google.com, pub-2774194725043577, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 L.A.Times Crossword Corner: Thursday January 23rd 2020 Bruce Haight

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Jan 23, 2020

Thursday January 23rd 2020 Bruce Haight

Theme: Cash Up - Five theme entries in the downs contain currencies running south-to-north:

3D. New Year's Day event in Pasadena: ROSE PARADE. Peso, or $ in most Latin counties (the Philippine Peso symbol is ₱.) There's what possibly is an urban legend that there is an upsurge in U-Haul rentals in the East and Midwest after the Rose Parade when the lovely Californian weather is usually on parade, along with the floats and people decide to move.


10D. Finish impressively: END WITH A BANG. Baht, or ฿.

21D. Lamb Chop puppeteer: SHARI LEWIS. Lira, or ₺. The Italian Lira is now defunct, having gone the way of the Euro, but Turkey still has theirs.

25D. It helps you go places: TRAVEL BUREAU. Ruble, or ₽. The symbol was officially adopted in 2013 following a public poll.

34D. Get support, in a way ... and what the puzzle circles do: RAISE MONEY. Yen, or ¥. I like how this is both the reveal and a theme entry in its own right.  Clever.

Another solid puzzle from Bruce, and again, we're looking at a 16x15 grid; I think this is the third Thursday in a row sporting that grid configuration. It's not impossible to place the two 12-letter theme entries in a 15x15 grid, but adding the extra row gives a little more elbow room and potentially a less scrappy fill. Bruce is just a "J" short of a pangram here, when I see Q, X and Z in a puzzle I start to look out for the J's, K's, V's and W's.

Let's take the grand tour:

Across:

1. Spunky: SCRAPPY

8. Longest-serving Japanese prime minister: ABE. Shinzō Abe, who is the current prime minister and has held the office since 2012.

11. Ave. crossers: STS.

14. Steel foundry input: IRON ORE

15. Traction-improving: NON-SLIP

17. "Try some!": TASTE IT! I need no further encouragement.

18. Lamaze class attendee: DAD-TO-BE

19. Expectant time: EVE.

20. One of the family: SIS

22. About 24% of the U.S. Congress: WOMEN

23. Stations: DEPOTS. Are these synonymous? To my mind, stations are for passengers and depots are for freight or stabling locomotives on the rail network.

26. Place for choppers: HELIPORT

29. Not quite right: AWRY

30. Oodles: A LOT

31. Broadway song that begins, "The most beautiful sound I ever heard": MARIA. From "West Side Story".

33. Brief encounter: BRUSH. Brush off, brush by and a brush with the law are all brief encounters of different types.

34. Flag thrower: REF. American Football. I can't think of another sport where a flag is thrown to indicate that an infringement has occurred.

37. Co-tsar with Peter I: IVAN V. Nice clue, I enjoyed the "co-star" play on words.

38. Saucepan cover: LID

39. Missile Command game company: ATARI

41. Place to stay: LODGE

42. Newcastle Brown __: ALE. A very famous beer in the UK. Like the Bass "Red Triangle" symbol, the iconic blue star logo, which was introduced in 1928, is instantly recognizable.


43. Starts bubbling, maybe: BOILS

44. Fleecy one: EWE

45. Loafs: LAZES

47. Strong suit: ASSET

48. Lost, as a big lead: BLEW

49. Way back when: ONCE

50. Rum drink: DAIQUIRI. I wasn't sure how to spell this, I had to let the crosses help me out.

54. Competition that includes snowboarding: X GAMES

57. Pianist Rubinstein: ARTUR

58. California's __ Gabriel Mountains: SAN. The backdrop to the Rose Parade. Pasadena is in the San Gabriel Valley.

60. Egg cells: OVA

61. Like the most busy busybody: NOSIEST

64. Mid-Michigan city: SAGINAW. I first learned this city from Simon and Garfunkel's song "America" from their Bookends album.

67. Uganda's capital: KAMPALA

68. Accessory for an Aquaman costume: TRIDENT

69. Before, in poems: ERE. 


Maid of Athens, ere we part,
Give, oh, give me back my heart!
Or, since that has left my breast,
Keep it now, and take the rest!
Hear my vow before I go,
Ζωή μου, σᾶς ἀγαπῶ

Lord Byron - Maid of Athens

I'm not sure I understand the device of the last line in Greek - it translates as "My life, I love you!" but it doesn't rhyme with "go", neither in Greek nor English. Any scholarly folk have any idea what Byron was doing here?

