Dark Bilious Vapors

But how could I deny that I possess these hands and this body, and withal escape being classed with persons in a state of insanity, whose brains are so disordered and clouded by dark bilious vapors....
--Rene Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy: Meditation I

Home » Archives » November 2004 » Trivia, once again....

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11/20/2004: Trivia, once again....


The Knights Who Say Ni have requested, nay demanded, that another trivia challenge issue forthwith. Since I don't want them appearing on my doorstep saying "Ni!" to me incessantly, I hereby obey. Though that wasn't much of a task; I'd been meaning to do a trivia post for a while. So without further ado: The Questions!

1) While an active player, Davey Johnson batted immediately behind not one, but two of baseball's all-time home run hitters. Who were they?

2) She's been a flight attendant for Pan-Am and American Airlines. She's also had careers as a teacher, a nurse, a ballerina, a rock star, and an animal-rights activist. Who?

3) Meanwhile, in his career as a show business legend, he's played roles ranging from barber to matador. One of his Oscar winning films was about the Knights of the Round Table. Who is he?

4) Who was #1 on Mr. Blackwell's 37th Annual Worst-Dressed Women List in 1997?

5) According to my sources, only three pitchers in MLB history have thrown no-hitters in 2 different centuries. Who are they? (Extra credit if you can find one my sources missed.)

6) Oh, baby! What got 9 inches longer in 2004?

7) Two great writers both died on the same date: April 23, 1616. Who?

8) Contrary to the implication of the preceding question, the two writers in question did not die on the same day. Why not?

9) Just recently, in 2003, researchers at a University in Greater Manchester, England, finally debunked a popular fallacy being distributed in email. Now that the world knows the truth, just what is it that they proved?

10) After he grew older and lost his employment in Hollywood, this child actor later found employment as a hunting guide and bartender, boozing and carousing incessantly before meeting an early end at 32 by being shot to death over a $50 gambling debt. Who was this ill-fated wild child, and what was his best-known role?

11) In the Bond flick Moonraker, Our Hero James (played by the ever-so-suave Roger Moore) gains access to a restricted laboratory by watching as one of the villian's henchmen enters a secret code onto a musical numeric pad. What's interesting about the code?

12) After molding 1.4 billion crayons, over 37 years, Crayola's senior crayon maker, Emerson Moser, retired. What secret did he reveal after he had made his last crayon?

13) On an afternoon in 1966 an event at Boston's PBS station, WGBH, drew a crowd of 10,000 people, more than the same afternoon's Red Sox game. What was that event?

14) What situation defines "coyote ugly?"

15) One summer while on vacation, I was driving down I-94 in North Dakota near Jamestown, ND. What record-holding monument did I see (it's pretty damn near impossible to miss)?

16) What was the name of Apple's first personal computer which used a mouse for user input? For extra credit: why did it get that name?

17) Calvin Coolidge was known for his brevity. Although not necessarily shy, "Silent Cal" was certainly not verbose and rarely spoke at social gatherings. One evening at a dinner party, one senator's wife bet another that she could persuade the president to say three words over the course of the evening. What was Coolidge's response?

18) Certain people are deemed so important that they are not allowed to travel together, to reduce the risk that they will both be killed in an accident. The President and Vice-President of the US are two; Prince Charles and Prince William of the United Kingdom are two more. Two other people are not allowed to travel together, for fear that if they were to both die a certain critical secret would be lost forever. Who are they?

19) On September 17, 1977 the Tennessee Valley Authority shut down a nuclear power plant at Knoxville, TN, for 17 days, for an unusual reason. What was that reason?

20) The reason for the Knoxville reactor shutdown was unusual, but hardly weird, all things considered. At the University of Florida there's a research reactor that is constantly being shut down and restarted for what one might consider a very weird reason. What is that?

Answers posted on Tuesday, probably (to give y'all who are interested the same amount of time that most weekend challenges (which are usually posted on Friday evenings) have gotten.

