LA Times Crossword Answers 9 Jul 14, Wednesday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Gary J. Whitehead
THEME: They Mix … each of today’s themed answers is a MIXER of sorts:

20A. Recording industry technician SOUND ENGINEER
38A. One with a busy engagement calendar SOCIAL BUTTERFLY
57A. Kitchen appliance FOOD PROCESSOR

68A. With 69-Across, what 20-, 38- and 57-Across do THEY
69A. See 68-Across MIX

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 8m 42s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

1. Subway map abbr. STA
Station (sta.)

8. Dreadlocks wearer RASTA
I must admit that I don’t really understand Rastafarianism. I do know that a “Rasta”, like Bob Marley, is a follower of the movement. Some say that Rastafarianism is a religion, some not. I also know that it involves the worship of Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia.

Dreadlocks are matted coils of hair nowadays usually formed intentionally, although if one lets hair grow out without grooming then it naturally forms twisted and matted dreadlocks. The hairstyle is associated with the Rastafarian movement in which “dread” is a very positive term meaning “fear of the Lord”.

16. Singer John ELTON
Elton John’s real name is Reginald Dwight. Sir Elton was knighted in 1998, not for his music but for his charitable work. He founded his own Elton John AIDS Foundation back in 1992.

17. Transfusion letters ABO
The most important grouping of blood types is the ABO system. Blood is classified as either A, B, AB or O, depending on the type of antigens on the surface of the red blood cells. A secondary designation of blood is the Rh factor, in which other antigens are labelled as either positive or negative. When a patient receives a blood transfusion, ideally the donor blood should be the same type as that of the recipient, as incompatible blood cells can be rejected. However, blood type O-neg can be accepted by recipients with all blood types, A, B, AB or O, and positive or negative. Hence someone with O-neg blood type is called a “universal donor”.

23. Tin Lizzie MODEL T
The Ford Model T was the first really affordable car that was offered for sale, and it was produced from 1908 to 1927. It was the Model T that ushered in the era of assembly line production, which greatly cut down the cost of manufacture. The engine was designed to run on petrol, kerosene or even ethanol. Famously, the Model T was known colloquially as the “Tin Lizzie”.

24. Director Kazan ELIA
Elia Kazan won Oscars for best director in 1948 for “Gentleman’s Agreement” and in 1955 for “On The Waterfront”. In 1999 Kazan was given an Academy Lifetime Achievement Award. He also directed “East of Eden”, which introduced James Dean to movie audiences, and “Splendor in the Grass” that included Warren Beatty in his debut role.

25. Kingston Trio hit with the lyric “Fight the fare increase!” MTA
“M.T.A.” was a 1958 hit for the Kingston Trio. The song tells of a man called Charlie who is stuck on board an MTA subway car in Boston. His problem is that “exit fares” had been introduced on the system to supplement “entrance fares” (true story!), and the man didn’t have the extra nickel needed to get off the train.

30. Santa __: Southwestern mountains TERESAS
The Santa Teresa Mountains are in Arizona, located with the Coronado National Forest.

32. Obsessed whale hunter AHAB
“Moby-Dick; or, The Whale” is an 1851 novel by Herman Melville. The title refers to a sperm whale that has been dubbed “Moby Dick” by Captain Ahab. The giant whale bit off Ahab’s leg, and so the captain is obsessed with revenge.

37. Hoity-toity types SNOBS
Back in the 1780s, a “snob” was a shoemaker or a shoemaker’s apprentice. By the end of the 18th century the word was being used by students at Cambridge University in England to refer to all local merchants and people of the town. The term evolved to mean one who copies those who are his or her social superior (and not in a good way). From there it wasn’t a big leap for “snob” to include anyone who emphasized their superior social standing and not just those who aspired to rank. Nowadays a snob is anyone who looks down on those considered to be of inferior standing.

Believe it or not, the term “hoity-toity” has been in the English language since the 1660s, but back then it meant “riotous behavior”. It began to mean “haughty” in the late 1800s, simply because the “haughty” sounds similar to “hoity”.

38. One with a busy engagement calendar SOCIAL BUTTERFLY
Not me, said he, heaving a sigh of relief …

43. Petal puller’s pronoun SHE
She loves me, she loves me not …

45. Sicilian seaport MESSINA
Messina is a port, and the third largest city on the Italian island of Sicily. The city’s natural harbor has a curved shape like that of a scythe. When founded by Greek colonists in the 8th century BC, the settlements first name was “Zancle”, from the Greek word for “scythe”.

