting” as it applied to the pattern painted on the hulls of ships.

104 “Parlez-___ français?” : VOUS

In French, “Parlez-vous français?” means “Do you speak French?”

107 National dish of the Philippines : ADOBO

Philippine adobo is sometimes cited as the country’s national dish. The term “adobo” comes from the Spanish “adobar” meaning “marinade, sauce” The marinade used comprises vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, bay leaves and black peppercorns.

108 Member of an isolated colony, once : LEPER

The horrible disease known as leprosy is also called Hansen’s disease, named after the Norwegian physician famous for isolating the bacterium that causes the disease. We can use the term “leper” to mean someone in general who is shunned by society.

109 Meeting for two : TRYST

In the most general sense, a tryst is a meeting at an agreed time and place. More usually we consider a tryst to be a pre-arranged meeting between lovers. The term comes from the Old French “triste”, a waiting place designated when hunting. Further, a tryst taking place at lunchtime is sometimes referred to as a nooner.

111 A “waking dream,” per Aristotle : HOPE

Aristotle was actually a student of Plato in ancient Greece (and in turn, Plato was a student of Socrates). Aristotle’s most famous student was Alexander the Great.

116 URL starter : WWW

In essence, the World Wide Web (WWW) is a vast collection of documents that is accessible using the Internet, with each document containing hyperlinks which point to other documents in the collection. So the “Web” is different from the Internet, although the terms are often used interchangeably. The Web is a collection of documents, and the Internet is a global network of computers on which the documents reside. The Web was effectively the invention of British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee. The key to Berner-Lee’s invention was bringing together two technologies that already existed: hypertext and the Internet. I, for one, am very grateful …