google.com, pub-2774194725043577, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 L.A.Times Crossword Corner: Monday September 9, 2019 Freddie Cheng

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Sep 9, 2019

Monday September 9, 2019 Freddie Cheng

Theme: DRESSING DOWNS (14. Severe reprimands, and a hint to the starts of the answers to starred clues) - Four different salad dressings are placed in Down slots.

3. *Deadly "game" in "The Deer Hunter": RUSSIAN ROULETTE.

9. *Stallone nickname, with "the": ITALIAN STALLION.

5. *Ones helping with the horses: RANCH HANDS.

31. *Trio after turtle doves: FRENCH HENS.

Boomer here. 

Hello Everyone.  Happy Bowling season!! I had my three month review and a couple of treatments at the VA oncology department. I was told that everything looks fine. The doctor leaked that things were not so fine a year ago but my response to treatments has been really good! Bowling is only average though.  Three game set of 531 last week. 
Boomer, Friday 9/6/2019, VA
 
Across:

1. More certain: SURER.  Add an "IN" in front of that and watch your mailbox for ads.

6. Gp. with moms, dads and educators: PTA.  "The day my Mother socked it to, the Harper Valley PTA".  (Jeanie C. Riley, Dolly Parton, and others)

9. "Thereabouts" suffix: ISH.

12. "Men" or "teeth," grammatically: PLURAL.

14. One of Ringo's set: DRUM.  The choir has a set of bongos in my church.

15. __ kwon do: TAE.

16. Absurd, as a scheme: INSANE.

17. Autodialed annoyance, often at dinnertime: ROBOCALL.  I have heard that Attorneys General from all 50 states are moving to control or eliminate these nasty interruptions.

19. Prof's aides: TAS.  Teaching Assistants - TA DA !!

20. System of rules: CODE.  Winter's coming and if you catch one of these, you may need to get to the drug store and pick up some DayQuil, or NyQuil.

22. Protection for political refugees: ASYLUM.

23. German I: ICH.  "Ich bin ein Berliner"  (JFK - back when I was a kid)

25. Philosophies: Suff.: ISMS.

27. Picky details: NITS.

28. Computer event with a "blue screen of death": CRASH.  Kevin Costner as Crash Davis in "Bull Durham."  It got a couple of screenplay awards but no Oscars.  That's why I never watch the Oscars anymore.

30. Penultimate Greek letter: PSI.  Not the same as PSA. Mine was 0.22 last week.

31. Big Pharma watchdog: Abbr.: FDA. They are not watching too closely.  Drug prices are through the roof.

32. Suggest: HINT AT.

34. Encroach (on): INFRINGE.  I remember one of my sisters used to call her bangs "Fringe".

38. Musical knack: EAR.  You use your EARS to hEAR and get up EARly.

39. Naughty: NOT NICE.

41. Black or Red waters: SEA.  Is the Red Sea really red?

42. Downpour concern: FLOODING. Sad that Dorian devastated the Bahamas and also created havoc on our USA east coast. 

44. Bills with Franklin on them: C NOTES.

46. Good times: UPS.  I thought they delivered packages.

47. Japanese vegetable: UDO.  "No I don't - Yes U DO."
Japanese Udo

49. Infatuated with, with "about": CRAZY.  Patsy Cline always appears in those "Back in the day" CD ads.

50. "__ Land": 2016 Best Picture? Not!: LA LA.  This puzzle was in the LA LA Land Times.

52. Elite English boarding school: ETON.

53. Deadly "2001" computer: HAL.

54. "Brideshead Revisited" novelist Waugh: EVELYN.

56. Laundry: WASH.  Twins will host the Nationals this week.

58. Wall St. takeover: LBO.

61. Exacts revenge: GETS EVEN.  Why folks stay at the craps table too long.

63. Punctuation that Brits call a full stop: PERIOD.

65. Guggenheim display: ART.  Mr. Garfunkel in the "Sounds of Silence".

66. Johns, to Brits: LOOS.

67. "__ can play!": "It's easy!": ANYONE.  I think I have seen this in Casino Ads.