48. SOS responder USCG
The US Coast Guard (USCG) has the distinction of being the country’s oldest continuous seagoing service. The USCG was founded as the Revenue Cutter Service by Alexander Hamilton in 1790.

The combination of three dots – three dashes – three dots, is a Morse signal first introduced by the German government as a standard distress call in 1905. The sequence is remembered as the letters SOS (three dots – pause – three dashes – pause – three dots), although in the emergency signal there is no pause between the dots and dashes, so SOS is in effect only a mnemonic. Similarly, the phrases “Save Our Souls” and “Save Our Ship” are also mnemonics, introduced after the “SOS” signal was adopted.

51. Actress Catherine __-Jones ZETA
Catherine Zeta-Jones is a movie actress from the Welsh city of Swansea (where I lived for a couple of years). Her earlier starring roles were in films such as “The Mask of Zorro” and “Entrapment”, followed by much-lauded performances in “Traffic” (2000) and “Chicago” (2002). Zeta-Jones is married to actor Michael Douglas who is exactly 25 years her senior (the pair share the same birthday).

53. Belief in one god THEISM
Broadly speaking, “theism” is the belief that there is at least one god. The term is also used describe the belief in just one god, what is perhaps more accurately referred to as “monotheism”. As such, followers of Christianity, Judaism and Islam would be classified as theists.

60. Family car WAGON
The style of automobile that we call “station wagon” here in North America, is known as “estate car” in the British Isles. Both names are really references to the vehicles utility in hauling baggage in the extra space provided in the rear. A station wagon could haul bags to the station, and an estate car could haul bags to one’s country estate!

62. Turkish titles AGHAS
“Aga” (also “agha”) is a title that was used by both civil and military officials in the Ottoman Empire.

63. Galadriel in “The Lord of the Rings,” e.g. ELF
Galadriel is royal Elf in J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of The Rings” books. She is played by Cate Blanchett in the Peter Jackson movie adaptations of the novels.

64. Deadly virus EBOLA
The Ebola virus causes a very nasty form of hemorrhagic fever. The name of the virus comes from the site of the first known outbreak, in a mission hospital in the Ebola River Valley in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

65. Ruled perch? ROOST
Someone always seems to “rule the roost” …

66. Ike’s 1940s command ETO
General Dwight D. Eisenhower (“Ike”) was in command of the European Theater of Operations (ETO) during WWII. If you’re a WWII buff like me, then I recommend you take a look at a great, made-for-TV movie starring Tom Selleck as Eisenhower called “Ike: Countdown to D-Day” that came out in 2004.

67. Family car SEDAN
The American “sedan” car is the equivalent of the British “saloon” car. By definition, a sedan car has two rows of seating and a separate trunk (boot in the UK), although in some models the engine can be at the rear of the car.

Down
2. Forbidden thing TABOO
The word “taboo” was introduced into English by Captain Cook in his book “A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean”. Cook described “tabu” (likely imitative of a Tongan word that he had heard) as something that was both consecrated and forbidden.

5. Woodworking joint DOVETAIL
In the world of carpentry, a dovetail joint is one using a “pin” cut into the end of one piece of wood mating with a “tail” cut into another.

6. Santa Monica-to-Jacksonville rte. I-TEN
I-10 is the most southerly of the interstate routes that crosses from the Atlantic to the Pacific. I-10 stretches from Santa Monica, California to Jacksonville, Florida. Various stretches of the route have been given different names, for example, the Rosa Parks Freeway, the Santa Monica Freeway, the San Bernardino Freeway and the Christopher Columbus Transcontinental Highway.

7. Threshold VERGE
Years ago I was taking a tour of a beautiful Elizabethan manor house in England, and was told a little “threshing” story by the guide as we stood in one of the rooms. She reminded us that threshing was the removal of seeds from chaff, and told us that back in the day the “chaff” was sometimes called the “thresh”. Thresh would be used on the floors, particularly in the kitchen areas where it would soak up spills and provide some thermal insulation, much as sawdust was used in my favorite pubs many moons ago. She pointed to two slots at the bottom of the door jambs where she said a low board was placed upright on the floor, to hold the thresh in the room. The board was called a “thresh hold”, giving us our contemporary word “threshold”. I am not sure if all of that is really true, but it makes a nice story.

