Ken Jennings's Trivia Almanac (183 page)

5.
E (green)

6.
A

7.
H

8.
I

9.
J

10.
C

OCTOBER 26

ONE DEGREE

Easy

1.
Apollo 13

2.
A Few Good Men

3.
Footloose

4.
Mystic River

5.
Wild Things

Harder

1.
The River Wild

2.
Sleepers

3.
Tremors

4.
Diner

5.
JFK

Yeah, Good Luck

1.
He Said, She Said

2.
Queens Logic

3.
Starting Over

4.
The Big Picture

5.
Beauty Shop

DOC TALK

Easy

1.
German measles

2.
Lockjaw

3.
Mad cow disease

4.
Whooping cough

5.
High blood pressure

Harder

1.
Pinkeye

2.
Down syndrome

3.
Lou Gehrig’s disease

4.
Bed-wetting

5.
Athlete’s foot

Yeah, Good Luck

1.
Leprosy

2.
Mumps

3.
Shingles

4.
Heartburn

5.
Crosseye or squint

EASY AS PIE

1.
Geena Davis and Jeff Goldblum

2.
Lake Pontchartrain

3.
Morgan Freeman

4.
Sergeant Rock

5.
Sunday morning

OCTOBER 27

APTRONYMS

1.
Bill Medley (the Righteous Brothers)

2.
Chris Moneymaker

3.
Larry Speakes

4.
Tiger Woods

5.
William Wordsworth

IN ALPHABETICAL BORDER

Easy

1.
Iraq

2.
Brazil

3.
Zimbabwe

4.
Lithuania

Harder

1.
Bangladesh

2.
Azerbaijan

3.
Eritrea

4.
South Africa

Yeah, Good Luck

1.
Benin

2.
Malawi

3.
Kyrgyzstan

4.
Guinea-Bissau

AN INSIDE JOB

1.
Ulysses

2.
Outland

3.
James Watt

4.
Rich “Corinthian” leather

5.
Australia

OCTOBER 28

FIRST DEGREE

1.
France

2.
Dick Tracy’s

3.
Two consecutive posthumous number ones

4.
Annika Sorenstam

5.
Orville Wright

6.
London

7.
It was the first item sold on eBay

8.
Valentina Tereshkova (first woman in space)

9.
Technetium

10.
Joan Cusack (
Working Girl
)

MOVIE MOVIE

1.
I

2.
A

3.
B

4.
G

5.
F

6.
J

7.
E

8.
C

9.
D

10.
H

OCTOBER 29

I NOW PRONOUNCE YOU…

Easy

1.
BAY-sing-er

2.
ROH-ling

3.
rayf fines

4.
HYOO-glee

5.
SHY-uh luh-BUFF

Harder

1.
HAM-ur-styne

2.
VICE

3.
boo-SEM-ee

4.
KOH-fee ANN-un

5.
KLOH-ee SEV-uh-nee

Yeah, Good Luck

1.
dee-AN AR-bus

2.
lee-EV SHRY-burr

3.
MOAG

4.
SOYSS

5.
shar-LEEZ THROWN

DEAR CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY LAWYERS

1.
The Bering Strait

2.
The Strait of Messina

3.
The Strait of Hormuz

4.
The Strait of Magellan

5.
The Strait of Gibraltar

ROLE PLAYING

1.
B

2.
F

3.
H

4.
J

5.
E

6.
C

7.
I

8.
G

9.
D

10.
A

OCTOBER 30

FEAR FACTOR

1.
Her first period

2.
Edward Albee

3.
Feathers

4.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

5.
North Carolina

6.
The number 666

7.
The Smiths’

8.
The Fly

9.
Tommy

10.
Martin Van Buren’s

MR. JENNINGS’S TEN BEST DRESSED

1.
Spats

2.
Savile Row

3.
Breakfast at Tiffany’s

4.
Beau Brummell

5.
Navy blue

6.
Oleg Cassini

7.
Blue Velvet

8.
Barbie

9.
Vera Wang

10.
Spider-Man

OCTOBER 31

NOSE CANDY

1.
A button

2.
The septum

3.
Dmitri Shostakovich

4.
Chief Joseph

5.
The cricket

6.
“Health”

7.
Tycho Brahe

8.
Froot Loops

9.
Roxane

10.
“New car smell”

INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS

1.
Gram Parsons

2.
Eva Perón’s

3.
Charlie Chaplin

4.
Alistair Cooke

5.
John Barrymore

BEST(IARY) SELLERS

Easy

1.
Snake

2.
Cat

3.
Hippogriff

4.
House elf

Harder

1.
Dragon

2.
Dog

3.
Phoenix

4.
Giant

Yeah, Good Luck

1.
Owl

2.
Centaur

3.
Toad

4.
Thestral

NOVEMBER 1

1911
D
URING A RECONNAISSANCE MISSION
against Turkish forces in Libya, an Italian pilot named Giulio Gavotti invents the aerial bombing raid when he realizes he can toss grenades at targets from his small plane. I’m guessing he was the kind of guy who threw stuff off overpasses when he was a kid.

DA BOMB

1.
What was the code name of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima?

2.
What famous B-17 was named for a Tennessee cotton entrepreneur’s daughter named Margaret Polk?

3.
What club, whose first chapter formed in San Bernardino in 1948, borrowed the World War II nickname for the 303rd Bombardment Group?

4.
Slaughterhouse-Five
was inspired by the firebombing of what German city?

5.
What 1989 song was named for the tin-roofed cabin where the B-52s wrote their hit song “Rock Lobster”?

1939
H
OLLYWOOD’S STRICT MORAL CONSCIENCE,
the Production Code, passes an amendment allowing certain uses of the words “damn” and “hell” in historical or literary context. The rule is specifically designed to avoid censoring Clark Gable’s last line in
Gone With the Wind.

FRANKLY, MY DEAR…

On what rivers would you find these dams?

1.
Aswan High Dam

2.
Hoover Dam

3.
Three Gorges Dam

4.
Grand Coulee Dam

5.
Fort Peck Dam

1944
T
HE WORD “VEGAN”
is coined when Donald Watson founds the United Kingdom’s Vegan Society. Watson is fed up with ovolacto types co-opting the “vegetarian” label, so he wants a new concept that would be “the beginning and the end of vegetarianism”—hence, veganism.

SOCIETY PAGES

1.
What turn-of-the-century event was provoked by the Society of Right and Harmonious Fists?

2.
What rapper lost his role in
Menace II Society
when, he said, he made the mistake of beating up the directors?

3.
What Baptist missionary is remembered today only because he was shot by Chinese Communists near Xi’an in 1945?

4.
What British band released
The Village Green Preservation Society
the same day the Beatles’ “White Album” came out?

5.
What’s the largest of the Society Islands?

6.
What author’s words are read to open every meeting of the
Dead Poets Society
?

7.
What famous inventor was a founder, and the second president, of the National Geographic Society?

8.
The Crosby-Sinatra-Kelly film
High Society
was a musical remake of what classic film?

9.
What’s the more common name for Saint Ignatius of Loyola’s Society of Jesus?

10.
Who coined the phrase “conventional wisdom” in his book
The Affluent Society
?