Len on 11.20.04 @ 09:01 PM CST



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Replies: 10 comments

on Saturday, November 20th, 2004 at 10:23 PM CST, Dan said

Hey, two of my favorite subjects, Apple Computers and Calvin Coolidge! Awesomeness.

5) Cy Young and Randy Johnson?

16) The Lisa. And wasn't it the name of Steve Jobs's illegitimate child?

17) "You lose."

Woo hah, just add some ska and some 1870's baseball and you'd have all of my interests pegged down.

on Sunday, November 21st, 2004 at 9:46 AM CST, Len Cleavelin said

Your answer to 5 is two-thirds right; you're missing one. The others are correct.

Hmmmmm... I'll have to do some reading up on ska and 1870s baseball then; I tend to concentrate more in the modern (post-1900s) age myself.

on Sunday, November 21st, 2004 at 11:41 AM CST, mike hollihan said

#2/ Birgitte Bardot or Goldie Hawn?

#10/ The actor who played Buckwheat. (Or Buh-whee if you're an Eddy Murphy fan.)

#14/ Courtney Love? ;-)

#19/ Watt Bar nuke, and something to do with candles being used near the reactor.

Phew! These are tougher.

on Sunday, November 21st, 2004 at 5:53 PM CST, BSTommy said

1. Is it Eddie Mathews and Henry "the Hammer" Aaron?

2. Barbie?

3. I'm probably wrong, but is it Bugs Bunny?

7. Shakespeare and Cervantes.

12. That every crayon contained a little bit of his own earwax.

or

There is no such color as "blue." It's all a guvmint conspiracy.

on Sunday, November 21st, 2004 at 8:27 PM CST, Gooseneck said

#15: The worlds biggest Buffalo. One place I just have to visit before I die.

on Monday, November 22nd, 2004 at 3:15 AM CST, Grey said

1. Henry Aaron, Frank Robinson.

5. Cy Young, Hideo Nomo, Randy Johnson.

8. Living in different parts of the world, I'd wager.

11. It plays the theme from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" (thank you, Steven Spielberg).

14. (from a male's perspective) Waking up after a night of drinking next to a woman so ugly, that, were your arm trapped under her body, you would chew it off to escape (a la a coyote caught in a trap).

16. The Lisa. Steve Jobs' daughter.

17. "You lose."

18. Woodward and Bernstein.

on Monday, November 22nd, 2004 at 7:06 AM CST, Len Cleavelin said

I'm immensely gratified by the response this time. Let's acknowledge the correct answers given so far....

1) Hank Aaron is half the answer. Noboody's gotten the second star yet. Hint: think outside the MLB envelope.

2) and 3) BST knows his stuff. Barbie and Bugs are correct.

5) Grey finally got the third one. Young, Nomo and Johnson are the ones.

7) BST is on it again. And given the answer to 7, the answer to 8 should be fairly obvious now....

8) Pretty creative Grey, but not quite right.

10) Right series of shorts, Mike, wrong actor.

11) Right again, Grey.

12) Finally missed one, BST. But those were creative answers, so I'll give you some credit for that. Hint: "No such color as 'blue' " is, by a stretch, almost the correct answer, of sorts...

14) Mike's answer does have the ring of truth to it (OT digression: I'm shocked that The Smoking Gun doesn't have a mug shot of Ms. Love in their collection), but Grey has it nailed.

15) Correct, Goose. And it is pretty damn impressive.

16) and 17) Dan and Grey get those right.

18) "Woodstein" isn't the correct answer, but I like that kind of creativity...

19) I don't know if that's the name of the reactor, Mike, but the reason for shutdown isn't quite correct.

on Tuesday, November 23rd, 2004 at 9:23 AM CST, Gooseneck said

The next time you go up North Len, stop by here in Iowa. We'll have some beers.

on Tuesday, November 23rd, 2004 at 12:19 PM CST, SadPunk said

#18 is, I believe, the two guys who know the secret formula for Coca-Cola.

on Tuesday, November 23rd, 2004 at 1:03 PM CST, Len Cleavelin said

Goose, I rarely get up 'round that neck of the woods, but if I do you'll be the first to know.

And SP, that's absolutely right.

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