Day: May 27, 2013

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
9. Cupfuls after OJ and cereal JAVAS
Back in 1850, the name “java” was given to a type of coffee grown on the island of Java, and the usage of the term spread from there.

14. In __ of: replacing LIEU
As you might imagine, “in lieu” comes into English from the Old French word “lieu” meaning “place”, which in turn is derived from the Latin “locum”, also meaning “place”. So, “in lieu” means “in place of”.

16. Tequila plant AGAVE
Tequila is a spirit made from the blue agave. The drink takes its name from the city of Tequila, located about 40 miles northwest of Guadalajara.

17. *Sensitive spot on the elbow FUNNY BONE (“Funny Girl”)
The ulnar nerve runs alongside the ulna (one of the bones in the lower arm). The ulnar nerve is the largest unprotected (not surrounded by muscle or bone) nerve in the human body. The nerve can be touched under the skin at the outside of the elbow. Striking the nerve at this point causes and an electric type shock, known as hitting one’s “funny bone”.

The movie “Funny Girl” stars Barbra Streisand in the title role of Fanny Brice. The real Fanny Brice was a theater and film actress, and “Funny Girl” is very loosely based on her life story. Fanny Brice was born into a Hungarian Jewish family in New York City, with the real name of Fania Borach.

20. Hindu teachers SWAMIS
A swami is a religious teacher in the Hindu tradition.

21. __ eclipse SOLAR
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.

25. Immigrants’ night sch. class ESL
English as a Second Language (ESL) is sometimes referred to as English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) and English as a Foreign Language (EFL).

28. Mazda sports car MIATA
I’ve always liked the looks of the Mazda Miata, probably because it reminds me so much of old British sports cars. The Miata is built in Hiroshima, Japan.

32. Lime-garnished Mexican beer CORONA
The Mexican beer called Corona is the biggest-selling imported beer in the United States.

38. Ping-Pong barrier NET
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.

40. Tokyo-born Yoko ONO
Yoko Ono was born into a prosperous Japanese family, and is actually a descendant of one of the emperors of Japan. Ono’s father moved around the world for work and Yoko lived the first few years of her life in San Francisco. The family returned to Japan before moving on to New York, Hanoi and back to Japan just before WWII. There Yoko lived through the great fire-bombing of Tokyo in 1945. Immediately after the war the family was far from prosperous. While Yoko’s father was being held in a prison camp in Vietnam, her mother had to resort to begging and bartering to feed her children. When her father was repatriated, life started to return to normal and Yoko was able to attend university. She was the first woman to be accepted into the philosophy program of Gakushuin University.

41. Susan of “L.A. Law” DEY
The actress Susan Dey first appeared on “The Partridge Family” when she was 17-years-old when she had no acting experience. Years later, Dey won a Golden Globe for playing the leading role of Grace Van Owen in “L. A. Law”.

“L.A. Law” ran on NBC from 1986 to 1994, and was one of the network’s most successful drama series. It took over from the equally successful “Hill Street Blues” in the Thursday night 10 p.m. slot until, after a six-year run, it was itself replaced by yet another respected drama, “E.R.” The opening credits showed that famous California licence plate. The plate was on a Jaguar XJ for most of the series, but moved onto a Bentley towards the end of the run. For each series the registration sticker was updated, so no laws were being broken.

42. Smart __: wise guys ALECKS
Apparently the original “smart Alec” was Alec Hoag, a pimp, thief and confidence trickster who plied his trade in New York City in the 1840s.

46. Actor’s nickname that sounds like a golf term BOGIE
Humphrey “Bogie” Bogart’s breakthrough movie was “The Petrified Forest” from 1936, but for me, nothing beats “Casablanca”. Although, if you haven’t seen it, check out the original “Sabrina” from 1954, a real delight.

