Mark Brader:
> These questions were written to be asked in Toronto on the dates
> indicated below, and should be interpreted accordingly. If any
> answers have changed due to newer news, you are still expected
> to give the answers that were correct on those dates...
> For further information see my companion posting on "Questions
> from the Canadian Inquisition (QFTCI*)".
> * Game 9 (2012-07-09), Round 1 - Current Events
> 1. Joel Chestnut won an event for the 6th consecutive year
> this week. What kind of event was it?
(Nathan's) Hot-dog-eating contest. He tied his personal best at 68.
I accepted "eating contest". 4 for Gareth and Jeff.
> 2. Which band performed their 1986 hit on a bus on
> Spadina Av. this week?
The Shuffle Demons. (The song, of course, was "Spadina Bus".
Spadina buses have returned, temporarily replacing the streetcars,
during reconstruction of the tracks and shelters.)
> 3. What Harper government cabinet minister resigned this week
> without waiting to be pushed out?
Bev Oda (International Cooperation).
> 4. Born on the same day as Marilyn Monroe, and famous for his
> first film role as a manipulative, power-hungry radio
> personality in "A Face in the Crowd", this actor died last
> week at age 86. Name him.
Andy Griffith. Instructions to the QM in the original game said
that if anyone answered "Griffiths", the QM was to hiss "Lessss
sssspeccccific". Sssso I'm sssscoring that asssnswer as almosssst
correct. 4 for Joachim, Joshua, and Dan Blum. 3 for Marc.
> 5. Roger Federer won his 7th Wimbledon title on Sunday by
> defeating the first British man to make the finals in
> 74 years. What was the name of the guy who lost?
Andy Murray. 4 for Marc, Gareth, Joachim, Joshua, Peter, and Calvin.
> 6. It's been a bad couple of weeks if you work in finance and
> have a surname that sounds like a precious stone. In the US,
> CEO Jaime Dimon had to explain his company's $2,000,000,000
> trading loss to the Senate banking committee. In the UK,
> CEO Robert Diamond resigned after his company's role in an
> interest-fixing scandal was revealed. Name either of the
> two companies where this reprehensible behavior took place.
J.P. Morgan Chase (US); Barclays (UK). 4 for Marc, Gareth, Joshua,
Erland, Dan Blum, Peter, Dan Tilque, Calvin, and Jeff (the hard way).
> 7. What Canadian landmark was featured in a Google Doodle on
> July 4, its 111th birthday?
Hartland Bridge, NB. (The world's longest covered bridge.)
> 8. We're not going to ask you to explain it; just tell us the
> generally accepted scientific name for what the popular
> press has been calling "the God particle", which scientists
> at CERN's Large Hadron Collider announced that they seemed
> to have found.
Higgs boson. 4 for Marc, Gareth, Joachim, Joshua, Dan Blum, Peter,
Dan Tilque, Calvin, and Jeff. 3 for Erland.
> 9. Name the African city in which tombs of Moslem saints,
> recognized by UNESCO as heritage sites, were destroyed
> by members of an Islamist rebel group last week.
Timbuktu (Mali). 4 for Marc, Joshua, Erland, Dan Blum,
and Dan Tilque.
> 10. Bad things can happen when you're away on vacation. While
> former French president Nicholas Sarkozy and his wife Carla
> Bruni were relaxing at a Laurentian cottage, what happened
> at their homes?
They were raided by the police (investigating corruption and secret
campaign financing).
> * Game 10 (2012-07-16), Round 1 - Current Events
> 1. The CEO of G4S plc apologized this week for what?
Bungling the security arrangements for the London Olympics.
(I scored references to "safety" as almost correct. Not the same
thing in English.) 4 for Gareth, Erland, Peter, and Dan Tilque.
3 for Joachim.
> 2. Please decode the rot13 only after you have finished with
> question 1. Who was selected to be the official Canadian
> flag-bearer at the opening of the London Olympics?
Simon Whitfield (triathlon).
> 3. What specific event at the Calgary Stampede resulted in
> the death of three horses last week, raising the ire of
> animal rights activists?
Chuckwagon race. I did not consider "Chariot Race" to be almost
correct!
> 4. On what cabinet minister's website will you and countless
> other Canadians find a petition that you can sign to thank
> him for his performance of his duties?
Jason Kenney (Citizenship, Immigration, and Multiculturalism).
> 5. This week the Assembly of First Nations will select a new
> leader in Toronto. Who is the current leader?
Shawn Atleo. And he still is; he was reelected.
> 6. Over 400,000 Yahoo passwords were revealed when a server
> was hacked last week. What did analysis reveal to be the
> most frequently used password?
123456. I scored "1234" as almost correct. 2 for Joshua, Dan Blum,
and Jeff. 1 for Calvin.
http://blog.eset.se/statistics-about-yahoo-leak-of-450-000-plain-text-accounts/
says the top 10 were:
123456 1,666 (0.38%)
password 780 (0.18%)
welcome 436 (0.10%)
ninja 333 (0.08%)
abc123 250 (0.06%)
123456789 222 (0.05%)
12345678 208 (0.05%)
sunshine 205 (0.05%)
princess 202 (0.05%)
qwerty 172 (0.04%)
> 7. A Toronto realtor is calling for more disclosure of bidding
> wars. Her clients found out they paid significantly more
> than the asking price for a midtown home in the belief that
> they were in a bidding war -- but they were the only ones
> who had made an offer. Within $5,000, how much did their
> offer exceed the asking price by?
$90,000 (accepting $85,000-95,000). 2 for Peter.
> 8. The price of painkillers is enough to give you a headache.
> Why is Excedrin in such short supply that it's selling for
> $1 a pill on eBay?
A factory shutdown.
The Novartis factory in Lincoln NE that produces it has been shut
down until it improves its processes. Other drugs affected include
Bufferin, Buckley's, NeoCitran, and NoDoz.
> 9. A US court awarded the New Jersey company Mformation
> $147,200,000 in a patent litigation. What high-tech company
> was on the losing end of the ruling?
RIM. 4 for Dan Blum.
> 10. July 14 marked what would have been the 100th birthday
> of an illustrious Canadian. He taught at the University of
> Toronto and was the author of numerous books. Who was he?
Northrop Frye (1912-91).
Scores, if there are no errors:
GAMES-> 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 BEST EIGHT
Gareth Owen 0 20 20 12 10 12 31 12 16 4 133
Joshua Kreitzer 4 14 20 8 12 15 16 27 20 2 132
Dan Blum 8 16 16 6 19 8 16 18 16 6 117
Marc Dashevsky 8 12 20 8 12 8 20 16 19 0 115
Pete Gayde 12 12 28 12 -- -- 28 20 -- -- 112
Peter Smyth -- -- 12 12 8 12 23 16 12 6 101
Dan Tilque 0 4 4 16 4 8 16 16 12 4 80
Joachim Parsch 4 4 16 12 -- -- 11 16 12 3 78
"Calvin" 0 4 8 4 6 11 8 19 12 1 72
Erland Sommarskog 0 4 8 8 4 12 8 16 11 4 71
Jeff Turner -- -- 20 4 8 8 4 12 12 2 70
Stephen Perry -- -- -- -- -- -- 32 35 -- -- 67
Rob Parker 0 10 3 14 0 11 8 8 -- -- 54
Bruce Bowler 0 8 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 8
--
Mark Brader "...but the past thousand years
Toronto,
m...@vex.net have been atypical."