About Workoutable
A good quiz question is one in which, even if you don't know the answer, you can work it out through clues given in the question. Workoutable, thus, is not just about knowledge but also about problem-solving. Enjoy.
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22 May, 2008
Glory and Sadness, Beauty and Pain
X is a song written by Y and famously covered by Z. Time Magazine’s Josh Tyrangiel described it thus:
Y murmured the original like a dirge, but except for a single overwrought breath before the music kicks in, Z treated the 7-min. song like a tiny capsule of humanity, using his voice to careen between glory and sadness, beauty and pain, mostly just by repeating the word X. It’s not only Z’s best song — it’s one of the great songs, and because it covers so much emotional ground and is not (yet) a painfully obvious choice, it has become the go-to track whenever a TV show wants to create instant mood. ‘X can be joyous or bittersweet, depending on what part of it you use,’ says Sony ATV’s Kathy Coleman. ‘It’s one of those rare songs that the more it gets used, the more people want to use it.’
Name X, Y and Z.
18 May, 2008
May be harmful if inhaled or swallowed
In the book “The World of _____” by Bennett Alan Weinberg and Bonnie K Bealer, there is a photograph of a label from a jar of pharmaceutical-grade crystals. It reads:
“WARNING: MAY BE HARMFUL IF INHALED OR SWALLOWED. HAS CAUSED MUTAGENIC AND REPRODUCTIVE EFFECTS IN LABORATORY ANIMALS. INHALATION CAUSES RAPID HEART RATE, EXCITEMENT, DIZZINESS, PAIN, COLLAPSE, HYPOTENSION, FEVER, SHORTNESS OF BREATH. MAY CAUSE HEADACHE, INSOMNIA, VOMITING, STOMACH PAIN, COLLAPSE AND CONVULSIONS.”
Fill in the blank.
14 May, 2008
XYZ
In 1981, Jimmy Page, Chris Squire and Alan White got together to form a band, and tried to recruit Robert Plant into it. Plant attended one rehearsal, chose not to join the band, and the project fell through. Had it survived, the band would have called itself XYZ. Why?
11 December, 2007
A Small Eye Poet
"I am a small eye poet.” Who once wrote these words in a letter to his mother?
22 November, 2007
Dileep Kumar and Saira Banu
Who used to be known as Dileep Kumar, and is now married to Saira Banu?
15 November, 2007
All the Steps
In British Bingo, many numbers have nicknames, which are used while calling out the number. What number does the phrase “All the Steps” stand for?
12 November, 2007
Double Palindrome
Which is the only palindromic song by a palindromic group to have entered the US charts?
10 August, 2007
Tens of thousands
Herodotus once wrote:
“The counting was done by first packing ten thousand men as close together as they could stand and drawing a circle round them on the ground; they were then dismissed, and a fence, about navel high, was constructed around the circle; finally, other troops were marched into the area thus enclosed and dismissed in their turn, until the whole army had been counted.”
Whose army?
09 August, 2007
A Royal Procession
On what list will you find the following:
61. King Harald V of Norway
83. Princess Margarita of Romania
92. Hereditary Prince Peter of Serbia
184. King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden
213. Queen Margrethe II of Denmark
782. Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands
02 August, 2007
Soft Beckhams, Popular Beckhams, Hardcore Beckhams
In Japan, what are ‘Soft Beckhams’, ‘Popular Beckhams’ and ‘Hardcore Beckhams’ types of?
31 July, 2007
Vedic dwelling
It is a Sanskrit word meaning ‘dwelling’ or a building used for residential purposes. The first mention of this is found in the Yajurveda. The first book on this subject is believed to have been written about 3000 years back by saint Vishwakarma.Which word?
30 July, 2007
A painter derailed by circumstance
The self-portrait below is a homage to Vincent Van Gogh, and is painted by someone who once described herself as a “painter derailed by circumstance.” Who?
28 July, 2007
A sign in Vermont
Between 1976 and 1994, a sign hung outside the Cavendish General Store in southern Vermont:
NO DIRECTIONS TO
THE _____ _____
Fill in the blanks.
26 July, 2007
To please women over 30…
This 1999 movie was based on a book by Homer Hickam. However, a poll conducted by Universal Pictures suggested that women over 30 would not watch the movie if it had the same title as the book did. So, in order to broaden the appeal of the movie, it was given a title that was an anagram of the book’s title. Name the movie.
