google.com, pub-2774194725043577, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 L.A.Times Crossword Corner: Saturday January 16, 2010 Frederick J. Healy

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Jan 16, 2010

Saturday January 16, 2010 Frederick J. Healy

Theme: None

Total blocks: 33

Total words: 70

Man, this constructor Frederick J Healy sure loves multi-word entries. He used more than 20 in his last themeless, then again 20 today.

Very often long single words are easier for me to ferret out. My mind is just not wired to parse multi-word properly. I simply don't use those idioms or slang in my daily conversation. Feel very handicapped by my background.

Favorite clue today is HOLED (29. Rolled into a cup). I was definitely not thinking of rolling the golf ball into the cup. Sigh! I am actually pretty good at reading breaks on the green.

OK, let's tee off with multi-words:

1A. Nut: WHACK JOB. Terrific entry.

16A. Knows about: IS ONTO

17A. Rubbernecked: STARED AT

23A. The way you see it: AS IS. I wanted IMHO.

27A. Title burglar played by Bruce Willis in a 1991 film: HUDSON HAWK. Have never seen this movie.

33A. Note in an E major scale: G-SHARP. Got the SHARP part rather quickly.

35A. 1992 Grammy winner for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance: K. D. LANG. I peeked at the answer sheet. Name with initials is very tricky.

42A. Stock mover: CATTLE PROD. Oh, livestock. I was thinking of those trading shares.

51A. Succeeds completely: ACES IT

53A. Place to learn about cells, briefly: BIO LAB

55A. Improve in small ways: FINE-TUNE

59A. Mr. Right: THE ONE. Have you found yours?

60A. It's the most likely to succeed: BEST SHOT

2D. Ran into trouble: HIT A SNAG. I've learned not to recklessly put ED at the end.

8D. Pleiades components: B STARS. Most stars are classified using the letters O, B, A, F, G, K and M (mnemonic is "Oh, Be a fine girl /guy, kiss me"). O stars are the hottest and the letter sequence indicates successively cooler stars up to the coolest M class. I was stumped.

9D. Minded: LISTENED TO

12D. One after another: IN A ROW

13D. Gift giver, informally: ST. NICK. During Christmas.

37D. Discusses: GOES INTO

43D. 1980s-'90s Tennessee senator: AL GORE. Thought of Bill Frist first.

Across:

9. Apollo, musically: LYRIST. Because Apollo is God of Music/Poetry?

18. Car lot array: SEDANS

19. Texas-Louisiana border river: SABINE (SEY-bahyn). Spanish for "cypress". Wikipedia says it's in reference to the extensive growth of such trees along the lower river. New to me.

20. Sagan's subj.: ASTR (Astronomy). Carl Sagan.

22. Wrestler Flair: RIC. Born Richard Flair. Total stranger to me.

24. Works in una galleria: ARTE. Spanish/Italian for "art".

25. 1951 Emmy winner Imogene: COCA. My entry point today.

26. Feminine name ending: INA. As in Christina, Angelina, etc. Or tsarina, ballerina.

30. Telecom setup: LAN (Local Area Network)

31. Brian who produced some U2 albums: ENO

32. Firm heads, for short: CEOS. Firm = Company.

38. Old shipping allowance: TRET. The container weight is TARE.

39. Nice season?: ETE. The French city Nice.

40. Gut reaction?: OOF. Good clue.

45. A funder of PBS's "American Masters": NEA (National Endowment for the Arts)

46. Crab's sensor: PALP. Same root as "palpable" I think.

47. Some flawed mdse.: IRRS

48. Get-up-and-go: ZEST. Didn't come to me readily.

49. Barbary Coast land: Abbr.: ALG (Algeria). See this map. It spans quite a few countries in north Africa.

50. Zap with a beam: LASE

57. Loll: SPRAWL

58. Beckons: ATTRACTS

Down:

1. Holiday toast: WASSAIL. Have faintly heard of this word.

3. High-spirited horses: ARABIANS. Better than ARABS, isn't it?

4. Former "SNL" regular Farley: CHRIS

5. Insightful: KEEN. Keen can mean "wail" too. Keening.

6. Green hue: JADE

7. Concubine's room: ODA. The Harem room, reserved for women. We also have CASA (25D. Havana home).

10. Important river in WWI: YSER. Battle of the Yser. The Belgian river. Flows to the North Sea.

11. Wand: ROD

14. "Vissi d'arte" singer: TOSCA. Tosca is the title heroine in Puccini opera "Tosca". Too obscure a clue for me. Besides, I don't like the arte/ARTE (24D) repetition.

