puzzle by sudokusnydictation.com

By Enrique Henestroza Anguiano
©2023 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
02/15/23

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

Edited by Patti Varol and Joyce Nichols Lewis

02/15/23

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

Release Date: Wednesday, February 15, 2023

ACROSS
1 Tool that can 
be a musical 
instrument
4 Not berthed
8 Designated
14 Confidentiality 
contract: Abbr.
15 Spider-Man 
co-creator Lee
16 Prophecy source
17 Get-together with 
a sketchy vibe?
19 Beam benders
20 Cookie-based 
dessert
21 Spanish “those”
22 Salon job
23 Marketer’s blitz 
campaign?
28 Affirmative 
replies
30 General on a 
menu
31 Sign of healing
32 __ Cruces, New 
Mexico
34 “Yeah, I guess”
36 Pickleball shot
37 Intercom call on 
Take Your Child 
to Work Day?
40 Mud bath spot
42 Bash who 
co-hosts CNN’s 
“State of the 
Union”
43 Mo
44 The Buckeye 
State
46 WNBA official
47 A few bucks, say
51 Shake Weight 
and The Flex 
Belt, per their 
infomercials?
55 Heaps
56 Limo destination
57 Jack up
59 Nut used to 
make vegan 
cheese
62 Cold Hawaiian 
treat ... or a 
directive followed 
four times in this 
puzzle?
63 Understood by 
few
64 Despise
65 Org. with seven 
teams in Canada
66 “This Is Spinal 
Tap” director
67 Lyft competitor
68 Game Boy 
batteries

DOWN
1 Beagle who pilots 
an imaginary 
Sopwith Camel
2 Like premium 
streaming 
services
3 Communion 
rounds
4 Urgent letters
5 Narrow piece
6 Foodie website 
covering 25 
metro areas
7 “__ takers?”
8 Arcade 
achievements
9 Bad move
10 Ups the ante
11 Telethon VIPs
12 Blight-stricken tree
13 __ Moines
18 Grapefruit kin
21 Succeed
24 “You can come 
out now”
25 Rights advocacy 
gp.
26 __ Tomé and 
Príncipe
27 Recede
29 Hourglass stuff
33 Draw for some 
pictures
35 Contact lens 
holders

37 Uttered
38 Hr. for an after-
lunch nap, 
maybe
39 Interval of eight 
notes
40 Cry noisily
41 Soup with rice 
noodles
45 Anne of Green 
Gables, for one
48 “Riverdale” 
actress 
Huffman

49 “Caught 
red-handed!”
50 Braces (oneself)
52 Nobel-winning 
chemist Joliot-
Curie
53 Process that may 
involve PT or OT
54 Roofing option
58 Of all time
59 Subway unit
60 “What __ those?”
61 Bio or chem
62 Moo __ pork

SUDOKU

WHISPER

“Please 
unblock me 
mom”

“Happy 
birthday, 
Emily You!”

WHISPER

By Wendy L. Brandes
©2023 Tribune Content Agency, LLC
02/01/23

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

Edited by Patti Varol and Joyce Nichols Lewis

02/01/23

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

Release Date: Wednesday, February 1, 2023

ACROSS
1 Unexpected 
obstacle
5 “Pronto!” letters
9 Suffers after a 
Pure Barre class, 
say
14 __ Top ice cream
15 Four Corners 
state
16 “If only!”
17 “Will do!”
18 Emperor after 
Claudius
19 __ touch
20 Forgettable band 
with a memorable 
song
23 Jazz pianist 
McCoy
24 Unnecessary
28 Pie crust fat
31 Ace a 
presentation
32 “Pipe down!”
37 Lingerie selection
38 Musical ability
39 Old PC platform
41 Snaky fish
42 Shopping cart 
fillers
45 Spot for spare 
change
48 Cook’s Illustrated 
offering
50 Lake bird with a 
wild laugh
51 Sotheby’s 
auctions, e.g.
54 Fragrance
58 Element of irony, 
and what can be 
found in each set 
of circled letters?
61 Like 18-Across
64 Goalie’s success
65 Per-hour amount
66 Not sleeping
67 Diva’s big 
moment
68 Simpson 
daughter voiced 
by Yeardley 
Smith
69 Came to a close
70 Shout
71 Opening for a 
hotel key card

