google.com, pub-2774194725043577, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 L.A.Times Crossword Corner

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Aug 24, 2008

Sunday August 24, 2008 Edgar Fontaine

Theme: Chick Flicks

24A: Diane Keaton title role: ANNIE HALL

46A: Dorothy Dandridge title role: CARMEN JONES

69A: Kirsten Dunst title role: MARIE ANTOINETTE

95A: Barbara Stanwyck title role: ANNIE OAKLEY

118A: Ingrid Bergman title role: ANASTASIA

3D: Rosalind Russell tittle role: AUNTIE MAMA

9D: Cate Blanchett title role: ELIZABETH

15D: Shirley MacLaine title role: IRMA LA DOUCE

69D: Julie Andres title role: MARY POPPINS

78D: Greer Garson title role: MRS. MINIVER

84D: Ingrid Bergman title role: JOAN OF ARC

I like the theme, very ambitious. All the theme entries except ANASTASIA (118A: Ingrid Bergman title role) look great to me.

I am annoyed at ANASTASIA not only because because we already have one Bergman movie (84D), but the crossing of ANASTASIA with RALE (112D: Last breath) corner is extremely irksome. 4 RALE/RALES in one week? Unbelievable!

This is where the editorial creativity is sorely needed, as I am sure the constructor was not aware of the RALE(S) binge we've had. After reading the news clip on Madonna's "Sticky and Sweet" tour this morning, I thought of her title role EVITA, but it's too short. And QUEEN VICTORIA (Judi Dench in "Mrs. Brown") is not a title role, and it's too long. What movie title can you think of? It has to be a 9-letter word.

Crossword constructing is so hard. I really have huge respect for those guys, even if I often criticize their work. But my complaints are "For Love of the Game".

Lots of entertainment names in the grid, fitting the theme nicely. I had fun googling, no time to fully digest what I had read/linked though.

Across:

14A: Zodiac sign: LIBRA. Mine is Cancer. How about your?

19A: Comic Anderson: LOUIE. No, I've never heard of him or his game show "Family Feud".

22A: Bottom deck: ORLOP. I forgot why Clear Ayes mentioned this ORLOP last week.

26A: Stomachs of ruminants: OMASA. Singular is OMASUM. New to me. It's "the third division of the stomach of a ruminant animal". How many stomachs does a ruminant animal have? Three?

30A: Precision machinist: DIE MAKER. Boy, I had DOE MAKER for a long time. I wrote down SOLO instead of SOLI for the intersecting 13D: Arias for one.

40A: Fall off the wagon: IMBIBE

42A: Amin's birthplace: UGANDA. Ha, I already forgot where the capital of UGANDA is. Kampala, Kampala, Kampala.

54A: South Carolina river: SANTEE. It's named after the SANTEE tribe. Here is the map. New river to me.

57A: Womanizer: TOMCAT. I just learned that TOMCAT can be a verb too.

60A: Mother of Apollo: LETO. And the "Swan lover" is LEDA (or the "Mythical queen of Sparta").

64A: Louis and Carrie: NYES. I know neither of them, though I do remember "a NYE/NIDE of peasants".

73A: Fire opal: GIRASOL. New to me.

93A: Intermittently windy: GUSTY. Really? "Intermittenly"? I thought "GUSTY" was continuously blowing hard (This sentence feels weird, correct me if I am wrong).

94A: Ninny: SIMP. So many different words to describe an airhead.

98A: Fed: G-MAN. The FBI guy. Fed can also be T-MAN, the IRS guy.

99A: Egg receptacle: OVISAC. Another new word. It's "a sac or capsule containing an ovum or ova". What a solid made-up word! Reminds me of cruciverbalist.

103A: Patagonia plains: PAMPAS. Look, this lone gaucho seems to enjoy his life on PAMPAS.

114A: Coast of Morocco: RIF. I crossed the River Lethe again on this word. Here is the map. Argyle said "Er RIF" comes from the Berber word arif (The RIF, Er-RIF in Arabic).

115A: Composer Shostakovich: DMITRI. Can you believe I forgot his name again? This is the third time he appeared in our puzzle. Was it a gimmie to you? Do you like his music?

117A: Computer language std.: ASCII. Know the word. Can never remember what the acronym stands for.

124A: Redbone and Russell: LEONS. Interesting. "Stranger on a Stranger's Land". I don't grok what he is singing.

125A: Ancient Chinese poet: LI PO. "Li Bai" in Mandarin Chinese. From the Tang Dynasty (with capital in Xi'An). Here are some lines from his well-known "Drinking Alone by Moonlight": A cup of wine, under the flowering trees; I drink alone, for no friend is near. Raising my cup I beckon the bright moon. For her, with my shadow, will make three men....."