68. Caustic chemical: LYE.

69. Bowler's target: PIN.  Most of the time the target is PINS.  Sometimes we shoot at a single PIN spare though.

70. Emails: SENDS.

Down:

1. Barbecue rod: SPIT. Always thought this was a weird name. How would you like a chicken on your SPIT?

2. Arm bone: ULNA.  "The ulna's connected to the - wrist bones."

4. Big Band __: ERA.  Pitchers with a low one could win a Cy Young award.

6. Expert: PRO.

7. Low-pitched brass instruments: TUBAS.

8. Cookiedom's Famous __: AMOS.  Not as good as Mom's chocolate chip.

10. Henri's "Hi": SALUT.

11. Pilothouse wheels: HELMS.  Famous Senator Jesse from North Carolina.  A little more famous that our Jesse "Ventura" who went from pro wrestling to the Governor's office in Minnesota.

13. Lion constellation: LEO.  We said good by to LEO last month.  Now we are in VIRGO. 

18. Singer Lauper: CYNDI.  "Girls just want to have fun".

21. Slight market slide: DIP.

24. St. Louis hrs.: CST.  Same as Minnesota.

26. Short skirt: MINI.

28. Kitchen master: CHEF.  The guy in charge is the Chief Chef.

29. Iranian currency: RIAL.

33. Paris pronoun: TOI.

35. TV watchdog: FCC.  I wonder what they are supposed to watch.  I see a lot of questionable ads on TV.  Especially Car Insurance.  My question is, "How can EVERY Company save you 15 %?

36. "Wow!": GEEZ.  Gee whiz!

37. "No sweat": EASY.

40. Letter-shaped fastener: T NUT.  C.C. is a bit of a TEA nut.

43. October gemstones: OPALS.  My B-Day is in October.  I have no idea what the other 11 gemstones are.

45. Italian hour: ORA.

48. "We're __ schedule here!": ON A. On a Train, on a plane, on a bus, on a subway ?  Chad Mitchell Trio " The Hip Song"'

50. Permitted by law: LEGAL.

51. Bugs Bunny animator Tex: AVERY.


52. Ballade's last stanza: ENVOI.

55. Website with business reviews: YELP.  Or, when you step on a dog's foot.

57. Rejuvenation site: SPA.

59. "__, James __": BOND.  Goldfinger

60. Poems of praise: ODES.

62. Many millennia: EON.

64. Deli bread: RYE.  I like the dark pumpernickel. Sounds like "Dump Burnikel"  which is why I never ran for any office.

Boomer

49 comments:

  1. FLN -- Tony, the Hatfield girls dressed up for the McCoy boys, and the McCoy girls for the Hatfield boys. But hey, they were mountain folk. What's a little incest, as long as it's all in the fambly!

    Brian -- As has been noted before, the Mensa LATimes puzzle is still available, at least until Sept.15. Probably an automated update that no one bothered to turn off after they turned off all links to it. With luck, they'll never notice.

    On the other hand, I've just visited the WaPo (Washington Post) site, and am blown away by how nice that interface is! The settings button lets me customize it just the way I like! (But will they carry over from session to session?)

    A little robo-dialer, lonely for a chat
    ROBO-CALLED at dinner, just to chew the fat.
    The voice-mail came unhinged
    "You may not INFRINGE!
    It's NOT NICE to do, so shove it up your @ !"

    {A-.}

    ReplyDelete
  2. FIR in 29:55 min.

    Good morning Cornerites.

    Thank you Freddie Cheng for your enjoyable Monday CW.

    Thank you Boomer for your excellent review.

    Ðave

    ReplyDelete
  3. There is little as uplifting as seeing Boomer on a Monday. The continues humor and positivity along with your progress in battling for your health is a great way to start the workweek.

    We are faced with NYT/WSJ veteran Freddie CHENG making his LAT debut with a nice Monday theme. I really hope they finally come up with a way to end ROBOCALLS. My apparent new best friend is "SCAM LIKELY."

    Ask and ye shall receive Boomer. This is a comprehensive look at the MONTHLY GEMSTONES. I have never owned a PERIDOT.

    Thanks, Freddie and Boomer.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Owen, your poem ALMOST made me feel sorry for that lonely robocaller!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Good morning everyone.

    Good news Boomer on your response to treatments. The bowling will come.

    Hondo - Good luck and hope for a speedy recovery on your hernia repair. Been there; done that. I've had 3 different ones done in the last 25 years. Last 2 were ambulatory(same day discharge) and last was laparoscopic. I do sympathize with your 'invasion' concern.

