Electrified Tea Leaves

So a few days ago I set you all a Mystery Object of the Week quiz, well today is the big reveal.

While there were some interesting guesses (thanks Adrian), no one got it right. It is in fact a static grass applicator -- an example of the grass can be seen to the left, and I've blogged about static grass in more detail on my railway modelling blog.

Essentially this specific applicator is the handle and electronics from a fly swatter with the swatting bit replaced by a tea strainer and a crocodile clip on the end of a wire. (it's easy to build although I bought mine from eBay) Pressing the button causes a static field to be setup between the tea strainer and the crocodile clip so when the grass fibres fall out of the tea strainer they align vertically to produce the grass. What you don't want to do, however, is let the crocodile clip and the tea strainer touch as the rather large amount of stored electricity, that would normally be used to kill a fly, gets released with a bang and a flash of light -- certainly something you don't want to get too close to!

Mystery Object Of The Week

It's been a while since I last did a mystery object of the week quiz (see here for the the previous objects) but I thought it might make a nice change from recent posts.

As before feel free to leave your guesses in the comments and in a few days I'll post the answer. Happy guessing!

Mystery Object Of The Week

So a quick quiz to start the weekend. Name the mystery object. The answer will be revealed sometime next week. Feel free to leave a guess in the comments.

Comprehension Test: The Answers

Okay, so here are the answers to the short comprehension test I posted the other day.

According to the news article...

1. The accident took place in Queens
2. Four vehicles were involved; a bus, a truck and two vans
3. Five people were taken to hospital
4. None of the injuries were life-threatening so we can assume there were no fatalities.

Now that was quite straightforward apart from the fact that the BBC couldn't count. If you listen to the voice over they clearly state that there were three vehicles involved yet you can easily see four in the video.

To make matters worse they even had the descriptive text for the article stating that there were three vehicles. Although after about forty-eight hours someone did eventually change the text.

Comprehension Test

Click To Play

Watch this short news article and then answer the following questions.

1. Where did the accident take place?
2. How many vehicles were involved?
3. How many people were injured?
4. Were there any fatalities?

MAG's 2009 Christmas Quiz: The Answers

What with the snow, lack of food, and not being too well the fact that I was supposed to post the answers to my Christmas quiz completely slipped my mind, sorry!

Rather than put the answers in the post I'm keeping them in a separate file so that I don't spoil the questions for anyone who is still trying to figure the answers out.

Nobody got all the answers right but some people came close -- no one got the answer to question 10, sorry if it was a bit too ambiguous! Hopefully you all enjoyed the quiz and I'll spend the year trying to come up with at least another ten questions ready for next Christmas.

MAG's 2009 Christmas Quiz

Given that we knew there wouldn't be a JAD's Christmas quiz this year I've spent some of the last twelve months thinking of fiendishly difficult quiz questions for everyone else to have a go at. Unfortunately I only managed to come up with 10 questions instead of 20 but hopefully you will find them challenging and enjoyable.

Please don't post answers to the questions in the comments as that spoils it for everyone else. Details of how to submit entries to the quiz can be found in the PDF version of the quiz but for those who just want the questions they are:

1. Which Rumour returned to the BBC after 12 years?


2. Connect 1885, 1955, 1985, 2015


3. If the mouse is purple, the goldfish blue and the scorpion orange then what colour are the dove, peacock and cow?


4. Johnson's Dictionary, the four minute mile, Kew Gardens, and fourteen others.


5. Play fair and give the inventor his due!
   I T A Y
T R H A
C M W O
K R W S
U S T R
E G W U


6. Identify
   
   1. A Soho 'Lady'
      
   2. A Lonely Spinster
      
   3. A Schoolboy's Crush
      
   4. A Flame-Haired Seductress
      


7. Connect and explain
   
   1. Jahnna N. Malcolm
      
   2. P.J. Tracy
      
   3. Zizou Corder
      
   4. M. M. Mannon
      


8. Connect
   
   1. Claudia, Jed, Leo, Josh and Donna
   2. Malcom, Zoe, Hoban, Inara and Jayne
   3. Sydney, Arvin, Marcus, Marshall and Jack
   4. Brian, Sandra, Gerry, Jack and Esther
      


9. If hares can run at 10 m/s, tortoises can only walk at 10 cm/s and a snail moves at just 1 cm/s what is the minimum time the hare must have slept for the tortoise to win a race of 3 km?


10. Why might turning through 360 degrees not be enough to keep you facing in the same direction?

Hopefully you will all enjoy having a go at the questions. The closing date is midday on the 4th of January 2010 and as I said before the submission instructions are in the printable PDF version.

Enjoy!

Solution #1: Mystery Item

Well anyone one who wanted to have a guess should have had the time to leave a comment so here is the answer to my first quiz.

The mystery object was the ring pull from a can of Red Bull. I'm not sure if I made it easier or harder to recognise the logo by placing the ring pull on red cardboard.

Scriptor Senex came closest by recognising the Red Bull logo but not the item, so he can half gloat.

L'homme bizarre avec la barbe grise shouldn't feel too bad for not being able to see the bull, I couldn't either until I ripped the ring pull off the can and looked at it from the back so that the bull was facing left instead of right. To me it looks more like a crouching elephant with it's trunk in the air!

Quiz #1: Mystery Item

I've decided that periodically I might have the odd quiz on this blog (please let me know if you think this is a really stupid idea).

The first instalment is simply to identify the object in the photo.

I doubt there will be any prize other than the ability to gloat. Add your answer to the comments and I'll reveal all in a day or so to give everyone a chance to take part.

R.I.P. JAD

For the last fifteen years or so I've been attempting to get a high score on JAD's annual Christmas Quiz. JAD's Christmas quizzes have to be the hardest I have ever tried, but they are always an interesting challenge. To get an idea as to how tricky they can be the submission instructions suggest that if you have managed to answer over half of the twenty questions then it is worth sending in the answers.

The publication of this years quiz (in the December/January issue of Scouting magazine) will, however, be the last as JAD has sadly passed away. JAD was the initials of John Arthur Deft who died aged 60 earlier this year having produced a Christmas Quiz for the last 33 years. As a final, and fitting, tribute his family allowed his final quiz to be published for everyone to enjoy.

I've decided that the best tribute I can make to JAD is to try even harder this year to answer all the questions. For anyone one else who wants to try I've included this years quiz in this post (you can get it from the link above but that is a 20MB PDF and I thought a single JPEG would be a lot easier for everyone). Please don't post answers to any of the questions in the comments. JAD thought asking for help via the Internet was against the spirit of the quiz and anyway I want the fun of working out the answers for myself.

If you enjoy this years quiz then you can also try the quiz from 2005, 2006 and 2007 as well.