The term “Bogey” originated at the Great Yarmouth Golf Club in England in 1890, and was used to indicate a total round that was one over par (and not one over par on a particular hole, as it is today). The name Bogey came from a music hall song of the time “Here Comes the Bogey Man”. In the following years it became popular for players trying to stay at par to be “playing against Colonel Bogey”. Then, during WWI, the marching tune “Colonel Bogey” was written and named after the golfing term. If you don’t recognize the name of the tune, it’s the one that’s whistled by the soldiers marching in the great movie “The Bridge on the River Kwai”.

49. Johannesburg’s land: Abbr. RSA
The Republic of South Africa (RSA).

Johannesburg is the most populous city in South Africa. The city developed from a prospecting settlement, and was named after two surveyors: Johannes Meyer and Johannes Rissik.

54. Foist (upon) IMPOSE
Our word “foist” comes from the Dutch word meaning “take in hand”. The original concept came from playing dice, in which one die was held surreptitiously in one hand.

Down
2. Lucy of “Charlie’s Angels” LIU
Lucy Liu is an Asian-American actress from Queens, New York. Liu’s big break came when she was chosen to play the Ling Woo character in “Ally McBeal”. I liked her in the 2000 film “Charlie’s Angels” but as I am no fan of Quentin Tarantino, I did not enjoy the movie “Kill Bill”. I am having fun watching one of Liu’s latest projects, in which she plays one of the two leads in the TV crime drama “Elementary”.

“Charlie’s Angels” is a fun action movie from 2000 that is a spinoff from the iconic TV show of the same name from the seventies. The “Angels” in the movie version are Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu, with Bill Murray as John Bosley. John Forsythe provides the voice of the unseen “Charlie”, just as he did in the original television show.

7. Golfer Palmer, to fans ARNIE
Arnold Palmer is one of the greats of the world of golf. Palmer is very popular with many fans of the game, and his followers are usually referred to as “Arnie’s Army”.

11. *1777-’78 Continental Army campsite VALLEY FORGE (“valley girl”)
The village of Valley Forge is in Pennsylvania, about 25 miles northwest of Philadelphia. Most famously the village hosted George Washington’s Continental Army during the 1777-1778 winter.

The original “valley girls” were the young, middle-class females living in San Fernando Valley in Southern California.

18. Female advocacy org. since the 1850s YWCA
The Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) was founded in the mid-1800s about 50 years after the YMCA, although the two organizations have always been independent of each other. Having said that, some YWCA and YMCA organizations have amalgamated at the local level and often share facilities. The YWCA is quite the organization, and is the largest women’s group in the whole world.

24. *Political head honcho PARTY LEADER (“party girl”)
“Honcho” is a slang term for a leader or manager. The term comes to us from Japanese, in which language a “hancho” is a squad (han) leader (cho).

26. “Peanuts” boy with a blanket LINUS
In Charles Schulz’s fabulous comic strip “Peanuts”, Charlie Brown is friends with at least three members of the van Pelt family. Most famously there is Lucy van Pelt, who bosses everyone around, particularly Charlie. Then there is Linus, Lucy’s younger brother, the character who always has his security blanket at hand. Lastly there is an even younger brother, Rerun van Pelt. Rerun is constantly hiding under his bed, trying to avoid going to school.

36. “… bombs bursting __” IN AIR
The words “bombs bursting in air” come from “The Star-Spangled Banner” written by Francis Scott Key.

The lyrics of “The Star-Spangled Banner” were written first as a poem by Francis Scott Key, inspired by the bombarding by the British of the American forces at Fort McHenry that he witnessed during the Battle of Baltimore in September 1814. The words were then set to the tune of a popular British drinking song penned by John Stafford Smith called “The Anacreontic Song”, with the Anacreontic Society being a men’s club in London.

37. Big books TOMES
“Tome” first came into English from the Latin “tomus” which means “section of a book”. The original usage in English was for a single volume in a multi-volume work. By the late 16th century “tome” had come to mean “a large book”.

