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

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May 28, 2020

Thursday, May 28th 2020 Bruce Haight

Theme: Not only but ... As the reveal tells us what to look for:

66A. Cross-reference indicator ... and directions to the link among the five longest puzzle answers: SEE ALSO

Seems clear enough! Let's go find them:

18A. Wayward one in Luke: PRODIGAL SON. If you are of a certain age, you will not be able to see "wayward son" without hearing this. You can't un-see the hair or the beard either.

24A. Origin of new business, perhaps: REFERRAL SOURCE

39A. Oscar category: BEST ORIGINAL SONG. I've used my music link for the day, but no matter. If "Kansas" isn't your thing, the wonderful Audrey Hepburn certainly should be, the song won the Oscar in 1961.

48A. Hypothetical evolutionary starting point: PRIMORDIAL SOUP. Food! Recipe to follow.

57A. Click or cluck: ANIMAL SOUND "Animal Noise" led me astray a little, but soon corrected.

Here's the recipe for Primodial Soup:


Ingredients:

1 ocean (tropical oceans have the best flavor and a lower sodium content than inland seas).
1 active volcano spewing lava (these are available on your local Hawai'ian island, or substitute an Icelandic Eyjafjallajökull or similar).
2 tbsp concentrated amino acids
1 tablet of Alchemy
1 16oz bottle of captured lightning

Method:

Pour molten lava into ocean. When the ocean boils, reduce to a simmer and add amino acids. Leave to steep for millenia until a green bloom is apparent. Activate the alchemy tablet with a few drops of ocean until it is foaming. Add to the soup and immediately uncork the lightning and flash onto the surface of the mixture. When small sea creatures are observed crawling onto the rim of the pot and developing lungs and legs, the soup is ready. Salt to taste, garnish with kelp and serve. Keeps, refrigerated, for ice ages.

Warning: Prepared in an environment which may include traces of Big Bang.

Right, that flight of fancy over, let's get back to the puzzle. 

The theme entries are nicely consistent - the AL-SO breaks across two words in each instance. Bruce is a dab hand at the long entries across for the themers, and he generally throws in a couple of extended down entries, in this case two of those long downs tie three theme entries together, that's a nice touch.

There's a lot of shorter fill, but that need not be a bad thing as long as the abbreviations are held at arm's length and there's some humor to the cluing, and that's what we see here. Good job.

Let's hop the tour bus. No need to tip the driver.

Across:

1. Barely enough to notice: A TINGE

7. Defib expert: EMT

10. Monopolizes: HOGS

14. Like a side view: LATERAL

16. __ cross: TAU

17. Playing a fifth qtr., say: IN O.T.

20. Partnership for Peace org.: NATO.

21. "On the Waterfront" director Kazan: ELIA

22. Radio tuner: AM DIAL

28. Open a crack: AJAR

30. California agricultural farm name: KNOTT'S. You can still get the fried chicken and boysenberry pies that started the whole thing off when Mrs. Knott started serving meals on the berry farm. The food is pretty good.

31. City near Berlin: POTSDAM. Site of the Potsdam Conference in 1945 when Stalin, Churchill and Truman carved up post-WWII Europe. Not sure quite how well that turned out.

35. Exercise regimen complement: DIET. Exercise regimen compliment: Looking good!

36. Bagged leaves?: TEA

42. __-mo: SLO

43. One-named supermodel: EMME

44. Flying biter, informally: SKEETER. This was new to me. As kids, we used to build "Super Skeeter" balsa wood airplanes like this one (although it looks like the tail fin is missing!)


45. Put forward with confidence: ASSERT

47. General vibe: AURA

54. Chew out: REBUKE

55. "Beautiful Girls" singer Kingston: SEAN. This song passed me by in the early 2000's, but it's got more than 500m hits on YouTube so someone's been playing it.

56. Pianist Gilels: EMIL

64. Fit figure: SIZE

65. Semi-important part?: CAB

67. "Now!": STAT!

68. "That's odd ... ": HMM

69. Binge-watch, perhaps: STREAM. There's been a lot of that going on recently. I'm surprised that the Amazon and Netflix tech infrastructure has been able to keep up with the demand, that's pretty impressive.

