If you enjoy picking nits, Crossworld is for you. Today’s clue at 33D was “San Pellegrino offering,” and the answer was LEMON SODA. Innocent enough? Hardly. It was taken to task on two grounds: Sanpellegrino is one word (OMG, it is!), and their product is “Limonata, a sparkling lemon beverage,” not “soda.”
If you go to the company website, it does confirm the “one word” gripe. The mineral water is S. Pellegrino, but the company is consistently listed as Sanpellegrino. They don’t use the word “soda” themselves, preferring “sparkling beverage,” or various other terms, but defenders note that since it contains sugar and is carbonated, it meets the definition of soda. Sheesh.
“Music Mann?,” at 41A was AIMEE. She was born in Richmond, VA, and is 62 years old — yikes! She’s six feet tall, with long arms to reach all the way down to lace up her boots. Oh, hi Aimee — didn’t mean to interrupt. Owl chatter here.
When she was three, her mother had an affair and became pregnant and her parents divorced. Aimee was kidnapped by her mother and her new boyfriend and taken to Europe. Her father, a marketing executive, hired a private detective, who brought her back from England a year later to a new stepmother and two stepbrothers. Aimee said her father was like a stranger when they were reunited, and she did not see her mother again until she was 14. It scarred her.
In addition to her prodigious musical successes, she was in The Big Lebowski, and, on TV, in The West Wing. Mann said songwriting is “an exercise in order… To attempt to describe something — to make connections, to put pieces together, to try to sum up complicated ideas in a three-and-a-half minute song — that’s trying to put chaos in order for me.” She names Leonard Cohen and Elton John among her influences.
For puzzles, it’s important to remember that it’s SACHA Baron Cohen, not “Sasha.” He’s a pretty serious guy, when not in the role of a lunatic like Borat. He says things like: “I remember, when I was in university I studied history, and there was this one major historian of the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw. And his quote was, ‘The path to Auschwitz was paved with indifference.’ I know it’s not very funny being a comedian talking about the Holocaust, but I think it’s an interesting idea that not everyone in Germany had to be a raving anti-Semite. They just had to be apathetic.”
Cohen is not a religious Jew, but tries to keep kosher and goes to services about twice a year. He married actress Isla Fisher after she converted to Judaism and they have three kids. In 2015, they donated $500,000 to Save the Children to help vaccinate children in northern Syria against measles; they donated the same amount to the International Rescue Committee, also aimed at helping Syrian refugees.
After Borat, the government of Kazakhstan threatened Cohen with legal action. The NYT reported that Cohen (in character as Borat) replied: “I’d like to state that I have no connection with Mr. Cohen and fully support my government decision to sue this Jew.”
He was, however, defended by Dariga Nazarbayeva, the daughter of Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev, who stated, “We should not be afraid of humor and we shouldn’t try to control everything.” The deputy foreign minister invited Cohen to visit the country, stating that he could learn that “women drive cars, wine is made of grapes, and Jews are free to go to synagogues.” After the success of the Borat film, the Kazakh government, including the President, altered their stance on Cohen’s parody, recognizing the invaluable press coverage the controversy created for their country. And the number of men who are married to goats has dropped substantially.
Cohen played Abbie Hoffman in the Trial of the Chicago 7 film in 2020, and guest starred in a Simpsons episode as a quick-tempered Israeli tour guide.
Did someone mention Abbie? — former Sandwich Man in the dorms at Brandeis? Here’s a quote: “Women’s rights? I can’t support women’s rights. The next thing you know, men will want rights too!”
At 39A, the clue was “‘A guy walks into a bar’ may start one,” and the answer was JOKE. Here’s Norrie’s favorite (Hi Nor!) — A skeleton walks into a bar. The bartender says “What’ll it be?,” and the skeleton says: “A beer and a mop, please.”
At 44A, the clue was “Cocktail named for two iconic beverage brands,” and the answer was JACK AND COKE. The JACK is Jack Daniels, of course. Remember Pacino in Scent of a Woman asking Charlie for a “John Daniels?” Charlie says, “Isn’t it Jack?” and Pacino replies: “Well, when you’ve known him as long as I have . . . “
I don’t know why I find this poem by Ted Kooser so moving. It can’t be that I’m getting soft, because I’ve always been soft. Anyway, it’s called “Splitting an Order.” Thanks for stopping by. I’ll see you tomorrow.
I like to watch an old man cutting a sandwich in half,
maybe an ordinary cold roast beef on whole wheat bread,
no pickles or onion, keeping his shaky hands steady
by placing his forearms firm on the edge of the table
and using both hands, the left to hold the sandwich in place,
and the right to cut it surely, corner to corner,
observing his progress through glasses that moments before
he wiped with his napkin, then to see him lift half
onto the extra plate that he asked the server to bring,
and then to wait, offering the plate to his wife
while she slowly unrolls her napkin and places her spoon,
her knife, and her fork in their proper places,
then smooths the starched white napkin over her knees
and meets his eyes and holds out both hands to him.
The Wellington Files 