Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Question 766: A 'Crooshing' defeat


A recently declassified document of the US Navy.
What does it show?

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Question 765: Au revoir...



1994. Something very very bad happened.

Tell me:
  • What this is?
  • What the red circle signifies, ie., what happened there?
Give relevant details.

Monday, August 29, 2011

Question 764: Greed, for lack of a better word, is...stupid.

__X__ is a thingamajig.
This thingamajig is generally credited to, and named after ___Y___ who is believed to have come up with it in order to curb the greed of a certain set of workers and preventing it from, well, overflowing.

This funky invention consists of a column in the centre positioned directly over the stem and over the hole at the bottom of the stem. A small, open pipe runs from this hole almost to the top of the central column, where there is an open chamber. The chamber is connected by a second pipe to the bottom of the central column, where a hole in the column exposes the pipe to the contents of __X__.

It uses some fancy Pascal's Principle of Communicating Vessels and other less fancy siphon concepts to work and thus successfully defeats the greed of the evil greedy people who are so full of greed and thirst and stupidity and what not.

What? Explain how X works.

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Question 763 : Trump card

Latin ___ meant ‘______’ (a possible lihk with Old High German gehan‘say’ and Sanskrit yācati ‘ he implores’ suggests that its underlying meaning was ‘word-play’). It passed into old French as jeu, which lies behind english __ probably also jewel.  connected with fun and ‘humour’, among them ____ (17th c.) and --- (17th c.), both from Latin derivatives of ______(the superficially similar_____incidentally, is etymologically unrelated), and ____ itself, which was originally introduced in the form __ or __(‘coming off with so many dry ____ and biting repartees’, Bishop Kennett’s translation of Erasmus’s Encomium Moriae 1683). 




Word?




Which common word?

Friday, August 26, 2011

Question 762 : Countdown time

Cartography from the 1450s.

 I wouldn't recommend your imaginations going wild, but try and guess what this map represents.




Question 761: Winning's in their blood


Borrowed from the world of gambling, __X__ is a term used to describe stocks of a company with a national reputation for quality, reliability and the ability to operate profitably in good times and bad.
Based on the idea that different tokens dictate different values ranging from lowest to highest, the phrase was coined by Oliver Gingold of Dow Jones sometime in 1923 or 1924. Company folklore recounts that the term apparently got its start when Gingold was standing by the stock ticker at the brokerage firm that later became Merrill Lynch. Noticing several trades at USD$200 or USD$250 a share or more, he said to Lucien Hooper of W.E. Hutton & Co. that he intended to return to the office to "write about these __X__ stocks." Thus the phrase was born. It has been in use ever since, originally in reference to high-priced stocks, more commonly used today to refer to high-quality stocks.

Yenu?
Give original funda behind __X__ with reference to gambling.


Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Question 760: Happens to you?



"Today, this girl who has been stalking me for almost 7 months sent me a 12 page text comparing her love for me with her passion for cheese. ___"




"Today, my stepbrother found my diary and read it. He then told my boyfriend how I had a crush on another guy, and no longer liked him, causing my boyfriend to break up with me. That diary was from the third grade. ___"




"Today, I took my Catholic girlfriend home to meet my family for the first time. My brother thought it would be civil to spend over an hour insulting her religion and explaining in detail the many ways in which "the Force" is superior. ___"




"Today, my car was broken into, and they stole all my CDs, but left my daughter's Black Eyed Peas CD behind. I'm pretty pissed about the theft, but almost glad to see that the delinquents in my town have a decent taste in music. ___"




"Today, I spent $500 buying my lost cat back from a jerk who thought it was his. I get home and my mom tells me that she'd sold it to the same guy for $10 because she thought the cat was ruining my love life. ___"




"Today, I walked in on my mom ranting on about what a useless bitch I am. She was talking to my cat. It's not the first time this has happened, either. ___"




"Today, my cats found my box of condoms. This is the third one they've chewed up. The worst part? They've gotten more use out of them in the last two months than I have. ___"




"Today, I forgot to do my French homework, but since it was an online worksheet, I told my teacher my internet wasn't working. I told her with an e-mail. ___"

Fill in ze blank.


Monday, August 22, 2011

Question 759: No Fear




__X__ was launched by four Harvard students on January 7, 1999. Most of its users were high school and college-going students. It was acquired by Barnes and Noble in 2001 for approx. $3,555,000.

Many teachers accused __X__ of being a cheating tool but __X__ condemns the idea of cheating.

"When your books and teachers don't make sense, we do." is their slogan.

Identify X and explain the title.

Question 758: Worst thing's to Rush!

