Next 20 Flashcards
“Teléfono Nuevo,” “Gracias Por Nada,” and “Perro Negro” are among the many singles that were all on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in
October 2023 that feature what artist?
Bad Bunny
All American Girl debuted in 1994 and was the first major network sitcom with a majority Asian cast. Who was the Korean American stand-up comedian in the lead role?
Margaret Cho
American singer, songwriter, musician, and performance artist who is the lead vocalist, pianist, and lyricist of the duo the Dresden Dolls. Married Neil Gaiman until 2022.
Amanda Palmer
Which Oklahoma city (which is not Oklahoma City) frequently labels itself the “Oil Capital of the World”?
Tulsa
Dusty Springfield was first performer on Top of the Pops with what song in 1964?
I Only Want To Be With You
The Rolling Stones were first band to perform on Top of the Pops with which song?
“I Wanna Be Your Man”
In 1966, what early Gay Rights organization staged a “sip-in” to protest the law against serving homosexuals in bars? Julius’, the
Greenwich Village bar where this first happened, now holds a monthly party named in honor of this group.
Mattachine Society
On Sesame Street, what is the name of the turquoise furry Muppet from Mexico who became the show’s first bilingual Muppet when she debuted in 1991? She often introduces the Spanish Word of the Day.
Rosita
She is perhaps best known for portraying Nancy Bartlett Thomas on the ABC sitcom Roseanne from the fourth season (1991) to the end of the show in 1997. She played Nurse Judy Kubrak in the FX drama series Pose. She is number 96 on Comedy Central’s list of the 100 greatest stand-ups of all time. Without You, I’m Nothing, With
You, I’m Not Much Better was a one-woman off-Broadway follow-up to I’m Your Woman?
Sandra Bernhard
Coined by Johannes Kepler using Greek roots, what pair of words describe a solar object is at its closest and farthest from the Sun? Two
answers, please.
PERIHELION, APHELION
Which Santa Monica-based video game developer created the Black Ops series of games in the Call of Duty franchise for Activision? This
group also ported a few Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater games for the DreamCast.
Treyarch
Most decorative and scented candles are now made from what petroleum-refining byproduct and type of wax? Occasionally kerosene is known by the same name.
Paraffin
While many sports teams wield a home-field advantage when playing their games, NHL teams playing at their home arenas are most
frequently said to wield a home-what advantage?
Ice
Who is the guitarist for Black Sabbath who thought he’d never play guitar again after losing two fingers in an accident, but was inspired to
try after learning that famed jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt was able to play without the use of all his fingers?
Tony Iommi
The 1987 biopic La Bamba starred Lou Diamond Phillips as Richie Valens and who as his troubled brother Bob? This actor has starred in other films with mostly Latinx casts like My Family and The Disappearance of Garcia Lorca.
Esai Morales
Technically a regional dance of the Hwanghae Province, what term for a mask dance drama is now used generally to refer to such performances throughout Korea? This art form is on UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage.
Talchum
American film director Karyn Kusama directed what 2009 comedyhorror film written by Diablo Cody and starring Megan Fox as a murderous teenager with a taste for male flesh?
Jennifer’s Body
Which legendary NASCAR driver of the 1990s and 2000s is remembered for the rainbow-clad, DuPont-sponsored #24 Chevrolet he drove?
Jeff Gordon
Legendary New York club CBGB opened in 1973 with a different intentfrom the punk club it became. What did the letters CBGB stand for?
Only give the answer for these four letters.
Country Blue Grass Blues
What is the northernmost mainland province of the Netherlands? It shares its name with its capital and largest city and it’s noted for the
Grote Markt which was partially destroyed during a World War II battle there.
Groningen
George Washington Carver is remembered for his agricultural research, in particular developing uses for peanuts. He primarily conducted this research at what prominent HBCU in Alabama, which is also home to the nation’s first research center focused entirely on bioethics?
Tuskegeee Institute
The Love Parade is the fictional debut novel of young writer James Leer in what novel by Michael Chabon? The novel is about his
complex relationship with writing professor Grady Tripp.
Wonder Boys
Not named because it resembles something you’d see during teatime, in ice hockey, what is the term for the kind of pass that barely leaves the ice but leaving the ground just enough to hover or fly like an alien craft to a teammate’s stick?
Saucer Pass
Candles before the 1800s were commonly made from beeswax, or what rendered fat mainly from beef or mutton?
Tallow
Which western African nation is home to Île de Gorée, the largest slave-trading hub on the African coast for nearly five centuries? It was one of the first three African places to be named a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.
Senegal
Who played Bob’s girlfriend Rosie in La Bamba? She starred in many other films with Latinx casts, like Tortilla Soup and How the Garcia Girls Spent Their Summer.
Elizabeth Pena
Arising during the Ayutthaya Kingdom, what form of masked dance drama accompanied by narrators is a Thai entry on UNESCO’s list of
intangible cultural heritage? The traditional form usually includes heroes, heroines, ogres, and monkeys as characters.
Khon
George Washington Carver encouraged crop rotation with plants such as peanuts and cowpeas to restore what essential chemical element in the soil? Rhizobium bacteria form nodules on the plant roots and produce an enzyme that reduces this element into useful forms.
Nitrogen
CBGB’s full official name included 5 more letters — what were they?
Bonus points in our hearts if you can tell us what the letters stood for.
OMFUG (Other Music for Uplifting
Gourmandizers)
Which province of the Netherlands, located in the middle of the country, shares its name with its capital and largest city, which is noted for the Oudegracht, the old canal that runs through it?
Utrecht
Which legendary NASCAR driver of the 1980s and ’90s is remembered for the black, Goodwrench-sponsored #3 Chevrolet he
drove?
Dale Earnhardt
Her specials included Born to be Mild and Naked Beneath My Clothes. Since 2001, she has performed almost exclusively in Las Vegas, selling almost two million tickets and becoming the longest-running solo comedy show in Las Vegas.
Rita Rudner
On Sesame Street, what is the two-word name of the pink fairy-like Muppet who debuted in 2006 and has a wand that gives her magical powers?
ABBY CADABBY
What music performance and dance program ran in the US from 1952 to 1989, with Dick Clark hosting from 1956 until the show’s end?
American Bandstand
What early Lesbian rights organization, named in part for a fictional lover of Sappho, published the magazine The Ladder from 1956 to 1972 which provided a lifeline to lesbian women around the country?
Daughters of Bilitis
Which Santa Monica-based video game developer created the Modern Warfare series of games in the Call of Duty franchise for Activision? The O.G. members of this studio all worked together on Medal of Honor: Allied Assault
Infinity Ward
What is the Arabic word for a crescent moon? Sports fans likely know it best from being found in the name of Neymar’s Saudi Pro League
team, which he joined in August 2023 before suffering an ACL tear in October.
Hilal
What was the surname of Dolley Madison’s first husband, a name she retained after his death in 1793? It was also the maiden name of the wife of the 16th president.
Todd
Ovulation test kits, like Clearblue Easy and First Response, measure the level of what chemical in the body produced by the pituitary gland,
with a structure similar to follicle-stimulating hormone, that signals the ovaries to release an egg?
Luteinizing
Albemarle Sound and Pamlico Sound are coastal waterways in what U.S. state?
North Carolina
The “hard c” or “k” sound in English is known linguistically as a voiceless velar WHAT?
Stop/Plosive
known for his songs “Sound of da Police”, “Love’s Gonna Get’cha (Material Love)”, and “My Philosophy”
KRS-One / Knowledge Reigns Supreme Over Nearly Everyone
Which of the gospels in the Bible describes the visit of the three wise men to the infant Jesus?
Matthew
In which Spanish city is the National Museum of Romanticism located?
Madrid
Which Brontë sister wrote the poem No Coward Soul is Mine?
Emily
What drink can be made using a burr grinder and a steam wand?
Coffee
Polynesian method of kneading massage, but with overtones of the indigenous religious beliefs, comes from Hawaiian/Samoan language for “Knead”, inspired by the ocean.
Lomilomi
In 1936, which British monarch became the first to fly an aircraft to his own ascension?
Edward VIII
In which sport do teams in New Zealand compete for the Ranfurly Shield? Colloquially known as Log o’Wood
Rugby Union
“Fisherman’s daughter” is cockney rhyming slang for which beverage?
Water
The city of Quibdó, recorded as having the highest amount of rainfall of any city in South America, is in which country?
Colombia
Which Spanish artist painted the Scottish National Gallery’s Old Woman Frying Eggs (1618)?
