Sludge Around Quizzyland

15 Points Per Correct Answer - No time limit  

1. Animals: In 1989, the oil tanker Exxon Valdez wrecked itself on Bligh Reef near Prince William Sound, Alaska. This released eleven million gallons of crude oil into the sea. Which of these animals was not affected by the sludge from this accident? Bald eagles Sea otters Walking catfish Pink salmon

2. Brain Teasers: What is this "fractured" word? Spelling counts! Kay Mick Al Waist Answer: (Two Words - eight and five letters)

3. Celebrities: This 2002 movie was intended to be Britney Spears’ breakout role, but unfortunately it failed to meet with widespread critical success. (If you’re wondering what that has to do with sludge, you may not have seen the movie.) Glitter Gigli Crossroads From Justin to Kelly

4. Entertainment: Though radioactive sludge seemed to be a miraculous substance in Marvel comics of the 1960s, granting super powers left and right, more common industrial sludge played a key role in the origin of this Golden Age badman, one of the enduring villains in all of popular literature. Who is this Darknight Detective nemesis that made his first appearance in 1940 with the advent of the comic simply titled "Batman"? The Joker The Penguin Two-Face Ric Flair

5. For Children: When it comes to toys, some ideas are just classic, even if they do need a little revamping every once in a while. Take Space Sludge, marketed by Binney and Smith, the same folks who do Crayola Crayons. Though relatively new, this product is actually a newly-colorized version of a toy first marketed in 1950. What is this bouncing, elastic, non-Newtonian fluid that has been keeping the plastic egg folks in business for over half a century? Answer: (2 words, five letters each; try to keep it out of the carpet, kids!)

6. General: The category where anything goes. More specifically, though, the home for ghosts, the unexplained, and the like. As those who follow such things know, ghosts occasionally leave behind their own spectral sludge, a mystical mélange that ranges from wispy (as in spirit photographs) to slimy (as in the movie "Ghostbusters"). What is the technical name for this byproduct from beyond? Gak Ectoplasm Diazolidnyl Peristalsis

7. Geography: It is October of 2000, and you are looking down at the Tug Fork River clogged with 306 million gallons of coal sludge that has broken from an impoundment into an underground mine, poisoned the water for 27,000 residents and killed all the aquatic life in the system. You are so stunned that you feel like having a stiff drink, but the area you’re in is "dry", so that’s out of the question. In what coal-mining region are you? Hazzard County, Georgia Martin County, Kentucky Dawson County, Nebraska Cook County, Illinois

8. History: One of the most infamous chapters in the history of sludge came to a head in Niagara Falls, New York. Into the 1950s, Hooker Chemical had used an abandoned attempt at a trans-falls canal as a toxic waste disposal site, packing the landfill with impermeable clay. The site was eventually used for an elementary school and housing development, albeit without the removal of the wastes, which seeped from the landfill following the clay seal’s rupture by the construction. What was the name of this now-infamous area so damaged by harmful sludge? Hell's Ditch Love Canal Erie Canal Hyde Park

9. Hobbies: The venerable "Pokémon" trading card game features a card/character (whatever you want to call it) that is the "living manifestation of sludge and waste". Though a trifle disgusting conceptually, this card is particularly useful in that it nullifies all other Pokémon powers previously in play. What is the English name of this intriguing character? Muk Piloswine Sneasel Lugia

10. Humanities: Folklorist Alan Dundes has done a fascinating, if somewhat repulsive, study of sludge in creation myths around the world. His central motif is the "earth diver", a primordial creature that dives into an endless sea, scoops up some matter from the depths, and uses it to build the Earth. Dundes postulates that this myth comes from men’s frustrated aspirations to create life; lacking a birth canal, Dundes hypothetical man uses another body part for issuing forth dirt-link material with which to form the world. Well, anyway, what major theorist does Dundes rely upon in making this analysis of man creating the world from sludge? Karl Marx Sigmund Freud Walter Benjamin Clifford Geertz