    Mostly easy Monday. Got the theme early, but didn't need it to solve. FIR.
    PIN - Boomer's forté.
    Ich - L. German ik; Dutch ik. The ch should be pronounced like the ch in 'ach' or 'loch'.
    LOOS - Sailors say 'heads'

    Lemonade re: peridot. I gave BH a peridot necklace for her birthday last month. It was a hit.


    ReplyDelete
  6. I like how the themers were connected by the DRESSING DOWNS fill. Otherwise RANCH could have been a odd partner to the other nationalities. It got me to thinking, what the heck is Thousand Island anyway?

    I rarely choose any of the themers for my dressing. I've had many great house-made salad dressings over the years including raspberry vinaigrette, garlic vinaigrette and a decadent bleu cheese.

    ReplyDelete
  7. FIR, but erased ITALIAN STALLIaN. BAD SPELARS OF THE WORLD, UNTIE!

    When I worked at 100 Wilshire Blvd in Santa Monica, there was a restaurant down the street called The Broken DRUM. Motto: "You can't beat it!" (If you've seen the introduction to Three's Company you've seen where I worked.)

    Lawmakers could fix ROBOCALLs if they had the will. For US-originated calls make it a felony to spoof a calling number that you don't own or have written permission to use. Jail time, not just a fine. For foreign-originated calls, make it mandatory for gateway operators to block incoming calls that populate the calling number field with US numbers.

    Wonder if they have pay LOOS in Merrie Olde England? Steve?

    Yesterday we had THONG bikinis; today we have MINIskirt. I like the trend.

    Thanks to Freddie for the fun, mostly easy puzzle. My Natick was EVELYn x EnVOI. My favorite was LALA Land because it was the best moment in the history of the Oscars. And thanks to Boomer for the usual Monday fun. I'm glad the treatments had such helpful effect. Hope you don't get that CODE in your doze.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Good Morning.

    Thanks for the puzzle, Freddie. I enjoyed finding what I thought was the theme until it wasn't! I had RUSSIAN ROuLETTE and DRESSING DOWN, so I thought I was looking at repeat starting letters so I was stuck for a bit until I was forced by the clues on the other long downs. I neglected to see the dressings. Right before my eyes!

    Like everyone else, I detest ROBOCALLs. I still want a house phone. I always know where the sets are in an emergency. I called ATT because they used to have a nice deal. I culd receive calls from anywhere, but local calls only would allow me to call all the nearby area codes. No longer--only nine miles! Pffft!!

    Boomer. Yay!! for you. Thanks for sharing the good news. Your review today was fun. Thanks.

    Have a good day everyone--sunny or not!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Musings
    -Great news, Boomer. You can’t keep a good kegler down!
    -I outthought myself by putting DRESSINGS DOWN first on this fine Monday offering
    -NOONISH doesn’t work for me. Set a time and be there
    -ROBOCALL greeting, “Catching you is harder than climbing Mt. Everest”. I really miss being able to slam down the phone
    -“Hey, there’s a garage sale.” Is that CODE for I want to stop or merely pointing out a fact? :-)
    -Smoking is someone’s right until it INFRINGES on my air space
    -Is it better when postponed?
    -Many restaurants do not have RUSSIAN DRESSING when I ask for it
    -ENVOI – Def. #2 - Last line of an author. 100 best last lines from books

    ReplyDelete
  10. Easy, but fun, Freddie. I was looking for nationalities for a short time, but soon saw the dressing. I just sprinkle on crumbled blue cheese and add balsamic vinegar and olive oil.
    Here's an oldie. What did the mayonnaise say when someone opened the fridge? Close the door, I'm dressing.
    Boomer, great news. I admire the way you are handling this. It seems to be paying off. Thanks for the fine expo.
    Owen, you sound quite perky. I hope it means all is going well. CC, hopefully you are getting better. IM, how is your shoulder recovering?
    AVERY was new to me. I am surprised I didn't know UDO.
    I frequently see envoi in crossword puzzles. I don't remember it from lit class. I see it also can mean "the usually explanatory or commendatory concluding remarks to a poem, essay, or book." I don't remember that, either.
    Time to thin out my closet of things I no longer wear.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Good morning, folks. Thank you, Freddie Cheng, for a fine puzzle. Thank you, Boomer, for a fine review.

    Hondo: Good luck with the surgery. I had one of those 8 or 9 years ago. Worked out for me.