DOWN
1 “Ask me 
anything!”
2 Mary Poppins, 
for one
3 Out of this world?
4 Went to a tutoring 
session, say

5 Many a 
godmother
6 Fret (over)
7 Judge who hit 
62 home runs in 
2022
8 Galaxy, for one
9 Set one’s sights 
on
10 “All the Birds in 
the Sky” Nebula 
winner __ Jane 
Anders
11 Monopolize
12 Prefix with dermis
13 Triple __: 
orange-flavored 
liqueur
21 Baghdad’s 
country
22 Room that may 
have a sectional 
sofa
25 Respected 
leader
26 Cucumber salad, 
coconut rice, etc.
27 Panache
29 Bacardi liquor
30 Blu-ray buy
32 Knightley of 
“Bend It Like 
Beckham”
33 “Peter, Peter, 
pumpkin __ ... ”
34 Build

35 Old name of 
Tokyo
36 Work hard
40 __-cone
43 Error
44 Brought about, 
as a movement
46 Like a red-carpet 
event
47 Opens, as a fern 
frond
49 Former 
quarterback 
Manning

52 Writing contest 
entry, maybe
53 Long look
55 “Reply all” 
medium
56 “Untrue!”
57 October 31 option
59 Malicious
60 Hand out cards
61 “Insecure” star 
Issa
62 Woolf’s “A Room 
of One’s __”
63 Fit to be tied

Wednesday, February 15, 2023 — 3
Arts
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Art has an ability to crack the 
surface and shove itself deep 
into every crevice of humanity. 
Once inside of us, art warps our 
foundations to add new mean-
ings to the lives we live, whether 
it be through pumping our hearts, 
pressing on our bruises or melt-

ing all of the soft, pink parts that 
make us human. Art can be an 
indulgence that outshines reality, 
but it is more powerful as a mir-
ror — reflecting the most vulner-
able, packed-away portions of our 
insides. This means that a connec-
tion to art requires a connection 
to self, and neither can be severed 
from its counterpart. So, while a 
work of art is an open wound, our 
connection to it is what keeps dig-

ging deeper and deeper into the 
skin until something strikes blood. 
For this reason, the consumption 
of art is the most intimate act of 
all. The Intimacies B-side is all 
about how art has shaped us and 
cut through us, and the tender-
ness we feel toward art. And while 
art may be the common diamond 
among our words, each work of art 
is surrounded by its own unique 
mix of vulnerability that only the 

observer can add to the master-
piece. Spanning from exploring 
how books bridge the gaps that 
love letters can’t to how art can 
become a makeshift home, this 
B-side has cocooned a cohort of 
writers who have split themselves 
open and let their own soft, pink 
parts fall right onto the page. This 
is a bit of a diary, this is a bit of 
an art critique and this is wholly 
what makes art worthwhile.

The Intimacies B-Side

On books as love letters 
and letting yourself 
be known

The intimacy of book-giving has 
two sides. There’s the side of the 
giver — of presuming to know the 
other person, of the vulnerability 
of exposing what you think is good 
or enjoyable. There’s the side of 
the receiver — of trusting the giver 
with untold hours of your life, 
with the deepest emotional part 
of yourself that a book can sneak-
ily unlock. As someone who gives 
and receives many books as gifts, 
the art of book-giving is something 
near and dear to my heart.
Famous anthropologist Mar-
cel Mauss has a theory of gift 
exchange, which says that gifts 
are ways of furthering and creat-
ing relationships. Unlike giving a 
gift, when you exchange money 
with the cashier at the grocery 
store, the goods (groceries and 
money) and actors (yourself and 
the cashier) are interchangeable. 
That very interaction could take 
place anywhere, between any two 
people. When you leave the store, 
the interaction is over.
But a gift exchange is differ-
ent — the actors are integral parts 
of the exchange itself because 
they inform everything about the 
interaction, and the interaction 
would be irrevocably changed 
should one or both of the actors be 
replaced. Because of this relation-
ship between the giver and the 
receiver, the gift itself becomes 
inalienable — that is, unable to be 
exchanged.

