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Any Questions #507: "Olympic Ring Colors"

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Any Questions logo/WAMC
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WAMC's Ian Pickus and resident quizzer Mike Nothnagel try to medal in honor of the 2021 edition of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

Last week's challenge
Start with a word for a person common at summer camps. Rearrange the letters and you can spell proper names from mythology. What are the words?
Answer: COUNSELOR, CRONUS and LEO.

THIS WEEK'S CATEGORY: OLYMPIC RINGS COLORS
On-air questions
: Earlier this week, the 2020 Olympic Games finally began in Tokyo, Japan. Preliminary events started this past Wednesday and the opening ceremonies took place today at 8:00 pm local time in Tokyo (which was about 12 hours ago here in New York). Baseball and softball will make their return to the Games after not being included in 2012 and 2016, and five sports including karate and skateboarding will make their debut at the Games. In honor of the long-delayed 2020 Olympic Games, each correct answer this week will contain the color of one of the five Olympic rings: blue, black, red, yellow, or green. Each color will be used once, but which color it is each time is for you to determine.

1. What 2018 film is the first one in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to win an Academy Award, the first Marvel Studios film to be directed by an African-American director, and currently the ninth-highest-grossing film of all time?
2. What 1973 song did Elton John replace the first word in the title of with the word “farewell” when he named his most recent – and, according to him, last – concert tour, which began in September of 2018 and will now extend through early 2023?
3. Who was Garry Kasparov’s opponent in two six-game matches, one in February of 1996 and the other in May of 1997, an opponent who he beat in the first match 4-2 and lost to in the second one 3½-2½?
4. In Lewis Carroll’s novel Through The Looking-Glass, Alice says “Well, in our country, you'd generally get to somewhere else – if you run very fast for a long time, as we've been doing.” Which character replies, “A slow sort of country! Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”?
5. What is the two-word name shared by an unincorporated settlement in Jackson County, Iowa, a nature reserve off the coast of the Australian state of Tasmania, and the smallest town in the state of New York, located some eight miles north of Albany?

Extra credit
1. What 1962 instrumental by Booker T. and the M. G.’s is the only instrumental in Rolling Stone’s 2004 list of the 500 greatest songs of all time?
2. The only other recurring character in the Curious George books besides Curious George himself is a man who is most known by a nickname that includes what article of clothing?

This week's challenge
Start with the phrase THE OLYMPICS. Change one letter to an S and you can rearrange the result to spell a five-letter word that names small things seen in Las Vegas and a six-letter word that names large things seen in Las Vegas. What are the words?

ANSWERS
On-air questions

1. Black Panther
2. “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road”
3. Deep Blue
4. The Red Queen
5. Green Island

Extra credit
1. “Green Onions”
2. Yellow hat

 

A lifelong resident of the Capital Region, Ian joined WAMC in late 2008 and became news director in 2013. He began working on Morning Edition and has produced The Capitol Connection, Congressional Corner, and several other WAMC programs. Ian can also be heard as the host of the WAMC News Podcast and on The Roundtable and various newscasts. Ian holds a BA in English and journalism and an MA in English, both from the University at Albany, where he has taught journalism since 2013.
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