Thursday, March 09, 2006

(Blockbuster!) BH#31

My debt to Wikipedia can never be repaid. So deep and wide are its awesome dimensions. I chain-set most of this quiz by tapping the "Random Articles" link and seeing where jumping from article to article would take me. Some very boring places, but thankfully some very interesting places. Praise be to all Wikipedia contributors, except the ones who write entries about no-hoper alternative bands, and small towns in Massachusetts. No, I don't mean to be nasty about such sterling efforts. They have admirable diligence. And you're all mad and I thank you for it. Actually, I'd always meant to set a Wikipedia-chain quiz and it seems I have done it. Hurrah for the subconscious achievement of one's goals! I'll sedate myself now. I would never say the word 'hurrah' in real life. My mumbly vocal chords are incapable of such fulgent celebration.

Also, doing this, piling through the whole website makes me think I hardly know anything. Then I have to remind myself that everyone feels the same way. I am also getting a blister on my scrollng finger. By the way, I'm not writing in one humungous lump. So that first paragraph? I did two hours ago, and the first sentence of this one half an hour ago. And nope, I never did get round to sedating myself. On and on and on, I go ... but I'd like to reiterate: in terms of knowledge, you get to the horizon then you see another. Fine, you think, you're already halfway. Then you realise there are about a thousand waiting to be reached, that might as well be stretching into infinity. Sure you do go a long way, but all that effort. It's too much. Then, of course, you die, unfulfilled, wondering if you could have set up a Christian mission in Africa and won a Nobel Prize. That normal life looks so enticing. Fifteen minutes later ... you can see how I'm gunning for world and European general knowledge. I must confess: it would be nice if I did well in those championships.

Twenty minutes later ... okay, I'm done. There are 75 questions here, some are very long and some are silly, but I feel they share a commodity called usefulness. However, this is what happens when you set a Wikipedia-chain quiz. You don't know when to stop, and by the time you have three hours have passed. The saving grace of this is that it stops me from watching TV. The gogglebox has swallowed up enough of my life. I could have been watching Quizmania last night. But I didn't (oh, I watched it the other night. Debbie was back on and was dressed in a manner that can only be described as Deadwood-whore chic. An intricate and daring corset, indeed. You had to look rather close to confirm the presence of some blush-saving jeans. Frankly, I ended up more disturbed by her calling every quizmaniac/sucker "my love", even when they were middle-aged men who sounded like they had just finished an hour-long session spent copulating with a gang of stray dogs. She also sounded like a West Country milkmaid who was plying wares of dairy goodness. Only, you had to remember, she was giving her audience false hope and murderous phone bills instead).

