Tag: barking

It’s Sunday, week 4 of Lockdown with Haircuts, and not Christmas Lockdown – The One that never happened! As usual, no Fagan’s theme quiz!

This week, we read a Facebook post from Tom @Fagan’s.

It’s the usual 20 questions for the quiz.

A little different this week for the theme, in some cases the theme spans two questions – these are always consecutive questions though, so no need to hunt for a pattern.

There may be “sound-a-likes” or embedded words.

The use of electronic devices to divine the answers, with the exception of hearing aids and pacemakers, is forbidden.

1. Which large island off the east coast of the North American is separated from the mainland by the Strait of Belle Isle and blocks the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River, creating the world’s largest estuary – the Gulf of Saint Lawrence?

2. Who is the English cricketer who kept wicket for his country between 1987 and 1998, broke the world record for dismissals in a test match in 1995 and now known for his abilities as an artist, as a cricket wicketkeeping coach, and a football goalkeeping coach?

3. Which TV service was launched in 1961, broadcasting to most of Cumbria, southern Scotland and parts of Northumberland and continued until 2002 following a takeover?

4. One of several vegetables in the species Brassica oleracea in the genus Brassica, what is this annual plant that reproduces by seed and, typically, only the head is eaten – the edible white flesh sometimes called “curd”?

5. Which sea area, as used by the BBC’s Shipping Forecast, is bordered by Fisher, Dogger and Humber sea areas and, up to 1956, was named as Heligoland?

6. Who is the English television presenter and journalist who was a main presenter on the now defunct breakfast programme GMTV and since April 2014 has worked on ITV’s breakfast show Good Morning Britain and hosted game shows such as The Krypton Factor, Tipping Point and Ninja Warrior UK?

7. Which children’s comic strips and books were adapted into a TV series, using cardboard cut-outs filmed in live-action, that was first shown on the BBC in 1957, ran until 1966, was revamped in colour from 1974 to 1975 and re-appeared a 2nd time in 1998 as a traditional animation series?

8. Which is the biggest UK county, home of legendary bad guys Guy Fawkes and Dick Turpin and if it was a country, would have come 12th in the 2012 Olympic games, having scooped 7 Gold, 2 Silver and 3 Bronze medals?

9. What is the nickname of the English football team Huddersfield Town A.F.C.?

10. Which song by the popular American beat combo Simon & Garfunkel from their album Bridge Over Troubled Water became one of their biggest hits in 1969 and opens with the lines “I am just a poor boy, Though my story’s seldom told”?

11. British transportation company FirstGroup acquired a controlling stake in which North American intercity bus company as part of their agreement to buy the US firm Laidlaw for £1.9 billion?

12. Which ship, launched on May 11, 1820 at the Royal Navy’s dockyards on the River Thames, was the British naval vessel aboard which Charles Darwin served as naturalist on a voyage to South America and around the world between 1831 an 1836?

13. Which company’s 1990s TV adverts featured Joan Collins, Larry Hagman, Harry Enfield, Burt Reynolds and others flicking up their flaming thumbs and asking the viewer “Don’t you just love being in control?”?

15. Originally created by H. C. McNeile and published under his pen name Sapper and continued by Gerard Fairlie who is the fictional First World War veteran who, fed up with his sedate lifestyle, advertises looking for excitement, and becomes a gentleman adventurer? The character has appeared in novels, short stories, on the stage, in films, on radio and television, and in graphic novels?

15. The Sheffield Directory of 1842 records which company as being a “wholesale confectioner, lozenge maker and British wine trader”? Possibly their best-known product was created by accident in 1899 when a sales representative supposedly tripped over and dropped a tray of samples he was showing a client, mixing them up. After he scrambled to re-arrange them, the client was intrigued by the new creation.

16. Which is the third of the four crime novels written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes, is set largely on Dartmoor and was the first appearance of Holmes since his apparent death in The Final Problem? The success of this book led to the character’s eventual revival.

17. Which beverage brand from Gaymer’s Cider Company was apparently designed for the American market in 1939 but never shipped out due to the outbreak of the Second World War: it was sold in the UK as a special offer during the war and until 1950, and then became a standard product of the company?

18. Which competitive sport was featured in BBC One Man and His Dog from 1976 to 2013, when it become part of the rural affairs show Countryfile?

19. Simon Templar, featured in a series of novels and short stories by Leslie Charteris published between 1928 and 1963 and later, other authors collaborated with Charteris on books until 1983 – what is the characters nickname?

20. Yosser Hughes, the troubled “hard man” whose life is falling apart in Alan Bleasdale’s groundbreaking 1980s TV drama Boys from the Blackstuff was played by which English actor?