    Jinx: I also spent considerable time at 100 Wilshire Santa Monica. Larry Grimm was our interface.

    Worked the puzzle via cruciverb, which has been pretty steady lately. Maybe I will wish I had not said that. Time will tell.

    Puzzle was easy. Got it all done and could not see the theme. I had all the answers, then it hit me, salad dressings. I am a little slow sometimes.

    Liked TUBAS for 7D. My instrument!

    I do not see to many C NOTES.

    EVELYN Waugh was not known. Perps.

    Made great headway in book yesterday. Will finish this afternoon. I always time myself for a half hour and see how many pages I read in that time span. Then I can estimate how long to finish the book. Works well for me.

    See you tomorrow.

    Abejo

    ( )

    ReplyDelete

  12. Speed run this morning. As it should be on Monday. Boomer added the spice to the dressing today.

    The only true unknown today was ENVOI. Perps to the rescue.

    ROBOCALLS are the majority of the calls that we get anymore on our landline. Also starting to get more spam calls on my cell phone. Our answering machine picks up after 4 rings and the Spammers usually hang up then, except for the phony IRS calls where the sheriff is going to arrest me if I don't give them my personal info. One side effect of this is that DW does not try to answer the phone when I call home. I have to call twice and hope she answers the second time.

    Dorian also hit the Maritime Canadian provinces. It caused some damage there, but not like it did to the Bahamas. The Weather Channel reported that there is the possibility of more storms forming and heading our way.

    Stay warm and dry.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Musings 2
    -As I was reading those famous ENVOIS (Last lines of books I posted earlier), I encountered the EVNOI from Wild Swans – Three Daughters of China you see below and thought of C.C. immediately

    - "As I left China farther and farther behind, I looked out of the window and saw a great universe beyond the plane's silver wing. I took one more glance over my past life, then turned to the future. I was eager to embrace the world."
    Wild Swans, Jung Chang

    ReplyDelete
  14. Good Morning:

    This was a typically easy Monday but with a few entries that might cause a newbie some trouble: Envoi, Avery, and Udo. However, the perps were fair, so no harm, no foul. I've heard of Udon noodles but not Udo. I liked Drum crossing Tubas (Hi, Abejo) and the plethora of A endings: FDA, PTA, Era, Spa, Sea, Ora, and On a. CSO to Bill G at Geez. I liked the theme being down answers vs across, for a nice change of pace.

    Thanks, Freddie, for a smooth start to the week and thanks, Boomer, for the fun and factual review. Thanks, also, for sharing the wonderful news about your checkup and progress. You're an inspiration to us all. Hope CC is feeling better.

    YR, I'm much better than I was and am able to do basic odds and ends that I couldn't do a week or so ago. I still have pain, particularly with certain movements, but nothing I can't tolerate. Believe it or not, the injury occurred 4 weeks ago yesterday. Thanks for asking.

    Hondo, best wishes for a speedy and uneventful recovery from your surgery.

    Have a great day.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Marvelous Monday. Thanks for the fun, Freddie (congrats on your LA Times debut) and Boomer.
    I FIRed in good Monday time, but nearly forgot to go back and find those DOWNward DRESSINGs. Smiled when I found them.

    I noted ISMS and IST.
    I smiled also at 46A UPS, 14D (dressing) DOWNS, 21D DIP.
    Beaucoup de francais today with SALUT, ENVOI, TOI. (I did not remember ENVOI as "a brief stanza concluding certain forms of poetry" - thanks HuskerG for sending me in the right direction).
    Yes, oc4beach, 42A FLOODING reminded me of the devastation caused by Hurricane Dorian. Maritime Canada is recovering today. Winds probably caused more harm than the rain.
    DorianHammersNovaScotia

    This Canadian had to wait for perps to determine that Franklin bill. Almost a Natick when it crossed another American clue FCC; fortunately NOT NICE perped.

    Can anyone tell me if my iPad will give me a Blue Screen of Death warning? It is almost 5 years old and can no longer be updated. It CRASHes if the site has too many videos, ads etc., and I thought it had died the other day. But I rebooted and voila, it works again. But I think I need to start watching for a sale!

    Off to get some groceries.
    Enjoy the day.