21. Warehouse workers: STOCKERS

24. Some new parents: ADOPTERS

27. Spirit: HEART. Your heart sank when ...

28. Fly-by-night: UNRELIABLE. Fly-by-night is a new phrase to me.

34. www letters: HTTP. The URL starter.

36. Model of excellence: NONESUCH

41. Most profitable, as a business contract: FATTEST. Like the ones for Erik Prince/Blackwater or whatever the new name is.

42. Islamic leader: CALIPH (KEY-lif). Dictionary defines it as "a spiritual leader of Islam, claiming succession from Muhammad". I could only think of IMAM.

44. Ready-made: PREFAB

46. Brewer Frederick: PABST. Easy guess. I did not really know Pabst founder's given name, the same as today's constructor.

48. Sorority letters: ZETAS

50. Egg-rolling site: LAWN

51. Colony workers: ANTS

52. Like some U.S. mail: CERT (Certified). A special "Thank you" to MJ for mailing me the Dan Naddor obit in LA Times.

54. Thai native: LAO

56. Ore suffix: ITE. Common mineral suffix. Graphite, for example.

Answer grid.

C.C.

45 comments:

tfrank said...

Good morning, C.C. and all,

This was a fun puzzle today. My first run through the across clues produced only four or so answers. The downs were a little easier. I finally got some traction in the central portion with cattleprod, and was able to grind it out. My time was 40, with only red letter and perp help. Best clue was some new parents.

Sabine was a gimme as I have driven many times from here to Mississippi to visit relatives. Coming home, when you cross the Sabine, you see a sign sayng El Paso - 845 miles. Makes you realize how big Texas is.

The only unknowns for me were palp and Hudson Hawk. Got them with the perps.

This was a good way to start the day. Hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did.

Have a great weekend!

Argyle said...

According to the Greeks, the first lyre was made from a turtle shell by the god Hermes when he was a baby, and then Hermes gave it to Apollo. Apollo was the god of reason and logic, and the Greeks thought of music as a great expression of order and patterns.(and crosswords?) Apollo at a jam session?

Hello and Goodbye, it looks like I'll be on the road today. Enjoy and play nice.

Dick said...

Good morning C.C. and All, a very nice walk in the park today. Like tfrank my first pass through did not produce much, but then I got the NE corner and everything seemed to fall onto place after that. I did not know “Hudson Hawk”, but it fell via the perps. I enjoyed all of the multiword fills and they all came easily. I guess Mr. Healy and I were on the same wave length today.

This puzzle seemed a bit easy for a Saturday, but my ego needed this one after some of the other struggles this week.

It looks as if the temperature will be in the mid 40’s today so I will be out and about.

Hope you all have a great Saturday.

Bob said...

This one really stressed the gray matter. A few false starts, but in the end, everything worked out properly. No errors, no help, 36 minutes.

Anonymous said...

Easier than last Saturday.

Spitzboov said...

Agree with C.C. on the general difficulty. A real slog in the SE. Only had to g'l NONESUCH. For 15A had 'is in on' before perps showed ISONTO. CATTLEPROD finally gave me the footing to begin the solve. Too many multi-word entries for me to fully enjoy.

ÉTÉ is back after a short absence. How about doing Hivre and Printemps once in a while.

2 rivers today; SABINE and YSER - also 'HUDSON'HAWK

PABST - means 'pope' in German; might be an interesting clue some day.

But I digress. Enjoy the rest of the weekend

MH said...

According to wiki, k.d. lang won the grammy in 1993. It was Bonnie Raitt in 1992. The song was "Constant Craving" from her 1992 album Ingenue.

Leading with "whack job" definitely whacked me out. Once I peeked at that the rest came fairly easily.

Lemonade714 said...

I am on the road, up early while the youngsters sleep. Some nice new clues, and I love FREDERICK being in the puzzle; (it did remind me of my favorite FREDDY . I would work my name in all the puzzles I created, like Hitchcock. Anyway, happy belated KQ and many more.

