{"id":2618,"date":"2022-03-24T15:40:24","date_gmt":"2022-03-24T15:40:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/?p=2618"},"modified":"2022-03-31T15:40:40","modified_gmt":"2022-03-31T15:40:40","slug":"idle-moments-april-may-2022","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/2022\/03\/24\/idle-moments-april-may-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"Idle Moments – April\/May 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hello again faithful followers (and those who stick pins into wax effigies of me every two months \u2013 or maybe the aches and pains are just because I\u2019m just getting old). Well, the Met Office says it\u2019s Spring; the weather is quite pleasant and there are lots of daffodils in bloom in Bushy Park. That\u2019s not a bad sign following the close-knit family of storms we had recently. Ah Spring! When an old man\u2019s fancy turns to thoughts of going to rugby matches without needing the long johns and body warmer under the winter coat!<\/p>\n

What sort of old codswallop is that!? Let\u2019s get on with some number puzzles. I\u2019ll admit that there are a couple I have used before (but word search tells me that it wasn\u2019t in the last 17 years):<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. 12 E on an O<\/li>\n
  2. 72 is TCTTS (AA)<\/li>\n
  3. 2 S on a \u201cB\u201dB<\/li>\n
  4. 6 is at TOC on a DB<\/li>\n
  5. 10 A in a SF<\/li>\n
  6. 4 H of the A<\/li>\n
  7. 1728 CI in a CF<\/li>\n
  8. 2 RL on the F of the H of C<\/li>\n
  9. 10,500 SB in L<\/li>\n
  10. 160 FO in a G<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Right, so that\u2019s got us limbered (or is that fed?) up. I now present for your delectation and delight (What is this guy on!?) 5BY4. Having done islands last time, I thought I would not waste the idea so this month I\u2019ve gone upmarket to the World\u2019s Biggest Islands. No, I have not included Australia; Wikipedia says it isn\u2019t one \u2013 it\u2019s one of the World\u2019s four land masses and besides, it would be just too obvious.<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Victoria Island (Canada)   A [822,700 square miles]<\/li>\n
    2. Great Britain B [303,381 square miles]<\/li>\n
    3. Ellesmere Island (Canada) C [288,869 square miles]<\/li>\n
    4. New Guinea D [226,658 square miles]<\/li>\n
    5. Madagascar E [195,928 square miles]<\/li>\n
    6. Borneo F [171,068 square miles]<\/li>\n
    7. Baffin Island (Canada) G [87,200 square miles]<\/li>\n
    8. Honshu H [83,897 square miles]<\/li>\n
    9. Sumatra I [80,823 square miles]<\/li>\n
    10. Greenland J [75,767 square miles]<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      It was nice to see Great Britain in the list, wasn\u2019t it? (No? Well, suit yourself!). I was trying to think of a subject to pull the General Trivia questions into some kind of a cohesive mass (Sounds a bit like three day old gravy) when I thought, rather than covering a two month slice of the year (as I sometimes do), I would follow the success (?) of the last edition with questions that all relate to a single date \u2013 1 April,<\/p>\n

      this time. So here we go.<\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Probably regarded by some as the classic April fool\u2019s trick, Value Added Tax (VAT) was introduced in Britain on 1 April in what year?<\/li>\n
      2. Regarded as the archetypal English actress, Dame Cicely Courtneidge was born on 1 April In what part of the Commonwealth?<\/li>\n
      3. Physician William Harvey was born on 1 April 1578 in What fundamental property of the human body (and other animals) was he the first to discover?<\/li>\n
      4. In what year did the Times <\/em>become the first newspaper to publish a daily weather chart?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
          \n
        1. Scott Joplin, the ragtime pianist and composer of Maple Leaf Rag among many others, died on 1 April but in what year?<\/li>\n
        2. In what year (on 1 April) was Tinos I, the United States\u2019 first meteorological satellite launched?<\/li>\n
        3. David Gower, captain of the England cricket team was born on 1 April 1957 in Tunbridge Wells. For what two English counties did he play (from 1975 to 1989 and 1990 to 1993 respectively)?<\/li>\n
        4. The administrative county of Greater London came into being on 1 April, in what year?<\/li>\n
        5. The Swedish word ombudsman first came into use in Britain when Sir Edmund Compton took office as the first Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration on 1 April, in what year<\/li>\n
        6. The use of the treadmill as a means of hard labour finally ended in British prisons on 1 April of what year?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