131A: Saint of letters: CYRIL. I've never heard of this saint. Have vaguely heard of the Cyrillic alphabet though.

Down:

4D: Time of Nick?: NITE. "Nick at NITE". I've never seen it.

6D: Kiddie spoilers?: GRANDMAS

8D: Dog's first name: RIN. RIN Tin Tin.

17D: Al of the '50s Indians: ROSEN. Couldn't tell whether this card is a real card or a reprint.

25D: Mammalian epoch: EOCENE. I could not believe this is a real word. It looks so wrong. OK, Eos is Greek goddess of dawn. "cene is " means "new", like "recent" I suppose. ECOCENE is "an epoch in which mammals dominant (50 million years ago)."

28D: Like lofty poetry: ODIC. Very interesting how adjectives are formed. For Pindar, it's Pindaric; For Keats, it's Keatsian, not Keatsic.

31D: German Dadaist: ERNST (Max). A surrealist as well. Here is The Elephant Celebes. I am looking forward to seeing ERNST's buddy Paul KLEE next week.

32D: Papeete's location: TAHITI. Got it from the across fills. I had no idea where Papeete is. FYI, Gauguin painted his "Two Women on the Beach" in TAHITI also.

33D: "A Perfect Peace" author: AMOS OZ. Gimme. He knows "How to Cure a Fanatic".

39D: Central Park S. Landmark: NYAC (New York Athletic Club). No idea. I've never been to NY.

41D: Brown in fat: BRAISE. I don't think this clue is wholly accurate. The process of braising needs some liquid for simmering.

44D: Organisms requiring oxygen: AEROBES. AER(O) is air, Obe is from Microbe. Good to learn this stuff.

53D: Multi-deck game: CANASTA . Not a familiar card game to me. I've never play rummy.

56D: Wild pig: WARTHOG. I forgot. So ugly.

79D: Thick soup: POTAGE. I did not know that some POTAGES are made of thickened liquid with mashed FLOWERS/fruit. Sounds so sweet.

80D: Fred of "The Munsters": GWYNNE. I would not have got his name without the crossing fills. It's so hard for me to grasp the popularity of this show and the wide-range (often expensive) collectibles.

83D: Water-to-wine site: CANA. You can find The Wedding at CANA at Louvre.

91D: Share a book project: CO-EDIT

92D: "The Listeners" writer Walter: DE LA MARE. "Is there anybody there...." This is the first time I heard of this poet.

97D: K2 creature?: YETI. I had no idea that K2 is a mountain peak (Karakoram Range in northern Kashmir). And it's the 2nd highest in the world. I am just so used to the "Abominable Snowman" clue.

100D: Traveling bag: VALISE. This Civil War VALISE is so well preserved.

105D: Georgia city: MACON. I forgot. Dennis mentioned this name when we had the MOON PIE long time ago. MACON is nicknamed "Heart of Georgia". Lovely cherry blossom.

107D: Incendiarism: ARSON

115D: Dist. across: DIAM (Diameter). I don't like this clue. "Dist. across" what? A square? Definitely needs a "circle" in the clue.

116D: Somewhat blue: RACY. Van Gogh' somewhat blue (literally) "Starry Night Over the Rhone popped into my mind immediately. He is such a brilliant yet tragic figure. I really like his various paintings on sunflowers, esp those in full bloom. I am so touched by his bold & daring strokes of yellow color, breathtaking. Indeed, Theo, "The sunflower is mine in a way..."

123D: Lowly NCO: CPL. PFC is the lowest NCO, right?

C.C.

Aug 23, 2008

Saturday August 23, 2008 Robert H. Wolfe

Theme: None

Total blocks: 26

I hope you found beautiful red, red roses in this thorny puzzle. It's way too tough for me. Felt like climbing Mountain Everest without a shirpa. I definitely need a theme to guide me.

Too many unknowns and strange cluings. I was stumped immediately by KAMPALA (1A). Letter K was simply impossible for me as I was not familiar with crossing KIWANIS (1D) at all. And I got bogged down in MENOTTI area for a long time. Had to ask Google for help.

Across:

1A: Capital city of 15A: KAMPALA. Here is the map. It's located on Lake Victoria.

8A: "The Consul" composer: MENOTTI (Gian Carlo). I forgot. Vaguely remembered seeing his name somewhere before. Wikipedia says he won Pulitzer (1950) for The Consul". He wrote both the music and the libretto for the opera. Amazing. He must love Wagner.