39. Hailed car CAB
A hansom cab is a very specific design of horse and buggy that was patented by Joseph Hansom in 1834 in England. The “cab” in the name is short for “cabriolet”, a prior design of carriage on which the hansom was based. It’s from “hansom cab” that we get our modern term “cab”.

46. Pear variety BOSC
Bosc is a cultivar of the European Pear grown in the northwest of the United States. The Bosc is that pear with a skin the color of a potato, with a long neck. I always seem to use the potato as my point of reference. How Irish am I …?

50. Pierre’s female friends AMIES
A male friend in France is “un ami”, and a female friend is “une amie”.

59. Meditative practice ZEN
Zen is one of the Buddhist schools, and it developed its own tradition in China back in the 7th century AD. Zen is a Japanese spelling of the Chinese word “chan”, which in turn derives from the Sanskrit word “dhyana” meaning “meditation”.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Stately shade trees ELMS
5. Like tails in the dog park AWAG
9. Cupfuls after OJ and cereal JAVAS
14. In __ of: replacing LIEU
15. No __ traffic THRU
16. Tequila plant AGAVE
17. *Sensitive spot on the elbow FUNNY BONE (“Funny Girl”)
19. Contradict BELIE
20. Hindu teachers SWAMIS
21. __ eclipse SOLAR
22. Distinct feature ASPECT
25. Immigrants’ night sch. class ESL
27. Microscope part LENS
28. Mazda sports car MIATA
29. Like days when hats fly WINDY
31. Gets it wrong ERRS
32. Lime-garnished Mexican beer CORONA
35. In good shape FIT
38. Ping-Pong barrier NET
39. *Conceal COVER UP (“cover girl”)
40. Tokyo-born Yoko ONO
41. Susan of “L.A. Law” DEY
42. Smart __: wise guys ALECKS
43. Study feverishly CRAM
44. Work hard LABOR
46. Actor’s nickname that sounds like a golf term BOGIE
47. Fruity drinks ADES
49. Johannesburg’s land: Abbr. RSA
51. Lawn cutters MOWERS
52. Not entirely: Pref. QUASI-
54. Foist (upon) IMPOSE
56. Below UNDER
57. Like many a teen boy … and like the starts of the answers to starred clues? GIRL CRAZY
61. End of __ AN ERA
62. Be mindful of HEED
63. Crossed (out) EXED
64. Puts mail in boxes, say SORTS
65. Baker’s amts. TSPS
66. Cub Scout groups DENS

Down
1. Arctic toymaker ELF
2. Lucy of “Charlie’s Angels” LIU
3. “That’s just like a guy!” MEN!
4. Events before evening twilight SUNSETS
5. Facing the pitcher AT BAT
6. “To __ it may concern” WHOM
7. Golfer Palmer, to fans ARNIE
8. Conjecture GUESSWORK
9. Short punches JABS
10. From way back when AGE-OLD
11. *1777-’78 Continental Army campsite VALLEY FORGE (“valley girl”)
12. Birdlike AVIAN
13. Clairvoyants SEERS
18. Female advocacy org. since the 1850s YWCA
22. Make changes to AMEND
23. “Yes __, Bob!” SIREE
24. *Political head honcho PARTY LEADER (“party girl”)
26. “Peanuts” boy with a blanket LINUS
30. Not a deep sleep NAP
32. Red, white or blue COLOR
33. Inadvertent omission OVERSIGHT
34. __ hall: campus hangout REC
36. “… bombs bursting __” IN AIR
37. Big books TOMES
39. Hailed car CAB
43. Crouched in fear COWERED
45. State with confidence ASSERT
46. Pear variety BOSC
47. Greenish blues AQUAS
48. “Ain’t got a clue!” DUNNO!
50. Pierre’s female friends AMIES
51. Gelatin shapers MOLDS
53. Some nest eggs: Abbr. IRAS
55. Get ready, briefly PREP
58. Lumberjack’s tool AXE
59. Meditative practice ZEN
60. Golf course meas. YDS

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