Bill G. said...

Hi everybody,

I had just the opposite experience from those of you who posted so far. I struggled so much I finally gave up (which is unusual for me). No fun theme to look forward to either. I thought I was getting better at crosswords too. Discouraging. Oh well...

Ric Flair reminded me of watching Wrestling from Hollywood with Dick Lane as a kid. Antonino Rocca, Baron Michele Leone, Mr. Moto, etc. All fake but still lots of fun.

melissa bee said...

good morning c.c. and all,

nice challenging puzzle today, managed to solve clockwise and had a tough finish in the sw. c.c. i agree, names with initials are difficult but kd lang actually goes by 'kd' as her first name, pronounced 'kaydee.' i had to go to wikipedia to find out it stands for kathryn dawn.

another musical entry, brian ENO, wrote the music for the movie 'the lovely bones,' which i saw with my daughter yesterday.

favorite clue was stock mover/cattle prod.

belated happy birthdays to jd and kq, hope it was your best ever.

off to work ...

Anonymous said...

Good morning all.

I truly did not get this one! I had seven answers, and then gave up and came here. It was hard to fill in all the blanks because the answers C.C. gave were mixed between across and down for quite a spell. But I'll be gone for a week to get a new set of hearing aids to try. I surely hope they help, and maybe that'll make me smarter.

My favorites were the seven I got!

Cheers

Clear Ayes said...

Good Morning All, LOL, WHACK JOB AIR HEADS reminded me of some recent Anon comments. 1D was a gimme because our chorus sang a couple of WASSAIL songs at our December concerts. Those entries, as well as HUDSON HAWK, which came pretty easily (I remember it as being a pretty bad movie.) helped a lot with solving some of the top half perps.

I needed to come here to finish off the SE. I did have KD LANG, whom I like very much, but I don't think I've ever heard the term NONESUCH, except as a brand of mincemeat, which I can't stand! GOES INTO just didn't come to me and FATTEST isn't something I would have thought of in terms of a business contract.

Pretty tough all the way around. I don't feel too bad when it is a Saturday challenge that gives me fits.

Hmmm, is U.S. considered so much of an abbreviation, rather than a common usage "nickname", to allow the abbreviation CERT.? Looks like it is.

Lemonade714, I like seeing Frederick/Fred too.

Yes, C.C. I have found THE ONE...who is willing to put up with all my silliness! But that is a two-way street, so it evens out nicely.

Bill G, you made me laugh with the old wrestlers names. I think the era of Gorgeous George, Antonio ("Argentine")Rocca, Doc Grable and the others you mentioned, was the last time I watched wrestling. Of course, at the time, there were only three channels on TV in Los Angeles, so there wasn't a big choice.

MJ said...

Good morning, C.C. and all,
I found today's puzzle extremely challenging. A lot of guessing filled in the southern half and center, but had empty grids in the NW and NE corners. Chipped away at those, and finally finished, but STARED AT them for a long time before it all came together. Loved seeing WHACKJOB right over AIRHEADS, and also liked fresh fill such as SPRAWL and NONESUCH.

C.C.-You're so welcome. My pleasure!

Off to enjoy a day with sunshine. Heavy rains are predicted for the next week, which means likely flooding in some areas, as well as mudslides in the areas burned in recent fires.

Enjoy the day!

Clear Ayes said...

Lost my avatar somehow, but since GAH is golfing again today (like Windhover, he makes hay while the sun shines), I thought I'd pay a little homage to him....at least for a while. ;o)

Anonymous said...

@sallie, c.c. just highlighted the 20 compound words before her normal across and down.

Dick said...

I used to work out at the YMHA in Pittsburgh, while going to school at U of Pittsburgh. At that time Bruno Sanmartion was the wrestling champ and he also worked out at the YMHA. We used to watch him bench press 500 pounds. It was quite a feat at that time, circa 1959.

Anonymous said...

Stanley Tucci's great in "The Lovely Bones".

Anonymous said...

Stanley Tucci's performance in "The Big Night" is NONESUCH.

JD said...

Good morning CC and all,

I really needed a cattleprod to get me going on this one.
It completely deflated whatever ego I had. I know it was doable because I completed the NW corner without help, but only Sabine and "stared at" came at 1st glance.Had no clue about O-B-A-stars.I seem to have big gaps in my hippocampus.

