LJ Daily Answers: 1 February 2010

[chaosvizier.livejournal.com]

1. What fairy tale character spun straw into gold?

"Fairy tale? Hell, no. That's my hairdresser." - distaff_exile

"Adam Smith" - drbunsen

"Simon Cowell" - majorsamfan

"Mickey Mouse. The little rodent sure spun plenty of gold for Disney." - seekingferret

"If the answer isn't Tesla, I'm going to be very upset." - illogicalvulcan

"Straw into gold? That's nothing! Ben Bernanke can make bazillions of dollars just by pressing the 'O' key on his computer!" - phrench_phried

"The Honest Politician" - seferin

"Rumpelstiltskin. What did he want with a baby, anyway?" - rikchik, hotandcoldrp, bababanaba

"I wish I'd had this ability while working retail. Just steal the straws from the break room, make gold, then quit." - umbralcorax

"Rumplestiltskin (why am I thinking foreskin now... who spun straw into little penis caps... my brain is offically broken)." - 7tree_hugger

"Rumplestiltskin, who had the original gild complex." - i_calql8

"How did they come up with the name Rumplestilkskin anyway? Were they writing the character sheet by committee?" - sskipstress

"I read an article yesterday about how Rumplestiltskin is a sex metaphor. It was exactly as strange as you'd expect." - flipthefrog

(Tell me, was that article on cracked.com by any chance? -AL)

"If what cracked.com says is true, apparently one of the earlier, raunchier versions had him getting his entire body stuck in the protagonist's vagina when he worked himself into a fury over her finding out his name." - kohikari

"Rumplestilskin has since quit the 'straw into gold' scam and has since started a mail-in gold exchange business. Simply put your used or unwanted gold or first born child into the secure, sealed envelope and mail in for CASH!" - kristinmachina

"The moral of this story: You know how your parents are always bragging to their friends about your high school GPA and your great job? It could be worse." - tabbyclaw

Correct Answer: Rumpelstiltskin

"Or, in the immortal parlance of one Sir Mix-a-Lot, Rump-o-Smooth-Skin." - babybokal



2. Who was both the youngest and the oldest Secretary of Defense of the United States?

"I know America's a young country, but has there only ever been one?" - puredeadthingy

"Benjamin Button." - lots42, tabbyclaw, thefannishwaldo

"Harold Saxon" - distaff_exile
"Must be a Time Lord, whoever they are." - wint3rhart
"Doctor Who? Time travel has gotta be involved here somehow." - gigglingpixie

(+1, Doctor Who – LL)

"Super Secretary, who teamed up with Wonder Waitress and Mega Maid. Oh crap, I just wrote a manga!" - mattwolf

"Zaphod Beeblebrox IV" - etcet, deza

"That would be Donald Rumsfeld. Due to an accident involving a Nazi UFO, the USS Philadelphia, and an alien fetus, he was born old, like Merlin, and iswaswill become the youngest Secretary of Defence around 2036, during the Mary-Kate Olsen administration." - drbunsen

"Doc Brown" - drunken_hedghog

(+1, Back to the Future. -CV)

"Shhh. I'm trying to forget about the Bush era." - dorei

"i will not name him. he's dead to me. and i didn't even respect him enough to sit shiva." - songquake

"James Vincent Forrestal. He was the very first Secretary of Defense, so while he was in office he was both the youngest and oldest to have served in that capacity. I demand full credit." - thepikey

(-1, Googlecheating. -AL)

"Edward Cullen. Young & Old at the same time! And gay." - star_bunnies

(Hahahah, that's a good on- wait, what? -AL)

"...shouldn't it be Donald Ginsfeld for ljdq?" - kagomeshuko

(Yes. If he were our secretary, we would make him change his name. -CV&LL&AL)

"Schroedinger's Rumsfeld's cat. He was both there and not in office, all at the same time." - iamza

"Ironically that is exactly the sort of thing Donald Rumsfeld would say." - many_from_one

(Rumsfeld said some of the GREATEST things, things that sounded a lot like....)