11. Literature: One of the canonical works of French prose presents a denouement intimately pervaded with sludge of a terribly unpleasant sort. This classic spirals toward its conclusion as its protagonist, Jean Valjean, carries his ward’s fiancée, Marius, to safety through a mile of French sewers, with all that entails. What work uses sludge in this visceral, archetypal manner? Les Miserables Candide Le Père Goriot The Little Prince

12. Movies: As in literature, one of the chronically favorite films of the 1990s makes good use of sludge in its climactic scenes, which feature the wrongly-jailed protagonist crawling to freedom face-first through "five football fields" of exceedingly foul wastewater. What Stephen King-based film is this? The Shawshank Redemption Stand By Me Misery The Green Mile

13. Music: As would surprise no one who has followed the "hardcore" music scene of the last fifteen years, sludge has given its name to a subgenre of rock music. "Sludge metal" is characterized by a high level of guitar and bass feedback (producing a "sludgy" sound) and contrasting tempos within pieces, as well as brooding, nihilistic lyrical themes. Which of these bands would NOT typically be considered a sludge metal ensemble? Air Supply Eyehategod 3D House of Beef Gojira

14. People: "Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs And towards our distant rest began to trudge." What starkly realistic poet of World War I penned these lines? Ernest Hemingway Rudyard Kipling Erich Remarque Wilfred Owen

15. Religion: While modern society deals with the sludge of human existence through its sewer system, the Israelites were commanded to do quite otherwise: "Thou shalt have a place also without the camp, whither thou shalt go forth abroad: And thou shalt have a paddle upon thy weapon; and it shall be, when thou wilt ease thyself abroad, thou shalt dig therewith, and shalt turn back and cover that which cometh from thee."(KJV) Where in the Bible can one find this fine admonition on dealing with sludge? Genesis 38:15-16 Proverbs 25:24 Leviticus 15:16-18 Deuteronomy 23:12-13

16. Sci / Tech: As someone much more knowledgeable than me once said, "Active sludge is really quite interesting from a microbiological standpoint." Having now looked into how wastewater treatment facilities use microbes to reduce the organic content in sewage, I must say that I quite agree. Which of the following is a micro-organism typically used in this manner? Penicillium notatum Arcella vulgaris Treponema pallidum Sola scriptura

17. Sports: Sludge of various types played a large part in the 1904 Olympic Games in St. Louis, Missouri. This affair, which spread out over four months in the midst of the World’s fair, would go down as perhaps the most ignominious games of all, with the host country winning about 85% of the medals. Which of these sludge-filled affairs made its initial appearance at this Olympiad? Mud Fighting The 100m Mud Crawl The Mucus Toss The Sewer Relay

18. Television: One of the classic television characters of the 1950s made his living in the sludge trade, a profession which, to his way of thinking, granted great cultural cachet. As he put it, when teaching his pal Ralph Kramden the gentlemanly game of golf: "Golf’s a game with eighteen holes. I've been working in the sewer for ten years. If that don't qualify me as an expert on holes, I give up." Who was this loopy persona created by Art Carney? Maynard G. Krebs Ed Norton Ed McMahon Arthur Fonzarelli

19. Video Games: There is a charming little video game on ezone.com where the players find themselves playing as drops of slime (no great stretch for certain ex-wives, but I digress). These vicarious viscous video visions stretch across the screen, either grabbing new targets or slingshotting through space to find their mark. Speaking as a non-gamer for the most part, it is great fun. What name is given this fine diversion? Sling Blobbo Sludgeshot Othello

20. World: When running your car, oil sludge is the enemy. When motor oil breaks down, it forms a gel that doesn’t lubricate your engine, and retains heat instead of dispersing it. Sludgy oil affects essentially every moving part in your engine, and will cause odd, unexpected failures in parts like gaskets, timing belts, and many otherwise reliable components. Which of these will NOT minimize sludge formation in your engine? Use of premium oil filters Avoid synthetic motor oils Changing the oil every 3,000 miles Change your antifreeze every 2 years or 20,000 miles