9. Soothing succulent ALOE
Aloe vera has a number of alternate names that are descriptive of its efficacy as a medicine. These include the First Aid plant, Wand of Heaven, Silent Healer and Miracle Plant.

11. Pump part TOE
A pump is a woman’s shoe that doesn’t have a strap. Such shoes are probably called “pumps” because of the sound they make while walking in them.

26. Indian drum TABLA
A tabla is a percussion instrument used in the Indian subcontinent. The tabla consists of a pair of hand drums and is similar to bongos.

27. Nineveh’s land: Abbr. ASSYR
Nineveh was an ancient Assyrian city on the eastern bank of the Tigris River in modern-day Iraq. The ruins of the city are located just on the other side of the river from the Iraqi city of Mosul. At one time, Nineveh was the largest city in the world.

33. Green targets HOLES
Golfers aim for the hole cut into the green.

36. School sweater letters NUS
The Latin equivalent of the Greek letter nu is “N”. An uppercase nu looks just like the Latin capital N, however, the lowercase nu looks like our lowercase “v”. Very confusing …

39. Grand Canyon State native ARIZONAN
The Grand Canyon is in Arizona. The canyon continues to be carved out of layers of rock by the Colorado River. The Grand Canyon is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide and over a mile deep. I hope to be visiting there next month during a summer roadtrip …

46. Outlaw Kelly NED
Ned Kelly was an Irish-Australian outlaw, regarded by many as a symbol of resistance against the British ruling class in Australia in the 19th century. There have been two famous films made of his life story. “The Story of the Kelly Gang” was released in 1906, and is recognized today as the first feature film ever made. We might be more familiar with the film called “Ned Kelly” released in 1970, as it starred Mick Jagger from the Rolling Stones in the title role.

47. Bond trader’s phrase AT PAR
Stocks, and other financial vehicles, may be sold “at par”, meaning at the original price, not discounted nor at a premium.

52. Shop jargon ARGOT
“Argot” is a French term, the name given in the 17th century to “the jargon of the Paris underworld”. Nowadays argot is the set of idioms used by any particular group, the “lingo” of that group.

55. Conductor Sir Georg SOLTI
Sir Georg Solti was a great Hungarian-British conductor, who spent 22 years as music director of the Chicago Symphony, one of many prestigious positions he held in the world of classical music and opera. Solti was awarded 31 Grammy Awards, the most won by any individual in any genre of music.

56. Dahl’s “Fantastic” title critter MR FOX
“Fantastic Mr Fox” is a children’s novel by Roald Dahl. “Fantastic Mr Fox” was adapted into a 2006 animated film directed by Wes Anderson.

58. “Return of the Jedi” dancing girl OOLA
Oola was a slave-girl dancer who was eaten by a scary creature in the movie “Star Wars Episode VI: The Return of the the Jedi”. Oola was played by British actor Femi Taylor.

60. “Rushmore” director Anderson WES
Wes Anderson’s most famous movie is probably “The Royal Tenenbaums”, released in 2001, not my favorite film by any stretch. However, his 2007 release “The Darjeeling Limited”, that I enjoyed.

“Rushmore” is a 1998 film directed by Wes Anderson and co-written by Anderson and actor Owen Wilson. The title is a reference to Rushmore Academy, a private school in Houston that the main character attends as a student. That main character is called Max Fischer, and was portrayed by actor Jason Schwartzman in his first film.