"You play LJDQ with the answers you have, not the answers you wish you had" - zihuatanejo, umbralcorax

(...that. -AL)

Correct Answer: Donald Rumsfeld

"...or as his friends call him, Satan." - flipthefrog



3. According to T.S. Eliot, what cat "will do as he do do and there's no doing anything about it"?

"All of them, dammit." - lots42, and many, many more

"Just about any cat really, not even Chuck Norris can train a cat to do anything it doesn't wish to do." - b_hulsmans

"" - un_sedentary

"Shaft! Jooooohn Shaft." – Anonymous, drbunsen, 4492

(Damn right. -CV)

"Whichever one it was, he probably do do in my shoe shoe, rather than his litterbox. Bastard." - dorei

"Sting, who also 'will do as he do do do, de da da da, and there's no saying anything else to you'." - i_calql8

"The Rum Tum Tigger - just be careful, he's gets a bit bounce happy after one too many drinks." - frequencyshift

"MIIIIIDNIIIIIGHT, ALL ALONE IN MOOOOOOOOOOONLIIIIIIIIIIGHT. Too bad I sound like a cat when I try to sing." - uadlika

"Have you EVER seen any production of Cats and SEEN that costume?!?!?! Oh, my, if he puts his groin even NEAR your face . . . ahem." - kagomeshuko

"Instead of the usual Sweet 16 party, I and 15 other friends got tickets to "Cats" on Broadway. The seats were on the stage. We saw the actor's butts. Best birthday ever!" - kristinmachina

"Honky Cat? Oh, no, wait, that was Elton John not TS Eliot and all he did was get back to the woods." - phrench_phried

"…Rum Tum Tugger sounds like one of those girlie drinks with a little umbrella…" - nitasee

"Also, T.S. Eliot may have been a spectacular drama queen who wrote terrifically convoluted poetry about his own existential crisis, but I believe there was only one 'L' in his name...I think...) ('I grow old...I grow old.../I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.' He probably wrote an emo poem every time he found a new grey hair." - kohikari

(...fair enough. I like extra L's. -CV)

Correct Answer: The Rum Tum Tugger



4. The business of smuggling alcoholic beverages over water is generally referred to as what?

"But why is the rum gone?!?" - all of you

"It's called AWESOME, that's what it's called! Piracy? Wait, didn't the dwarves and Bilbo get out of that place in The Hobbit by using that same trick?" - 4492

"Impractical. You can get what you need at your local liquor store." - dorei

(True, & thank God for the 21st Amendment. -AL)

"Doing the Han Solo." - alexiel_neesan

"Waterboarding" - wiredwizard, wrestlingdog

"Michigan would like to remind all its bashers of the favors we did for the rest of you during prohibition. We'd say 'you're welcome' but it's clear we're not being thanked any time soon." - greatleaps

"Business as usual at a college football game" - i_calql8

"This was a particularly convenient method to distribute American beer, since it was already close to water anyway." - darthparadox

(It's like making love in a canoe! -AL)

"SWI- Swimming While Intoxicated" - seekingferret

(Not a good idea. Flip turns are ESPECIALLY not a good idea. -AL)

"Profitable and Dangerous, LLC" - majorsamfan

"Rum running, which isn't a 10K race sponsored by Captain Morgan." - sskipstress

"Rum-stumbling. Trust me, there's no such thing as rum-running." - mandydax

"Not to be confused with streaking, which is running after too much rum." - deza

Correct Answer: Rum Running



5. Who was the brother of the Decepticon named Frenzy?

"over here we have condoms with the brand name Frenzy. I can't get past that to make a guess sorry." - bababanaba

"I'm Hanzy and this is my brother, Frenzy, and we're here to pump *clap* you up!" - i_calql8

(I hate you very much right now. -CV)

"i feel ashamed that i know this is a transformers reference. i feel relieved, however, that i didn't know the names of any of the decepticons." - songquake

"there's no way I'm going to know Transformer family trees. I'm nerdy, but not THAT nerdy." - rikchik
"My geekdom doesn't extend quite that far." - distaff_exile

