Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Ken Jennings Tuesday Trivia - March 19
THIS WEEK'S QUESTIONS
1. Athol Fugard, Alan Paton, J. M. Coetzee, and Nadine Gordimer are among the most respected writers ever to hail from what country? South Africa
2. What achievement in baseball can be statistically nullified if the scorekeeper rules "defensive indifference"? stolen base
3. What Cree Indian food staple was usually made by combining equal quantities of dried venison and melted fat? dried meat by itself is jerky. Is pemmican what you call dried venison and melted fat?
4. What song topped the British pop charts throughout January 1981, despite having been originally released almost a decade earlier? January 1981 was shortly after John Lennon's murder. Maybe "Imagine" became popular in Britain and re-entered the charts.
5. The 2013 OfficeMax/Office Depot merger makes the new company the largest in its space. What company is now #2? Staples. that was easy
6. Below fluorine, chlorine, bromine, and iodine on the periodic table sits what heaviest halogen, the rarest naturally occurring element on Earth? (If you don't count a few stray atoms of berkelium, that is.) rubidium? strontium? this question reminds me that I really should read The Disappearing Spoon with stories about the elements of the periodic table
7. What unusual distinction is shared by these books? The Bad News Bears, The Children of Men, The City of Ember, The Flight of the Phoenix, The Gangs of New York, The Silver Linings Playbook, The War of the Worlds all books were adapted into movies (in several cases more than one movie), but that is not unusual
LAST WEEK'S ANSWERS
1. What does a phlebotomist collect? Blood, if they stuck you right. "Phlebotomy" is the medical procedure of poking a hole in a vein. correct
2. What Rhode Island peninsula had its name immortalized in the semicircular prefab structures that the U.S. Army built there during World War II? Quonset huts, as they're still called, are named for Rhode Island's Quonset Point. correct
3. By what name do reality TV viewers better know Alana Thompson? That's what "Honey Boo Boo" will be called at Yale. correct
4. What type of Javanese cloth is colored using traditional wax-and-dye techniques? Batik. I have no joke about batik. Moving on. correct
5. What magazine credits its production to "The Usual Gang of Idiots"? That credit has been seen for well over half a century in the masthead of Mad magazine. correct
6. The Wright Brothers promised their father, Bishop Milton Wright, that they would never do what, a rule they broke only once in their aviation career, on May 25, 1910? That was the only time they ever flew together--with dad's permission. (They took him up in the next flight.) Bishop Wright didn't want to lose two children at once should a "Wright Flyer" crash, as early planes often did. correct
7. What unusual distinction is shared by all these famous folks? Richard Burton, Jefferson Davis, Lyndon Johnson, Carly Simon, Barbara Stanwyck, Ben Stiller. They all married someone named "Taylor." (Jefferson Davis was Zachary Taylor's son-in-law, for example. Cool.) If Taylor Swift would turn some of her ill-advised celebrity relationships into ill-advised celebrity marriages, this list could get a lot more interesting soon. correct - a rare 100% effort!
1. Athol Fugard, Alan Paton, J. M. Coetzee, and Nadine Gordimer are among the most respected writers ever to hail from what country? South Africa
2. What achievement in baseball can be statistically nullified if the scorekeeper rules "defensive indifference"? stolen base
3. What Cree Indian food staple was usually made by combining equal quantities of dried venison and melted fat? dried meat by itself is jerky. Is pemmican what you call dried venison and melted fat?
4. What song topped the British pop charts throughout January 1981, despite having been originally released almost a decade earlier? January 1981 was shortly after John Lennon's murder. Maybe "Imagine" became popular in Britain and re-entered the charts.
5. The 2013 OfficeMax/Office Depot merger makes the new company the largest in its space. What company is now #2? Staples. that was easy
6. Below fluorine, chlorine, bromine, and iodine on the periodic table sits what heaviest halogen, the rarest naturally occurring element on Earth? (If you don't count a few stray atoms of berkelium, that is.) rubidium? strontium? this question reminds me that I really should read The Disappearing Spoon with stories about the elements of the periodic table
7. What unusual distinction is shared by these books? The Bad News Bears, The Children of Men, The City of Ember, The Flight of the Phoenix, The Gangs of New York, The Silver Linings Playbook, The War of the Worlds all books were adapted into movies (in several cases more than one movie), but that is not unusual
LAST WEEK'S ANSWERS
1. What does a phlebotomist collect? Blood, if they stuck you right. "Phlebotomy" is the medical procedure of poking a hole in a vein. correct
2. What Rhode Island peninsula had its name immortalized in the semicircular prefab structures that the U.S. Army built there during World War II? Quonset huts, as they're still called, are named for Rhode Island's Quonset Point. correct
3. By what name do reality TV viewers better know Alana Thompson? That's what "Honey Boo Boo" will be called at Yale. correct
4. What type of Javanese cloth is colored using traditional wax-and-dye techniques? Batik. I have no joke about batik. Moving on. correct
5. What magazine credits its production to "The Usual Gang of Idiots"? That credit has been seen for well over half a century in the masthead of Mad magazine. correct
6. The Wright Brothers promised their father, Bishop Milton Wright, that they would never do what, a rule they broke only once in their aviation career, on May 25, 1910? That was the only time they ever flew together--with dad's permission. (They took him up in the next flight.) Bishop Wright didn't want to lose two children at once should a "Wright Flyer" crash, as early planes often did. correct
7. What unusual distinction is shared by all these famous folks? Richard Burton, Jefferson Davis, Lyndon Johnson, Carly Simon, Barbara Stanwyck, Ben Stiller. They all married someone named "Taylor." (Jefferson Davis was Zachary Taylor's son-in-law, for example. Cool.) If Taylor Swift would turn some of her ill-advised celebrity relationships into ill-advised celebrity marriages, this list could get a lot more interesting soon. correct - a rare 100% effort!