Diego Velazquez
Piernik is a traditional gingerbread cake originating from which country?
Poland
What word links the title of a Britney Spears album with a famous landmark in Bath?
Circus
Babassu, Jipi-japa, and Raffia are all types of what tree?
Palm
Korean name for Korean New Year?
Seollal
In 1918, which member of the Benn political family dynasty organised and carried out the first parachute drop of a secret service agent behind enemy lines?
William Benn
At the 1960 Olympic Games, Queen Sofia of Spain competed for Greece in which sport?
Sailing
Which African country is home to Zagazig University?
Egypt
Serving as Alaska’s U.S. representative for 49 years, who, at the time of his death in 2022, was the oldest and longest-serving member of the U.S. Congress?
Don Young
Which Yorkshire cricketer, nicknamed “Chilly” and best known for helping England defeat Australia at Headingley in 1981, retired to run a fish and chip shop in Cornwall?
Chris Old
Parookaville, a three-day electronic dance music festival, is held in which country?
Germany
Which American crime writer created the ex-NFL player turned FBI investigator Amos Decker starting with Memory Man in 2015?
David Baldacci
Ballinesker Beach and Curracloe Strand, the filming locations for Saving Private Ryan, are in which Irish county?
Wexford
Chocolate spot is one of the most common fungal diseases of which vegetable?
Broad Bean
Which Apollo mission was the first crewed flight into space?
Apollo 7
What name links the winner of the 1975 Derby, an Australian television production company, and a family in The Archers?
Grundy
Hirohito known by what honorific?
Showa
Which state’s supreme court disqualified former US president Donald Trump from the state’s primary ballot for the 2024 presidential election under the Fourteenth Amendment?
Colorado
Which country’s 141 opposition MPs were suspended from its parliament for joining protests relating to a security breach in which two men intruded into the parliament, shouting slogans and spraying coloured gas?
2023
India
Which Asian country’s parliament voted to change its flag in December 2023 by replacing wavy rays with straight rays to “eliminate the ambiguous interpretation of the meaning of the flag image”?
Kyrgyzstan
The Mobley Hotel in Cisco, Texas was the first hotel owned by which famous hotelier?
Conrad Hilton
On December 25, 800, Charlemagne was crowned emperor by which Pope?
Pope Leo III
American-Ivorian basketball player Mo Bamba currently plays for which NBA team?
Philadelphia 76ers
Which African country announced its departure from the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries in December 2023 over a dispute on output quotas?
Angola
The red-haired Margaret Wade is attracted to which comic book character?
Dennis the Menace
Which artist painted Washington Crossing the Delaware?
Emanuel Leutze
Which US state unveiled in December 2023 the design of its proposed state flag following criticism that its current flag was offensive to Native Americans?
Minnesota
The name of which American skateboarding-focused company is taken from one of New York City’s oldest skate crews? The company is currently owned by the Iconix Brand Group.
Zoo York
Streetwear urban brand founded by Marc. The company’s products gained public attention in the late 1990s; they were originally associated with hip-hop and skate culture and moved into mainstream urban culture in the early 2000s. It is most often associated with hip-hop. The style is based on graffiti art. Its brand features a rhino as its logo.
Ecko Unltd
An archaic two letter interjection of vague meaning, used to project attention to something, which features in verse 2 of “Oh Come All Ye Faithful”
Lo
2 letter internet expression broadly equivalent to the French “chapeau!”
HT (Hat Tip)
A three letter acronym originating in the US in the late 19th Century meaning you may need to get on with this round or you’ll run out of time
PDQ (Pretty Damn Quick)
Which writer of 8 British number 1 singles was cited by Beatles producer George Martin as “the finest songwriter of his generation” but was voted the most overrated guitarist of the century in a Guitar Magazine poll in 1999?
Noel Gallagher
Which former captain of Hampshire CCC ghost wrote Shane Warne’s autobiography No Spin and succeeded Stephen Fry as President of MCC in October this year?
Mark Nicholas
Who was President of MCC from 2020-21 the first non-UK born President? Sri Lankan player.
Kumar Sangakkara
Who held the presidency of Marylebone Cricket Club from 2021 until 2022, first woman to do so? She made her England One Day International debut in 1995 and played her first Test match that winter. She achieved a hat-trick against India in 1999 and captained England from 2000 until her retirement from international cricket in 2006.
Clare Connor
Which British television host and journalist interviewed all eight British prime ministers from Alec Douglas-Home to David Cameron, and all eight American presidents from Lyndon B. Johnson to George W. Bush, and is commemorated by a memorial stone in Poets’ Corner of Westminster Abbey unveiled in March 2014?
David Frost
Which ship, launched in 2004 and named after the Queen Consort of George V, is the flagship of Cunard’s fleet and the only ocean liner still in service?
Queen Mary 2
Which TV personality ended her contract with BBC radio Wales last month after refusing to accept the Corporation’s new social media guidelines?
Carol Vorderman
Which British athlete, now a presenter on TV including leading Sky’s netball coverage and a regular on A Question of Sport, won a 400m bronze medal behind Cathy Freeman in the 2000 Sydney Olympics?
Katharine Merry
Which was the first Lloyd Webber and Rice musical to be performed publicly, making its professional premiere at the Haymarket ice rink during the Edinburgh International Festival in 1972, and seeing West End revivals in 2019 and 2021?
Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat
Lloyd Webber and Rice first collaboration was The Likes of Us, an Oliver!-inspired musical based on the true story of which director and philanthropist?
Thomas John Barnardo
Round 3 is more general knowledge Since October, what has been the price of a First Class stamp?
£1.25
The Green Man, an ancient figure from British folklore, symbolic of spring and rebirth, was the most prominent feature of the artwork for which invitation this year?
Coronation
Which political protest will celebrate its 250th anniversary on Saturday?
Boston Tea Party
How many Kings of the UK have broadcast a Christmas message?
3 – George V, George VI and Charles III
Whose size 14s were filled this year by a variety of co-hosts including Stephen Mangan, Lauren Laverne, Konnie Huq, Ed Gamble, Alex Brooker and Gyles Brandreth?
Richard Osman’s
Which word used in French cooking for a fowl, classically cooked with oranges, or slow roasted in its own fat, in English means a false or unfounded story, rumour, or claim, often one that is deliberately misleading?
Canard
Who received a fixed penalty fine from Lancashire police in January this year for taking off his seat belt in a moving car?
Rishi Sunak
Billie Piper gained recognition as a singer after releasing her debut single “Because We Want To” at age 15 in what year? There’s something about Mary was big at the Box Office in this year. Marc Overmars and Nicolas Anelka scored in the FA Cup Final and Amartya Sen won the Nobel Prize for Economics
1998
What Billie Piper song re-entered the UK charts at number 17 in 2007, eight years after it’s initial release, thanks to efforts by the BBC Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles? The first verse begins “I’ve been missing you, I should be kissing you”
Honey to the Bee
When Billie Piper took on the role of Rose Tyler, which actor was playing Doctor Who? This actor was the Ninth Doctor
Christopher Ecclestone
Billie Piper married Chris Evans in 2001. Name either of his two other wives.
Carol MCGIFFIN or Natasha SHISHMANIAN
What was the 3-word title of Billie Piper’s second album? This was also the name of a Dire Strait’s song which contains the line “Here comes Johnny singing oldies, goldies”
Walk of Life
The 1865 Walt Whitman poem “O Captain! My Captain!” is one of four he wrote about the death of Abraham Lincoln. Name any of the other three.
“When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d” “Hush’d Be the Camps To-day”
“This Dust was Once the Man”
Captain and Tennile took “Love will keep us together” to the US number one spot in 1975, but what first name did Tennile go by? This is also the first name of the woman who had a Best Supporting actress Oscar nomination for “The Sixth Sense” and another woman who had a big hit with the song “Breathe Again”
Toni
A Captain in the Royal Navy is the equivalent of what rank in the British Army? The current insignia of this rank is two diamond-shaped pips below a crown
Colonel
Who became the first Swiss act to reach the top 40 of the UK charts when they got to the top ten with “The Captain of her Heart” in 1985?
Double
In the Cannonball Run, which large actor had the alter ego “Captain Chaos”? In total this man made five movies with Burt Reynolds
Dom Deluise
DNA evidence has shown that Thomas Jefferson impregnated what woman many times whilst she was a slave at his Monticello estate?