1 Which Scottish poet, humorist and musician, who died this month following a stroke, appeared in The Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour in the role of Buster Bloodvessel?
2 In which North American city are the headquarters of the International Civil Aviation Organisation?
3 Produced in Guangdong province, the Chinese liqeuer Canton is flavoured with what?
4 Mentioned in the Mahabarata, which ancient Indian game is presumed to be the ancestor of the strategic board games chess, shogi, janggi and makruk?
5 Said to be the first great Australian tennis player, which sportsman was nicknamed The Wizard and became the first leftie to win the Wimbledon men's singles in 1907?
6 Which golfer from Northern Ireland's victory at the 1947 Open Championship remains the sole win for any player from either side of the Irish border?
7 Melyssopalynology is the study of what?
8 Also called complete metamorphism, what term is applied to insect groups to describe the specific kind of insect development that has four life stages: embryo, larva, pupa and imago?
9 On which island is Narawantapu National Park?
10 In which national park are Venezuela's Angel Falls located?
11 What names are given to table-like mesas found only in the Guiana highlands, for example Monte Roraime and Autana, and have a name given to them by the indigenous people meaning "Houses of the Gods"?
12 Which river is called Bahr al Azraq by the Sudanese and Abbay by the Ethiopians?
13 Which Clapham Rovers player, who made his national debut in 1879, did Wayne Rooney usurp as England's youngest ever football player?
14 What make was the car, the General Lee, in the TV show The Dukes of Hazzard?
15 By what name do we now know the once great forest of Anderida?
16 Which military figure's last words were: "Tell Hill he must come up. Strike the Tent"?
17 What Greek name meaning the "apportioners" was the other name for the Fates?
18 Owner of the middle name Haag, whose "name band" was the first to employ Frank Sinatra as a singer in 1939?
19 Famed for its shoes and furs, which Italian fashion brand began in 1918 when Adele Casagrande opened a leather and fur shop in Via del Plebiscito in Rome; its name coming from the man she married in 1925?
20 Pamplona's running of the bulls (a.k.a El encierro) is held every year during which nine-day festival?
21 Now denoting any red wine from the eponymous region that does not adhere to the usual blending laws, what kind of wine came about in the 1970s when Piero Antioni decided to make a richer drink by eliminating the white grapes?
22 Also known as the Boer Revolt or Five Shilling Rebellion, which Boer uprising at the beginning of World War Two against the government of the Union of South Africa took its name from the head of a commando of Union forces on the border of German South West Africa who had allied himself with the Hun?
23 Which Dutch football team is nicknamed Boeren or 'Farmers' due to its provincial city origins?
24 Made famous by David Blaine, which impromptu magic trick sees the performer apparently levitate a few inches above the ground and is named after its late Italian-American creator?
25 Educated in Liege between 1075 and 1081, which Bohemian priest and historian (d. 1125) wrote his 3-book magnum opus Chronica Boemorum (Chronicles of Bohemia) in Latin?
26 Retained in the rare cases of the dioceses of Lincoln and Lichfield after the 16th century's Act of Dissolution, which term described a type of canon and administrative post connected to a cathedral or collegiate church, and was derived from the benefice or income made from church estates?
27 Known by the initials BMC, which national representative body has its HQ at Didsbury in Manchester?
28 A drumlin is a similar formation to what type of rocky hill or mountain, but with a less resilient core, an example being the rock on which Edinburgh Castle stands?
29 From the Greek for "constant boiling", what term describes a mixture of two or more compounds which at a specific composition has a vapour in equilibrium with that liquid with the same composition as the liquid?
30 Where is the Royal Engineers Museum and Library?
31 Who has been President of the Democratic Republic of Congo since the previous incumbent's assassination in January 2001?
32 Believed by some to be the ancestors of the ethnic group, the Hazaras, which ancient dwellers of Afghanistan constructed the Buddhas of Bamiyan?
33 Which Bristol-born guitarist has been a member of Dead or Alive, The Sisters of Mercy and The Mission, and also played on records by All About Eve?
34 Which Greek city in the Peloponnese has Nafplio for its historic harbour and had its ancient acropolis sited on Larissa hill?
35 Formed in 1972 by Gary Gygax and Don Kaye, which game-publishing company is most famous for producing the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game?
36 Written by Valencian knight Joanot Martorell and finished by Marti Joan de Galba, which key work in Catalan literature was published in 1490 and featured an eponymous knight who from Brittany who has a series of adventures before asked by the Emperor of the Greeks to help him fight the Turks?
37 Also known as paraffins, what are saturated hydrocarbons without cycles called in chemistry?
38 Anglian York was firstly capital of which kingdom of 6th century AD that took its name from the name of a Brythonic kingdom which meant "waters"?
39 What phrase has been used to describe the series of campaigns that William the Conqueror waged in the winter of 1069-70 in order to subjugate such areas as Northumbria and the Midlands?
40 Called "contre-torpilleur" in French and "Zerstorer" in German, what naval term describes a fast, maneuvrable and long-endurance warship that escorts larger vessels in a fleet and defends them against smaller, short-range attackers?