"The first six My Little Ponies were Cotton Candy, Butterscotch, Minty, Blue Belle, Blossom, and Snuzzle. Which has nothing to wo with the question, but I have not the slightest damn clue as to the answer and so I have to do something to reclaim my 80s toy geek street cred." - tabbyclaw

(I'd only give you a +1 if any of those were tranforming robot ponies. -CV)

"said out loud in France, 'Decepticon' sounds real weird 'cause you hear 'Décès' (dead) and 'p'tit con' (little shit)." - alexiel_neesan

(Full credit. -CV)

"Darrell. And they had another brother named Darrell." - 4you_blue_jway

"Feeding. And when they combine they form a huge piranha. Om Nom Nom Nom!" - usmu

"Can I play the age card here? I was too old for the Transformers the first time around, and fell asleep in the movie version." - dorei

"... I don't think that question makes sense. Can I buy a vowel?" - star_bunnies

"Are you telling me robots sexually reproduce??!?!! Are you telling me there's possibly some canon basis for all the stoopid Transformers slash out there?" - thepikey

"i watched gem, not transformers." - kira_snugz

"Mormons say Jesus and Lucifer are brothers. Lucifer, aka Satan or the devil, is "the father of lies" (deceiver or Decepticon). Ergo, Jesus is the brother of Decepticon" - majorsamfan

(I'm going to have to give you a +1 just out of principle. -CV)

"Can I just say, I am SO OVER Megan Fox right now. Blah blah blah I can't act blah blah blah I might like girls blah blah blah STAB." - babybokal

"Rümba (he transformed from a vacuum cleaner)" - zihuatanejo

"Let's get ready to Ruuuummmmble!" - Michael Buffer and 7 of his closest quizling friends

"Was Rumble really his brother, or just a bootleg copy?" - falconpain

"If two Decepticons decide to mate, would that be considered auto-eroticism?" - n5iln

Correct Answer: Rumble



6. What gets you dancing?

"I don't feel like dancing. No sir. No dancing today." - many_from_one & others

(+1, Scissor Sisters. -AL)

"The bouncing breasts of female dancers." - lots42

"I'm ashamed to admit that I can still remember the dance moves to The Macarena, Saturday Night, and The Locomotion. Luckily, it takes a lot of beer before I unleash those skillz on the world." - lins_arosa

"The gravesite of a particularly despised enemy." - drunken_hedghog

"My thesis is due on Sunday, which will get the dance of glee when it's done, but right now is causing the dance of much fear." - flipthefrog

"My problem isn't starting to dance, it's getting all the parts of my body to do the SAME dance." - iamraffiki

"" - darthparadox and a few others

(Bugs in pants make me dance a truly titanic jig. -CV)

"I find that most MMOs use /dance or /e dance to get you dancing. " - cholma

"A long line to get in the ladies room. " - dorei

"Bacon. " - linguafranca

(Word up. – LL)

"70's music, no fooling. What can you do when your mom believes her contemporary music make for your best lullabies? " - ntlespino

"A cute pair of red rhumba panties. " - sskipstress

"Is it that time on Schprockets already? " - etcet

"Gay bars. They always have the best music! " - deza

"Hug a musician (that would be me), 'cause they never get to dance." - jmthane

"If you commit a crime in the Phillipines, you are sentenced to Moonwalking, grabbing your crotch, and potential caning" - kristinmachina



And there you have it. The theme was rum! Not dancing, that was just there to keep you all guessing. Unless you said rumba, which is like dancing and like rum. Sorta. That's not the point. The point is... well, I guess there's no real point here either. So let's all get down and daaaaaaaaance the night away.

Thanks to all who played, welcome aboard to all who are new, and let's keep rocking this new year and all its newfangled newness! Or, on a calmer note, happy February!

Alex Trebek: This is the only month that starts with Feb. *beep* Mr. Connery?
Sean Connery: Febtober!
Alex Trebek: No. *beep* Ms. Flockhart?
Callista Flockhart: Febterday?
Alex Trebek: No!
Sean Connery: Ha ha, she said "turd"!
Alex Trebek: The answer of course was February. This is the ONLY month that starts with Feb.

Rock On!

AL&CV&LL