Sally HEMINGS
Born on a slave ship in the Atlantic and sold into slavery in New Granada, which man later became a London shopkeeper and the first known British African to have voted in Britain?
Ignatius Sancho
Which British historian, a well known face on TV, attended the University of Liverpool to study the history of slavery? His TV work includes “A house through time” and 2023’s “Union”
David Olusoga
Which American woman escaped from slavery with her infant daughter in 1826, and then went to court to recover her son a couple of years later? She became the first black woman to win such a case against a white man.
Sojourner TRUTH
What cells are responsible for gastric acid secretion, which aids in the digestion of food, absorption of minerals, and control of harmful bacteria?
Parietal Cells
In the cell what word could mean a control mechanism that ensures proper progression, or in more general terms a place along a road where travellers are stopped for inspection?
Checkpoint
What “T” are the structures within chloroplasts that are the sites of the light-dependent reactions of photosynthesis? From Greek for sac-like.
THYLAKOIDS
A major physiological activity that the body undertakes during times of low activity, especially sleep, is restoring which organic molecule commonly known by a 3-letter abbreviation? This molecule is responsible for energy transfer in living cells
ATP - ADENOSINE TRI PHOSPHATE
What organelle in plant and fungal cells are essentially enclosed compartments which are filled with water containing inorganic and organic molecules including enzymes in solution?
Vacuoles
In the dictionary, what 9-letter word beginning with “C” is defined as “the organized complex of inorganic and organic substances external to the nuclear membrane of a cell”?
Cytoplasm
The number of times a normal somatic, differentiated human cell population will divide before cell division stops is the BLANK limit. What word fills the blank? It is named after an American Professor of Anatomy who studied the aging process for more than fifty years.
Hayflick
Coming from the Latin for “Box”, what 7-letter word is the name for waterproof receptacles in buildings used for storing rainwater? A famous example lies near the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul
Cistern
What “H” is the Turkish language word for the Turkey (the bird)?
Hindi (meaning India)
The Nika Riots of 532 CE took place against the rule of which Byzantine emperor?
Justinian I
Islamic version of a pulpit
Minbar
Istanbul is a location in which award-winning science fiction book of 1984? This book is considered one of the earliest and best-known works in the cyberpunk genre
Neuromancer
After conquering the city in 1453, Mehmed II made Constantinople the new Ottoman capital, replacing which other city? This city in Thrace is famous for its breaded and deep fried liver.
ADRIANOPLE (acc Edirne or Hadrianopolis)
What was the name of the journalist and dissident who was assassinated at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018? He was a first cousin of Dodi Fayed
Jamal KHASHOGGI
Iranian-British dual citizen who was detained in Iran from 3 April 2016 as part of a long running dispute between Britain and Ira
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe
Regnal name and number please of the man who was twice Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and who conquered Constantinople at the age of 21, bringing an end to the Byzantine Empire in doing so
MEHMED II/ MEHMED THE CONQUEROR
What two-word term was the title of the effective head of government within the Ottoman Empire? The title of the modern day Prime Minister of Pakistan in Urdu literally translates into this term
Grand Vizier
Which alliteratively named actress and Broadway star was the mother of Larry Hagman? Amongst other successes she originated the musical role of Maria Von Trapp
Mary Martin
Who was the mother of Eros in Greek mythology?
Aphrodite
What child singing star took the song “Mother of Mine” to number 2 in the UK charts in 1971? He shares his surname with the US Senate majority leader between 2007 and 2015
Neil REID
a Scottish former child singing star, winner of ITV’s Opportunity Knocks, and the youngest person to reach number one on the UK Albums Chart
Neil Reid
What is the shared 4-letter first name of Whistler’s mother, and the mother of Elisabeth, James and Lachlan Murdoch?
ANNA (Anna McNeil Whistler and Anna Torv)
What was the shared surname of the mother and daughter country music duo who had the first names Wynonna and Naomi? They are one of the most successful country music duos ever, having won five Grammys
The Judds
In Greek mythology, which woman, the wife of King Priam of Troy, had 19 children, many of whom feature prominently in Homer’s Iliad? These children include Paris, Hector and Cassandra
Hecuba
Which actress, who played Cassandra’s mother in Only Fools and Horses, is the real life mother of Benedict Cumberbatch?
Wanda Ventham
Which vestal virgins is the legendary mother of Romulus and Remus? According to Livy’s account of the legend, she was the daughter of Numitor, king of Alba Longa
Rhea Silvia
The Swiss city of Geneva is situated near the point where which river leaves Lake Geneva? This river eventually meets the sea near Marseilles
Rhone
Which city in the German-speaking part of the country is home to Switzerland’s oldest University?
Basel
According to Tripadvisor, the number one museum in Switzerland is actually dedicated to which man, born in Walworth, South London?
Charlie Chaplin
Kofi Annan died in which Swiss city in 2018? Albert Einstein worked out his theory of relativity whilst working here
Bern
The Matterhorn overlooks which Swiss town in the canton of Valais? It is the most southernly place in the German speaking part of Switzerland
Zermatt
Located in the Bernese Highlands of Switzerland, which village beginning with the letter “M” and with 6 letters was the first place to host the Apline Ski-ing World championships back in 1931?
Murren
In the early 1990s Roy Hodgson managed the Swiss football team called Xamax. In which town do Xamax play? This French speaking town is a centre of the Swiss watch industry and was also the site of the secret first meeting between Balzac and the married woman who later became his wife, Eveline Hanska
Neuchatel
The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty of 1850 reduced tensions between the US and Great Britain in regard to the plans to build a transcontinental canal through which Central American country?
Nicaragua
Hester Prynne is the main protagonist in which novel of 1850, decribed by D.H. Lawrence as a “perfect work of the American imagination”?
The Scarlet Letter
The credit corporation called American Express was founded by what two men? Their surnames live on in the name of another American banking company
Henry WELLS and William FARGO
What name was given to the 1850 to 1864 war between the Qing Dynasty and the Hakka-led Heavenly Kingdom? With 20 to 30 million dead, it is regarded as one of the bloodiest wars of all time
Taiping Rebellion
What 3-letter name was given to the Iranian religious leader born Ali Muhammed who was killed by firing squad in 1850? His place within the Bahai faith is similar to that of John the Baptist within Christianity
Bab
Which man became President of the United States in 1850? He failed to win the Whig nomination for president in 1852 but gained the endorsement of the Know Nothing Party four years later.
Millard Fillmore
What name has been given to the diplomatic episode of 1850 when Greeks rioted after being asked not to burn an effigy of Judas Iscariot at the time of a visit from James de Rothschild?
the DON PACIFICO affair
“And then we saw the daughter of the dinosaur” and “The Giantess (Guardian of the Egg)” are famous works by which British-born surrealist painter and novelist?
Leonora CARRINGTON
The California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, the Parliament House in Valetta, Malta and the New York Times building in New York are all the creations of which architect?
Renzo Piano
The works of which British science fiction writer include “Supertoys Last All Summer Long” and the Helliconia Trilogy? Supertoys was the basis for the Stanley Kubrick-developed Steven Spielberg film A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001).
Brian Aldiss
“Young peasant having her coffee” and “Boulevard Montmartre” are all famous works by which Impressionist who lived from 1830 to 1903?
Camille Pisarro
“Self portrait with 7 fingers” and “Bella with white collar” are two of the most famous works by which man, born in what is now Belarus in 1887?
Marc Chagall
One of the best-known images in 20th-century American art is which man’s painting “Christina’s World”? His first name is Andrew.
Andrew Wyeth
“Rum and Guitar”, “Man with a Guitar” and “Still life with Grapes and Clarinet” are all famous paintings by which French man born 1882?
Georges Braque
What author received Critics Choice and Writers Guild of America nominations for his screenplay for The Perks of Being a Wallflower?
Stephen Chbosky
Natalie Imbruglia had a Billboard chart topper with “Torn” in 1997, but that was actually a cover. What band released the first Englishlanguage version of the song two years earlier in 1995?
Ednaswap
In the original version of Risk, the Oceania continent consists of four territories, Eastern and Western Australia, New Guinea, and what
large archipelagic country with over 17,000 islands?
Indonesia
Visual Artist Before and After, first and last names required: The first Black woman to have a solo show at the Whitney with her rainbow colored abstract works meets the American realist who painted The Gross Clinic.
Alma Thomas Eakins
Due to longtime erosion, what natural arch, located in the Maltese archipelago, completely collapsed in 2017?
