Potpourri Number Six Trivia Quiz

Answer: The famous coloured houses in San Francisco

Painted ladies are San Francisco's famous tri-coloured Victorian and Edwardian houses - and they're quite lovely. Almost 50,000 of these beautifully styled houses were constructed there from 1849 until 1915. Described in the "California Architects and Builders News, April 1885" as "red, yellow, chocolate, orange, everything that is loud is in fashion...if the upper stories are not of red or blue... they are painted up into uncouth panels of yellow and brown...". Even lovelier were the mansions in Nob Hill there, but alas, most of those were destroyed in the great earthquake of 1906. During the two World Wars, most of these lovely old homes were painted over with a dull grey shade, and the houses themselves began to pulled down, but within recent years, there has been a resurgence in the construction of their unique styles and colour schemes, so San Francisco springs to architectural life once more.

Answer: Antonine

The Antonine Wall was built to the north of Hadrian's Wall, across the Firth of Forth and the Firth of Clyde. This was a turf wall constructed on a stone base that measured 39 miles long, 10 feet high and 16 feet wide. It is believed that this was then enforced by a deep ditch on the Scottish side and was topped by a wooden palisade. Work began on this structure in 142 AD and took twelve years to complete from one side of Scotland to the other.

There is not much evidence left of this wall today because of the turf and wood used in its construction, but it appears here and there still.

It was protected by nineteen larger forts stretched across the country, with various smaller fortlets between each one. Abandoned only eight years after its completion, it was occupied by the Romans for a short period once again in the year 208, before being left to crumble away altogether after that.

Answer: Divination by reading onions

Cromniomancy has been done for very many centuries in Europe, parts of Asia and in Africa. Even the ancient Egyptian valued the onion so much that whenever they took an oath they rested their right hand on one. The most popular form of this art was to inscribe yes or no on two onions, and the one that sprouted first was the answer to an important question from a seeker. Or wishing an answer between two choices - such as choosing between two lovers - or seeking to know the welfare of loved ones far away. That was done by inscribing their names on onions and checking the condition of the shoots that sprouted. Mostly carried out by practitioners of the Wicca "religion" today, cromniomancy is not looked upon as a serious method of revealing hidden truths. Do you think that stinks?

Answer: Ugly human bags of mostly water

When the Enterprise arrives at the terraforming colony on the planet Velara III, which was theoretically devoid of all life prior to the project, they suspect something is seriously amiss after a member of the colony is found dead and a laboratory machine attacks Data, a member of the Enterprise crew. Found nearby is a glowing crystal which is taken back to the Enterprise for further investigation.

It proves to be a sentient being, a life form of the planet, which was being threatened by the actions of the terraforming colony.

It subsequently attacks the ship itself, placing all the crew in imminent danger, and when communication is finally made with it, describes them all as "ugly human bags of mostly water". The look on their faces is classic after this compliment. Fortunately, all is resolved, the crystal life form is returned to the planet, with its area quarantined from all future interference, and the Enterprise crew go on their merry way, continuing to "seek out new life and new civilisations (and) to boldly go where no one has gone before".

Answer: Seated on his horse

The Crypt in Britain's St Paul's Cathedral is the largest in Western Europe. However, this structure is not packed with the famous and mighty as you may think, because most of it is filled with support structures that help hold up the Cathedral. The largest monument in this space is dedicated to the Duke of Wellington (1769-1852) the British military hero who defeated Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.

He is seated on his equally famous horse, Copenhagen. Peculiarly so though, that notable statue of steed and rider wasn't allowed to be installed in the crypt until 1912, sixty years after Wellington's death.

This was because the committee that oversees the operations of the Cathedral refused permission on the grounds that a horse shouldn't be allowed in the Cathedral.

As ridiculous a reason as ever was given.

Answer: The sugarbird lady

Robin Miller (1941-1975), while earning her degree in nursing, obtained her private and commercial pilot's licence. She then obtained permission from the Western Australia Department of Health to fly to various regions in the north west area of that large state to carry out a polio vaccination programme for the indigenous children who lived there.