Favorite clue-firm heads. Of course I was thinking of lettuce!!

Argyle, thx for telling us about the turtle shell lyre.

Off to the Sharks game.

No one asked but my avatar is Truman and my grand pups a year ago on Halloween.

JimmyB said...

Saturday puzzles lately seem to require a break for fresh air in the middle. It sure helped again today, especially in the corners. My brain needs more than a CATTLEPROD when having to think of multiword answers. The toughest nut for me to crack was WHACKJOB, although I loved it once I got it.

PALP, ODA and BSTARS were totally new to me. In all, it took me about the same as last Saturday (45 minutes), being able to complete it without falling for the temptress Miss Google.

Annette said...

I haven't done the puzzle yet, but didn't want to wait until my usual end of the day post for this.

Kazie: I apologize for mis-crediting yesterday's Guy Mitchell clip to Argyle instead of you. As I was reading the blog, I'd made a mental note to comment on his initial reference to the singer, and it still stuck in my mind even after I saw your link. Sorry, I knew I should have taken a moment to scroll up and double-check before posting...

Annette said...

Well, I finished today, but with a little more red letter help than usual. There were some nice clues, but overall, it wasn't a "fun" puzzle for me.

Dick: I'm duly impressed! I'm not a wrestling fan at all, but my grandparents were, so Bruno Sammartino was a big name in our household! I have one very vague memory of actually going to a match with my grandfather. I just saw an article last week that Bruno will be given a Lifetime Achievement Award at this year's Dapper Dan Charities event. I though it was a very interesting article: Bruno Sammartino He's so humble and classy!

Anonymous said...

I guess I'm in the minority, this was an awful puzzle.

Buckeye said...

Argyle; You are the man. I was at the "Apollo" theater in the early sixties and saw "Murry The K and His Swinging Swaree". The show had all of the great "Mo Town" groups. What a great day.

Please see my late night post from last night. Love ya, Jeanie.

I must be off!

Anonymous said...

Wanted Nonpareil for 36 Down.

Jill said...

You might be thinking lyricist instead of lyrist. Really fun puzzle.

Bob said...

I used to see Ric Flair around Charlotte (NC) back in the 1980's from time to time. Who could miss that hair. If you don't know him, here's a link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iy-LQH8N6Ug

For a tougher one, does anyone recall Haystack Calhoun? Used to break planks with his stomach by falling across them. For some reason that impressed me as a kid, although I was never a wrestling fan or could even figure out what was "professional" about it.

eddyB said...

Hi.
Dick, are you seller9?

eddyB

VTQUILTMOM said...

Whew! It took numerous breaks to get through the puzzle today. I got the middle done and then the northern parts but was really stumped with some of the southern reaches. The perps I had weren't helping at all. So I switched from paper and pencil, loaded my answers online, and for some reason, could then finish it with one 1 red letter.

For Apollo, I was really stuck on the theater and music acts.

Buckey - Thanks for the memories of Murray the K and the Swinging Swaree. Those were some great shows back then!!

Fun puzzle though and I felt a real sense of accomplishment when I was finished. Learned a few new words with this one; oda and tret. I was clueless on oda and had tare for the longest time until 'unreliable' became visible to me which gave me 'adopters' right next to it.

Hope everyone enjoys the weekend!

Chuck of the West said...

Hello all. This one was no fun for me. Too many obscure answers. I don't enjoy C/Ws if I have to cheat too much.

Dick said...

Annette, thanks for the Bruno S link. Yes he was always the gentleman even back in the day when he was so well known. Always ready to talk with you or help you with the weights.

Dick said...

EddyB, yes I am.

kazie said...

I struggled all the way through this from start at 8 am to finish at about 4;30 pm. A meeting and company in between, but too many difficulties to sail through it easily.

However, eventually, I did get all of it with no real help. I didn't have time during the day to google, tried the CW dictionary once to no avail, so I did actually get it all unassisted, it just took me all day. I guessed all the names, most of which were complete unknowns, but some dragged up from the nether regions of my memory.

Last fill was ST. NICK. Those SAINT names when abbreviated are a real pain.

Spitboov,
Hiver and Papst, though the beer brand would sound the same.

