A mistimed hop ruined R.B.'s preflight
mantra 11 years on. But still, nobody died so no worries. Where?
inspired by Venky
Just a little too twisted and lacking in specific clues I'm afraid.
R.B is not Sir Richard Branson but Raymond Babbitt, and the mantra Qantas,
Qantas never crashed.
Qantas has never lost a passenger in the jet era but it has
crashed. Eleven years after Rainman was filmed the flagship QF1 on the
London - Sydney kangaroo run was having it's hop at Bangkok when it
came off the runway. But nobody was killed, so no worries, right?
2
The images are a bit mixed up. I'm looking for six teams and one geographic
link.
(click for larger image)
Todd
Jared
The teams are all colleges from New Jersey.
A. Scarlet Knights of Rutgers University (the chess pieces)
B. Cyclones of Centenary College (hurricane and the roller coaster
at Coney Island)
C. Pirates of Seaton Hall (Orlando Bloom, Johnny Depp of Pirates
of the Caribbean and I believe the hanging of a pirate)
D. Professors of Rowan College (Sprout, McGonagall, Dumbledore
and Snape)
E. Ospreys of Richard Stockton College of New Jersey (the bird
and the airplane)
F. Tigers of Princeton University (Tiger Woods, Tamil Tigers, and
Tiger tanks)
Venky
2. Pirates, Tigers, Ospreys, Profs, Scarlet Knights and Cyclones.
Sports teams from New Jersey.
The key point was to see professors rather than wizards, they were all
professors but Sprout and McGonagall were witches. The dude in the
dark glasses is a modern day pirate not a Tamil Tiger. The Tiger tank was
the best tank on the western front in World War II, the Soviets had a tank
to better it in the East but the allies made up the difference in the West
with quantity rather than quality.
Alan claims the yellow image shows the hanging of pirate "Major" Stede
Bonnet in Charlestown, North Carolina, 10 December 1718.
3
Where might you find an overt
egress,
a saintly blob, a New Year cub, a tank
clerk, and an R-trap keeper?
Alan
In comic books. They're anagrams of the "real" names of various superheroes:
Clark Kent (Superman), Billy Batson (Capt. Marvel), Steve Rogers (Capt.
America), Peter Parker (Spider-Man), and Bruce Wayne (Batman).
4
What lesson is this?
Todd
Illustration from an anti-Semitic German children's book, DER
GIFTPILZ (The Poisonous Mushroom), published in Nuremberg, Germany,
in 1935. The caption reads: "The Jewish nose is crooked, it looks like
a 6." The lesson is “Never again”.
Dadge
Rassenlehre
“Racial theory”.
But Alan's answer is too good to mark wrong, especially after revealing “Out
of nowhere, I realised what I think is the keyword for your cartoon
while sitting on the tube, and embarrassed myself by uttering it out loud...”
I asked him to clarify his
answer:
You mean that wasn't what you were thinking of? That's amazing.
O.K.: The scene is a classroom in a German school. The boy is drawing
the number 6 on the blackboard. The German for "six" is "sechs",
pronounced "sex". So, the class is "sechs (sex) education".
If the real answer is better, I'll be gobsmacked.
5
Who is this?
Alan
Björk Gudmundsdottir, who helpfully drops her family name professionally
I think technically it's a patronymic rather than a family name.
- the Common Raven (Corvus corax) is also known as the Northern
Raven, or
- the German band Corvus Corax releases its music through Noir
Records in the USA, or
- in the film Brewster McCloud a character yells "Get out,
you Nigger bird" when a raven lands on a bird cage.
But which to choose? While I pondered, weak and weary, I suddenly
remembered the line from Edgar Allen Poe's poem The Raven (1845): "Quoth
the raven, 'Nevermore.'"
Quoth is also a character
in the Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett.
He's a raven, obviously, he hangs around translating for the Death of
Rats whose utterances seem to consist entirely of the word SQUEAK, sometimes
repeated. He also works as transport for his bony master. He claims he's
only in it for the eyeballs (it's a raven thing) but he doesn't do the
N word.
Jared
Corvus Corax is the Latin name for
the common black raven. The raven is associated with Edgar Allen
Poe’s
famous poem by the same name.
“Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and
weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.”
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'
Nevermore is the N word.
7
What is the song, the adjective that didn't quite take off and where does
the flower fit in?
Alan
7: Dedicated Follower of Fashion
a) Frilly nylon panties (a quote from the lyrics)
b) The Kinks (who sang it)
c) The Kinks (who sang it)
d) Scarlet pimpernel flower (Anagallis avensis)
e) Carnaby Street
Carnabetian ("the carnabetian army marches on") is the
adjective that died a sudden and deserved death; the lyrics also
include "they seek him here", the famous reference to Sir
Percy Blakeney, the eponymous Scarlet Pimpernel character in the
novel by Baroness Orczy.
They seek him here, they seek him there,
His clothes are loud, but never square.
It will make or break him so he's got to buy the best,
cause he's a dedicated follower of fashion.
And when he does his little rounds,
round the boutiques of london town,
Eagerly pursuing all the latest fads and trends,
cause he's a dedicated follower of fashion.
Oh yes he is (oh yes he is), oh yes he is (oh yes he is).