Azure Window
A 1986 Keith Haring mural in East Harlem depicting bodies and skeletons piled against a blood red background bears what rhyming
anti-drug message?
Crack is Wack
In 1979’s The Amityville Horror, what is the last name of the family, headed by George and Kathy, that was tormented by the supernatural
forces in their house?
Lutz
The third edition of what video game franchise has expansion packs titled The WarChiefs and The Asian Dynasties?
Age of Empires
One man who probably thought about the Roman Empire several times per week was what Germanic chieftain of the Visigoths who sacked Rome in 410 CE, the first foreign power to seize the city in 800 years?
Alaric
What rustic, hand shaped bread style, with a thick, crispy crust, is historically and etymologically linked to French bakeries, and is also easy to make by home bakers in a Dutch oven?
Boule
Eminem’s 2010 album Recovery and Rihanna’s 2010 album Loud featured versions of what collaboration whose chorus begins “Just
gonna stand there and watch me burn”?
Love the Way You Lie
“His wings are clipped and / his feet are tied / so he opens his throat to sing.” These are lines from what Maya Angelou poem that echoes the
title of her memoir, but is only two words long?
Caged Bird
Who was the first press secretary of the Clinton Administration, serving as the inspiration for The West Wing character C. J. Cregg?
Dee Dee Myers
A precursor to modern lace, the 16th century Italian technique punto a groppo created geometric patterns without a bobbin; this technique was related to WHAT better known technique that had possible beginnings in 13th century Arabic cultures?
Macrame
In the original version of Risk, the South America continent consists of four territories, Venezuela, Peru, Brazil, and what?
Argentina
While “In the Hall of the Mountain King” may be the best-known movement of the Peer Gynt Suite by Grieg, what sort of titular “Mood” is suggested by its also well-known first movement?
Morning Mood
What is the name of the traditional type of French bread that is shaped into a oblong, oval loaf, with a size and shape in between boule and the longer baguette?
Batard
The second edition of what video game franchise has expansion packs titled Heart of the Swarm and Legacy of the Void?
Starcraft
What eventual Cronkite award winner and member of the Television Hall of Fame served as LBJ’s press secretary from 1965 to 1967?
Bill Moyers
John Herschel, son of William, gave what nickname to the first-everdiscovered planetary nebula because of its bulged ends?
Dumbbell Nebula
What Nikki Giovanni poem is titled with the first and last name of a real civil rights figure who “who could not stand that death. / And in not
being able to stand it. / She sat back down”?
Rosa Parks
Born with first name Yolande in Knoxville, Tennessee in 1943, One of the world’s most well-known African-American poets.
Nikki Giovanni
In macrame, one of the basic knots is the reef knot, also know by what name?
Square Knot
One man who probably thought about the Roman Empire several times per week was what Germanic leader who deposed Romulus Augustus in 476 CE, traditionally marking the end of the western Roman Empire?
Odoacer
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts had a Billboard chart topper with “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll” in 1984, but that was actually a cover. What band first recorded that song, back in the summer of 75?
The Arrows
Keith Haring’s 1989 poster created for the AIDS/HIV justice group ACT UP depicts three figures covering their eyes, ears, mouths. Two frequent slogans of ACT UP protests are emblazoned across the top and bottom. Name either.
IGNORANCE=FEAR or
SILENCE=DEATH
Due to longtime erosion, what natural arch, located in the Galapagos
archipelago, completely collapsed in 2021?
DARWIN’S Arch
What type of citrus, native to East Asia, is a commonly used in Japanese and Korean cuisine and is an ingredient in kosho, a spicy pepper sauce, can be used in ponzu sauce, and is added as flavoring to teas, liquor drinks, like sours, and various sweets?
Yuzu
What is the last name of the housekeeper in Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca who is rather obsessed with the last Mrs. DeWinter?
Danvers
Martin Goodman started the company Timely Publications in 1939. Now owned by a media conglomerate, what is that company’s current name?
Marvel Comics
Francoise Bornet was one half of the young couple seen in The Kiss by the Hotel de Ville, taken in 1950 by which French photographer?
Robert Doisneau
Former chancellor Nadhim Zahawi has made a surprise appearance in an ITV drama about the Post Office IT scandal.
He plays himself questioning which then-Post Office chief executive in ITV in Mr Bates vs The Post Office.
Paula Vennells
Tetris is a puzzle video game created in 1985 by which Soviet software engineer?
Alexey Pajitnov
Dutch video game designer and entrepreneur of partial Indo descent. He is known for producing Japan’s first major turn-based role-playing video game The Black Onyx, securing the rights to distribute the Russian puzzle video game Tetris on video game consoles where the game found popularity, and as the founder of Bullet-Proof Software (later called Blue Planet Software) and The Tetris Company, which licenses the Tetris trademark.
Henk Rogers
How many different tetriminos are there if counting different shapes regardless of reflection/rotation whatever?
7 (5 free shapes but two of them are inverted pairs)
The phrase ‘through a glass darkly’ can be found in a book of the Bible named after which people?
Corinthians
In 1978 Nancy Spungen was found dead in which infamous New York Hotel?
Chelsea (Hotel)
In Greek mythology, Hippomenes was the husband of which swift-footed Greek heroine?
Atalanta
Foxbase Alpha (1991) was the debut album of which British indie band?
Saint Etienne
Which American rock musician wrote and performed the 1989 sleeper hit Wicked Game, popularised by the David Lynch film Wild at Heart in 1990?
Chris Isaak
What links 1) the command module pilot of Apollo 16, who died in October 2023 2) the current bench coach of the Toronto Blue Jays and former New York Yankee nicknamed “Donnie Baseball”?
MATTINGLY (Ken and Don)
Concerning the rituals of a Russian peasant wedding, the 1923 ballet Les Noces was choreographed by which dancer and Protégé of the Ballets Russes who worked closely with her older brother? She is also renowned for her Poulenc-accompanied work, Les Biches.
Bronislava Nijinska
What Greek island links 1) a genetic disease characterised by a right ventricular cardiomyopathy, distinctive woolly hair and palmoplantar skin lesions 2) a Greek Island 3) a classical record label founded by Klaus Heymann in 1987?
Naxos
What name links 1)The winner of the 2004 women’s French Open tennis championship 2) a 3 time winner between 2008 and 2013 of the BDO Women’s World Darts Championship and 3) The impostor Anna Anderson?
Anastasia (Myskina (Tennis) and Dobromyslova (Darts) and impersonator of assassinated Grand Duchess of Russia)
Professional darts player. She is a three-time Women’s World Professional Darts Champion of the British Darts Organisation (BDO). Russian darts and nicknamed From Russia with Love.
Anastasia Dobromyslova
In Medicine, the abbreviation “PR” stands for what route of examination or drug administration?
Rectum
Founded in 1908 and based in the Ivrea commune of Turin, which typewriter manufacturer now produces personal computers, printers, photocopiers and tablets?
Olivetti
Made up of thin layers of striated and smooth muscle, the cremaster muscles raise and lower what paired organs to regulate their temperature? They retract these organs as a reflex action to touch, cold or anxiety.
Testes
Located in current day Southern Benin and Western Nigeria, which major Yoruba empire founded around 1300 CE by Oranyan controlled the slave trade in the area between the Volta and Niger rivers before its fall in the 19th century?
Oyo
Working on fruit flies and zebrafish, which German developmental biologist shared a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1995 with Edward B Lewis and Eric Weischaus for her research on the genetic control of embryonic development?
Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard
Consisting of Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers and The Eumenides, what name is given to the 5th century BCE trilogy of plays by Aeschylus covering events from the murder of Agamemnon by Clytemnestra, her death at the hands of her son and the trial and pursuit of the latter by the Furies?
Oresteia
The Mezzotint, an intaglio printmaking process, was said by John Evelyn in 1662 to have been developed by which German-English Royalist Cavalry Commander in the English Civil War? He was the grandson of James VI of Scotland/James I of England and son of Frederick V of the Palatinate.
Rupert of the Rhine
What connects 1) a French president who fell out of a train window in 1920, resigning on the grounds of ill health the same year 2) Forensic Anthropologist Dr Temperance Brennan
Deschanel (Paul, Emily and Zoe)
The longest moon orbit in the solar system is that of Neso, with an orbital period of 26.67 years. It is a satellite of which planet?
