2. Only once, in 1972, has a professional football team gone undefeated the entire season and then won the Super Bowl. What team was it?
3. The Canary Islands, located off the west coast of Africa, is a territory of what country?
4. Petrology is the scientific study of what?
5. What is the world’s largest lizard?
The Answers…
1. Cynophobia is the fear of dogs. Curiously, the word is pronounced syno, not kyno, although derived from kyon, the Greek word for dog. Kyon, also curiously, is pronounced cue-on.
2. The Miami Dolphins.
3. Spain. The Canaries are a major tourist destination due to the balmy weather, pristine beaches, and spectacular mountains and forests. The islands, population about two million, get over 12 million visitors a year.
4. Sorry, nothing to do with fuel. Petrology is the branch of geology that studies the formation of rocks. The Greek word petros means rock.
“The Sound of Silence” is a heck of a tune. Better than a lot of poetry. It excels in message, melody, harmony, and the wonderful imagery it evokes.
Paul Simon wrote the song at age 21 (in his bathroom, because it was private and the tile generated neat echos). According to Simon, it is essentially about how people go about their lives in silence because society has become materialistic and people are obsessed with consumerism. When the narrator implores others to wake up, he is greeted with silence.
Garfunkel said the song addresses “the inability of people to communicate with each other, not particularly intentionally, but especially emotionally, so what you see around you are people unable to love each other.”
A bummer, but still a masterpiece.
The Sound of Silence
By Simon & Garfunkel, 1964 Written by Paul Simon
Hello darkness, my old friend. I’ve come to talk with you again, Because a vision softly creeping Left its seeds while I was sleeping, And the vision that was planted in my brain Still remains, Within the sound of silence.
In restless dreams I walked alone. Narrow streets of cobblestone. ‘Neath the halo of a street lamp, I turned my collar to the cold and damp, When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light That split the night And touched the sound of silence.
And in the naked light I saw 10 thousand people, maybe more. People talking without speaking. People hearing without listening. People writing songs that voices never shared. No one dared Disturb the sound of silence.
“Fools,” said I, “You do not know Silence like a cancer grows. Hear my words that I might teach you. Take my arms that I might reach you.” But my words like silent raindrops fell, And echoed in the wells of silence.
And the people bowed and prayed To the neon god they made. And the sign flashed out its warning In the words that it was forming. And the sign said, “The words of the prophets Are written on the subway walls And tenement halls And whispered in the sounds of silence.”
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.
— Oscar Wilde
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He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was a highly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic individual, full of empty childish fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everyone’s personality, in an overwhelming degree — and this is another reason why they fell for him.
— Carl Jung, describing Adolph Hitler
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If the misery of our poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin.
— Charles Darwin
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Cruel men believe in a cruel God and use their belief to excuse their cruelty.
2. How did Broadway in New York City get the nickname “the Great White Way”?
3. What is the last word in the King James version of the Bible?
4. Who was the first African-American actor to win an Oscar?
5. What is a jib?
The Answers…
1. First, the heat of the flame melts and vaporizes the wax. The wax is composed of hydrogen and carbon, which combine with oxygen in the air, forming carbon dioxide and water vapor — which, along with the heat, dissipate into the air.
2. The part of Broadway near Times Square, aka the Theater District, converted to electric lights in the late 1800s. The numerous bright marquees in the District led to the nickname.
3. Amen.
4. Sidney Poitier for Lilies of the Field, 1963.
5. A jib is a small triangular sail set forward of the mast on a sailing vessel. Experts say the jib helps the main sail utilize the wind’s energy more efficiently — a concept I don’t understand, but will accept.
The more I see of the moneyed classes, the more I understand the guillotine.
— George Bernard Shaw
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One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.
— George Galloway
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Here lies George Johnson, hanged by mistake, 1882. He was right, we was wrong, but we strung him up, and now he’s gone.
— Epitaph in Boot Hill Cemetery, Tombstone, Arizona
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In all history, there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious, even when successful.
1. In the German word “dachshund,” the “hund” part means dog. What does “dachs” mean?
2. Who was the first woman inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?
3. On a standard QWERTY keyboard, four of the five vowels are on the top line. Which vowel is not?
4. What is the most common training command taught to dogs?
5. Members of the deer species Rangifer tarandus are called either caribou or reindeer depending on what circumstance?
The Answers…
1. “Dachs” is German for badger. Some experts believe wiener dogs were bred in the 1700s to hunt badgers, rabbits, and other burrowing critters, but the origin is not certain.
2. Aretha Franklin, 1987. She wasn’t remotely a rock singer, nor are later inductees Madonna and Dolly Parton. Nor are current nominees Cher and Mariah Carey. But apparently, being famous eclipses that.
3. The letter A. For some mysterious reason, it’s on the home/second row.
4. Sit, of course.
5. They are called caribou if wild, reindeer if domesticated.
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