Three of a Kind, Part 33 Trivia Quiz

Answer: salmon

The salmon is a fish in the family Salmonidae which is found natively in the Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans. The Atlantic ones are of the genus Salmo while the Pacific ones are of the genus Oncorhynchus (and taste better). Salmon are mostly anadromous, which means they are born in fresh water, grow up in salt water and return to fresh water to spawn. Native American myth claims that they return to the exact place where they were born; science now confirms that this is generally true.

A collection of the writings of Douglas Adams (1952-2001) ("Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy") was published a year after his untimely death. It was entitled "The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time." The book is of two parts: essays and reminiscences in one; the other a draft of a novel which might have been a sequel to "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" (1987) and "The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul" (1988), or another entry into the Hitchhikers Guide series.

Lake Washington is connected to Puget Sound via the Lake Washington Ship Canal and the Hiram M. Chittenden Locks. Salmon Bay is the westernmost portion of the canal and is salt water; Lake Washington is fresh. Salmon Bay is crossed by the Ballard Bridge. Fishermen's Terminal, the home port of the North Pacific fishing fleet, used to be called Salmon Bay Terminal.

Answer: scooter

Wheelchairs with electric motors are called mobility scooters because they afford mobility to those who would otherwise be limited by disability. They are transportable in vans equipped with ramps or may be disassembled and reassembled at the point of use.

In the SpongeBob SquarePants universe, Scooter is a parrotfish or surfer fish who is lavender with green lips and appears at Goo Bay routinely. He is a friend of SpongeBob's. He is a happy fellow who laughs a lot and spends his time surfing. Oddly, he dies in one episode but appears alive and well in subsequent episodes.

Scooter is a male Gobot who transforms into a motor scooter. He is also equipped with computer-hacking equipment and a hologram projector. As a member of the Guardians, he relies more on intelligence than weapons to get himself out of trouble.

Answer: mason

A brick mason builds with bricks and a stone mason builds with stone and masons in general use things like bricks and stones to build. Stone masons are also craftsmen in cutting and shaping natural stone. Masonry is one of the earliest trades in human history. The English term probably derives from an early 12th Century Old French surname "masson" or "maçon."

Mason bees are those members of the Osmia species which use mud or other rocky materials to build their nests, often in cracks in rocks or holes in trees. Unlike honeybees, all Osmia females are fertile (about which they are generally pleased). Although they produce no honey, they are extremely useful as agents of pollination in crops raised by humans.

Johnny Hart (1931-2007) was the creator of both the comic strips "B.C." (1957) and "The Wizard of Id" (1964). His grandson, Mason Mastroianni, is a comic artist who took over drawing "B.C." upon Hart's death in 2007. He later also took over drawing "Wizard of Id" in 2015.

Answer: Friday

Friday Harbor is small but is the only incorporated town on San Juan Island. Its name comes from Joseph Poalie Friday, a native Hawaiian, who was one of the agrarian founders of the island economy. The island is connected to mainland Washington and British Columbia by ferry. It was the setting for the movie "Practical Magic" (1998).

Friday Caliban is one of the Castaways on an island which Count Olaf wants to name Olaf Land. Her mother told her that her father, Thursday, was eaten by a manatee while they were being shipwrecked. This was as untrue as it was unlikely.

The first "Friday the 13th" movie (1980) was set at Camp Crystal Lake where Jason Voorhees drowned. The franchise resulted in eleven sequels, a TV series, numerous novellas and comic books. There was also a cross-over: "Freddy vs. Jason" (2003), teaming Jason with Freddy Krueger from "A Nightmare on Elm Street."

Answer: fingers

Roland Glen Fingers (b. 1946) was known as Rollie throughout his major league career. He was a relief pitcher/closer for the Oakland Athletics, the San Diego Padres and the Milwaukee Brewers. He won three World Series, was an MLB All-Star four times, and won both the AL MVP in 1981 and the Cy Young Award the same year. His handlebar moustache was legendary.

The original Cadbury Fingers were introduced in 1897; the modern version in 1951. They are a center of baked cookie coated in chocolate. Made in the U.K., they are sold around the world. They are offered in a variety of flavours.

Jack Toback directed Harvey Keitel playing Jimmy "Fingers" Angelelli in the 1978 crime drama "Fingers." Keitel's character is an accomplished young pianist who does strong-arm debt collection for his loan-shark father. The Mafia and Carnegie Hall get into the mix, as does romance. Merrilee Rush' "Angel of the Morning" is part of the sound track as is Johann Sebastian Bach's Toccata in E minor (BWV 914).

Answer: mule

Mules are shoes which do not wrap around the back of the heel. The term is French. They have existed since at least the 16th Century. Marilyn Monroe was partly responsible for their popularity in the 1950s. A slide is a mule with open toes.