Neptune
What word connects 1) paired structures of the brainstem adjacent to the medullary pyramids, with roles in auditory processing and motor learning 2) Cerignola, Picholine, and Manzanilla 3) A character played by Anna Karen in a UK sitcom and 4) The UK 1996 No.1 single You’re Not Alone
Olive
What links 1) A survival horror videogame franchise with instalments The Dark Descent, A Machine for Pigs, Rebirth and The Bunker 2) a 2014 Peter Carey Novel 3) Retrograde, Anterograde and Transient Global?
Amnesia
The hypothalamic KNDy neurons produce the neuropeptides Kisspeptin, Dynorphin and the “B” form of which neuropeptide demonstrated to induce hot flushes when injected into healthy women? Its receptor is the target for the inhibitory drug Veoza (Fezolinetant), a newly MHRA-approved drug to treat menopausal hot flushes.
Neurokinin
What common name is given to bulky, large-mouthed fish of the order Perciformes which make up the Epinephelinae subfamily of the Serranidae family? The largest example is the Atlantic Goliath at almost two and a half metres long.
Grouper
Named after the number of tracks on it and containing the singles We Are All Made of Stars and Extreme Ways, what was the title of Moby’s sixth studio album released in 2002?
18
South Korean-Canadian director, playwright, and screenwriter based in the United States. Among her plays are Endlings and The Seagull on The Sims 4. Her directorial film debut Past Lives was released at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival.
Celine Song
Term for female divers in the South Korean province of Jeju, whose livelihood consists of harvesting a variety of mollusks, seaweed, and other sea life from the ocean. Korean for diver.
Haenyeo
She had supporting roles in the Netflix comedy-drama series Russian Doll (2019–present) and the Apple TV+ drama series The Morning Show (2021–present). She gained prominence for her starring role in the romantic drama film Past Lives (2023), for which she received a nomination for a Golden Globe Award.
Greta Lee
a musical comedy with music and lyrics by William Finn, with a book written by Rachel Sheinkin, conceived by Rebecca Feldman with additional material by Jay Reiss. The show centers on a fictional spelling bee set in a geographically ambiguous namesake Middle School.
The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee
the only undrafted player to be named NFL MVP and Super Bowl MVP, and the only undrafted quarterback to lead his team to a Super Bowl victory. He was also the first quarterback to win a Super Bowl during his first season as the primary starter. Zachary Levi played him in 2021 film American Underdog.
Kurt Warner
former American football linebacker who played his entire 17-year career for the Baltimore Ravens of the National Football League (NFL). He was named NFL Defensive Player of the Year and led the Ravens’ record-setting defense, which established a 16-game single-season record for the fewest points allowed (165) and the fewest rushing yards allowed (970), to victory in Super Bowl XXXV. He also became the second linebacker to win the Super Bowl Most Valuable Player Award. Won 2 superbowl.
Ray Lewis
In the board game Clue(do), which character’s starting place is between the Study and Library?
Professor Plum
Which North American mammal has the most teeth?
Opossum
Which country music group, composed of Hillary Scott, Charles Kelley, and Dave Haywood, shortened its name in June 2020 during the George Floyd protests?
Lady Antebellum (now Lady A)
What Swedish magazine is owned by investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist in the Lisbeth Salander novels by Stieg Larsson?
Millenium
What historic Nashville venue was the home of the Grand Ole Opry from 1943 to 1974?
Ryman Auditorium
The state songs of Maryland and Iowa both use the same melody as what German Christmas carol?
O Tannenbaum
Which small constellation shares its name with the second chamber in the alimentary canal of a ruminant animal?
Reticulum (Rumen > Reticulum > Omasum > Abomasum)
On the TV series Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, what organization did Capt. Scarlet work for?
Spectrum
What director of The Imitation Game was the first Norwegian nominated for a Best Director Oscar?
Morten Tyldum
He is best known in his native Norway for directing the thriller film Headhunters (2011), based on the novel by Jo Nesbø, and internationally for directing the historical drama The Imitation Game (2014), for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director, and the science fiction drama Passengers (2016).
Morten Tyldum
What chemical element with atomic number 49 got its name from the blue line in its spectrum?
Indium
Wide receiver Stefon Diggs caught a touchdown pass from which Vikings quarterback in a 2018 playoff game-winning final play nicknamed the “Minneapolis Miracle”?
Case Keenum
Former Miss America Mary Ann Mobley appeared with Elvis Presley in the movie Girl Happy and which other movie?
Harum Scarum
What nickname was shared by one of Sgt. Nick Fury’s Howling Commandos and the sheepdog sidekick of Touche Turtle?
Dum Dum
What American rock band recorded the platinum-selling albums Grave Dancers Union in 1992 and Let Your Dim Light Shine in 1995?
Soul Asylum
Cyclosporiasis is a disease caused by the infection of a parasite that affects which specific part of the body?
Jejunum
Which anatomical structure works as a trapdoor to close off the shell of some sea, freshwater, and land snails?
Operculum
Which product was invented in 1921 by Robert Fergusson, a sea captain, after he noticed that fish oil spilled on rusty metal decks stopped corrosion from spreading?
Rust-oleum
Radical feminist Valerie Solanas was the author of a 1967 manifesto that suggested the creation of an organization, known by which acronym, dedicated to eliminating the male sex?
SCUM
What thick band of nerve fibers connects the two hemispheres of the brain?
Corpus Callosum
Which type of currency got its name from a shortening from the Massachusett or Narragansett word meaning “white strings of shell beads”?
Wampum
Oskar Matzerath is the unreliable narrator of what 1959 novel by Gunter Grass?
The Tin Drum
Hermann Hesse book: Set in the twenty-third century, The Glass Bead Game is the story of which main character, who has been raised in Castalia, the remote place his society has provided for the intellectual elite to grow and flourish.
Joseph Knecht
What was the name of the ousted Supreme Chancellor played by Terence Stamp in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace?
Finis Valorum
Which director of 1987’s Fatal Attraction directed the 2022 erotic thriller Deep Water starring Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas? It is his first film since Unfaithful in 2002.
Adrian Lyne
What single word is found in the meteorological phrases for the bright light that occurs when a transformer explodes or a power line is snapped during a storm but perhaps more well known in the phrase for when a liquid rapidly dips below its freezing point?
FLASH (power flash, flash
freezing)
What artistic technique uses the drawing of closely spaced fine lines to create shading, with the density and spacing of lines creating variations from light to dark?
Hatching
What Saturday morning 1980s cartoon was created as an excuse for Mattel, partnering with Hallmark, to sell a lot of dolls of Starlite, Twink, the seven Color Kids, as well as the titular heroine?
Rainbow Brite
In 1973, 1983, and 2005, Ringo Starr, Def Leppard, and Nickelback, respectively, all had hit songs with what title?
Photograph
Franklin Resources, a global investment firm, trades on the New York Stock Exchange under what 3-letter symbol in homage to its namesake?
BEN
By what name is the Persian new year best known? It lands on the spring equinox and is celebrated throughout Central, Western, and South Asia as well as being a major holiday for the Persian diaspora worldwide.
Nowruz
Which Yale psychologist is remembered for his experiments about obedience and control, particularly a noted experiment instructing subjects to shock other humans?
Stanley Milgram
What writer and producer on The Office later created the sitcom Superstore that ran for six seasons, starring America Ferrera and Ben Feldman as employees at Cloud 9?
Justin Spitzer
What spring Jewish pilgrimage festival, with a date directly linked to Passover, has several biblical names including Feast of Weeks, Feast of Reaping, and Day of First Fruits?
Shavuot
Fat Bear Week is an annual event where the public is invited to vote on their favorite bulked up bears before they go into hibernation. These bears gain most of their weight from Brooks River in which National Park?
Katmai
What is the French-derived name for a bra without straps or underwires, also known as a tube bra, meant to wear under strapless tops and dresses?
Bandeau
The TV sitcom Cheers featured a “will-they-won’t-they” pairing between Sam Malone and what graduate student turned waitress, who departed to finish her novel at the end of season 5? (First name acceptable.)
DIANE Chambers (played by Shelley Long)
A fish so nice, they named it twice. What is the scientific binomial name for the bogue, a small fish native to the eastern Atlantic?
Boops Boops
Based in Mexico City, what Liga MX team has the most championships, with 13 titles, in the premier Mexican football league?
Club America
What political cartoonist depicted Cecil Rhodes standing astride across Africa in 1892, creating one of the most recognizable images of the imperialist scramble for Africa?
Edward Linley SAMBOURNE
Which commentator was dismissed by Fox News in April 2023? His eponymous Tonight show ran from 2016 to 2023; since his departure he has hosted a show on Twitter/X.