He thinks he is a flower to be looked at,
And when he pulls his frilly nylon panties right up tight,
He feels a dedicated follower of fashion.
Oh yes he is (oh yes he is), oh yes he is (oh yes he is).
There's one thing that he loves and that is flattery.
One week he's in polka-dots, the next week he is in stripes.
cause he's a dedicated follower of fashion.
They seek him here, they seek him there,
In regent street and leicester square.
Everywhere the carnabetian army marches on,
Each one an dedicated follower of fashion.
Oh yes he is (oh yes he is), oh yes he is (oh yes he is).
His world is built round discotheques and parties.
This pleasure-seeking individual always looks his best
cause he's a dedicated follower of fashion.
Oh yes he is (oh yes he is), oh yes he is (oh yes he is).
He flits from shop to shop just like a butterfly.
In matters of the cloth he is as fickle as can be,
cause he's a dedicated follower of fashion.
He's a dedicated follower of fashion.
He's a dedicated follower of fashion.
Have a singalong, it's a great feel-good song. Live version at the
top, the definitive recording below, with lyrics.
I like carnabetian. What other words could you use for those dandies in
that picture? Oh yeah, pratts would cover it too.
If you need to buy man-sized frilly pink panties there
are suppliers out there, and with matching bras in man sizes too. Happy
shopping.
8
What's the next letter in this "Rocky" sequence?
U S F M F I S C B C M A G T S L I P E L T A M
S for Spain (again).
Starting with U for United Kingdom at Gibraltar and touring clockwise around
the Mediterranean coastline.
Dadge
9
My dictionary falls
open, between an unpleasant thick liquid substance and a colloquial currency
unit I find a minimalist shoe; a dockyard feature; a single-masted ship;
an arboreal mammal who epitomizes a green lifestyle; a despondent depression
that demands Betjemanesque aerial attack; a pellet that risks being lead
to its own doom and a rather impure form of diacetylmorphine hydrochloride.
As a tie breaker suggest two alternative ways to pass the day, one
for a friend and one for an enemy, using as many words from these two
pages as you think is advisable.
For a friend there could be a (Singapore) sling, slivovitz, sloe
gin, a Sloppy Joe and a slumber party (when they’re too sloshed
to drive)
For an enemy there could be a slip noose, a slight, slops, a slugfest,
or a slur, such as calling them a slob, sloppy, sloshed, slovenly,
slow, slow-witted, a slugabed, a slumlord, a slut,
Slingback was what I was looking for but slipper also fits. Doesn't
it Cinders?
Slough comes from the Slough of Despond, according
to Wikipedia “The
Slough of Despond is a deep bog in John Bunyan's novel Pilgrim's Progress,
into which the character Christian sinks under the weight of his sins
and his sense of guilt.” The other reference is to Sir
John Betjeman's poem:
Slough
Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!
It isn't fit for humans now,
There isn't grass to graze a cow.
Swarm over, Death!
Come, bombs and blow to smithereens
Those air -conditioned, bright canteens,
Tinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans,
Tinned minds, tinned breath.
Mess up the mess they call a town-
A house for ninety-seven down
And once a week a half a crown
For twenty years.
And get that man with double chin
Who'll always cheat and always win,
Who washes his repulsive skin
In women's tears:
And smash his desk of polished oak
And smash his hands so used to stroke
And stop his boring dirty joke
And make him yell.
But spare the bald young clerks who add
The profits of the stinking cad;
It's not their fault that they are mad,
They've tasted Hell.
It's not their fault they do not know
The birdsong from the radio,
It's not their fault they often go
To Maidenhead
And talk of sport and makes of cars
In various bogus-Tudor bars
And daren't look up and see the stars
But belch instead.
Slug is a bit twisted. A slug pellet is bait for slugs to eat which
contains poison. But there's more, a lead pellet, such as ammunition
for an airgun, is also known as a slug.
A sloth epitomizes a green lifestyle by extreme conservation
of energy because it hangs upside-down from trees by its hook-like claws
requiring no muscle tension at all. Which is just as well. If a hungry
hunter shoots an arrow at a sloth it continues to hang there, as it doesn't
use any energy to stay put killing it doesn't cause it to fall down. It
moves extremely slowly and allows algae to grow in its fur turning
it green, no mammal
has green pigment for a reason which awaits scientific discovery. Its
method of self preservation can best be described as eating leaves of
such low nutritive value that it has no competitors and conserving its
own limited energy (limited by its poor diet) so much that its potential
predators don't even realize that it's made of meat.
10
What is missing - albeit with a slight change of personnel?
Sergeant Dudfoot
Dadge
Road to.. Zanzibar, Utopia (Thomas More), Rio (Ferdinand), Bali
(barley), Morocco (leather), Singapore? Missing: Hong Kong, with
Joan Collins
Alan
10:
The pictures are of:
a) A Singapore salad
b) National flag of Zanzibar
c) Book bound in Morocco leather
d) Manchester United and England football player Rio Ferdinand
e) Barley, which almost rhymes with Bali
f) Sir Thomas More, author of Utopia
The placename in each clue (Rio in (d)) completes the title of
one of the seven Bing Crosby and Bob Hope "Road To ..." films.
Missing is "Hong Kong", the last of the series, in which
the gorgeous Dorothy Lamour was replaced by the appalling Joan
Collins as the love interest.
