The Wombat File Is Yours to Keep

You'll gasp with disbelief when you see that the Friday Quiz is unaccountably in sync with the events of the day -- practically ripped-from-the-headlines, Dick Wolf style.

OK, not really. But there was another debate tonight between Presidential candidates, and this question (or set of questions) is about...debates!

As you likely know, the first nationally televised debate in a U.S. election was between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy, in 1960. After that election, the next televised debate did not take place in the following electoral round. Who were the pair of debaters in the next round of televised general election debates following 1960? And -- this is the serious question -- what pair followed those two as participants in a televised general election debate?

Final set of superbonus questions: the first national radio broadcast debate was in 1948, between two candidates for the Republican nomination. The Democratic party didn't follow up with a radio broadcast of its finalists for the nomination until 1956. Name the four debaters involved.

On any correct answer to any subquestion, the first correct answer will win an unopened case of "GIULIANI FOR PRESIDENT" straw boaters. No Googling or mounting an off-the-books robocall campaign to smear and discredit your opponents (especially because you don't want boxjam uncorking his Chicago-style political dirty tricks in retaliation, at least not this early in the campaign. It's just February, people. Save something for the stretch). One guess per comment, but with the kind of electronic comment system we got going here, I'm sure it can be abused all to hell.

Posted by BT at 11:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (10)

The Wombat needs sleep, you need your quiz, and so without further ado:

In the Lithographia Helvetica of the celebrated 18th-century scholar Johann Jakob Scheuchzer, the author writes of the discovery of a fossilized skeleton found in Baden. Analyzing it, he claimed that the skeleton was the remains of a human being who perished in the Biblical flood. This account was believed to be the truth for decades, until the French scientist Georges Curvier re-examined the fossilized skeleton, identifying it -- more accurately -- as a prehistoric version of a creature which has descendants now living in China and Japan. By what common name are these descendents known? Bonus question: Scheuchzer's later work proved to be an instrumental source for a politically influential play by Friedrich Schiller in 1804. What was the name of the play's eponymous hero?

First correct answer posted to comments wins something semi-hilariously related to something going on in the news. Please don't Google to get your answer, even though I've failed to make this request in an amusing manner, or elaborated on it in an endearingly shaggy-dog-ish fashion. And just one answer per comment, please, although of course there's no limit on comments. See you in the morning.

Posted by BT at 11:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (38)

I'm trying to be a responsible, educated voter. So I watched tonight's South Carolina debate, really the first of this campaign I've tuned in for.

Assuming, for a moment, that you may also be choosing your likely November vote (to say nothing of, perhaps, a Super Tuesday vote) from among the three people on that stage -- do you find these useful? Are they informative? If not, is there somewhere else from which it is better to get one's information on what the policies, likely intentions, and guiding philosophies of the candidates are? Mind you, I know I could go to the candidates websites, and I intend to. But I suppose I'm pessimistic about getting help there.

Much of what I read -- even on sites dedicated to the minutae of presidential politics -- seems to be focused on the horse race aspect, and to the "electibility" questions. Who is "tough enough" to survive the general election? Who will discover their "voice?" Etc., etc. Nothing that helps me decide who I want to be running the show.

In the past several elections, my electoral choices seemed to have been made for me by preceding events. But while I presume that Hillary Clinton has an enormous advantage in the Democratic primary in New York, it hardly seems like a foregone conclusion. So I'm forced to feel that my vague and hard-to-explain political leanings, this time around, will not be enough.

Does anyone out there feel the same way? How have you coped?

Posted by BT at 11:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

No time for preambles, introductions, forewords, overviews, summaries, or suchlike. Today’s weak coffee for the tired mind:

She was the first American citizen elevated to the position of honor she eventually achieved. The youngest of thirteen children born to a family in Lombardy in 1850 was trained as a teacher emigrated to the U.S. in 1889. She was naturalized as a American citizen in 1909. She died of malaria in 1917. By what name is she popularly known?

First correct answer posted to comments wins a shoebox full of perfectly good printer cartridges from a variety of printers that broke before the ink supply ran out. Suitable for hucking at your rivals for tribal or village power after an unspecified apocalypse in which the conveniences of 21st century life all become meaningless detritus. No Googling or doing anything to sabotage our decadent and wasteful culture just because you think that somehow getting more quickly to the dystopic hell referred to above would in the end mean that our long, slow journey to a more chastened and healthy human society could begin right away. Most of us just aren’t ready for that, OK? One guess per comment, but totally comment a lot.