Tucker Carlson
In Wiccan practice, what is the name of the black handled knife used in ceremonial rituals, like casting circles or divination? Its use was
codified and popularized by Gerald Gardner, a leading Wiccan practitioner of the 20th century.
Athame
What “L” word is given to the term for how light interacts with the surface of a rock, crystal, or mineral?
Luster
What women’s rights advocate, also mother and namesake to a multi–Academy Award-winning actress, was the president of the Connecticut Woman Suffrage Association in the 1910s, and in the 1920s, served on the board of directors of Margaret Sanger’s American Birth Control League?
Katherine Hepburn
A bra that has cups that lift the breasts straight up has what architectural name? Note that a push-up bra pushes both up and together and a shelf bra generally lacks cups.
Balconette or Balcony
What national park consists of its namesake island, the fourth largest lake island in the world, as well as hundreds of smaller surrounding islands? It is also known for the unique single predator-single prey relationship between the resident wolves and moose?
Isle Royale National Park
In Liga MX, what city has two teams that were seeded 2nd and 3rd behind Club America in the 2023 Apertura tournament? Their nicknames are Los Rayados and Los Tigres.
Monterrey
Don Lemon was dismissed by what news channel in April 2023? He had been host of his eponymous Tonight show between 2014 and 2022 before becoming co-host of This Morning.
CNN
Be mature, children, as you tell me the name of which word, beginning with a “C”, that describes a mineral or crystal’s tendency to break or split along definite structural planes?
Cleavage
What political cartoonist was credited with coining the term “McCarthyism” in a 1950 cartoon?
Herbert Block
In Wiccan practice what is the word, from the Middle English meaning advice, that describes the basic tenet of core practice? A typical one is “An ye harm none, do what ye wilt.”
Rede
Which Justin Spitzer sitcom was cancelled after two seasons? It follows employees at Payne Motors and stars Ana Gasteyer as a CEO who knows very little about the industry.
American Auto
What spring feast holiday celebrated by several branches of Christianity occurs at a similar time to Shavuot? It has a name stemming from the Greek term for Shavuot.
Pentecost
What 1980s cartoon was created as an excuse for Kenner Toys, partnering with American Greetings, to sell a lot of dolls of Apple Dumplin’, Plum Puddin’, the villainous Peculiar Purple Pie Man, as well as the titular heroine?
Strawberry Shortcake
What artistic technique, distinct from pointillism, uses the drawing and placement of dots to create shading, with the density and spacing of
dots creating variations from light to dark?
Stippling
The Avis Budget Group uses what very fitting 3-letter NASDAQ stock symbol?
CAR
In 1973, 1980, and 1981, Styx, Kenny Rogers, and The Commodores, respectively, all had hit songs with what title?
Lady
Which director’s last American film, Hollow Man, was released in 2000? Since then he has worked primarily in Europe, releasing films such as Black Book and Benedetta.
Paul Verhoeven
Meteorologically speaking, what single word is found in the phrases regarding a ground-level fog-like cloud made of tiny ice crystals but perhaps more well known as a small, briefly-lived, mostly-nonthreatening whirlwind as what type of “devil” (though some regional
dialects use the word “dirt” in this phrase instead)?
Dust
What symbolically important seat of power was located in the Diwan-IKhas of the Red Fort of Delhi under the Mughals?
Peacock Throne
sometimes translated as the Rose Garden Palace from Persian language, was built in the 16th century, renovated in the 18th century and finally rebuilt in 1865. It is the former official royal Qajar complex in Tehran.
Golestan Palace
A light shade of what color is known as “Twin Bed” because its hexadecimal code is BEDBED?
Blue
A parody of Zorro, what onomatopoeic alter ego of Quick Draw McGraw was likely to smash an acoustic guitar over the heads of his foes?
El Kabong
The temple in Hanoi erected in 1076 and known as the Van Mieu or Temple of Literature. It was dedicated by the emperor Ly Thanh Tong to what famed individual of circa 500 BCE, locally known as Khong Giao?
KONGZI / KONG FUZI /
CONFUCIUS
A set of murals by Diego Rivera sometimes subtitled “Man and Machine” are in the namesake city’s Institute of Art and called by what two-word title?
Detroit Industry
The 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games featured 3 X 3 (or 3-on-3), a variation on basketball? The US team took home gold for the women’s event
but which European team won gold on the men’s side?
Latvia
Jeannette Rankin, the first woman to hold federal office in the United States, was elected to the House of Representatives from what state in
1916?
Montana
“If it weren’t for me, you would never have amounted to very much” is one of many similar statements in which Alanis Morissette single of 2002, whose chorus asks us to “flash forward to a few years later”?
Hands Clean
What NHL head coach has won the most Stanley Cups? He led the Canadiens, Penguins, and Red Wings to 9 collective championships from 1973 to 2002?
Scotty Bowman
Though not spelled the same, the band Aerosmith is pretty much named after a novel about a doctor and scientist from Winnemac by what eminent American novelist?
Sinclair Lewis
Water bottles and fishing nets are among the recycled materials used by what leggings and activewear company headquartered in Seattle? Perhaps ironically given its name, it was founded by husband-and-wife duo Quang and Ellie Dinh.
Girlfriend Collective
For her portrayal of Oracene Price in the sports drama King Richard (2021), she was nominated for an Academy Award. Played Isabel Wilkerson in the 2023 film Origin directed by Ava DuVernay. Also in Blitz Bazawule’s musical The Color Purple 2023.
Aunjanue Ellis
In 2018, he made his debut as a film director debut with The Burial of Kojo, 2020 musical The Colour Purple directed by him. Ghanaian director.
Blitz the Ambassador (Blitz Bazawule)
2022 biographical sports drama film directed by Akin Omotoso, from a script written by Arash Amel. Based on the true story of three young Nigerian-Greek brothers, Giannis, Thanasis and Kostas Antetokounmpo, who emigrate to the United States and rise to fame and success within the National Basketball Association.
Rise
Henry Kissinger was controversially awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973 for the Paris Peace Accords along with what statesman and politician?
Le Duc THO [Lay-Duhk-Toh]
The world’s leading producer of uranium is what country, whose mines include the Inkai Project and the Kharasan mine?
Kazakhstan
What straightforward collective name was given to Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award recipients Wayne Jackson and Andrew Love? They were a staple of 30 years’ worth of Stax Records, appearing on songs such as “Let’s Stay Together” and “Suspicious Minds.”
The Memphis Horns
After the blockbuster success of the original “Genus” edition, Trivial Pursuit released three specialty editions in 1983 including what edition
focused on a particular age group?
Baby Boomer
The intersection of 9th and Passyunk is home to Pat’s and Geno’s, rival restaurants who serve what geographically named foodstuff?
Philly Cheesesteak
What phrase, also used for an undesirable bodily function, refers to a form of graffiti between a basic “tag” and a more formal “piece” in complexity? These are often the writer’s name in bubble letters.
Throw Up/Throwie
Billy Joel’s “My Life” served as the theme to what 1980s sitcom featuring ad men played by Peter Scolari and another actor at least 1,000 percent more famous than Peter Scolari?
Bosom Buddies
What membrane-bound, short hair-like structures, from the Latin for
eyelash, can act as a “cellular antenna” sensing chemicals, temperature, and touch, as well as can move substances along the outer surface of the cell?
Cilia
With “Las,” what term beginning with P refers to a nine-day interval representing the months of Mary’s pregnancy, celebrated especially in Mexico and Central America, including processionals of actors traveling to houses?
Las Posadas
In the early 2010s, widespread protests about what proposed oil pipeline resulted in back-and-forth permit delays and approvals by
presidential administrations, resulting in the current abandonment of the proposed line?
Keystone XL
Breaking Through is a memoir by what scientist, who co-won the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Drew Weissman for their work on mRNA which laid the foundation for the development of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19?
Katalin Kariko
What sport that’s popular throughout Southeast Asia plays like a cross between soccer and volleyball and is sometimes known as “kick volleyball”? Though it is not yet part of the Olympics, it is an official sport of the Asian games which is overseen by the IOC.
Sepak Takraw
Appropriately, what peninsula breaks off from Europe and sails around the Atlantic in The Stone Raft by Portuguese Nobel Laureate Jose Saramago?
Iberian
Aerosmith’s third album Toys in the Attic shares its title with a semiautobiographical play by what eminent American playwright? Her other works include The Children’s Hour.
