What Do Giraffes Know About Trivia?

Well, I think I've waited long enough. 'Tis time to reveal the answers from Monday's trivia post and award the winner. Yes, I know it's only been two days, but there don't appear to be any more answers forthcoming, and quite frankly, because the answers received were all of such stellar quality, I've decided to pull rank and close up the contest...

Plus, I needed something to post about tonight.

So, here we go. Drum roll, and all that hoo-ha, please....

1. What type of insect is kept in apiaries? Bees are kept in apiaries, which are places where they build their hives.
2. Only three American presidential candidates won at least 520 electoral votes in their race for the White House. Who are they and how many votes did they get? Franklin Delano Roosevelt garnered 523 in 1936; Richard Nixon, 520 in 1972; and Ronald Reagan, 525 in 1984. Each of them was running for a second term.
3. How long have people cooked with chili peppers? Archaeologists have found evidence in northwestern Ecuador that chilies were cultivated and used in cooking 6,000 years ago.
4. Why should you be concerned if your elderly grandparent suddenly likes rock and roll? According to a recent report by researchers at Italy's National Center for Research and Care of Alzheimer's Disease, sudden changes in musical taste may be an indication that an elderly person is suffering from dementia.
5. For what activity is baseball player Moe Berg best known? As a player, Moe Berg was only a journeyman infielder/catcher who had a .243 lifetime batting average over his sixteen year career. But, Moe Berg was also a spy for the Americans. Among other things, in 1934, while touring Japan with a team that included Babe Ruth, he took photographs of Tokyo that helped guide American bombers during the war.

If you want to get technical, AK was the winner with a whopping two correct answers. However, what Tim & Jesse lacked in correct answers, they made up for with humor, which counts double. AK was also humorous, but he sacrificed some of it in order to show off and actually be right.

So, from my perspective we have a three way tie. I could be a right jackass here and declare that because of this stalemate, no one gets anything. However, I'm not a jackass. I'm a nice guy. Therefore, everyone gets a prize! Specifically, since I like it so much, they get a copy of the book where these questions came from - Do Giraffes Sleep Standing Up? It's great to just thumb through when you have a few moments, or when you're stuck writing a thesis/dissertation which, as luck would have it, all three of our contestants are smack in the middle of doing. Come to think of it, doesn't it strike you as odd that these three people, who should be hard at work, are the only folks with enough time to bother posting answers? Hmm? Don't let the intellectual elitism fool you, people. These learned friends of ours are busy gettin' advanced degrees in Intarweb surfin!!!

Anyway, yes, a copy of the book it is. Except for Goof (Jesse.) Since she gave me the book in the first place, she gets Mad Libs - Dan Brown edition if they have them. Congratulations to all, and look for an email from me in the coming days to find out where exactly I should send your prize. Toodles until tomorrow!

No Googling Allowed!

After last night's escapades, I think I'm going to make it an early night tonight. So, instead of being boring and posting another YouTube clip, I'm going to post five, count 'em FIVE trivia questions from the new trivia book Goof sent me in the mail today. I won't mention the name of the book until I post the answers (I wouldn't want you to go run to the store and look 'em all up) but, needless to say, being the trivia hound that I am, I'm thrilled with Mr. FedEx man's most recent delivery.

The first person to correctly answer all five questions will receive some sort of prize for me which I haven't thought of yet. Prize expense will probably be determined by how much I like you. If I don't like you at all, I'll just say you cheated, provide no real evidence and disqualify you anyway. Sounds fair, right? Good. Ready? Here we go:

1. What type of insect is kept in apiaries?
2. Only three American presidential candidates won at least 520 electoral votes in their race for the White House. Who are they and how many votes did they get?
3. How long have people cooked with chili peppers?
4. Why should you be concerned if your elderly grandparent suddenly likes Rock and Roll?
5. For what activity is baseball player Moe Berg best known?

Answers will be given in a future post along with the title of the book these questions came from. Good Luck, all you Cliff Claven wannabes!

Sweathogs & Barfly's

Thank god for Mental Floss. It always comes through when you're in a pinch. Here I am, at 10:18 on Monday evening, ready to brush my teeth and then lie in bed for a little bit with my new book (see? There it is on the sidebar. Doesn't it look, cool? I'm all excited. Ooh, and I'll let you in on a little secret... a friend of mine helped to write it. Yes, really!) with a couple of good ideas to blog about, but unfortunately not enough time to write a lengthy enough post that the topics warrant.

So, this ought to tide you over until such time arrives. We have here, not one, but TWO television theme song quizzes. Fifteen brief sound clips from various television theme songs of yesteryear are provided, and you have to match them up with the correct show. Easy, right?

