Tachoblog’s 2009 Christmas Quiz – The Answers
A Happy New Year to you! Did you try Tachoblog’s 2009 Christmas Quiz? If not then click the link and have a go.
For those of you that did, you’ll no doubt want to see how many you got right and what the answers to the ones you couldn’t get were. Well, here they are.
,1 Why does the US flag, ‘Old Glory’ have 13 stripes as well as all those stars?
They commemorate the original 13 rebel states.
Click below for the rest of the answers…
2 There is only one steam-powered public clock in the world. Where is it?
Vancouver, Canada.
3 Who just staged a Broadway comeback as Desiree Armfeldt in A Little Night Music?
Catherine Zeta Jones.
4 Fabergé was the jeweller to whom?
The Romanovs, the Russian royal family.
5 Which government is one of three controlling shareholders in diamond firm De Beers?
Botswana.
6 Who is the EU’s new commissioner for the single market?
Michel Berrier.
7 What is golfer Tiger Woods’ wife’s first name?
Erin.
8 What is the name of Sarah Palin’s new book?
Maverick.
9 George Clooney recently returned for a cameo role in the final episode of which drama series?
E.R.
10 What does a Flesch score measure?
Gobbledegook. The higher the score the clearer the English.
11 Who wrote Day of the Trifids, a science fiction story about man-eating plants?
John Wyndham.
12 Who just said he expects to leave Manchester United before Sir Alex Ferguson?
Ryan Giggs.
13 What is a geosynchronous satellite?
One that circles the earth so fast and far out that it keeps station over the same place.
14 Where are your metatarsals, and what are they?
Bones in your feet.
15 Where were the world’s first traffic lights?
Near London’s House of Commons at the intersection of George and Bridge Streets in 1868.
16 St George’s distillery in Roudham, Norfolk is producing what for the first time in over 100 years?
English single malt whiskey.
17 What are the oldest known living organisms?
The bristlecone pines, examples of which may be over 5,000 years old.
18 in 2001 which long-serving UK member of parliament retired “to devote more time to politics?”
Tony Benn.
19 Who is the only person so far to hold a Cambridge Blue for motor sport?
Oliver Turvey.
20 What is the Chinese Republic’s currency called?
Renminbi.
21 Who were the Three Musketeers?
Athos, Porthos, and Aramis.
22 What is the difference between a Royal Navy and a British Army salute?
A British soldier salute has the palm facing forward, British sailors salute with palm facing down.
23 When does the next Chinese New Year start?
14 February 2010.
24 What is a male swan called?
A pen.
25 What animal gives its name to the next Chinese year
The next Chinese year will a Tiger year.
26 What is the name of Parkinson’s autobiography?
Parky
27 What is the name for the part of armed forces pay deemed to compensate for service life?
The X factor.
28 What is the earliest date that Easter can fall?
22 March.
29 Where is the world’s biggest commodity market?
Chicargo.
30 Where is Egypt building a giant wall?
Along its border with the Gaza Strip.
31 How many US presidents have there been?
44.
32 Which are the only two London’s Underground lines that are entirely below ground?
The Waterloo and City line and the Victoria line.
33 When was the last time the English Channel froze over between Calais and Dover?
1673.
34 What is osculation?
Kissing.
35 Who, apocryphally said “The station will leave the train at 4:15″?
Albert Einstein.
36 Who won the world’s first Golden Disc and for what?
Glenn Miller in February 1942, celebrating 1,200,000 sales of “Chattanooga Choo Choo.”
37 The Tassenmuseum claims to hold the world’s biggest collection of handbags.. Where is it?
Herengracht, Amsterdam.
38 For what was Joseph Stiglitz famous?
Stiglitz is one of the world’s most frequently cited economists.
39 What does an Iambic pentameter measure?
Rhythm in verse.
40 What is widely accepted as the longest vowelless word in general English use?
Rhythm.
41 What is the oldest Christian church building?
Holy Sephulcre, Jerusalem.
42 What is the chemical symbol for gold?
Au.
43 Disneyland in Florida has just chosen an English town to be its twin. Which one?
Swindon, in Wiltshire.
44 What are the three Abrahamic faiths?
Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
45 Who is the first Briton selected by the European Sapce Agency for manned space flight?
Major Tim Peake. His selection was announced in May 2009.
46 Who played the lady in the life of Steve McQueen’s Bullitt?
Jacqueline Bissett.
47 Who first recorded Ferry Cross the Mersey?
Gerry & the Pacemakers. Written by Gerry Marsden, it was released in late 1964.
48 Solar Impulse is an unusual light aircraft. What is different?
It is solar powered and the only powered aeroplane to fly without fossil fuel.
49 When revolutionaries stormed the Bastille in July 1789, how many prisoners did they release?
Seven.
50 In which country are most birds of paradise found?
New Guinea.
51 What is the average time interval between high tides around the UK coastline?
12.5 hours.
52 In which country was a UN worker arrested this year for wearing trousers in public?
Sudan.