25 July, 2007
“You deserve happiness”
I ask you to forgive me for not fulfilling the hopes of those people who believed that we would be able to jump from the grey, stagnating, totalitarian past into a bright, rich and civilised future in one go. I myself believed in this. But it could not be done in one fell swoop… I am leaving. I have done everything I could… In saying farewell, I wish to say to each of you the following. Be happy. You deserve happiness. You deserve happiness and peace.
Who, and on what occasion?
19 July, 2007
Richard Melville Hall
Musician Richard Melville Hall has released music under a number of names. The one he is most well-known by is also his childhood nickname, and is in tribute to his great-great-grandfather, who was a famous writer himself. What name do we best know him by?
18 July, 2007
RE Foster, Walter Hammond and…
Complete this exhaustive list:
RE Foster (Dec 1903), Walter Hammond (Dec 1928), Walter Hammond (Dec 1928), Walter Hammond (Dec 1936), X (Dec 2006).
17 July, 2007
A German Virgin
In Texas hold ‘em poker, what two-card hand is sometimes called a “German virgin”?
12 July, 2007
The substance of fast food
This catchphrase was first used in the 1984 advertising campaign of a major US fast food chain. It has since become a popular expression in everyday speech, acquiring the meaning of questioning the substance of an idea or argument.
What is this phrase?
11 July, 2007
“Aw, shut up, ya bilge rat”
Her first words to her future husband, spoken in 1929 after being discovered as a Stowaway were “Aw, shut up, ya bilge rat”. In February 1999, after a 70-year courtship, she finally said “ I do.” Who?
Errata: Profuse apologies—an absent-minded error led to our giving the wrong answer below. The answer is not Minnie Mouse. Sorry for this!
09 July, 2007
The mysterious Mr Fowler
Though his actual last name is Fowler, he uses his middle name as the last name in films. One of the standard entertainment urban legends is that he took that name by combining the first and last names of a two-time Oscar winning legendary actor. The urban legend has gained credence because of the coincidence that he himself has won 2 Oscars. But it is actually his mother’s maiden surname. And he probably uses that name because of problems with his father, who was violent, alcoholic, and allegedly a member of the American Nazi party.
07 July, 2007
When X dined alone at the White House
In 1962, John F Kennedy hosted 49 Nobel Prize winners at the White House. While welcoming them, he said, “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent and of human knowledge that has ever been gathered together at the White House—with the possible exception of when X dined alone.”
Name X.
05 July, 2007
It sold a lot of Ray Bans
About which movie did Val Kilmer remark “It was a one-dimensional cartoon which sold a lot of Ray Bans?”
29 June, 2007
The good-natured wanderer
His most recognizable moniker is derived from his father’s, which meant “good-natured” or “simple”, and he was merely his father’s son. During his extensive travels, he also picked up the label Bigollo, meaning “wanderer”.
His most famous contribution to mathematics was originally proposed by an Indian mathematician named Acharya Hemachandra, and was presented to the Western world as an example of place values in counting, which made the Indo-Arabic system superior to Roman numerals.
This work was published as Liber Abaci or The Book of Calculations in 1202.
Who is this person?
28 June, 2007
Oswald
Brett Lee’s nickname in the Australian team is Oswald. Explain how it came about.
#106 - Generalissimo 76
Sample clues
9 across: Van Morrison classic from Moondance (7)
6 down: Order beginning with ‘A’ (12)
The 100 Most Common English Words
See how many you can guess. (Via Chandru.)
By Amit Varma in Miscellaneous
iAlive
Bloomberg accidentally releases Steve Jobs’s obituary, while the man still lives.
By Amit Varma in Journalism/Media
Lovers And The Box Office
DNA reports: Ranbir [Kapoor] and Deepika [Padukone] are not showing any interest in doing films together after seeing what…Salt And Sugar
If even MadMan makes mistakes, there’s clearly hope for lesser beings. I’m off to make the perfect Maggi now.…
The Desperate Passion of Ben Foster
Method acting meets controlled staginess in 3:10 to Yuma
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One Chai and a Wills Navy Cut
Pablo Bartholomew's latest exhibition offers intimate recall of the 70s and 80s
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