Jump to content

The All New All New Groundspeak UK Pub Quiz


Recommended Posts

If you were travelling from (say) New York to San Francisco via the panama canal, what direction would you be travelling when going through the canal?

Although you'd be going from the Eastern seaboard of the Americas to the Western seaboard, the Panama Isthmus itself runs approximately East/West and you'd be crossing that at almost a right angle. So you'd actually be travelling approximately due South when navigating the canal.

 

Edited to add: Darn it! That'll teach me to write reasoned responses! Nice one, Eusty!

Link to comment

Well we're getting closer, but no-one's correct yet!

 

South East

DING

 

Strange as it may seem the canal is aligned more or less NW to SE

, and going from East to West you're actually travelling in a South Easterly direction.

 

Woop woop

 

OK - what's the largest natural structure on earth?

Link to comment

DING!

 

They didn't win it again for another 69 years, but would have only waited for another 2 years for the next win if it hadn't been for Chelski. Given the current state of the club it may now be another 69 years to the next win - if they can survive that long!

Link to comment

"It's Lieutenant Hurwitz. Severe shell-shock. Thinks he's Ethel Merman"

"Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit amphetamines"

"A hospital? What is it?"... "It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now."

 

NAME THAT FILM!

 

(and for extra kudos, can you say what year it came out - not essential to get a ding)

Link to comment

I'm afraid I'd have to agree with the 364. Mainly due to the wording of the question AND the wording of the song.

 

If you think about it carefully, it says for example that you get the seven swans a swimming on the seventh day, but also get more of them again on the eighth day (after the maids a milking) AND another load on the ninth day, AND more swans on the 10th day AND on the 11th & 12th days. So just in swans, for example you'd end up with 6 days when you get 7 swans every day (on top of everything else) making 42 swans just for a start.

 

Extrapolate that for every gift item (12 partridges in a pear tree - one every day) (11x2=22 turtle doves) and you get 364 for everything.

 

If we're going to be REALLY pedantic, we'd have to check that the partridge IN the pear tree counted as one gift NOT 2. The wording of the question is ambiguous to suggest that the answer could indeed be as high as 364 plus another 12 gifts which is 376.

 

;)

Link to comment

Hmmm... As has already been said, that pre-supposes that a "Partridge in a Pear Tree" counts as just one item. Just for a moment lets suppose it's two items, then the total may well be 376. However... if you're going down that route, what about all the 'Maids a-Milking"? They have to have something to milk so how about adding 40 cows to the list? The total is now up to 416. Then, of course, you'll have to add the 22 Piper's pipes and the 12 Drummer's drums. Total now stands at 450; which is a whole lot of wrapping paper and Selotape in anyone's book!

Link to comment

Hmmm... However... if you're going down that route, what about all the 'Maids a-Milking"? They have to have something to milk so how about adding 40 cows to the list? The total is now up to 416. Then, of course, you'll have to add the 22 Piper's pipes and the 12 Drummer's drums.

Well they wouldn't necessarily need one cow each, given that cows' udders have 4 teats, so you could hypothetically get 4 maids per cow, which could then be as few as only 10 cows. Or indeed, they wouldn't necessarily have to milking cows - it might be goats or indeed any other mammal. If it's a mammal with more than 4 teats, that's even fewer animals. Or they might even be employees of the milking company able to do their job without a specific animal present (although I agree that one is a bit of a stretch).

 

The song also doesn't specify that the drummers have one drum each. I mean, it would be a bit of a squash, but they could technically all play the same really big drum - which means only one addition "drum" gift. Can't see the pipers being able to share the pipe, though...

 

... I need to get out more.

Link to comment

On the subject of pedantry, the thing that everyone's missing is that the question doesn't ask, "According to the Christmas song, ..."! It asks, "How many presents would you have from your true love if you totalled them all up?" The answer thus depends on who you are and what your own true love gave you. Unless your own true love was particularly perverse, I doubt there'd be a partridge or a pear tree among your presents, and maids or cows are as unlikely. Of course, the question could only be answered by those who've found true love, which is a little unfair to those who have not!

 

On the subject of the song, I did once see a series of letters from the recipient in the song as she slowly disappeared beneath the steadily growing pile of gifts. Season's greetings to all and I hope you enjoy the link!

 

Geoff

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...