70. Coffee hour sight: URN. It was a vase with feet last week.

71. "Sounds right to me": I'D SAY SO

Down:

1. Positioned: SITED

2. Really want: CRAVE. Why can't I crave kale? It's always fried chicken or truffles.


4. Tiny toiler: ANT

5. Name in eerie fiction: POE

6. Proper to a fault: PRISSY

7. Himalayan legend: YETI

8. "Furthermore ... ": AND

9. Fluffy wrap: BOA

11. Sportscast technique: SLO-MO

12. River near Vatican City: TIBER. Rome's river. The name of Trastevere, one of my favorite districts in Rome, comes from the latin Trans Tiberim, "beyond the Tiber".

13. Exhausted: SPENT

16. "Hold it!": STOP

24. Short, in a way: OWING

27. Gives the slip: ELUDES

28. Part of LAPD: LOS. Because none of the alternatives of Angeles, Police or Department would fit.

31. Pedometer unit: MILE. This is a little odd, I think. I wanted "step" at first, because that's what pedometers measure. A pedometer, strictly speaking, doesn't measure distance although it can provide an estimate based on an individual's stride length.

32. Swear: AVOW

33. Sport coat: BLAZER

35. Writer Gardner: ERLE

36. Rock that, oddly, loses to paper: FIST. I was trying to think of a type of rock at first, something along the TALC lines, then the penny dropped.

40. Puccini opera: TOSCA

46. Boxer Laila: ALI

49. Ventura County city: OXNARD

50. German word of gratitude: DANKE

51. Wildly cheering: AROAR. I've grown to like this word, I thought it was a little contrived when I first encountered it.

52. Knocker's words: IT'S ME!

53. Zinger: QUIP

55. Chris of "Captain America": EVANS. Thank you, crosses.

56. Handled: SAW TO

59. Wine made from Muscat grapes: ASTI

62. Camera type, for short: SLR. Single-Lens Reflex. When introduced, allowed the photographer to frame the picture looking through the lens of the camera, rather than a separate viewfinder lens.

63. You basked for it: TAN

65. USO show audience: GI'S

66. Wyo. neighbor: IDA.

That just about wraps it up for today!

Steve



35 comments:

  1. FIW, missing the TIgER River. Erased SAGaNAW and SHeRI LEWIS. DNK ARTUR, KAMPALA, or anything about Aquaman or Captain America.

    RIP Mr. Peanut. Snatched from advertising life at only 104 years old. Ashes to ashes, nuts to nuts.

    Thanks for the fun, Bruce. Hand up for liking "co-tsar". And thanks to Steve for the interesting tour. Somehow, "look out his bow tie is really a camera" is so much more lyrical than "oh man they've got a Ring doorbell", but the later is more up-to-date.

    Finally broke out of teh deep freeze. Its 53 degrees here just before dawn, and golf is in order.

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  2. On the Lord Byron quote, what little Greek I remember, the last word I think is agapo- Greek for I love you. This does rhyme

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  3. Good morning!

    Didn't Haight this one at all. Even got the theme as soon as OSEP/PESO appeared in the circles. It's interesting that most currency symbols have pairs of vertical or horizontal lines in them. I wonder why. Steve, you almost made it sound like the Euro was extinct -- "The Italian Lira is now defunct, having gone the way of the Euro..." But I knew what you meant. Fell into that STEP/MILE trap, as well as SKID/SLIP, and I tried C for that first I in DAIQUIRI. Got 'er done in good time, so life is good. Thanx, Bruce and Steve.

    SAGINAW: Tried LANSING first, but that wasn't working at all. If you're into high-brow music, you may remember this one byLefty Frizzell.

    Two items on today's calendar -- for this retired dude, that makes it a really busy day. Gotta run...

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  4. Clever theme - I'm with Steve - impressed that the reveal answer also had one of the theme answers. END WITH A BANG gave me BAHT in the circles, so I knew the others needed to be money going up - which definitely sped up the solve!
    What D-O said about LANSING before SAGINAW.

    Woke up to another snowy morning - but work never stops - so I'm off!
    Thanks to Steve and Bruce!

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  5. That was fun! I could see the upside-down currencies as I moved through the solve. I never used the themers to help, but I did see them.