If my friend gets me a pair of 
earrings, and I lose those earrings 
and get the exact same pair from 
the same store, the fundamen-
tal nature of the object has still 
changed (and not just because I 
had to pay for them this time). 
That’s because part of the special-
ness of a gift is the fact that it is a 
gift. That pair of earrings becomes 
inextricably linked with my friend; 
I think of her when I see them and 
wear them. Our society takes issue 
with overt materialism, but it is 
natural to imbue certain objects 
with meaning, especially when 
they are given as gifts. 
I don’t have to explain why 
books contain innumerable shades 
of meaning. But giving a book as 
a gift is like saying, “Here’s the 
inside of my brain. Here’s what 
my heart looks like.” Or, similarly, 
“This is who I think you are. This 
is how I think of you.” Often, it’s 
a combination of these things. 
Sometimes, recommending a book 
is like saying, “Here, take a look at 
the deepest parts of myself that a 
stranger articulated so perfectly.” 
Giving a book requires trust, 
vulnerability and, above all, inti-
macy. You must trust the other 
person as they trust you. The book 
between you represents that trust. 
In a way, giving someone a book 
feels like offering them a love 
letter in which you pour out the 
inside of your brain and heart in an 
attempt to let them know you. And 
is there anything more terrifying 
than being known? 

EMILIA FERRANTE
 Daily Arts Writer 

 AVA BURZYCKI
Senior Arts Editor

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

With love, from ‘Love, Rosie’

“Although a classic ‘indie’ film, 
and what many may call just anoth-
er romcom, ‘Love, Rosie’ enamors 
me, just as much as Alex and Rosie 
are enamored with each other.”
The statement above is a direct 
quote from my application to The 
Michigan Daily Arts section, in 
which I specified that “Love, 
Rosie” had been the last piece of 
media to make me cry. 
I cry, a lot. I think crying is one 
of the most organic reactions the 
human body can engender. When 
we’re sad, we cry. When we’re 
angry, we cry. Even when we’re 
happy, we cry. Crying serves as the 
ultimate response catalyzed by any 
emotion we may experience that 
feels like it’s too much to handle. 
These emotions render us speech-
less, so we have no other option but 
to cry in an attempt to fully express 
them. Crying doesn’t make us sen-
sitive, and it most certainly does not 
make us weak. It makes us real and, 
above all, it makes us intimate.
I possess many intimacies — 
with one of them being that I cry 
when I watch romcoms. I really 
can’t tell you what it is about them. 
They just make me very emotional. 
But among all the romcoms I’ve 

ever watched (and trust me, I’ve 
watched a lot), “Love, Rosie” never 
fails to make me cry the hardest. 
From the looks they exchange 
to the laughs they share, Alex 
(Sam Claflin, “Me Before You”) 
and Rosie (Lily Collins, “Emily in 
Paris”) never run out of intimacies 
to bless each other with, and that’s 
what makes their love so beautiful 
and so special.
“Love, Rosie” is the movie adap-
tation of Cecelia Ahern’s novel 
“Where Rainbows End,” and it fol-
lows childhood best friends Alex 
and Rosie as they go on the epic 
rollercoaster that is the transition 
from adolescence to adulthood, 
falling in love with each other in 
the process. With countless “right 
person, wrong time” moments 
throughout the course of the 
movie, Rosie and Alex’s relation-
ship is slow-burn excellence, even 
if the buildup drives me insane.
Alex and Rosie are intimate 
with each other in insurmount-
able ways. For them, a smile, a look, 
even a fleeting moment means so 
much more than any physical con-
tact they could share, more than 
anything they leave unsaid. There 
is an intimacy in two pairs of lips 
almost touching, but not quite, in 
two people bound by their past, 
even in their vastly different pres-
ents, that no written word will ever 

be able to explain. It sometimes felt 
like they were able to communicate 
telepathically. Sure, they couldn’t 
verbalize their feelings. I mean, the 
reason why it takes so long for them 
to finally get together is that Alex 
assumed that Rosie was choosing 
to forget the kiss they shared on her 
18th birthday when she had, truth-
fully, forgotten. But apart from 
that, they understood each other 
in ways nobody else did. Their con-
nection always leads me to ques-
tion how they could be so intimate 
with each other while hiding the 
most vulnerable intimacy of all. 
The feelings that others may 
find impossible to understand were 
naturally and simultaneously com-
prehended by Alex and Rosie. For 