Lillian Hellman
Scotty Bowman’s final Red Wings team was packed with Hall of Famers in search of a ring. What unorthodox Czech goaltender won
his first Stanley Cup with that squad? Nicknamed The Dominator.
Dominik HAŠEK
The saying “bottom of the ninth” originates from which sport?
Baseball (from the nine innings)
What British Columbia–based clothing company whose website includes “shop now to plant” and “Our Forest” buttons specifically engages in reforestation projects for every item bought?
Tentree
The M62 is an English motorway connecting Hull to what northwestern city?
Liverpool
Which Ice Cube’s track was an aggressive diss track about NWA of which he was formerly a member?
No Vaseline
The 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games featured events in Kata and Kumite for what sport?
Karate
A parody of every superhero ever, what alter ego of Doug Funnie in Doug wears his underwear outside his pants and a belt around his head, somewhat inexplicably?
Quailman
The lyrics to “Hands Clean” contain the title of what 2002 entirely self-produced and self-written Alanis Morissette album? It finished the question “What part of our history’s reinvented and…”?
Under Rug Swept
The Quan Thanh Temple in Hanoi is dedicated to Tran Vu, known in China as Xuan Wu. He is venerated in what ancient Chinese religious tradition whose well-known texts include the Zhuangzi among others?
Taoism
The fresco Man at the Crossroads was painted by Diego Rivera and removed because it featured some positive depictions of labor activism, and a picture of Lenin inserted once some folks objected. What New York skyscraper’s lobby did it decorate until 1934? The old or current name are acceptable.
RCA Building / 30 Rock
A Shih Tzu named Rocket won the Toy group at the 2015 Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. What publishing heiress once abducted by—and then sympathetic to—the SLA is that dog’s owner?
Patty Hearst
Nellie Ross, the first woman to be elected governor of a state in the United States, took office in January 1925 as the governor of what state?
Wyoming
Christmas Eve is typically known by what compound word in Spanish? Mexican traditions include midnight mass and tamales.
Nochebuena
In 2023, what European capital voted to close its city-center cruise port due to environmental and crowding reasons? The port is currently a walkable couple of kilometers from the Grachtengordel district.
Amsterdam
One of Jose Saramago’s most famous novels is The Gospel According to what figure, central to all Gospels?
Jesus Christ
In 2016 and 2017, protests centered on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation opposed the construction of what pipeline intended to transport crude oil from the Bakken formation? It has been in operation since April 2017.
Dakota Access
What is the traditional Filipino dance performed with dancers jumping rhythmically and athletically between long bamboo poles? This has recently gained in popularity in the US through school programs and competitions.
Tinikling
The Code Breaker is a biography of what scientist, who co-won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Emmanuelle Charpentier for the development of the gene editing method CRISPR?
Jennifer Doudna
Australia and what African country are the leading southernhemisphere producers of uranium? The Rossing and Trekkopje
deposits are major sources.
Namibia
What membrane-bound, long thread-like structures, from the Latin for whip, provides motility to a variety of cell types?
Flagella
Another specialty version of Trivial Pursuit released in 1983 was focused on movies and film and was called what?
Silver Screen
Traditionally graduates of a school now combined with the Helen Keller Institute, what long-standing gospel group with rotating members received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009?
Blind Boys of Alabama
Billy Joel’s “You May Be Right” served as the theme to what 1990s sitcom featuring Shadoe Stevens and Meshach Taylor as friends of
Harry Anderson’s title character, a Miami journalist?
Dave’s World
Intricate and complex graffiti pieces - especially those difficult to read because the letters are so stylized as to be unfamiliar to those not in
the know - are referred to by as what type of “style”? It is named in reference specifically to Tracy 168’s graffiti crew of the 1970s and also
names a character voiced by Elizabeth Banks in some 2010s animated films.
WILDstyle
In the movie Office Space, the waitress Joanna is criticized for wearing too few buttons and other paraphernalia, called “pieces of” what?
Flair
What name is given to the two 6th
-century monumental statues – a UNESCO World
Heritage Site - that were carved into the namesake valley in central Afghanistan that
served as a holy site for Buddhists on the Silk Road? The statues were controversially
destroyed in 2001 after the Taliban government declared that they were idols.
Buddhas of Bamiyan
Traders called kāpmon from which ethnic group prospered in part due to the unusual
absence of feudalism or serfdom, which is often referred to as this group’s namesake
“freedom”? In historical linguistics, this group’s language is the closest relative of Old
English in the Germanic family.
Frisians
In computing, ‘garbage collection’ is a method of automatically managing which
resource?
Memory
Sometimes known as ‘locations’ or lokasies in Afrikaans, what English word is more
commonly used for the racially segregated settlements and urban areas, commonly
found at the edges of cities, in Apartheid-era South Africa? Reserved for non-white
citizens, they should not be confused with the territories known as Bantustans.
Townships
Which family of cysteine proteases are central to initiating and carrying out apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death? A cascade of these enzymes results in the breakdown of cytoskeletal proteins and the inhibition of enzymes involved in DNA repair.
Caspase
Which shrine in Tokyo, constructed in 1869, is both a cemetery for military personnel and a site of ceremonies honouring ancestors? After World War II, it became controversial as the dead commemorated here include convicted war criminals.
Yasukuni
Like Hamburg, which German trading city on the Weser River is still officially known as a “Free Hanseatic City” because of its critical importance in the Hanseatic League? A church official from this city named Adam wrote the oldest record of Viking voyages to North America.
Bremen
What large body of water forms the western border of the northern parts of Quebec?
This body of water also borders the provences of Ontario and Manitoba, as well as the
territory of Nunavut.
Hudson’s Bay
What township was the site of a 1960 massacre, in which the South African Police opened fire on a crowd protesting the racist “pass laws”? Nelson Mandela was detained during the state of emergency declared by the government after this event and the wave of riots and strikes that followed from the black community.
Sharpeville Massacre
‘The Trolley Problem’ was given its name by which American moral philosopher who is
also well-known for her 1971 paper ‘A Defence of Abortion’?
Judith Jarvis Thomson
Which Ancient Egyptian creator god, who was to be fused with the Sun god Ra, became the official god of the pharaohs during the Eighteenth Dynasty? The city of Thebes was particularly rich in temples to this god.
Amun
In which 1987 American novel is a patchwork quilt used as a symbolic thread to
connect the novel’s fragmented narrative? The quilt was begun by Baby Suggs and
reworked and finished by Sethe and the title character.
Beloved
Matthew Rhys plays Perry Mason in reboot, written by which author?
Erle Stanley Gardner
Shelter is the first novel of which spin-off series by Harlan Coben named after the nephew of the main series?
Mickey Bolitar (nephew of Myron Bolitar)
The widespread criticism from the international community following the Sharpeville massacre was used by which politician - then the South African Prime Minister - to continue pushing for South Africa to become a republic? He is sometimes known as the “architect of Apartheid” for his work creating the various Apartheid policies.
Hendrik Verwoerd
QUESTION ONE
A type of error that garbage collection can help to avoid involves “dangling” types of
what specific object? These objects are memory addresses used to access data.
Pointer
QUESTION TWO
Caspase 9 is activated by the release of which specific haem-containing protein from the inner membrane of the mitochondria? This protein has an important function in the electron transport chain.
Cytochrome C
The 1883 novel Au Bonheur des Dames tells the story of a young woman who begins work in the titular department store, in which the owner gathers up a huge collection of textiles to intoxicate the senses of his customers. Sensuous descriptions of silks and woollens aim to also intoxicate the reader in this novel, the eleventh book in which author’s Rougon-Macquart series?
Emile Zola
Who wrote novel The United States of Banana? Her notable works include Empire of Dreams (1988), Yo-Yo Boing! (1998) and United States of Banana (2011).
Giannini Braschi
Late medieval maritime trade law was governed by the Llibre del Consolat de Mar (Book of the Consulate of the Sea), a text originating in what kingdom? This kingdom dominated trade in the Western Mediterranean after its conquest of Mallorca in the 13th century.
Aragon
In ‘A Defence of Abortion’, Judith Jarvis Thomson creates a thought experiment that asks the reader to imagine waking up connected to another person, who happens to be famous, in such a way that that person would die if he were to be disconnected. The famous person in this thought experiment is referred to by what name after the field in which he is said to have achieved his fame?