53 Which country won the Eurovision Song Contest in 2009?
Norwegian Alexander Rybak, singing Fairytale and winning a record breaking 387 points.
54 How many countries took part in the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest?
42.
55 Which is the first organisation to say that it would charge people to read its newspapers online?
Richard Murdoch’s News International.
56 Which club claims to be the oldest playing Association Football?
Sheffield FC, founded in 1857. It plays in the Northern Premier League.
57 When was the first mass produced and commercially available TV shown?
1928 when the Baird Corporation showed its Model B at the Radio Olympia Exhibition.
58 Who wrote Gone with the Wind?
Margaret Mitchel. It was the only book she wrote.
59 What recreational drug kills the most people each year in the UK?
Tobacco. It kills c.100,000 a year in the UK; alcohol kills c.15,000. Illegal drugs kill c.2,500.
60 Which 125 year old train service just stopped?
The Orient Express.
61 Which is Europe’s largest circulation daily paper
Bild, in Germany.
62 Whose album I Dreamed a Dream went gone to No 1 in its first week in the US recently?
Susan Boyle’s, on sales of over 700,000.
63 AB Kate Nesbitt is the first woman in the Royal Navy and the second woman awarded what?
The Military Cross.
64 Runescape, the virtual game made English legal history recently. How?
Some of the game’s players were cited in the first prosecution for alleged virtual theft.
65 Which is the largest glacier-free landmass?
Australia.
66 Who won The X Factor televison talent show in 2008?
Alexandra Burke (remember her?)
67 The Rt Rev Stephen Venner has just been made bishop of what?
The UK armed forces, who may not share the gentleman’s reported admiration for the Taleban.
68 Who does Vladimir Putin seem keen to rehabilitate?
Joseph Stalin.
69 Which brewer claims to be Britain’s oldest?
Shepherd Neame.
70 Who is leading the official UK inquiry into the Iraq war?
Sir John Chilcot.
1 What is the Cohen brothers’ latest film called?
A Serious Man.
72 Which previously Francophone state just successfully applied to join the British Commonwealth?
Rwanda.
73 How did Michaele and Tareq Salahi upset Barack Obama?
They gate crashed his first state dinner and were photographed shaking his hand.
74 Who is the leading lady in Steven Sondbergh’s latest film The Girlfriend Experience?
Sasha Gray.
75 Why is Asperger’s syndrome sufferer Gary McKinnon due to go the USA?
He is to be extradited and tried on allegations that he hacked into US Defense Dept sites.
76 Who wrote the Twilight Saga books?
Stephanie Meyer.
77 What is Robbie Knievel planning to do at Wembley next year that his dad failed to do in 1975?
Jump a Harley Davidson over 16 double-deck buses.
78 What is biggest waterfall in the Southern hemisphere?
Iguaçu Falls, on the Paraná river between Brazil and Argentina.
79 Who wrote Blithe Spirit?
Noel Coward.
80 Who played Zorba in the film Zorba the Greek?
Anthony Quinn.
81 Which tune should medical students learn for the correct rhythm for emergency heart massage?
Nellie the Elephant
82 Which dancer just launched a range of children’s wear?
Darcey Bussell.
83 Who is the head of the UK’s secret intelligence service MI5?
Sir John Soars.
84 Which telescope just delivered its first pictures?
The European Space Agency’s Herschel telescope.
85 Who played the male lead opposite the then Julie Andrews in the Mary Poppins film?
Dick van Dyke.
86 What is the name of the MI5 boss in BBC tv’s Spooks series?
Sir Harry Pearce.
87 Who reads Richmal Crompton’s Just William stories for BBC radio?
Martin Jarvis.
88 Which new Boeing made its maiden flight, two and a half years late on 15 December this year?
The 787 Dreamliner.
89 What has just been voted the most common cliché in English?
“At the end of the day”, according to a poll by equestrian charity The Brooke.
90 Whose retouched image in an Olay cosmetics advertisement was recently ruled misleading?
Twiggy.
91 What competition is New York’s city health department sponsoring?
One to design the wrapper for the City’s official condom..
92 Which playwright had a cameo part in the original Italian Job film?
Noel Coward.
93 Pope Benedict XVl is to beatify Cardinal John Henry Newman next year. Where?
At Coventry Airport.
94 Britain’s Carey Mulligan has been shortlisted for a Golden Globe for her debut part in which film?
An Education.
95 Work just started on the world’s longest bridge. What will it connect?
Hong Kong, Macao and the Chinese mainland.
96 The US Government is to buy the Thompson Correctional Center in Illinois. To house whom?
A so far undisclosed number of prisoners from Guantanamo Bay.
97 Girls Aloud singer Sarah Harding’s latest film is?
St Trinians 2.
98 Which country is the latest to announce compulsory internet filtering?
Australia.
99 Whose London-based football academy just shut?
David Beckham’s.
100 Who set up Lastminute.com?
Martha Lane Fox.
Once again, Tachoblog’s thanks to The UK’s Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (who supply our weekly CV News Roundup) for letting us publish their annual quiz.
