Musings of a Dead Parrot

THIS WEEK'S QUIZ
1. What legendary label-mate wrote Mary Wells's "My Guy" and the Temptations' "My Girl"? Besides Berry Gordy, can you name another song writer for Motown? I'll guess Gordy.
2. What nickname is shared by South Dakota, Florida, and Australia's Queensland? Queensland has a gold coast.
3. What pastime is technically termed "rhinotillexis"? rhino means nose. The only pastime involving I can think of involving the nose is nose humming.
4. What star of a TV megahit is also a department chair at Parsons The New School for Design in New York City? Ty Pennington is the only host of a makeover show whose name I know. Or is this someone like Jeff Probst, Phil Keoghan or even James Lipton? I will guess Lipton. I think the Actor's Studio is part of the New School.
5. What are "all alike," according to the famous first sentence of Anna Karenina? unhappy families
6. What movie classic almost produced a sequel called Brazzaville, set exactly 3,000 miles to the southeast? Casablanca. Learned this from the Pub Quiz.
7. What unusual distinction is shared by these people? Tony Danza, Berry Gordy Jr., Sammy Hagar, Ed "Too Tall" Jones, Nelson Mandela, Harry Reid, Roy Scheider, and George Wallace. I think this has something to do with boxing.

LAST WEEK'S ANSWERS
1. What two words that can each mean "a lock of hair" are also the first names of voice actors on The Simpsons? Those would be "hank" (Azaria) and "tress" (MacNeille). I wish I'd realized ahead of time that there's a "Harry Shearer" pun to be made here. I got 1/2 of this on my own.
2. Whose Westminster, Maryland pumpkin patch was named a national historic landmark in 1988? That was Whittaker Chambers's family pumpkin patch, where he briefly hid the famous Alger Hiss "Pumpkin Papers." This is really obscure US history. Never heard of the Pumpkin Papers before.
3. What's the only NFL team that now plays a game every season outside the U.S.? The Buffalo Bills recently announced a deal to play one home game every season in Toronto. Poorly worded question. Buffalo has not played any games in Toronto so you can't say that they now play a game every season outside the US. Should have used future tense.
4. What did an Arles, France prostitute named Rachel receive wrapped in newspaper as an early Christmas gift on December 23, 1888? Part of Vincent Van Gogh's left ear. Merry Christmas! Good thing Rachel wasn't Jewish...you probably don't want eight days of holiday gifts when someone's sending you body parts. Correct
5. Because of the posture it requires, what household fixture takes its name from a French word for "pony"? "Bidet" means "pony." Ride 'em cowboy. I think this should have read, "because of the posture required to use this household fixture . . ." I was thinking of an appliance shaped like a horse like a mixer.
6. Jain monks of the Digambara sect are unusual in that they wear what? Digambara monks are "sky-clad"--that is, they wear nothing at all. No clue on this one.
7. Who comes last in this sequence? Cloris Leachman, Ellen Burstyn, Tatum O'Neal, Valerie Perrine, Carol Kane, Mariel Hemingway, Cathy Moriarty, ______. This turned out to be harder than I thought it was. These are the last seven women to be Oscar-nominated for performances they gave in black and white (the movies are The Last Picture Show, Paper Moon, Lenny, Hester Street, Manhattan, and Raging Bull). This hasn't happened since 1980...until this year! The answer is Cate Blanchett, for the (mostly color, actually) I'm Not There.

# posted by The O'Brien's Team @ 8:48 AM