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  6. Easy money today. Finished in under 9 minutes. Didn't see the theme answers until finished. Kampala was new, and was doubtful on the spelling of Danke.

    Lacrosse officials also throw flags.

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  7. Fun puzzle. Very fast for a Thursday. Will Friday and Saturday puzzles be bears? Saw the money rising with PESO, needed the reveal for the exact wording.
    I needed perps for the first I in DAIQURI. I was ONCE (way back when) an excellent speller.
    Steve, do I see a convert? I have always liked AROAR and other A words. They are colorful and expressive.
    All pedometers measure steps. I thought of step first. But many modern pedometers measure miles and even calories burned. When a friend wears a pedometer to square dance it shows many miles in even one session.
    I do not care to bask in the sun. I just spend my time outdoors walking and doing my thing which produces a great tan in the summertime. The tan does not fade completely until December. At a pool or lake I prefer to sit under a tree and read.
    DO said,"Steve, you almost made it sound like the Euro was extinct -- "The Italian Lira is now defunct, having gone the way of the Euro..." But I knew what you meant." My first reaction, too. Most of the time "go the way of" means go extinct, fall our of common use.
    We are soon returning to 50 degrees +. So strange. I keep switching between winter coats and light jackets. With temps in the 50s we see people in shorts. I prefer 55 to 85.

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  8. Danke very much for a fun puzzle this morning Bruce Haight.
    Pretty straight forward but had to change STEP to MILE to make the crosses work.
    FIR with just one sip of luke warm McD’s coffee left.
    Would write more but got company at my table.
    Cheers

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  9. Good morning. RAISE MONEY? I wouldn't be good at asking other people to donate or 'my cause'. But there seems to be an industry with well paid executives that somehow does it. To be honest, I didn't notice the money in the circles. After filling ROSE PARADE and TRAVEL BUREAU I wrote POSE and BLUE at the bottom of the paper. Then RAIL and BATH after the other two downs with circles. I couldn't figure out how those four words connected. Duh! It was obvious and simple but I missed it. But filling the puzzle was easier than most Thursdays.

    Collective value of ALL the MONEY? Mex PESO- $.05, RUBLE- $.015, Turkish LIRA- $.17, Thai BAHT- $.03, YEN $.009. Total them up and they are less than a QUARTER.

    I misread two clues. "co-star for co-tsar" and "asked for it instead of 'basked' for it". A little dyslexic this morning.

    Pedometer unit- I also wanted STEP because I don't think pedometers have GPS yet.

    Wine made from muscat grapes? Redd Foxx's favorite along with Ripple on Sanford & Son- MUSCATEL. It wouldn't fit but ASTI did.

    DAIQUIRI- in the NOLA area there must be at least 20 drive-thru daiquiri shops. They all sell frozen daiquiris, mudslides, margarita, & pina coladas. Since it's not legal to drink and drive they tape a straw across the top.

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  10. Not a bad Thursday puzzle. SE corner last to go.

    Had non skid first which makes more sense to me than NONSLIP at least for tires.

    Hands up for momTOBE first.

    DAIQUIRI a word read and heard but try to spell it. Gave up an let the perps do their work.

    Aver or AVOW? EWE never know.

    Accessory for an aquaman costume. Oxygen tank wouldn't fit.

    HELIPORT. Entrance to Hades?

    I have enough trouble completing the puzzle without messing with the circles...rebuses etc. Content just to FIR.

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  11. Good morning everyone.

    A few SCRAPPY clues but otherwise; just about right for a Thursday level. Perhaps a mite on the easy side. FIR. Liked the 'almost' pangram. Got the theme; raising money. Had PES at 3d, and plunked in the 'O' for IRON ORE. Good job, Bruce.
    DEPOT - In our neck-o-the-woods, we commonly hear bus DEPOT, for 'station' so I'm ok with the clue.
    DANKE - You also hear "DANKE gleichfalls", meaning 'same to you' or 'likewise'. My Dad used it a lot.

    Why is the person who invests your money called a broker?

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  12. Good Morning:

    I love Bruce's puzzles no matter what the gimmick is, but I love the word play themes the best. In this offering, his wordplay skills were in the clueing, e.g., You basked for it=Tan and Co-tsar of ....=Ivan V., among others. I saw the monetary units almost immediately because of the circles, but the reveal was still a nice surprise. I, too, liked Yen appearing in the revealer and being a themer, as well. That may well have been the seed for the theme.