Violinist
QUESTION ONE
Who is the namesake of the river which runs from the Great Lakes, through southern
Quebec, toward the Atlantic Ocean? This man, also the namesake of a gulf which feeds
between the river and the Atlantic Ocean, is the patron saint of librarians, comedians,
and miners, among others.
St Lawrence
Which Australian moral philosopher responded to Thomson’s ‘A Defence of Abortion’ by arguing that utilitarian calculus implies that we are morally obliged to stay connected to the violinist? This man is best-known for his 1975 book Animal Liberation, in which he argues the case for vegetarianism.
Peter Singer
Which politician and general of the Golden Age of Athens, who led the city into the Peloponnesian War, ordered the construction of the Parthenon?
Pericles
Which 11-century Khmer temple sparked off a border dispute between Cambodia and
Thailand in 2008, after the latter protested Cambodia’s attempt to register the temple
as a UNESCO World Heritage Site without its agreement? In 2011, the International
Court of Justice awarded the promontory of the temple to Cambodia, while the 2008
listing as a World Heritage Site remains.
Preah Vihear
Which Hindu king of the gods, often depicted on his white elephant mount, Airavata, killed the evil Vritra using a thunderbolt weapon known as the Vajra?
Indra
Apoptosis may also be initiated by the Fas signal pathway. The signal molecule in that
pathway, the Fas ligand, is expressed on natural killer cells and which other form of
lymphocyte, which target cancer cells and cells infected by viruses or bacteria? These
cells are marked by the presence of the glycoprotein CD8 on their surface.
Cytotoxic T
When pointers do not correspond to a valid location in memory, for example due to dangling pointers, what type of fault may occur? Its name refers to the divisions enforced by memory protection.
Segmentation Fault
One implementation technique for garbage collection “counts” what specific abstract
datatype? Similar to a pointer, this datatype enables a program to access data in
memory.
Reference
Following the Permian, which was the first period of the Mesozoic Era?
Triassic
An important set of annual trade fairs were held in which historical region of France under the auspices of counts who ruled from the city of Troyes? Among the products traded there was Brie cheese, named after a city within this historical region.
Champagne
Verwoerd’s assassination in September 1966 led to John Vorster, who also supported Apartheid, becoming Prime Minister of South Africa. Vorster had previously been the Minister of Justice who oversaw what trial, in which members of the ANC, including Nelson Mandela, were tried and sentenced to life imprisonment? The trial was named after a suburb of Johannesburg where the defendants were arrested.
Rivonia Trial
Haydn also helped develop a musical structure consisting of an exposition, development, and recapitulation. This structure, commonly used in the first movement of symphonies and string quartets, takes its name from what form of composition for a solo instrument?
Sonata
Cytotoxic T cells can also induce the caspase cascade by releasing granzymes and perforin into the target cell. Granzymes belong to a class of proteases named after which amino acid with a hydroxy-methyl sidechain? Trypsin, chymotrypsin, and thrombin also belong to that group of proteases.
Serine
A dispute over which 16th-century mosque in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh first started in
1858 and came to a head in December 1992 when Hindu nationalist groups demolished
the site? In 2019, the Indian Supreme Court handed down a historic verdict, awarding
the disputed site to a trust to build a temple for Lord Rama, while an alternative plot of
land was offered to the Sunnis to construct a mosque.
Babri Masjid
What name is given to a chemical compound that has the same molecular formula as
another but has different chemical or physical properties because its atoms are
arranged in a different structure? One example is glucose and fructose.
Isomer
What given name and surname is shared by the influential Peruvian economist who
introduced the idea of ‘dead capital’, and a Spanish conquistador regarded as the first
European to cross the Mississippi River? Please give a full name as your answer.
Hernando de Soto
Which region of South America takes its name from a legendary race of bigfooted
giants? The crew of the Magellan expedition claimed to have seen such people in 1520.
Patagonia
Literally meaning ‘to be pure’, what term of Arabic origin is used in Sikhism to refer to
the collective body of all baptized members of the religion?
Khalsa
Earth’s Creation is a painting by which artist from the Aboriginal Utopia community in
Australia’s Northern Territory?
Emily Kame Kngwarreye
The unfortunate central character of which 20th century novella dies after an apple thrown by his father becomes lodged in his back and festers there?
The Metamorphosis or Die Verwandlung
The first verse of the Italian national anthem (Il Canto degli Italiani) mentions the
helmet of which Roman general, who was victorious at the Battle of Zama?
Scipio
Which military officer led the 1952 Egyptian revolution with Muhammad Naguib and
went on to serve as president of Egypt from 1954 until his death in 1970?
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Which large lake – that lies to the north of Lake Tanganyika on the border of Rwanda
and the Democratic Republic of the Congo – contains 65 cubic kilometres of methane
and 256 cubic kilometres of carbon dioxide which could erupt during a volcanic or
seismic event?
Lake Kivu
South African singer and musician who was the founder and musical director of the choral group Ladysmith Black Mambazo.
Joseph Shabalala
Dating from around 1400, the Khitrovo Gospels contains eight pages of miniatures, including an angel attributed to which Russian artist, who is known for his icons and frescoes for the Cathedral of the Annunciation in Moscow and Dormition Cathedral in Vladimir?
Andrei Rublev
In organic chemistry, which chemical reaction occurs between two alkene compounds
known as a diene and dienophile, and produces a six-membered ring? Named after 1950 Chemistry Nobel duo.
Diels-Alder Reaction
Many of the twenty-four official languages of the European Union have their own
unique characters not shared by any of the other official languages. The alphabet of
which official language of the EU uses Ț [T-comma] as its 25th letter? Ț represents a
voiceless alveolar affricate.
Romanian
Which lake on the border between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo
gives its name to the western branch of the East African rift valley? After exiting Lake
Victoria, the White Nile flows through Lake Kyoga and this lake.
Lake Albert
Which French puppet character was developed by Laurent Mourguet in the early 19th
century? The name of this puppet follows ‘grand’ to give the name of a Parisian theatre
that has become synonymous with graphic naturalistic depictions of horror, violence
and gore.
Guignol
The Diels–Alder reaction belongs to which general class of reaction? These reactions
can be notated using square brackets to indicate the number of electrons involved in the formation of a product, with Diels–Alder being described as [4+2].
Cycloaddition
What is the most populous province in China and the second most populous national
subdivision in the world? It is the site of the Pearl River delta and the cities of Shenzhen
and Dongguan.
Guangdong
The Cisterns of Tawila form a rain storage system that protects the city of Aden, Yemen from periodic flooding. The earliest tanks may have been built by which pre-Islamic kingdom? This kingdom conquered the Sabaeans in around 280 CE to control most of the Yemeni highlands until its defeat to the Aksumites in 525 CE.
HIMYARite Kingdom
So named because performances can last several hours, the ‘long song’ is a singing
tradition in the culture of which Asian country? Other important features of this country’s music a type of fiddle called the morin khuur.
Mongolia
As a stereoselective reaction, the Diels–Alder reaction will typically preferentially generate products based on what transition state? This preference is known as the Alder (BLANK) rule.
Endo Transition State
Some scholars believe that Hildegaard von Bingen illustrated which manuscript, in
which she described 26 religious visions she had experienced, although it is more likely
that she supervised the illustration?
Scivias
One of the world’s oldest dams still in use, the Kallanai dam crosses the Kaveri River in Tamil Nadu. It was built on the orders of Karikala, an early king of which dynasty? This Tamil dynasty ruled much of southern India and established a maritime empire that was at its most powerful in the 9th century CE.
Chola Dynasty
Ź [Z with acute], or ziet, is the unique 31st letter in which official language of the European Union? Ź represents the voiced alveolo-palatal fricative. Ź also appears in Romanised Montenegrin, which is not (yet) an official language of the EU.
Polish
The Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II was inspired by the works of Voltaire, Diderot and
Rousseau and is often considered one of the three great monarchs of the Enlightenment along with Frederick the Great and Catherine the Great. He was the son of which empress, the only woman to rule the Habsburg dominions in her own right?
Maria Theresa
Typically depicting dramatic scenes from Hindu epics, wayang is a form of shadow puppet theatre that originated on which island? Wayang is often accompanied by a gamelan orchestra, or by a duo called gender wayang in nearby Bali.
Java
Mount Kinabalu is home to the largest species of which group of carnivorous plants, the only plants known to have caught mammalian prey? Other species in this group are found from Madagascar to New Caledonia, and their common name is also used for unrelated North American species in the genus Sarracenia.
pitcher plants (or Nepenthes, Nepenthaceae; accept pitfall traps)