WHAT?
Following the fatwa,________________ was put under police protection by the British Govt.. Despite a conciliatory statement by Iran in 1998, and ____________ declaration that he would stop living in hiding, the Iranian state news agency reported in 2006 that the fatwa would remain in place permanently since fatwas can only be rescinded by the person who first issued them, and Khomeini had since died.
As of mid-2011, ________ has not been physically harmed, but others connected with the book have suffered violent attacks. ___, its Jap translator, was stabbed to death on 11 July 1991; _____, the Italian translator, was seriously injured in a stabbing the same month; Nygaard, the publisher in Norway, barely survived an attempted assassination in Oslo in October 1993, and Aziz Nesin, the Turkish translator, was the intended target in the events that led to the Sivas massacre on 2 July 1993 in Turkey, which resulted in the deaths of 37 people. Individual purchasers of the book have not been harmed. However, the only nation with a predominantly Muslim population where the novel remains legal is Turkey.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

Question 757: Bad Hair Day

The __X__ generator was developed, starting in 1929, by physicist ___X___ at Princeton University. The first model was demonstrated in October 1929. The first machine used a silk ribbon bought at a five-and-dime store as the charge transport belt. In 1931 a version able to produce 1,000,000 volts was described in a patent disclosure. This version had two 60 cm diameter charge accumulation spheres mounted on borosilicate glass columns 180 cm high; the apparatus cost only $90 in 1931.

So ID X

May you have many more!

Here's wishing Nihar a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY! 


Woo.

Saturday, August 20, 2011

Question 756: You Said Who?

__X__ was quite a mute wikipedia entry when it was first made in 2006. It was tended by just two opinion-holders on the subject, commonly referred to as "The Stratfordian" and "The Oxfordian". The entry discussed an idea that had developed into a sort of literary blasphemy over the years. It erupted into a full flame war on the wikipedia moderator boards in 2009, and still made the coveted "featured article" six months later.

The idea has garnered several powerful advocated over the years, including Walt Whitman, Mark Twain, Freud, Hellen Keller and Malcolm X.

Give me the name of the wikipedia entry __X__ that discusses this much-disputed idea.

Friday, August 19, 2011

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Question 754: Kick the __

Id the man.
And the very famous tagline he coined for a very famous company.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Question 753: Who's calling?

HP Lovecraft's initial short story, __X__ was published in Weird Tales in 1928 and established the character as a malevolent entity trapped in an arctic underwater city called R'lyeh. Described as being "...an octopus, a dragon, and a human caricature.... A pulpy, tentacled head surmounted a grotesque scaly body with rudimentary wings", and "a mountain walked or stumbled",  the imprisoned __X__ is apparently the source of constant anxiety for mankind at a subconscious level, and also the subject of worship by a number of evil cults.

ID the game also being parodied along with the creature in __X__



Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Question 752: Re view the review?

xkcd. It's been long.Whee.
Easy one. Fill in the blank.


The problem with what?


Monday, August 15, 2011

Question 751: Check.

What did this man here become the first to do, in the year 2003?
Be creative.

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Question 750: Schtroumpf This

First introduced as a series of comic strips by the Belgian cartoonist Peyo (pen name of Pierre Culliford) on October 23, 1958. The original term and the accompanying language came during a meal Peyo was having with his colleague and friend André Franquin at the Belgian Coast. Having momentarily forgotten the word "salt", Peyo asked him (in French) to pass the schtroumpf . Franquin jokingly replied: "Here's the Schtroumpf — when you are done schtroumpfing, schtroumpf it back..." and the two spent the rest of that weekend speaking in "schtroumpf language".The name was later translated into Dutch as __X__ which was adopted in English.



Saturday, August 13, 2011

Question 749: When I Come Around

The company was six months from insolvency, and morale was at an all-time low. There were warring factions and fiefdoms pitting any number of internal groups against each other, with each assigning blame for the company’s slow demise. The returning (temporarily) interim CEO began cutting irrelevant products, projects and partnerships to streamline the company to a spartan group of products.

He selected a project that was an extension of the very first product the company released. It was in a very infant stage and it would wind up barely resembling what was originally envisioned. The vision was a radical design, a departure from just about anything else in the market.

There was no name for this product and the CEO felt that it would be extremely important to have a relatable name, something that didn't deviate from their original methodology, but pushed through their revolutionarily new TBWA\Chiat\Day-designed ad campaign.

After much back-and-forth between the visionary CEO and the creative branding genius, the new name __X__ for the product reverberated so much within the company and then out to the industry and the consumer world, that it has defined and stuck with every new product introduced by the company since then. It has represented the ease of access to the internet, the interestingly refreshing design methodologies used to create new niche markets and has become a techno-cultural platitude (almost).

What is this name, __X__ ?




Friday, August 12, 2011

Question 748: Meowrr

Just released sneak peek into the character __X__ from __Y__.
#brownie points for the actress (a personal favourite)


Thursday, August 11, 2011

Question 747: Colour me what?