    Thanks, Bruce, for always pleasing us solvers and thanks, Steve, for always enlightening and entertaining us, post solve. I always learn something from your analysis.

    FLN

    Anon T, as I used "pandering" in my comments about Code Switching, I think we're in perfect agreement vis a vis politicians! 😏 Enjoy your time with your family, especially little Bro!

    Have a great day.

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  13. Musings
    -Lou Grant – “You’ve got spunk! I hate spunk!”
    -Honest ABE?
    -AWRY to Burns – “The best laid schemes o' mice an' men / Gang aft A-GLEY”
    -Snake-bitten Saints have just had two seasons end with a flag NOT thrown
    -More NFL – Titans BLEW a 24-point lead against the KC Chiefs recently
    -Steve, I’ll get back to you on Byronic intent! :-)
    -People here who SITED their homes near the Platte River got wiped out in March
    -Martin Crane – “Your mother wanted to use the name Priscilla but I never cared for the nickname PRISSY” Niles Crane – “Me either”
    -Senators must be SPENT trying to find new words to present their intractable positions
    -I needed a strong light to tell my navy BLAZER from my black one

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  14. The pedometer shows a count of your steps on an LCD display; most will convert the step count to an approximate distance in miles or kilometers or the number of calories you've burned off at the push of a button.
    Shinzo ABE pronounces his name AH-BAY. In Japan he is known as Abe Shinzo, surname first.
    Non slip usually applies to mats and shoes, but not to tires. As mats do not involve traction, it must refer to nonslip shoes.There are ads for nonslip hiking shoes and nonslip mats
    Nonslip hiking boots help when going down slope in the fall on slippery leaves. Ah, those were the days.

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  15. Re: the answer to 47d, I didn't think oxen had them.

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  16. ?????There is no 47d in the Jan. 23 puzzle.

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  17. Woohoo! I got an entire Thursday Bruce Haight puzzle without a single error! Woohoo! Thank you, Bruce! I was daunted by the long across lines on top at first, but then I got MARIA (the melody popped right into my head), and that gave me MILE and then IVAN and AVOW, and so on, until the middle section filled right in. I watch the ROSE PARADE on TV every New Year's Day, and that helped getting the top started. And so it went, lots of fun. My favorite answer was the Lamb Chop puppeteer. I remembered those skits so well and knew it was SHARI--and then LEWIS popped into my memory. Like Ray, I knew it would be DAIQUIRI but the spelling took a while to be right. Anyway, a total treat--thanks again, Bruce.

    I taught my first spring class at the Senior Center yesterday on T.S. Eliot's "The Wasteland," which, surprisingly, showed up on "Jeopardy" later in the evening. Bet all my students got it.

    Have a good day, everybody.

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  18. Gotta like a puzzle where my fave today is ALE.
    Booze is always a fave at Villa Incognito. LOL

    I've been enjoying that "NEW" comedy show ... The Impeachment.
    (Too bad it will only be on a couple of weeks. UGH!

    A "Toast-to-ALL" at Sunset.

    Cheers!

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  19. Hola!

    DANKE, Bruce! This was on the MONEY! I liked it. Like others, I had step/MILE, mom/DAD and what could have been a Natick for some at the crossing of OXNARD/SAGINAW. I know the former but not the latter. I've got to visit Michigan!

    My granddaughter tried to help me with rock, scissors but we both laughed when FIST emerged. She did know Chris EVANS which I did not and still don't.

    I also love to watch the ROSE PARADE and its remarkable floats and marching bands.

    Much to do today including shopping for a dress to wear to my great-nieces' wedding.

    Have a beautiful day, everyone!

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  20. Some crunch encountered on this Thursday grid.

    Write-overs...MOMTOBE/DADTOBE, HELIPADS/HELIPORTS, DACQUIRI/DAIQUIRI, ATON/ALOT.

    So my hand is up.

    And on to Friday.

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  21. WIMS!
    (What Irish Miss Said...)

    Loved the witty clues...

    Loved even more that it was tough, yet doable.
    Ivan the "I" b/4 "V"
    Got stuck several times, put it down, & came back to
    many an "aha" moment!

    (Yellowrocks, somehow, to my ear, "an" aha sounds better than "a"aha)
    (not sure which is right ...)
    (possibly because it is supposed to be plural?)

    AnywhoHa...

    What I would do with this puzzle...