61. Civil War prez ABE
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the US, elected in 1860 as the first president from the Republican Party. Lincoln’s electoral support came almost exclusively from the north and west of the country, winning only two out 996 counties in the Southern slave states. Lincoln led the country through Civil War, and then was assassinated in 1865 just a few days after Robert E. Lee surrendered his army of Northern Virginia. President Lincoln was succeeded in office by Vice President Andrew Johnson.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Subway map abbr. STA
4. Early fifth-century year CDIV
8. Dreadlocks wearer RASTA
13. Bud PAL
14. Mechanical recitations ROTES
16. Singer John ELTON
17. Transfusion letters ABO
18. Stave off AVERT
19. Nonsense HOOEY
20. Recording industry technician SOUND ENGINEER
23. Tin Lizzie MODEL T
24. Director Kazan ELIA
25. Kingston Trio hit with the lyric “Fight the fare increase!” MTA
28. Fray, e.g. WEAR
30. Santa __: Southwestern mountains TERESAS
32. Obsessed whale hunter AHAB
35. It’s not free of charge ION
37. Hoity-toity types SNOBS
38. One with a busy engagement calendar SOCIAL BUTTERFLY
42. Take in or let out ALTER
43. Petal puller’s pronoun SHE
44. Way out there AFAR
45. Sicilian seaport MESSINA
48. SOS responder USCG
50. Prefix with thermal ISO-
51. Actress Catherine __-Jones ZETA
53. Belief in one god THEISM
57. Kitchen appliance FOOD PROCESSOR
60. Family car WAGON
62. Turkish titles AGHAS
63. Galadriel in “The Lord of the Rings,” e.g. ELF
64. Deadly virus EBOLA
65. Ruled perch? ROOST
66. Ike’s 1940s command ETO
67. Family car SEDAN
68. With 69-Across, what 20-, 38- and 57-Across do THEY
69. See 68-Across MIX

Down
1. Jerk SPASM
2. Forbidden thing TABOO
3. One way to read ALOUD
4. Nursery need CRADLE
5. Woodworking joint DOVETAIL
6. Santa Monica-to-Jacksonville rte. I-TEN
7. Threshold VERGE
8. Run through lines REHEARSE
9. Soothing succulent ALOE
10. Leaves in a huff STORMS OFF
11. Pump part TOE
12. Vague amount ANY
15. Circus support STILT
21. Ones with much to learn NEWBIES
22. German’s “never” NIE
26. Indian drum TABLA
27. Nineveh’s land: Abbr. ASSYR
29. Hold up ROB
31. Brings to a boil ENRAGES
32. “Same here” AS AM I
33. Green targets HOLES
34. Hurricanes and tornadoes, in insurance policies ACTS OF GOD
36. School sweater letters NUS
39. Grand Canyon State native ARIZONAN
40. Calendar abbr. THU
41. Precedent-setting trial TEST CASE
46. Outlaw Kelly NED
47. Bond trader’s phrase AT PAR
49. Well-developed, in a way CHESTY
52. Shop jargon ARGOT
54. “__ to recall …” I SEEM
55. Conductor Sir Georg SOLTI
56. Dahl’s “Fantastic” title critter MR FOX
58. “Return of the Jedi” dancing girl OOLA
59. “This is bad!” OH-OH!
60. “Rushmore” director Anderson WES
61. Civil War prez ABE

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5 thoughts on “LA Times Crossword Answers 9 Jul 14, Wednesday”

  1. Hello Bill, (on vacation) and friends,

    I found the puzzle rather puzzling today, – on the short answers. The long answers were a breeze, which was a big help. I suddenly realize I have a 23 yr. old Osterizer, mixer blender, which I use 3 days a week. Works great.

    Piano man, from yesterday, thanks for answering the Google Doodle query. Seems not so kind, of the Google people to make such a comment. Probably, its all in fun. The Brazilians must be in shell shock right now, with their disastrous defeat. All that billion dollar outlay gone to earth. Surely, there must have been bigger priorities that the money could have been used for.

    Bill, thank you for the 'dreadlock' explanation. I always thought they were to induce fear to all (other) viewers. (Personally, I know I would keep clear of them.)

    Thanks, Bill, for keeping the blog going, despite your need for a respite.

  2. On the matter of the ABO blood types, since the Universal Donor is mentioned as O neg, it should also be mentioned that the Universal Acceptor of ( all types of -) blood is the AB positive.

    So, thus, all groups are now represented here. ;-D)

    While I have, gladly given blood in the past, as an important civic duty, I find their current health questionnaires to be unduly intrusive. While the need to have clean, untainted supplies is very critical, IMHO the current rules are off the shelf. Just me.

    BTW, if you have spent any time in the UK, prior to 1974, your blood will NOT be accepted, by the American Red Cross, presumably because you may have the "mad cow" disease antigens lurking inside you ….

  3. Theism can also include Henotheism .

    The acceptance of one God with the possible acceptance of other deities who may (also) be worshipped.

    Because of the worship of the Virgin (Mother) Mary, the (putative) father, Joseph, and various saints, maybe Christianity could be described as a Henotheism (?).

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