Well, I thought so. Normally, I'd be proud to have scored 100% on both quizzes, but then I remembered the subject matter we're dealing with here, and realized what such a score says about me. Namely, that I'm a loafing TV junkie with no life, and fewer prospects - or at least I was at one time (jury's still out on whether or not that's still the case.) Anyway, see how you do. Any child of the 80's is bound to score reasonably well. So, here you go.

TV Theme Song Quiz #1 - I found this the more easier of the two, but only because I'm not nearly as familiar with the "newer" TV shows as I am the older - go figure, right? Some of you may find this a bit frustrating. (Note: At the risk of giving away one of the answers here - the Family Ties theme song is one of the soundbites, however, there was an error on the page rendering and so the graphic you're supposed to match the song with doesn't appear. There's just a place to enter the number, with nothing next to it. Don't let that throw you off.)

TV Theme Song Quiz #2 - I'm betting we'll see lots of high scores on this one. I almost blew it at one point, unable to decide between the Dawson's Creek theme and Ally McBeal (both shows I despised.) I kind of guessed on those two... correctly as it turned out. Yay me.

Four and Twenty Blackbirds Baked In A Pi

A rare day indeed, is that which is comprised of not one, but TWO holidays. Yet, such is the case today… and for some reason, I’m still at work. This is a borderline outrage but, when considering that everyone else is also at work, the sting is somewhat lessened, I suppose.

Further lessening the sting is the fact that I didn't even know either holiday existed until I checked my Inbox this morning. It was there that the good folks at Mental Floss sent their random update informing me that today was both Albert Einstein’s birthday (OK… not a holiday, but maybe it should be) and International Pi Day (Get it? Pi=3.14blahblahblah? Today is 3/14? How cool is that?)

(Note: I have subscribed to many magazines over the years, but Mental Floss is the only one I have read consistently since subscribing. Other magazines would often sit on the coffee table until I “had time to read them” which, of course, never came. I make time to read Mental Floss. It’s ridiculously addictive, despite being a magazine which contains tons of trivia facts and detailed articles on subjects you’d never think to bother reading about on your own (such as Gary Larson, the Louvre museum, various art movements, etc…) I have often been accused of having a mind full of nothing but facts that are only useful when playing Trivial Pursuit or watching Jeopardy. Mental Floss is a big reason why. So are Uncle John’s Bathroom Readers and any music related website I can find.)

Anyway, math and physics have NEVER been my forte. In fact, I flat out sucked in both subjects in high school. However, there are others I know who both love and adore them, and it is to those people that I raise my mug of tea and say, “Happy Pi Day, chum… oh, and Happy Birthday, Albert!” And, if I may be so bold as to copy and paste from my Mental Floss newsletter (I really can’t believe I’m this much of a geek) I offer you some pie to digest in celebration. What better way to celebrate? Yummy stuff. Scarf it down.

HUMBLE PIE - While it's now an idiom for a humiliating apology, humble pie was actually eaten at one time. It was originally called "umble pie" - "umbles" being organ meat.

AMERICAN PIE - A Don McLean song. He said the title was simply a combination of "Miss America" and the phrase "as American as apple pie." Some sources say that American Pie was the name of the plane in which Ritchie Valens, Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper perished, but that's an urban legend. The plane had no name.

COW PIE - Sounds cute, but it's really a name for a pile of cow dung. Icky.

CHRISTMAS PIE - Mentioned in the nursery rhyme "Little Jack Horner." According to a likely untrue legend that surfaced about 300 years after the supposed event, the Abbot of Glastonbury, in an effort to gain favor with Henry VIII, sent a messenger named Horner with some property deeds hidden in a pie. (They were placed there to foil would-be thieves.)

BOSTON CREAM PIE – It's not really pie, but cake. Back when the recipe was first devised, cake pans were unheard of. So instead, the dessert was baked in two pie tins. The contents were then stacked and filled with custard or cream.

SHEPHERD'S PIE - Made of diced meat, mixed with vegetables and gravy, and covered on top with mashed potatoes. When baked in the oven, the potatoes turn hard and brown, but the pie itself doesn't have a real "crust." Why shepherd's pie? It was originally made with lamb.

ESKIMO PIE - Devised in 1920 by confectionary store owner Christian Nelson. A youngster came into his shop to buy an ice cream, then changed his mind and purchased a chocolate bar instead. Asked why he didn't get both, the youngster said, "I only got a nickel!" Nelson worked to find ways to make chocolate stick to ice cream, and his invention, first called the "I-Scream Bar," was later renamed Eskimo Pie.

PORKPIE HATS - Named because they physically resemble pork pie, a traditional British dish. It's made of pork and pork jelly baked inside a crust. Porkpie hats became common in America after vaudeville actors began wearing them. Jazz musicians further popularized them, as did actor Buster Keaton.