Posted by BT at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (21)

I received this particularly wonderful piece of spam today. It is among the more delicately beautiful specimens I've been fortunate to collect. Its elegant structure -- which draws upon a St. Augustine-like conversion narrative -- is more than matched by its inventive recombinations of usage, and endlessly playful approach to grammar. In the creation of its protagonist, Mrs. Judith Williams, the anonymous author has fashioned a paradoxical figure -- heart-stoppingly direct, yet in the end elusive, an enigmatic voice that nonetheless speaks to us of the most pressing, personal matters: Please contact me and stop weeping.

Please take a moment to enjoy this enchanting creation.

Dear Friend ,

My name is Mrs Judith Williams am 79yrs old of age, i stay at [address]. I am a good merchant , I have several industrial companies and good share in various banks in the world .I spend all my life on investment and corporate business.

All the way i lost my husband and two beautiful kids in fatal accident that occur in November 5th 2003.

I am a very greedy woman with all cost i don't know much and care about people, since when I have an experience of my it difficult to sleep and give rest . Later in the year 2004 February i was sent a letter of medical check up, as my personal Doctor testify that i have a lung cancer, which can easily take off my life soon. I found it uneasy to survive myself, because a lot of investment cannot be run and manage by me again.

I quickly call up a pastor / prophet to give me positive thinking on this solution, as my adviser. He ministered to me to share my properties ,wealth, to motherless baby/orphanage homes/people that need money for survivor both student that need money/ business men for their investment and for future rising. So i am writing this letter to people who really need help from me both student in college, to contact me urgently.

So that i can make available preparation on that especially women of the day, who are divorced by their husband, why they cannot survive the mist of feeding theirself. Please contact me and stop weeping .

Probably let me now what you really need the money for, and if you can still help me to distribute money to nearest orphanages homes near your town.

Now am so much with God, am now born again.

May you be blessed, as you reach me,

I will give more information to you as i await your response immediately.

Best Regards ,

Mrs . Judith Williams .

Posted by BT at 10:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Of course I'd hoped to get all primary-season political on you, and pull together a bevy of challenging questions about The Sorta Democracy (TM), but as with all of my good intentions of late, it's come to naught. In the spirit of self-abasement and an embrace of the low standards to which I must admit I've long since stooped to, I hereby invite you to join me as I splash around in the extremely shallow end of the trivia pool. To wit, questions about old television shows.

To partially compensate for the particularly poor quality of the material, I'm offering up a four-part Quiz this week. Which is a real vote for quantity over quality -- and in that sense, what could be more American? Enjoy, fellow Patriots and freedom-enviers alike!

1. A televised competition in 1983 pitted Jim Perry, Bob Eubanks, Nipsey Russell, Betty White and Bill Cullen in a competition against Bert Parks, Jim Lange, Tom Kennedy, Leslie Uggams and Peter Marshall. On what program did this occur?

2. At the end of the original run of this series, the television network was flooded with phone calls demanding an explanation for the events of the finale. The creator of the series was reportedly beseiged at his home by similarly outraged viewers, and claims to have gone into hiding for a period of time as a result. What was the series?

3. Author Earl Hamner published an autobiographical novel in the early 1960s, based on his life as a young boy. It addressed themes such as the effects of infidelity and alcoholism in the family. A film adaptation followed, with an actor who would, two decades later, win an Academy Award. When Hamner wrote a follow-up novella, this became the basis of a long-running television series, for which he supplied offscreen narration. What was the series? For a bonus point, who was the actor in the original film adaptation? For a double bonus, what was the name of the original novel and film?

4. A 1980 episode of a long-running series climaxed with a speech, delivered by the star, about the final moments between artist Vincent Van Gogh and his brother Theo. What was the program?

First correct answer to any of these wins a random set of 15-20 pages pulled from a galley copy of Alexander Theroux's Laura Warholic, or, the Sexual Intellectual. No Googling or Warholicking. One guess at any part per comment, but you may comment, even if you're a member of the Writer's Guild. I promise not to pay anyone anything for any of this.

Posted by BT at 12:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (12)

New year, new hyper-efficient quiz action. Let's get to the brainfreeze:

In Saunderstown, Rhode Island is located (and preserved) the birthplace of a famous American. Although he was born in Rhode Island, he achieved professional success first in England, before returning to the U.S. to do the work which made his lasting fame. Indeed, one could say that every adult American, and many people around the world, are familiar with one of his achievements.

The home in which he grew up in Rhode Island was both a residence and a place of industry, as he lived above his father’s business, a water-driven mill of a special kind. What product (it was not food) was this mill used to make? One clue: the product is unrelated to the work that later brought him success.

Who was he, and what was the product?

First correct answer posted to comments wins a water-driven mp3 player, perfect for lazy evenings by a navigable river or stream. No Googling or caucusing. Or going to the Caucasus. One guess per comment, but each and every one of your comments is important to me and is loved as if it were a comment of my own.

Posted by BT at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (16)