Blankety Blanks Trivia Quiz

Answer: To turn into a stone tool

During prehistoric times, these blank stones were often used initially as trade objects, before being transported and made into a tool, or put to another use, in a different location. Hewn from very early and very primitive quarries, the shape of the removed blank stone, more often than not, signalled the purpose to which it would be eventually put. Most of these were chipped away to make stone tools, but now and then could be used instead to make early walls of some sort.

Answer: Yes

A blank cartridge used in a firearm does indeed contain gunpowder. It wouldn't makes the explosive sound or flash otherwise. However, it definitely doesn't contain shot or bullet. Small balls or pellets are referred to as shot. Depending on the distance and the target involved, the size and amount of the shot will vary in the cartridge. Bullets are part of the projectiles themselves, and found at the tips of cartridges.

They do their damage by penetration, not by explosives. A cartridge, on the other hand, is made up of the bullet itself, the gunpowder which acts as the propellant, the rim on the opposite end of the bullet, and the primer which ignites the gunpowder.

When a gun is fired, the bullet travels through the air, and the cartridge is ejected onto the ground. Blanks are used in starter pistols, or simulated gun fights or in military training, for example. Be aware that although blanks are designed to stay in the firearm after being fired, or at best only travel very short distances, these too can cause harm if fired at a very close range to a target.

Answer: Scrabble

Scrabble is a word board game that was invented by American born Alfred Butts in 1938. This gentleman with the unfortunate surname was an architect by trade. Two to four people can play the game. Its purpose is to make up various linking works on a square board marked out with 15 x 15 small spaces. Each space is big enough to accommodate a letter. Each letter is worth a given number of points, marked on the individual letter squares themselves.

The 15 x 15 board is also marked out so that some of the squares are worth either double or triple the value of the letter placed upon it.

This is an excellent and enjoyable game for helping children learn spelling and the love of words, and just plain good competitive fun for adults. NOTE: Not to be played with one specific Australian husband who sulks when he is beaten.

Answer: Drama

Starring Cecile Coustillac and Liliane Rovere, this drama tells the story of a woman named Felicia, who is hired to help look after an older lady named Anna in the family home. Anna is in her sixties and is suffering from the symptoms of early onset dementia. During the course of this somewhat dark and depressing film, Anna husband disappears and is never seen again, and Felicia is left to care for Anna by herself. Slowly, for the two women, the outside world becomes a place that is completely apart from the little world they create in their isolated home, until, finally, they both totally lose all sense of reality and sense of self. Don't go along to see this movie if you're in the mood for a laugh.

Answer: A key that hasn't been cut to a specific bitting.

The bitting on a key is the part of this piece of equipment that actually unlocks the mechanism on the lock for which it is matched. A keyway is part of the lock into which the key slides before it then uses its bitting to turn the lock. Many key blanks can be inserted into keyways, but unless the bitting matches, will not unlock the mechanism of same.

The things I learn when writing quizzes. This is such an amazing site. It has enabled my mind to be bitten.

Answer: Louisiana

The other three states are all in the far north of the nation. Louisiana is in the far south. Its capital city is Baton Rouge, and it was admitted into the Union on 30 April, 1812, as the 18th state. Blanks was set up because of the burgeoning lumber industry at the turn of the twentieth century there. Timbermen Hansel Blanks and Edwin Bomer worked individually in this industry before combining to form the Bomer-Blanks Lumber Company in 1912, a huge concern that saw the development of a large community around it. Homes, farms, shops, post office, sawmill all began to develop to help strengthen this sense of community which was at its height under the leadership of the two men in 1928 before changing hands. Today this area of the States has vast interests in farming, cattle, oil and gas industries.

The name Blanks came about as a lighthearted debate argument between the two original partners. They each wanted to call the area after the other. Bomer won the argument and so the community was known thereafter as Blanks.

Answer: A cappella

Singing a cappella is singing without any musical accompaniment at all. It's extremely difficult to do unless all members of the group are skilled musicians. The danger, otherwise, is that if one singer goes off key or loses rhythm, this can have the deadly effect of throwing the rest of the group right off as well.

Instead of then having the glorious treat of listening to pure vocal harmonies, you are punished with a barnyard cacophony instead. The Blanks are a group of young men who became well known at the beginning of the 21st century. With two albums to their credit and many appearances on the TV series "Scrubs" (2001-2010), the group comprises baritones Sam Lloyd and George Miserlis, tenor Philip McNiven, and bass Paul Perry.

They use no instruments at all in their live performances and albums, but utilise "hand claps, finger snaps and thigh slaps" instead to help maintain their rhythm and overall sound combinations.

They did however release one single of "Over the Rainbow" accompanied by the ukelele only.

Answer: Marvel Comics

Marvel Comics has been around since 1935. It is associated with such super heroes as Spider-Man, The Hulk, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four, and villains such as Doctor Doom, Magneto and the Green Goblin. The Blank, one of its super villains, is an ill-tempered out of work drifter who, one day, is waiting at a bus stop where also waits a scientist.

The scientist, obviously not too competent in road safety skills, is subsequently hit by a car. In the uproar that follows, the man who would become The Blank steals his suitcase and sets off on a crime spree with the scientist's stolen equipment.

His powers come from a high-tech field generator belt. This hides his features, protects him against damage, and allows the wicked fiend to escape dangerous situations with impunity.

Answer: Coin cutting

A planchet or blank is a piece of round metal ready to be turned into a coin. A press that exerts thousands of pounds of pressure is used in this process. There are several steps leading up to this stage however. The first one is rolling a sheet of metal out to the required thickness. Round shapes the size of the coins required are then punched out of the prepared sheets.

These are the blanks or planchets. The next step is heating these to 1,400 degrees Fahrenheit and then slowly allowing them to cool by air.

This is known as annealing the coins. It is carried out because it strengthens the metal in the coins. After rinsing any residue off the blanks left by the annealing process, the coins then go through a machine which raises the edge round each one.

The final step is impressing the blanks with the required image and wording, and voila, a brand new baby coin is born.

Answer: Isaac Asimov

Isaac Asimov was born in Russia into a family of Jewish millers in 1920 and died in America, as a citizen of that nation, in 1992. He is best known as an author of multiple science fiction works. Very few people realise that he was also a professor of biochemistry at Boston University. Asimov had a chronic fear of flying but, oddly enough, loved being in small, enclosed spaces. Married twice, he died from complications caused by an HIV infection he had contacted from a blood transfusion he had been given during triple bypass surgery several years earlier. "Blank!" relates the story of two scientists trapped forever in non-time because of a failed time travel experiment.