    What this puzzle caused AC/DC to do...

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  22. I don't know if it is still there but there was a fabulous fish restaurant in Trastevere named Sabatini. HIS Cousin had met one in Firenzi (Florence) mear the Arno.

    Here's a picture: https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g187791-d5506791-Reviews-Sabatini-Rome_Lazio.html

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  23. When I spent the year of 1963 in Thailand with the Army Engineers, I always thought of the baht as being worth a nickel.

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  24. Good one, Mr. Haight!
    I'D SAY SO...

    Yes, I too had STEP before MILE.
    And CanadianEh!, I had ALB before IDA. (I just forgot about MON.)

    Congratulations, Misty! Both on today's Ta~ DA! and on your class yesterday on The Waste Land.
    Frisch weht der Wind
    Der Heimat zu
    Mein Irisch Kind,
    Wo weilest du?

    Many decades ago I won an undergrad city-wide poetry contest reading The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. As part of my prep, I sat for hours in the library of SF STATE listening to Eliot's voice reading The Waste Land and other works.
    ~ OMK
    ____________
    DR:
    None. The grid is 16x15.

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  25. Not much to say. This went smooth and fast. No real writeovers. I've been doing these in the early am but I dozed while reading posts.

    WC

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  26. It isn't fish, but you all want to come to So.Fla. to try our latest delicacy? NEW FOOD TREAT ?

    John28Man's restaurant.

    Hungry Mother - the Thai Baht was worth a nickel for many years but has been free trading for years. Here is a chart from 1963 to 1988
    THAI BAHT

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  27. Hello everyone. I’m back from the wilds of southern Arizona (Tucson-ish), where we were WAY too busy to puzzle. A night trip to the Kitt Peak National Observatory was outstanding!

    Always nice to see a BH puzzle, and also to see that Steve did the writeup.

    Why did I instantly know the correct spelling of DAIQUIRI? Hmmm... another sign of a misspent yute.

    Hand up for wanting nonskid before NONSLIP, and step before MILE. WEES about the pedometer.

    I actually thought this was pretty easy for a Thursday, and FIR in about 13 minutes.

    Don’t know why, but MARIA has been my earworm since yesterday and here it is in today’s puzzle!

    Abejo, you can stop testing... it works. :-)

    Off to shovel the walks. Have a nice evening, all.

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  28. Good evening, folks. Thank you, Bruce Haight, for a fine puzzle. Thank you, Steve, for a fine review.

    Puzzle went through pretty easily until the South. Tough ones: BUREAU, ARTUR, KAMPALA, OCNARD, TRIDENT, SAGINAW, EVANS, etc. Perps got me through it.

    Liked the theme. Figured it out eventually.

    In Edinboro, PA, now for a few days. My nephew’s gun raffle is Saturday.

    See you tomorrow.

    Abejo

    ( )

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  29. Wait a sec,

    Iguanas have white, and dark meat?

    Add onions to the stew water...?

    Aw nuts, I just ate sushi,
    & now I am hungry again...

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  30. Hi All!

    Thanks Bruce for a great that stumped 1 of three solvers in the house today [Pop's DW & I nailed it; Army Bro, not so much].

    Excellent Expo Steve; Bros & I are fans of Newcastle too.

    WOs: elf b/f ANT, DANKa
    ESPs: SITED(?), EVANS, KAMPALA, ERLE
    Fav: The cluing "You basked for it" and "co-tsar"

    Funny take on Mr. Peanut Jinx.

    HG - I hate SPUNK. I though the same think at 1a.

    Misty - I loved SHARI LEWIS and Lamb Chop too.

    WikWak - In college I worked at a place in Monroe, LA called DAIQUIRIs Unlimited. Sold 'em through the drive-thru window with, as BigE pointed out, scotch tape over the straw-hole to make it a closed container. Business was brisk esp. on HS game nights.

    Have a good one!

    Cheers, -T

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  31. The closest thing to those drive thru daiquiri joints was NH rest areas which doubled as package* stores.

    They were conveniently located right on the Massachusetts State line.

    WC

    Known as the "Packie"

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  32. Thank you, Ol'Man Keith, for quoting the lovely German "Waste Land" verse--I read it to my class with my Austrian accent yesterday.

    And so glad you too liked Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop, AnonT.

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  33. Thanks Steve!
    The reason for the 15x16 layout is the ten letter middle entry.....

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