When this was granted, she borrowed money to buy a small plane, and set off on her life saving trips. Robin distributed the polio vaccine to the children in sugar lumps. Who knows how many she saved from a life time of suffering and disability during her short life before she died of cancer at the age of 35.

In a heart warming tribute to her humanity, she is still referred to today in that remote area of Australia as "the sugarbird lady".

Answer: Cardiac arrest

"Commotio cordis" is a lethal interruption to the regular beating of the heart that occurs in younger children and teenagers, but boys in particular. It is caused by an unexpected blow to the chest from a ball, or an elbow or a foot, whether wearing chest protection or not.

The sport in which this most occurs is baseball. It happens in ALL sports however, including all the football leagues, ice hockey, cricket, karate and other martial arts. The horrifying rates of deaths that occur from these incidents is 65 per cent (with CPR and defibrillation), and 80 per cent otherwise.

Answer: School canteens

Tuckshops are in almost every school in Australia, and, one imagines, in England as well. These are small canteens selling a variety of food during morning tea and lunch breaks. Most of this food isn't terribly healthy, but it's filling and gives the kids something to look forward to, to break up the long school day. On average, here in Australia at any rate, they sell hot pies, sausage rolls, sandwiches, salad rolls, fruit juice and fizzy drinks, hot dogs, a bit of fruit (largely unpurchased), hot chips and so on.

The staff who run these tuckshops are usually all volunteering parents (mostly mums who work part time or have chosen to stay at home to rear their children), and all profits raised from the sale of food go towards buying extra equipment for the school.

In Australia now, government department officials are beginning to request that the tuckshops sell healthier foods instead. At present, these are only minor changes, such as brown bread sandwiches instead of white, fruit juices and milk instead of fizzy drinks etc - but already other changes are in the air.

While these changes are healthy and good for children, the downside to this is that some children are already sneaking out of bounds to buy pure junk food elsewhere, that the revenue from the tuckshops will begin to drop off, and that eventually the education of the children will suffer due to lack of much needed equipment usually purchased by the tuckshops.

Answer: Rise in ticket prices at Covent Garden

After both Drury Lane and Covent Garden theatres had burned down in separate incidents at the beginning of the 1800s in London, the new Covent Garden was rebuilt from funds raised by King George III and the Dukes of York and Northumberland. This wasn't enough to cover the cost of rebuilding, however, and the theatre manager, John Kemble, decided to raise the price of admission to make ends meet.

These were quite hefty jumps for the times, and when, in addition, he decided to convert the third tier of the theatre - usually reserved for the public - into private stalls, selling at three hundred pounds a year, Londoners had had enough.

They rioted. And not just a one or two day riot. Those feisty Londoners rioted for over two months. Known as the OP Riots (Old Price), all classes joined in.

Whenever Kemble tried to bring in the authorities to quell them, the rioters upped the ante and grew even more boisterous. They didn't damage the new theatre though. Finally, Kemble had to give in. He issued an apology, dropped the prices to their former cost, and left the third tier of the theatre as it was. Until the next season began, that is.

He tried to sneak in private boxes in the third tier again, and that set the rioters off once more, so he hastily backed down again. And Covent Garden continues on happily to this day, intact, calm and dignified, and ready, as always, to begin performing whenever the curtain raises.

Answer: A Scottish hairstyle

A cock-up was an arrangement of the fully rigged sails on a ship anchored at wharf. A cockernonnie was a hairstyle once worn by elderly Scottish women, but, gathered up slightly higher in a type of chignon, began to be worn by young women as well. This new and flattering style being worn by the flighty lasses definitely met with the stern disapproval of the preachers of the time, for more than one spoke out against it. One Mr. Kirkton of Edinburgh, preaching against it in the middle of the 19th century, has gone on record as thundering from his pulpit that "I have spent all this year preaching against the vanity of women, yet I see my own daughter in the kirk even now, with as high a 'cock-up' as any of you all".