15A: Infamous dictator: IDI AMIN. I still don't understand why he is called "The Last King of Scotland".

16A: Protein in cereal grains: ALEURON. No idea. I could only think of GLUTEN. Dictionary says it's a "granular protein found in the endosperm of many seeds or forming the outermost layer in cereal grains." ALEURON is Greek for "meal".

17A: Rhode Island city: WARWICK. We get quite a few TMS solvers there.

18A: 3-D miniature scene: DIORAMA. New word to me. Beautifully done.

22A: Hindu sect member: SIKH. Literally, "disciple" in Sanskrit. I always confuse this word with ANKH, the Egyptian cross.

23A: City in NE France: NANCY. METZ was clued as "City near NANCY" on a July puzzle. I wonder why the editor has never considered cluing RANCY Reagan.

25A: Death rattles: RALES. This word should really be mothballed.

28A: Subcontinent leader?: INDO. INDOCHINA. Trickey clue.

29A: Adriatic seaport: BARI. It's here in Italy. Unknown to me.

30A: Seed covering: TESTA. Also, "head" in Italian.

34A: Up to the patellae: KNEE DEEP. Interesting clue, so literal.

36A: Omnispective: All -SEEING. "Omnispective" is a new word to me.

38A: Paginated: FOLIATED. No idea. I always thought FOLIATE is an adjective. I've never heard of "paginate" before.

45A: Cricket segments: OVERS. No. Dictionary defines OVER as "the number of balls, usually six, delivered between successive changes of bowlers". I originally thought OVERS might be like our "innings" in baseball.

48A: "The Lion King" character: NALA. "Can you feel the love tonight?...". Beautiful song from "The Lion King".

53A: One-tenth of MDXL: CLIV. I cannot think of any other non-Roman numberal way to clue this "CLIV", can you?

55A: Lumberjack's two-man tool: PIT SAW. Hard work!

58A: Otological problem: EAR ACHE. Be prepared, the answer might be OTALGIA next time.

60A: Bereft: SO ALONE. I disagree, they are not synonymous.

62A: Commonplace: PROSAIC

63A: Cutting tooth: INCISOR

64A: Nerve connection: SYNAPSE. This puzzle should please our fellow solver Flyingear.

65A: Suppurates: FESTERS. I did not know the meaning of "Suppurates".

Down:

1D: Worldwide service club: KIWANIS. Unknown to me once again. It's "an organization founded in 1915 for the promulgation of higher ideals in business, industrial, and professional life".

3D: "Right to remain silent" warning: MIRANDA. "You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law..."

6D: Tiny insects: LICE. I penned in NITS.

8D: Kahn of "Blazing Saddles": MADELINE. I googled her name. I've never heard of "Blazing Saddles".

12D: Gad about: TRAIPSE

13D: 1992 U.S. Open winner: TOM KITE. Know him, but had no idea he was the 1992 Open champion. I was thinking of Lehman. That ball did land in the hole.

14D: Randomly piled: IN A HEAP. I got this after cheating with the across fills.

21D: Delineated: MARKED OUT

24D: 1997 Nicolas Cage movie: CON AIR. Good movie, good song too.

26D: Gregg user: STENO. Did not know what "Gregg" is.

29D: Wallop: BELT. Nice BELT.

31D: Abutting: EDGING. No need to clue *ING answer with an *ING. "Border" is just fine.

37D: Carefully planned and executed performance: SET PIECE. New phrase to me also.

38D: Medical implement: FORCEPS. Completely foreign to me. Here are some surgical FORCEPS.

39D: Of plant seeds: OVULARY. Sigh... no, no.

40D: Shackle: LEG IRON. Techincially it's "lower shackle".

42D: California city: SAN JOSE. "Do You Know the Way to SAN JOSE?"

43D: Rigby of song: ELEANOR. Not familiar with this Beatles' song. Only know ELEANOR Roosevelt.

44D: Lumberyard employs: SAWYERS. I always thought it was SAWERS.

47D: Isolated mountain: MASSIF. New to me also. It's defined as "A large mountain mass or compact group of connected mountains forming an independent portion of a range". Behind them is the Himalayan Annapurna MASSIF.

51D: Plant pest: APHIS. I forgot. Saw this clue before. Strange plural form APHIDES.

52D: Aircraft surveillance acronym: AWACS (Airborne Warning And Control System). Nope, too sophisticated for me to undertand and remember.

54D: Swedish ship that sank on maiden voyage: VASA. No idea. I like the bright colors on this VASA model.

C.C.