C.C.,
I'd say by the looks of him we're lucky not to know Ric Flair! Ugh!

Annette,
No problem, I actually wondered if you were confused with the other Mitchell he referred us to. Guy Mitchell's Singing the Blues was actually the second "Rock and Roll" record I ever owned, after "Rock around the Clock", both on 78s.

Chickie said...

Hello All--I had so many missteps that I finally gave up and came here to finish up my mostly unsolved puzzle. I wanted Take Care of for Listened to, Standard for Nonesuch, Sci Lab for Bio Lab and I finally gave up and put in Slow for some U.S. Mail!!

I always think of A Galleria as a Market place. This is where we went to buy everything from pineapple, to baskets. I couldn't get my mind around an art gallery at all.

Oh well, Monday is another day and maybe I'll feel a bit better about my crossword solving abilities then.

PJB-Chicago said...

Good evening, C. C. and friends!
Yowza! This was a toughie, but still lots of fun.

As someone who spent adolescent summers on a golf course (caddying, weeding sandtraps and calculating handicaps) I sure as sugar should have known HOLED.

Lots of unknowns: B STARS, PALP, ODA, RIC FLAIR and SABINE (which I knew only from paintings and history). Loved the clue "rubbernecked," and the word WHACKJOB, which along with sibling "nutjob" is sometimes used by mental health professionals afterhours, but never in case notes. You could get your license yanked for language like that!

Saw kd lang perform in an outdoor concert once--she was phenomenal. No gimmicks, no pyrotechnics, just one costume change, a small band and a voice that had the birds stopping by just to hear her sing. [Really.] Her Canadian accent is quite pronounced.

Happy belated birthday KQ. You are a gem.

Robin said...

I wish you a peaceful evening, with a roaring fireplace, with Norah Jones, Alicia Keys or Diana Krall playing, a lovely glass of wine and the love of your life sitting next to you....or at least a wonderful friend.

eddyB said...

Hurrah, the e-mail links on the
profile pages are working! Guess I solved that problem.

Two of three isn't too bad. I added cheese and crab to the platter. Wife is at Asilomar for the week-end.

The weather forcast is calling for
nine days of rain. My canoe is ready but watch out mid-west and east coast here it comes.

eddyB

Robin said...

What is Asilomar EDDYB?

JD said...

Robin, Asilomar is a gorgeous spot on the CA coast where conferences are held. It is in Pacific Grove, the town that Chickie mentioned the other day, where the Monarch butterflies unite.

JD said...

EddyB, is your wife at the annual reading conference? That is where I got hoooked on collecting gazillion versions of Cinderella

Jazzbumpa said...

Hi gang -

Worked the puzzle on the drive to T-Town. Fortunately the LW was behind the wheel. Solve took me the whole trip. Had an Atlas in my lap, so we could show the moms my step-son's new place in FLA. Thus, I was able to find SABINE. Otherwise, the NW corner would have defeated me.

Had EYES for "the way you see it." Not found of AS IS for the fill. People see what they want, not reality.

Had GETS INTO IT for 37D which made 40 and 45A meaningless 3 letter drivel. I tht thy wr abbrvs I ddnt recgnz. "Model of excellence" is a very poor clue for NONE SUCH.

Overall - good, tough puzzle, though.

Key of E Maj had F, C, G, and D sharps. Very awkward for brass instruments, but I've gotten almost comfortable with it, after playing so any European symphonies.

The LW and I went out to dinner last night to celebrate our anniversary, which is tomorrow. Nineteen fun-filled, wonderful years - and you skeptics said it would never last!?! Yep, she tells me I'm still THE ONE. She sure is, for me.

Tomorrow, we have Nate and Em, while their mom and dad celebrate a birthday, a few weeks late.

Geez - if I'm going to tell my life story, I ought to go get my own blog.

Cheers!
JzB the GOES INTO IT trombonist

Anonymous said...

Nice fill someone in on and this enter helped me alot in my college assignement. Thank you as your information.

Chickie said...

JD, I've been to many conferences at Asilomar. I love the coast and the rustic buildings. The Reading Conference weekend was one I always looked forward to.

Anonymous said...

Brewer Frederick: PABST.

My favourite beer.

PBR

Anonymous said...

Hi
Very nice and intrestingss story.