    ReplyDelete
  16. ASYLUM may have different definitions between Americans and Canadians but I will not discuss further here because it may be too political.
    Warning: open link at your own discretion if you want a view (opinion) of Canadian ASYLUM laws. Please no further discussion here.
    ChangingCanadianAsylumLaws

    I posted this separately and it may be removed if too controversial.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Hola!

    Thanks to Freddie Cheng for an easy Monday grid! Congratulations on your LAT debut!

    Until I saw the reveal I could not connect the nationalities. Oh, salad DRESSING! Clever. I prefer Raspberry Walnut Vinaigrette myself.

    CSO to my mother, LALA, to Boomer at PIN, to Abejo at TUBAS, and to BillG at GEEZ.

    Like most of you ENVOI was unknown as was AVERY (I only know the labels). Learning moment that he was the animator of Bugs Bunny.

    Boomer, it's heartening to see that you are in such good spirits and that your treatments are going well. May it continue so. Thank you for the amusing commentary.

    From LN, Lemonade and AnonT, thank you for the links to NOAM Chomsky. That is all very interesting.

    Have a happy Monday, everyone!

    ReplyDelete
  18. I'll chance the political implications and remind folks that ASYLUM Records had some pretty fair talent: Jackson Browne, Linda Ronstadt, Joni Mitchell, Glenn Frey (who later formed a group called the Eagles), Don Henley, Tom Waits, John Fogerty and Bob Dylan.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Delightful Monday puzzle, Freddie--thank you so much for getting the week off to a great start. And so happy to hear your good news, Boomer--another great Monday gift. Just hope C.C. is feeling better after yesterday.

    This puzzle was lots of fun. I got RUSSIAN early and put in the ROULETTE. Wow--a downward grid-spanner and I got it before going on with the rest of the puzzle! And before long I got ITALIAN STALLION for Sylvester Stallone--Woohoo! Also nice to see EVELYN Waugh turn up. But what is LBO? Finally, I just couldn't figure out the theme even after I finished the puzzle with all the right answers. It never occurred to me that the dressing could be salad dressings--Doh! Still, one of my most enjoyable Mondays ever.

    Sorry you still have some pain, Irish Miss--you deserve to feel great again.

    Loved your mayo joke, Yellowrocks.

    And good luck with the surgery, Hondo.

    Have a great week, everybody!

    ReplyDelete
  20. Congratulations to Boomer for your great health report! I wish you the best of luck going forward.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Hi Y'all! Great theme, Freddie! Yay, Boomer! Thankful for your good progress.

    12a "men" or "teeth" = PLURAL. Answer was a long time coming. ESP. Duh! Those two words together had me doing some imaginative thinking.

    DNK: UDO, AVERY, ENVOI.

    Car insurance: I just got a big 15% reduction on mine because I so seldom drive it. If the house burns down....

    ROBOCALLS: My sis-in-law finally cancelled her land line because she got tired of all the ROBOCALLS on the answering machine. She's using a cane & her hubby's on an UPwalker so they got wristwatch phones. Not enough hands for the regular cell phones.

    Got to go watch for my gentleman caller. Grocery delivery day.

    ReplyDelete

  22. This Monday grid went quickly.

    No markovers today.

    Time to go shopping.

    See you tomorrow.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Agnes, you have had to undergo a long, painful siege. I am glad you are beginning to see light at the end of the tunnel. I often send healing thoughts your way.

    ReplyDelete
  24. 14D It's DRESSINGS DOWN, not DRESSING DOWNS (or are we more concerned with the downs of a crossword puzzle than with proper English? That's lame).

    31D "FRENCH HENS" does not go “after” “turtle doves” in the song; it precedes it.

    36D GEEZ does not mean “Wow,” it’s slang for Jesus (and what ever became of the "no religion" constraint?).

    ReplyDelete
  25. I liked this puzzle. I used to like getting DRESSED UP for special occasions. I also used to receive DRESSINGS DOWN when I was NOT NICE.

    Misty, an LBO is a Leveraged Buyout. So, what's a Leveraged Buyout? I don't really understand what it is or how it works. I think it involves using somebody else's money to buy out a company.

    Good wishes to you all.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Anon @ 1247 - French Hens are first mentioned after Turtle doves. In succeeding stanzas the count down is reversed so I think that is what confused you. A little fast out of the chute.

    Geez - Is in the puzzle so it should be discussible. Merriam does not attribute any especial religious significance. Seems you're a little fast out of the chute again

    DRESSING-DOWNS is the correct plural. You could LIU. 3 strikes and yer out.

