Quiz 1

Hi !

Here's the first set. It's a general quiz to begin with.

1 "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly ____:Who, when he had found one ____ of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it."These lines form part of a parable told by Jesus Christ in explaining the value of the Kingdom of Heaven, from the Gospel of Matthew. A Berkeley grad considered naming his 'invention' after his wife Gloria but then named it after the word blanked out in the parable. However, he found that this too was already in use but went ahead albeit with a modification. How do we know it today ?

2 Connect the company Luckyland Biscuits and Twix brand of chocolates. (extended connect)

3 Connect these films - Birth of a Nation, Apocalypse Now and What's Opera Doc? . (Think music)

4 Where would you find the following verses / lines (whatever you'd like to call 'em) ?

"sing as if no one is listening

dance as if no one is watching
love as you've never loved before

live as if heaven is here on earth"

5 Fill in the blank.Cesar Romero, Jack Nicholson, Mark Hamill, ----- ------

6 Who is featured on this seal ? (Very workable. Clues abound)

7 This group originated with the religious movement known as Bible Students founded in the 1870s by Charles Taze Russell. Various splinter groups arose after Russell's death, particularly during the presidency of Joseph Rutherford. Their official teaching regards blood as sacred and rejects transfusions of whole blood, red cells, white cells, platelets or plasma. In a 1931 convention at Columbus , they adopted their present name. Name the group.

8 In his youth, this person was diagnosed with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). At 19, he was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol and served 18 months probation. Two unique morphological features have aided him - long arms (201 cm) diproportionate to body height (193 cm) and size 14 feet. Nicknamed Gomer and MP alternatively, name this person. (Again - enough clues)

9 Connect the three visuals.

10 Connect the four visuals.

Have fun !

Zed

First Serve

Hi !

I've been grappling with the idea of quizzing being a worthwhile pursuit over a long period. Having exercised the 'good old cerebellum' a bit, I've to say that it's germinality can be traced back to our schooling days when every minutae, every snippet of seemingly insignificant trivia was gobbled up with glee. Coupled with a sense of being bogged down by the cavalcade of information that's available at a click. With growth, it dawns upon one that the trick is not in gleaning as much as possible, but making sense of the enormity, to know what's relevant.

Earlier, the issue was with the abundance of know-how but very little of it being organized and manicured to present a larger picture. Now, the pendulum has swung in favour of too much information with diminishing know-how. This brings us to a conundrum - where does quizzing (by its very nature, dealing with trivia) figure amidst the present day emphasis on relevant data.

One rather obvious panacea is that over a period of time quizzers or indeed, anyone who believes in the acquisition of knowledge as an end in itself, tend to specialize - home in on areas of interest. This solves the primal issue but gives birth to a new one - the fact that one tends to become laned during the journey. This can result in one turning a blind eye to other areas.

Happily though, quizzing in itself offers a solution for the other issue as well. Here's an example.

Connect the two persons with the girl in the visual below.

The connect is 1984.

The visual below is from the Apple Macintosh Ad released in the year 1984 which used the Big Brother motif in the 1984 novella by George Orwell as a veiled reference to IBM. It opens with a setting similar to the one described in the novel and the movie version with Big Brother holding sway over a submissive audience when the girl in white and orange breaks the screen and Apple is introduced. The ad was a huge success back then and lauded for its innovative concepts.

The first person is Anthony Burgess who wrote a novel titled 1985, not a sequel to 1984 as is commonly believed, but one that uses the same setting as 1984 to advance Burgess' own visions of the future based on the scenario he witnessed in England in 1978. He has also authored a book called 99 Novels and once again 1984 is used as the seminal work. The period of selection for the novels is from 1939 (when Orwell wrote 1984) to 1984 itself.

The other person is Richard Burton who played the role of O'Brien in the movie version of 1984.

Such questions have become more popular in recent years and the affliction with mundane facts has more or less been shed. Right too. This then solves the other issue - this sort of question triggers one's curiosity in multiple directions and results in knowledge with perspective. In keeping with this, this site will feature quizzes on a regular basis. From time to time, thematic quizzes, crosswords etc will also be featured.

So, include this blog on your radar and watch out for this space.

Zed