Down:

1. Skiing spot: ALP. It's funny, I never really thought of alps in the singular until I came across them in crosswords. You wouldn't say that Mt. Everest is a himalaya, but there's no arguing that Alp d'Huez isn't an alp. English is a funny language, as we all know. Is Mont Blanc an alp, or a peak in the alps? Troubling times.

2. La Brea goo: TAR. I love the smell of hot tar.

3. Skater Midori: ITO

4. Composer Rorem: NED. Known from crosswords past. I had absolutely no idea what his music is like. Here's a snippet of his Pulizer Prize-winning composition "Air Music".

5. Playful criticism: GRIEF

6. Birdie topper: EAGLE. Golf, two under par for an eagle, one under for a birdie. Did you watch the Mickleson/Woods Tom Brady/Peyton Manning charity event at the weekend? I was sceptical but it was a lot of fun, and together they raised more than $20m. That's a good afternoon's work.

7. Extras on many Syfy shows: ET'S

8. Chinese chairman: MAO

9. Ahi serving: TUNA STEAK

10. Bhagavad Gita believers: HINDUS. The best-known of the Hundu scriptures.


11. Studio sign: ON AIR

12. Did so-so in class: GOT A "C"

13. Took badly?: STOLE. Nice clue.

15. Place for a long winter's nap: LAIR

19. Fun time: LARK

23. Spotted pattern: MOTTLE

24. "Midnight Cowboy" hustler: RATSO. Not the most attractive of characters, I think it's fair to say. Great performance by Dustin Hoffman though.

25. Once, once: ERST

26. "... __ quote:": AND I

27. Pork cuts: LOINS

28. Emer. alerts: APB'S

29. One of the Minor Prophets: JOEL. What makes a "minor" prophet? Prophetic output? Accuracy? If I make two prophecies and I'm spot-on does that make me less minor than a prolific prophet with a 50% hit rate? We should be told.

32. Makes a decent living: DOES OK

33. Close proximity: ARM'S REACH

34. Played charades: MIMED

36. Add: TOT UP. Is this English English? I'm not sure I've heard the phrase in the USA.

37. Part of DOE: Abbr.: ENER. I get "Environment" and "Energy" mixed up.

38. Tourist city about 110 miles from New Delhi: AGRA. Site of the Taj Mahal. I was going to visit the last time I was in Delhi, but the pollution was so bad that I didn't want to go outside. I was told that the round trip would take around eight hours by car, so I skipped it. I still came down with bronchitis so bad that I tore rib cartilages coughing so hard.

40. "Deadwood" actress Jewell: GERI. Thank you, crosses.

41. 12-time NFL Pro Bowler Junior: SEAU. A  great player, and a tragic victim of brain trauma which led to his suicide. 

45. Talisman: AMULET

46. Australian isl. state: TASM.

48. Media attention: PRESS

49. Pay: REMIT

50. Spanish resort island: IBIZA

51. Green spaces: LEAS

52. Retail statistic: SALES. It doesn't take a prophet, even a minor one, to tell you retail sales will be down this year.

53. Get-go: ONSET

58. Setting for some war movies, familiarly: 'NAM

59. "THINK" sloganeer: IBM. My PC laptop is a ThinkPad, named for the slogan, before IBM sold their PC business to Lenovo.

60. Crew aid: OAR

61. Mod or nod ending: ULE

62. Intel-gathering gp.: N.S.A.

63. __ Pérignon: DOM. Cheers!


My company just gave me a Macbook Air, so now I've got my Chromebook, the aforementioned Lenovo laptop and a snazzy new Mac. To say I don't know whether to scroll down for up, up for down, whether to command- or ctrl-, use a left mouse button or not and "confused" is an understatement. Plus all the keyboards are just a little different regarding spacing. All good fun. Getting a screen grab of the grid and coloring in the "ALSO" squares was a good (!!!!) learning experience. Except I missed one. Doh!

Here it is, in all its Chromebook/PC/Mac glory, and thanks again to Bruce for the fun.

Steve