Well done to Chris Keane, the lady who put this quiz together.

Answers:

1. What does a camel store in its hump? A> Fat
2. What is the third glorious mystery of the Rosary? A> The descent of the holy spirit [apparently]
3. If  you dialed 1850 365 000, who would answer the phone? A> Westdoc
4. In which range of mountains did the character of Rip Van Winkle sleep for 20 years? A> Catskills

Picture round #1, Irish Eyes:

1. Miriam O’Callaghan
2. Louis Walsh
3. Brian O’Driscoll
4. Mary Harney
5. Conor Counihan
6. Ryan Tubridy
7. Mary Robinson
8. Pat Shortt
9. Seán Fitzpatrick
10. Pádraig Harrington

Picture round #2, Dingbats:

1. Back stroke
2. Home is where the heart is
3. Little by little
4. Two left feet
5. Upset over nothing
6. Love is in the air*
7. The long and the short of it
8. Vice versa
9. Within reason
10. More to it than meets the eye

Picture round#3, The Young Ones:

1. Catherine Zeta-Jones
2. Demi Moore
3. Sandra Bullock
4. Keanu Reeves
5. John Travolta
6. Brad Pitt
7. Meg Ryan
8. Nicholas Cage
9. Pierce Brosnan
10. Leonardo DiCaprio

Picture round #4, Towns of Connacht:

1. Charlestown
2. Ballinlough
3. Athenry
4. Castlebar
5. Boyle
6. Fourmilehouse
7. Headford
8. Carrick-on-Shannon
9. Westport
10. Belmullet

Name the song:

1. That saved a wretch like me A> Amazing Grace
2. How wonderful life is, when you’re in the world A> Your song
3. Said Sam, you’re looking at a lonely, lonely man A> North to Alaska
4. Caught in a trap, I can’t walk out A> Suspicious Minds
5. Now you don’t talk so loud, now you don’t feel so proud A> Like a Rolling Stone
6. But February made me shiver, with every paper I’d deliver A> American Pie
7. And now the end is near and I must face the final curtain A> My Way
8. Imagine there’s no heaven A> Imagine
9. Look in to my eyes, you will see A> (Everything I do) I do it for you
10. They got cars big as bars, they got rivers of gold A> Fairytale of New York

Hope you all enjoyed the challenge.

Normally, my blogs are akin to a sprint but this one was a bit of a marathon.  Well, it certainly was to type, anyway!

So it was a pleasant surprise to find that last night’s quiz at the Ballyhaunis Golf Club was a real diamond in the rough (pun pun).  It was a small quiz, in terms of entry, with just nine tables taking part, but the production quality on show was first class.

First of all, upon paying our entrance fee, all tables received a welcome package, sealed in clear plastic and looking like it had just arrived from Cupertino, California. I’ve included a picture I snaped of it but I think the lighting conditions were against me. This packet contained:

• a programme, with a list of round topics
• our answer books, with round and table number already filled-in
• four small squares of pink paper – I assumed these were for jotting notes on
• a selection of riddles to get the brains warmed-up

We also got a pen but this wasn’t included in the package, presumably as it would spoil the lovely finish.

The quiz itself was a nice, traditional, 10 rounds of 10. Included in those 10 rounds though were four picture rounds. Yes, four! Throw in a song lyric round, in which the questions were handed out on a sheet of paper, and you begin to realise how much work had gone in to preparing this event.

Further novelty was ensured for yours truly as it was the first time I’d sat down at the same quiz table as my father since 1996.  Our dynamic has changed in the intervening years and he, mostly, goes along with what I think is the correct answer now. That said, we did have a small discussion over the contents of a camel’s hump and, in going with his answer, we got it wrong. That proves a point, I think!

At the end of the night, we finished in second place, with 89/100.  The winners on the night scored 91, so my dad was off the hook over his earlier answer. I didn’t need to get the hump etc.

Questions we got wrong:

1. What does a camel store in its hump?
2. What is the third glorious mystery of the Rosary?
3. If you dialed 1850 365 000, who would answer the phone?
4. In which range of mountains did the character of Rip Van Winkle sleep for 20 years?

Picture round #1, Irish Eyes:

Picture round #2: Dingbats:

Picture round #3, The Young Ones:

Picture round #4, Towns of Connacht*:

Name the song (from the lyric):

1. That saved a wretch like me
2. How wonderful life is, when you’re in the world
3. Said Sam, you’re looking at a lonely, lonely man
4. Caught in a trap, I can’t walk out
5. Now you don’t talk so loud, now you don’t feel so proud
6. But February made me shiver, with every paper I’d deliver
7. And now the end is near and I must face the final curtain
8. Imagine there’s no heaven
9. Look in to my eyes, you will see
10. They got cars big as bars, they got rivers of gold

Impressive huh? Well, it certainly made for a bumper blog post.

Update: answers are here.

* Take note quiz setter, this is how our province is spelt.

Click continue… whenever you feel ready.

Wordle Song Lyrics:

1: ‘Umbrella‘ by Rihanna

2: ‘Hot N Cold‘ by Katy Perry

3: ‘Chasing Cars‘ by Snow Patrol

4: ‘Bohemian Rhapsody‘ by Queen

5: ‘Pretty Fly (for a White Guy)‘ by The Offspring

6: ‘Bat out of Hell‘ by Meatloaf

7: ‘She’s leaving home‘ by The Beatles

8: ‘The Model‘ by Kraftwerk

9: ‘Mac Arthur Park‘ by Richard Harris

10: ‘Black or White‘ by Michael Jackson

I’m having second thoughts about the accuracy of #5, surely the words “pretty” or “fly” should be more prominent?!

Hope ye enjoyed them, in any case.

It’s a very handy website which generates word clouds from any block of text, identifying individual words and then showing them at a size relative to their frequency (in the fashion of the Topics box on the right of this page).

Since things are a bit quiet these days on the quizzing scene, I’ve come up with a use for wordle.net.  After the continue… you’ll find Wordles of 10 famous songs (or their lyrics, to be accurate).  See if you can identify them from the words alone.

Here’s ‘Firestarter‘ by The Prodigy, by way of an easy example:

Song Lyric Wordles:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

Few easy ones at the start (I hope!) and a couple of challenging ones at the end.

Update: answers here.