    ReplyDelete
  27. LIU first.
    From Your Dictionary "Noun (plural dressing-downs)" as reprimands.

    The song counts backwards.
    "On the third day of Christmas
    My true love gave to me
    Three French hens
    Two turtle doves
    And a partridge in a pear tree."
    First day-Partridge in a pear tree
    Second day-Two turtle doves
    Third day- Three French hens
    Second day comes before third day.

    Anonymous@ 12:47, your interpretation of GEEZ is a religious argument itself. This is your interpretation. Not all Christians agree about this. For some GEEZ innocently shows surprise or annoyance as in WOW! Many of the innocent minced oaths, golly, my gosh, goodness gracious, are said by and in the presence of certain clergy.

    ReplyDelete
  28. Spitz, you beat me while I was checking my work. Great minds....etc.etc.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Boomer, we loved Bull Durham too, but we loved Long Gone even more. Relatively unknown but SO good.
    The puzzle was a bit more challenging for me than the typical Monday. Didn’t know AVERY or ENVOI, and thought SALUT was usually a toast, not a greeting. Learning more all the time.

    Some seem to enjoy picking out supposed flaws more than solving the puzzle!



    ReplyDelete
  30. Misty and Jayce, an LBO (leveraged buy out) occurs when a company acquires another one using money borrowed against the assets of the company being acquired. For example, if you own a successful (incorporated) pizza joint in your home town, and covet an (incorporated) Mexican restaurant across town, you might want to take over that restaurant without risking your existing business. You can do an LBO by borrowing money against the assets of the Mexican restaurant. Maybe you decide you can buy it for $1,000,000. You decide to put up $100,000 of your company's money and borrow $900,000 against the Mexican restaurant. By doing so you control a $1,000,000 asset for "only" $100,000. If the restaurant does well, the pizza joint gets a great return on the investment. If it goes badly, you only lose your initial investment.

    Corporations usually fund long-term debt needs through issuing bonds. The type of bonds used in LBOs are referred to as "junk" bonds. They command a higher interest rate than safer bonds, so some risk-tolerant investors love them.

    If you were more sure of the wisdom of the purchase, you could sell additional shares of stock in the pizza joint and use those funds to purchase the Mexican place. But LBOs are attractive when you think that the asset you want to acquire is mismanaged and your team could substantially improve its performance.

    ReplyDelete

  31. Does anyone have Hondo’s email address?

    Mark S

    ReplyDelete
  32. 13d Lion constellation : LEO. Prince Valiant has been fighting off a pride of lions in Africa in his skivvies and with his Singing Sword for over a month in the Sunday comics. You'd think he should be getting pretty tired by now. He also doesn't age a whole lot.

    ReplyDelete
  33. I hereby amend the first paragraph of my post:

    I liked this puzzle. I used to like getting DRESSED UP for special occasions. I also used to receive DRESSING-DOWNS when I was NOT NICE.

    ReplyDelete
  34. Upvote for Spitzboov @ 1:23 PM.

    ReplyDelete
  35. That Price Valiant guy, he's pretty, um, valiant! :)

    ReplyDelete
  36. Keith: @ (at) is the word that rhymes, although it's a near homonym of a synonym for prat. Visually it even slightly resembles that homonym. But that would be profanity, which isn't allowed in civil discourse. So obviously, the reference must be to the robo-dialer's eddress. 😉 😉 😉

    ReplyDelete
  37. OMK, it's a lot like buying your house. The junk bonds ("paper" in the finance community) already have committed buyers, and the bonds are placed and the money changes hands when the deal closes. You are right - they don't just cut a check to the buyer for an acquisition he is fixin' to make.

    The buyers are the big guys - Vanguard, J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs, etc. They are big enough to dictate transaction details, and big enough to lose a small portion of these investments in return for the large returns (typically 5% above government securities).

    ReplyDelete
  38. Fun Monday puzzle, with the theme answers Down, and long answers to boot.

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  39. DRESSING (s)DOWN is like RBIs in baseball. It's too awkward. I did wait to find where the S would be.

    And it's too early to start leaping lords and milking maids.

    I got into it with my father at about age 8. We were having a great father son moment and I said GEEZ. He claimed Jesus was said. And we argued: him shouting, I sticking to it, the "Lie" word invoked. End of moment never to be repeated, mutual resentments never really relinquished.