Finches, especially goldfinches, were popular caged songbirds in the U.K. until they became strongly regulated. Aviculturists then began crossing British finches with canaries and marketing the resulting birds under the name "mules." To this day, a popular bird food in England is called "British Finch & Mule."

In the original "Foundation" series, the Mule is a character with the mental capacity to influence the emotions of others, individually and in large groups. He uses this ability to overcome the Foundation and supplant it with his own galactic confederation, the "Union of Worlds." Because he is sterile (as are mules), he dies without an heir and his empire collapses.

Answer: soap

Soap is a salt of a fatty acid. It has the property of being both hydrophilic (water-attracting) and lipophilic (fat-attracting) at once. Soaps are therefore useful in cleaning people, clothing, dishes and messes. Primitive soaps were made from animal fats and lye derived from ashes. Good Queen Anne (1665-1714) imposed a luxury tax on the manufacture of soap which was not repealed until 1853, leaving the upper classes better smelling than the working classes, no doubt.

The first soap opera (or "soap") was "Painted Dreams" on Chicago's radio WGN in 1930 and the first nationally-broadcast soap was "Clara, Lu and Em" on NBC's Blue Network in 1931. Programmes of this sort were aired during the day on weekdays. The target audience was housewives. Common sponsors were makers of soap, hence the name,

The process of "fulling" is the cleaning of cloth before it is put to dye. The substances used to clean it (nitre, soap, stale urine) are collectively known as "fullers' soap." Urine was a source of ammonium salts and was known as "wash." The process is mentioned in the Bible (2 Kings 18:17; Isaiah 7:3 and 36:2; Proverbs 25:20 ; Jeremiah 2:22; Malachi 3:2; Mark 9:3).

Answer: fire

The film "Chariots of Fire" (1981) is based on the true story of Eric Liddell (a Scottish Christian) and Harold Abrahams (an English Jew). Issues of religion and prejudice abound. The movie won the Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay. The name "Chariots of Fire" derives from the hymn "Jerusalem" which derives from a poem by William Blake which derives from 2 Kings 2:11 and 6:17.

Pontiac built the Firebird from 1967 to 2002. Ford released the Mustang late in 1964. The Chevrolet Camaro went on sale in 1966. Mercury offered the Cougar in 1967. The initial Firebird was a muscle car with an optional air scoop in the hood. The Trans Am was a specialty package which added hotter suspension, horsepower and markings.

The reference with which James Taylor's "Fire and Rain" begins is to the news that his friend Suzanne Schnerr had committed suicide while he was away in London, which news was kept from him to allow him to concentrate on recording. Carole King played piano on the record. King says that her song "You've Got a Friend" is a response to the line in Taylor's song: "I've seen lonely times when I could not find a friend."

Answer: machine

The definition of a machine is varied. There is a sense in which a pipe wrench is a machine and another in which a computer is a machine, a tea kettle is a machine and a battleship is a machine. In general terms, machines use energy (mechanical, electrical, chemical) to move something, which is the desired result. Beyond this, there are debates.

George Kelly Barnes (1895-1954) was known as Machine Gun Kelly because of the weapon he used. His most heinous crime was the kidnapping of oil man Charles F. Urschel in 1933. This violated the Lindbergh Law (1932) which made kidnapping a federal crime. It was J. Edgar Hoover's case. Kelly was sentenced to life imprisonment and died in prison. His life was (loosely) portrayed by Charles Bronson in the movie "Machine Gun Kelly" (1958).

Emilio Estefan Jr. formed the Miami Latin Boys musical group in 1975. Gloria García (who he would later marry) joined the band in 1977 and they changed the name to the Miami Sound Machine. Her immense success led the group to be rebranded as Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine.

Answer: brick

The fictional town of Cicely, Alaska, was filmed on location in Roslyn, Washington. John Buffo and Peter Giovanni opened a tavern in Roslyn in 1889 and rebuilt it with 45,000 bricks in 1898, hence the name: "The Brick." It claims to be the longest continuously-operating bar in Washington State. On the show, the Brick is owned and run by Holling Vincoeur and his wife Shelly Tambo.

The Indianapolis Motor Speedway was paved with 3.2 million bricks in 1909 leading to its nickname as "the Brickyard." The last brick was laid by then Governor Thomas R. Marshall. When the modern Indianapolis 500 is held there, spectators can see a three-foot patch of the original bricks which remain at the start-finish line.

"The Three Little Pigs" was a fable or fairy tale well before its publication in 1886. In most of the stories, the pigs build three houses: one of straw, one of wood and one of brick. The Big Bad Wolf demands admission, each pig denies it saying "Not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin" to which the Wolf responds by blowing the straw or wooden house down (but not the one made of brick). Walt Disney produced the Silly Symphony cartoon version in 1933.