          The new year resolution to cut down on the parentheses didn\u2019t last long, did it! Have a good Easter.<\/p>\n

          Andy Pirson<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

          As usual, here are the solutions to the puzzles set in the February Idle Moments column.<\/p>\n

          NUMBER PUZZLES:<\/strong><\/p>\n

            \n
          1. 10 Florins in a Pound (Before Decimal Currency)<\/li>\n
          2. 6 Thousand Million Million Million Tonnes is the Approximate Mass of the Earth<\/li>\n
          3. 7 Magpies for a Secret Never To Be Told<\/li>\n
          4. 12 Toes on a Three-Toed Sloth<\/li>\n
          5. 5 Points for the Blue Ball in Snooker<\/li>\n
          6. 1 Leg of Dudley Moore\u2019s Tarzan<\/li>\n
          7. 7 Pedals on a Concert Harp<\/li>\n
          8. 1024 is Two to the Power of Ten<\/li>\n
          9. 3 Laws of Motion by Isaac Newton<\/li>\n
          10. 145 is a Gross and One<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

            5BY4: London Brewers (2)<\/strong><\/p>\n

              \n
            1. SlyBeast \u2013 Wandsworth<\/li>\n
            2. Ignition \u2013 Sydenham<\/li>\n
            3. Bianca Road \u2013 Bermondsey<\/li>\n
            4. Tankleys \u2013 Sidcup<\/li>\n
            5. Orbit \u2013 Walworth<\/li>\n
            6. Greywood \u2013 Wood Green<\/li>\n
            7. Deviant & Dandy \u2013 Hackney<\/li>\n
            8. Neckstamper \u2013 Leyton<\/li>\n
            9. Anspach & Hobday \u2013 Croydon<\/li>\n
            10. London Beer Lab \u2013 Loughborough Junction<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

              General knowledge:<\/strong><\/p>\n

                \n
              1. The British coal industry was nationalised on 1 January in<\/li>\n
              2. On 1 January 1909, the first old age pensions were paid in Britain to people over the age of 70<\/li>\n
              3. The two British coins which ceased to be legal tender on 1 January were the half crown (2\/6d) in 1970 and the half (new) penny in<\/li>\n
              4. The new daily newspaper, the Daily Universal Register<\/em>, which was founded on 1 January 1785, changed its name three years later to The Times<\/em>.<\/li>\n
              5. New British \u2018silver\u2019 coins ceased to contain any silver (and became fully cupro-nickel) on 1 January 1947.<\/li>\n
              6. Samuel Pepys started writing his famous diary on 1 January 1660. He discontinued it on 31 May 1669.<\/li>\n
              7. The British Board of Film Censors began operating on 1 January 1913.<\/li>\n
              8. It was Sudan which became an independent republic on 1 January 1956, after having been jointly administered by Great Britain and Egypt.<\/li>\n
              9. The country which became the tenth member of the EEC (now EU) on 1 January 1981 (following Britain, Ireland and Denmark) is Greece.<\/li>\n
              10. New Year\u2019s Day first become a national holiday throughout the whole of Great Britain on 1 January 1974.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                Hello again faithful followers (and those who stick pins into wax effigies of me every two months \u2013 or maybe the aches and pains are just because I\u2019m just getting… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1092,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-idle-moments"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2618"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2618\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2627,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2618\/revisions\/2627"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/londondrinker.camra.org.uk\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}