"This is a song about prejudice
And the language of prejudice
And the power of... the language of... prejudice
It's called
Prejudice

In this modern freespoken society
There is a word that we still hold taboo
A word with a terrible history of being used to abuse oppress and subdue
Just six seemingly harmless letters arranged in a way will form a word
With more power than the pieces of metal that are forged to make swords
A couple of G's an R and an E an I and an N
Just six little letters all jumbled together have caused damage that we may never mend
And it's important that we all respect that if these people should happen to choose to reclaim the word as their own it doesn't mean the rest of you have a right to its use
So never underestimate
The power that language imparts
Sticks and stones may break your bones but words can break hearts
A couple of G's G's unless you've had to live it an R and an E Even I am careful with it
An I and an N, in the end it will only offend, don't want to have to spell it out again

Yeah

Only a ______ can call another ______ ______
Only a ______ can call another ______ ______
So listen to me if you care for your health
You wont call me ______ less your ______ yourselfOnly a ______ can call another ______ ______"







What is this six letter word?
The above piece is written by?

Don't google this.


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Question 746: Heaven or Hell

Glenn Frey described the origins of the song:
The song began as a demo tape, an instrumental by Don Felder. He’d been submitting tapes and song ideas to us since he’d joined the band, always instrumentals, since he didn’t sing. But this particular demo, unlike many of the others, had room for singing. It immediately got our attention. The first working title, the name we gave it, was ‘Mexican Reggae'.
ID the song
#brownie for the band
Hint

Monday, August 8, 2011

Question 744: How many fingers am I holding up?


Okay, __X___ syndrome is an extremely rare occurrence which is symptomatic of brain damage. What happens is, the affected person can't see. But he doesn't tell anyone about it only because he doesn't believe that he can't. He behaves normally and it is only when he collides with his surroundings or trips or something to that effect do the people around him realise that something's wrong with his vision.
ailment

What is __X__?


Numero Uno


Hey.
We're gonna cut it down to just one question per day (officially) and see how that works out. This system will be in place until further notice.

That is all.


Sunday, August 7, 2011

Friday, August 5, 2011

Question 742: "SmacK" That around a bit

Nonsensical title, but used to describe a nonsensical world which is yet to make sense. A massive advertising campaign aimed at kids(which 1 isn't), ID the company & the person blanked out (said person is the mascot)
#brownie points for the name of the campaign, which is what you need to sit through an episode of it.


Thursday, August 4, 2011

Question 741: I like em big...and I like em chunky

"I swear by Apollo, the healer, Asclepius, Hygieia, and Panacea, and I take to witness all the gods, all the goddesses, to keep according to my ability and my judgment, the following Oath and agreement:
To consider dear to me, as my parents, him who taught me this art; to live in common with him and, if necessary, to share my goods with him; To look upon his children as my own brothers, to teach them this art..."

What art? What is this?

Question 740: Affair but not Just

___X___ was a political scandal that divided France in the 1890s and the early 1900s. It involved the conviction for treason in November 1894 of _______ a young French artillery officer of Alsatian Jewish descent. Sentenced to life imprisonment for allegedly having communicated French military secrets to the German Embassy in Paris, _____was sent to the penal colony at Devil's Island in French Guiana and placed in solitary confinement.

Two years later, in 1896, evidence came to light identifying a French Army major named Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy as the real culprit. After high-ranking military officials suppressed the new evidence, a military court unanimously acquitted Esterhazy after the second day of his trial. The Army accused _____ of additional charges based on false documents fabricated by a French counter-intelligence officer, Hubert-Joseph Henry, who was seeking to re-confirm ______'s conviction. Henry's superiors accepted his documents without full examination.

ID X & the officer (same name)


Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Question 739: London Bridge NEVER falls down.

Id.

Question 738: Fly like a butterfly

According to Jacques Levy, with whom __X__ wrote the song __Y__ about __Z__,

__X__ wasn't sure that he could write a song [about ___Z__].... He was just filled with all these feelings about __Y__. He couldn't make the first step. I think the first step was putting the song in a total storytelling mode. I don't remember whose idea it was to do that. But really, the beginning of the song is like stage directions, like what you would read in a script: 'Pistol shots ring out in a barroom night.... Here comes the story of the ___Y___.' Boom! Titles. You know, ___X___ loves movies, and he can write these movies that take place in eight to ten minutes, yet seem as full or fuller than regular movies.
X & Z

(Y is the nickname of __Z__)
ID X-Z

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Question 737: And then you wonder why you get left behind...


Sorry for potentially scarring any pleasant memories of yours.



Identify the person.

Question 736: My drink of Choice

Simple recipe for a drink
Should really try it out once, feel a sort of kinship with it.
It combines Mathematics with a very famous drink, thus giving the name ___X-Y____



All the blanks save for the 4th one refer to the same concept, the 4th being blank as it would give it away.

Monday, August 1, 2011

Question 735: By all things Unholy!

ID all four for 20 points( +5 for each)


Question 734: Can't Just 'Waltz' In

SImple meme question
HEre are 2 cultural icons morphed into one
ID