    This xword went very quickly as fast as ink could flow. I never saw ENVOI until Boomer mentioned it. I love Boomer Mondays.

    Nice to see IM recovering.

    WC

    Re. LBOs ..
    In some cases the attacked company will scout for investers and fight back with its own virtual LBO. I think Gillette went through this. Result, Gillette pays more interest, employees and stockholders get less.

    Fatcats get fatter

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  40. Alex Trebek's mustacheSeptember 9, 2019 at 5:40 PM

    Just an FYI.

    The new season if Jeopardy! starts tonight!!

    Jason Zuffranieri, a math teacher from Albuquerque, returns as champion defending his 6-game winning streak.

    Kudos for Alex returning after completing treatment for stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

    ReplyDelete
  41. Tony, are we enemies tonight!?? I admit I’m thrilled to get to watch my hero JJ Watts! A true gentleman and good guy off the field and a mean nasty... but smart player on the field. What’s not to like?

    Of course, I hope he plays well and loses!

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  42. Forgot to mention the "leveraged" part. Say you sold $1,000,000 of stock and bought the Mexican restaurant, and after putting in new management and policies in it was so much better that it was worth $1,500,000 after a year. If you sell it at that point, your stockholders will have made $500,000 on their $1,000,000, for a handsome 50% return on their investment. But if you had done an LBO, they would have made $500,000 on your $100,000 investment, for an even prettier 500% return. That's leverage.

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  43. When I was 8 or 9, my neighbors took me to their church summer Bible school for kids. In the classroom, I said "Gosh" or "Geez" or something like that blabbing along. The strait-laced teacher immediately stopped the class and asked everyone to pray for me. I had no idea what I'd done wrong. The kids had to tell me at recess. So much a feeling of being DRESSED DOWN. That did little to clean up my language but it definitely let me know I didn't want to join their church.

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  44. Hi All!

    Thanks Freddie for a fun puzzle - I got the theme very early on but still enjoyed it. Enjoyed your expo too Boomer! Keep getting better (both in heath and bowling :-))

    WO: N/A [but I almost did the DRESSINGs HG].
    WAGfest at EVELYN, ENVOI, and wasn't sure if I recalled Tex AVERY correctly.
    ESP: UDO
    Fav: NOT NICE. Though Youngest was just learning to talk, she had a strong sense of Justice and would tell other kids "Nat, NOT NICE" while wagging her finger at the perpetrator. ("That's not nice").

    {A} FLN - Just makin' sure :-)

    Misty / Jayce - Jinx beat me to the more in-depth discussion of LOBs. An issue with LOBs is with companies like Sears or ToysRUs - the debt used to take over the target-company is larded on to the already struggling company. Some further reading. Oh, don't worry - the "big boys," as Jinx pointed out @4:18, will get their money.

    PK - LOL! I had that feeling too when playing with the takes-God-too-seriously kids.* Growing up Catholic we all knew Jesus' middle name started w/ an H 'cuz Father Peters would inform 'ya if, say, he hit his thumb with a hammer.

    SwampCat (@6:23) - not any longer :-) Game is over so, "Who Dat!?! Who Dat?!" //I was a Saints fan when I lived in Shreveport and later in Ruston @LA Tech. That was the early '90s and, (was it Anderson?), The Saints had a kicker that wouldn't miss at 60yds... (ok, that may be a bit of an exaggeration)

    Cheers, -T
    *It still happens today - Eldest was no longer allowed to sit for the neighbors after wearing her I Love Lucy tee.

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  45. er, LBOs... Can I balme auto-correct?

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  46. Many thanks for the quick explanations of LBOs, Jayce and AnonT, and for the complex and thorough explanation, Jinx. I really appreciate the information, but it sure makes me glad I did literature and teaching and not getting into the field of finance. That would have been a lot more stressful, I suspect. Again, many thanks for all the learning I get to do on the blog.

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  47. Our internet went out yesterday during a storm, but went back up some time while I was at work. Fun puzzle and little crunchier than the usual Monday!

    I was thinking that your next infusion Boomer was in September - hope it doesn't keep you down (literally and figuratively) too long! Prayers for you!

    Thanks Boomer and Freddie!

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  48. Continued good health in future. Love ur blog. Great help for a chord bumpkin like me

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