41 What Taiwanese city is the second largest after Taipei?
42 According to Geoffrey of Monmouth, the legendary king of the Britons, Leir, built the city of Kaierleir. By what modern name is it known?
43 Located about 40km south of Salzburg, which Austrian cave was officially discovered by Anton Posselt in 1879 and is the biggest ice-cave in the world?
44 Which 1968 war movie was famously filmed at the medieval castle Burg Hohenwerfen in Austria?
45 "Ex astris, scienta" (From the stars, knowledge) is the motto of which fictional organisation in a well-known TV show?
46 Known for its Virgil-derived motto "Avorum Cultus Pecorumque" (Caring for the fields and beasts), the Royal Agricultural College is based in which market town?
47 Meaning "good men", what name was given to the aristocratic faction of the later Roman republic and included among them Sulla, Cicero and Brutus?
48 Abbreviated as POGG, which country's motto is often used to describe the principles upon which that country's Confederation took place?
49 Which English city adopted the motto Semper Fidelis in 1588 to signal its loyalty to the Crown, and is also the motto of the Royal Navy's warship that bears its name?
50 Which Caribbean island has idyllic beaches located at the village of Castara, and Bloody Bay and Englishman's Bay?
51 Rumoured to have married Wizzard singer Roy Wood at one point, which pioneering British Asian presented the children's TV pop show Lift Off from 1969-74?
52 The Italian actress Rosalinda Celentano is best known in English-speaking countries for which 2004 film role?
53 Which monotheistic religion, practiced mostly in southern Iraq and the Iranian province of Khuzestan, may have derived its name from the Biblical Aramaic for 'knowledge' and uniquely do not recognise Jesus, Moses or Muhammad but revere John the Baptist as a great teacher?
54 The lytic and lysogenic cycles are the two cycles of what type of reproduction?
55 Born at Tagaste in modern day Algeria, which saint (333-387) was the mother of St Augustine of Hippo?
56 Which perennial herb has about 350 species including Citrus, Woolly, Creeping and Wild, the last being an important nectar source for honeybees?
57 The turning point in which comedienne's career came when she was chosen to star with Gary Cooper in 1936's Mr Deeds Goes to Town, and followed up with Mr Smith Goes to Washington and a Best Actress nomination for 1943's The More The Merrier?
58 Founded in 1943, where is the Hockey Hall of Fame? (thinking Ice Hockey and NHL here)
59 Which Argentinian city is located in the foothills of Sierras Chicas mountains on the Suquia river and was founded in 1573 by Jeronimo Luis de Cabrera? Its "National University" is the oldest in South America.
60 Which Austrian physicist invented statistical mechanics and hanged himself while holidaying in Italy in 1906?
61 Inventor of an eponymous "phase rule" in chemistry, which American mathematical physicist invented vector analysis and was the first person in the USA to ever receive an engineering PhD (from Yale)?
62 In 1576, who built The Theatre, London's first purpose-built public theatre, on what is now Curtain Road in Hoxton?
63 Abbreviated CEA, which congenital, inherited bilateral eye disease of dogs affects the retina, sclera and choroid coat?
64 The French artist Jean Dubuffet created which label to art created outside the boundaries of official culture, applying it to work produced by insane asylum inmates?
65 A limited form of which originated in the British Parliament in 1660, what right to send mail for free is typically granted to select elected officials by government?
66 In Japan what kind of musical instrument is a shakuhachi?
67 Which name is given to "blowing meditation" or Zen Buddhist practise of playing the shakuhachi as a means of attaining self-realisation, and is used by monks of the Fuke sect, whose practitioners are called "komuso" (emptiness monks)?
68 Viracopos-Campinas International Airport serves which major city?
69 Designed by Larry Wall in 1987, the name of the programming language Perl is a contraction of which four words (not including 'and')?
70 ZAZ, standing for the Zaporizhia Automobile Building Plant, is the main car-manufacturer of which country?
71 Murimuria is the underworld and Buroku the heaven of which mythology?
72 One of the top four "Super Major" oil companies in the world, which company is headquartered in Paris and was founded in 1924 as the "Compagnie francaise des petroles" (CFP: French Company of Petroleums)?
73 What stock exchange was formed in September 2000 in a merger of the stock exchanges of Paris, Amsterdam and Brussels in order to take advantage of the harmonisation of EU financial markets, and in 2002 merged with the Portuguese stock exchange BVLP and the London-based LIFFE?
74 Which architect known for his New Design style saw his career take off in 1982 when he designed the interiors for the private apartments of President Mitterand, and more recently, gave the Eurostar train service a £35 million refurbishment and been commissioned to build a Virgin Galactic 'spaceport' in New Mexico?
75 Born in Venice in 1922 to French parents, which fashion designer introduced the "bubble dress" in 1954?

Answers to BH quiz #30
1 Genco Olive Oil Company 2 Ron Pickering 3 Aulus Gellius 4 Houston 5 Interstatal 6 Patriarch of the West 7 Kuntsevo 8 Tolstoy 9 Jacques Offenbach 10 Alsos 11 Otto Hahn 12 Mainau Declaration 13 Clark Gable 14 Russell Coutts 15 Blu-ray Disc 16 Spectroscopy (spectra) 17 The War of the Triple Alliance (Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay) 18 Uruguay 19 French Guiana 20 Victor Hugo 21 Sandor Petofi 22 Bret "The Hitman" Hart 23 Golf 24 Krypteia 25 Bilderberg Group 26 Beati Paoli (from San Francisco di Paola) 27 Club of Rome 28 Voltaic Pile 29 Albert Anastasia 30 Lew Jenkins

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