instance, when Rosie’s father died, 
she was virtually inconsolable. Her 
hopelessness is understandable, but 
one could only expect that her hus-
band would be able to appease her 
sorrow, even if to a small degree. 
Funnily enough, it wasn’t Greg 
(Christian Cooke, “Point Blank”) 
who was able to make her smile at 
her dad’s funeral. It was Alex. Alex 
knew exactly the gift to bring and 
just what to say. While Greg was off 
making jokes about Rosie’s cousin 
being a “bore,” Alex spoke wonders 
of Rosie’s dad and was able to bring 
their inner children back, even if 
for a short moment, in an attempt 
to comfort Rosie. 

 GRACIELA BATLLE CESTERO
Daily Arts Writer

Design by Phoebe Unwin

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Literally me: The cringe 
characters that knew me 
before I knew myself

“A character, sir, may always 
ask a man who he is.” — Luigi 
Pirandello 
Cringe. That awful feeling 
that gravitates your shoulders 
together, tightens every muscle 
in your face and sticks a needle in 
your soul. Cringe is a divider, the 
benchmark on which we measure 
what’s acceptable to enjoy on the 
internet and what is mocked end-
lessly. It is pure embarrassment, 
both second and firsthand, though 
somewhat arbitrarily assigned. 
I’ve been cringe in publication 
before — admitting myself as a 
Five Nights at Freddy’s and Sonic 
fan, as well as a “Morbius” ana-
lyzer — but none so far as these. 
When it comes to the characters 
I’ve intimately known, these are 
the three — across Shakespeare, 
musicals and anime — that always 
come to my mind.
I was in eighth grade when it 
first happened. As we were seated 
in my English class, I fixated on 
my class copy of “A Midsummer 
Night’s Dream,” trying my best 
to decipher a path through its 
Shakespearean labyrinth of lan-
guage. One character handed me 
a glowing thread and we began 
to understand each other. I don’t 
even remember the scene, but 
I remember when it clicked. I 
remember starting to skip over 
lines, just looking for the four 
capitalized letters and colon, 
the lines that spoke to my soul. I 
remember starting to giggle as I 
began to understand this grem-
lin and began to feel understood 
by the bard, despite being centu-
ries apart. I glanced around at my 
friends, who were confused by my 
barely-contained laughter, and 
explained:
“Dude, Puck is literally me.”

Now, what the hell was I on 
about? Well, for those unfamil-
iar with that totally niche classic, 
Puck’s basically the prototypical 
“silly little guy.” His defining char-
acter traits and contributions to 
the plot of “A Midsummer Night’s 
Dream” are causing problems on 
purpose and through incompe-
tence, but choosing to laugh at 
both. This is what stood out to 
me, more than any other fictional 
character I’ve read: a perhaps 
self-deprecating admission of my 
childhood cycle of self-sabotage. 
I was never the best-behaved kid, 
so I think having a character that 
exhibited his mistakes as enter-
tainment for himself rather than 
further degradation contained 
within a text almost half a millen-
nium ago — something about that 
was supremely significant to me.
The second time was as a 
high school freshman, fixating 
on something that you possibly 
might’ve heard of: the hip-hop 
historical musical “Hamilton.” 
What I’m going to confess is 
definitively cringey — the charac-
ter I found myself again intensely 
relating to, more than any other 
character, was that eponymous 
protagonist Alexander Hamil-
ton. Not the historical figure, of 
course, but this musical reimagin-
ing of the character. Looking back, 
my reasons were not as complex 
as relating to Puck. Alexander was 
simply a character who shared my 
love for the art of the argument, 
stemming from an annoying 
assumption that he was always in 
the right. I also related to his driv-
ing impetus being as existential 
as one should get in high school 
— to leave behind a legacy. What I 
reflect on now is how embarrass-
ing admitting that makes me feel, 
or at least how it used to feel.

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

SAARTHAK JOHRI
 Digital Culture Beat Editor 

Design by Evelyn Mousigian

