Find the Missing Link (General) Quiz

Answer: Moon

A full moon occurs when the moon and the sun are on opposite sides of the earth, and is the phase of the moon where the whole disc is illuminated. The moon of course, has no light source itself - we simply see the parts of the moon that are illuminated by the sun. We typically have 12 full moons a year. The saying 'once in a blue moon' (which means exceedingly rare), refers to the fact that every two and a half years, we have two full moons in a calendar month and the second full moon is called a blue moon.

Moonshine can be either mean moonlight - which is its original meaning - or illegally distilled liquor. Most often moonshine is associated with homemade, un-aged whisky. The word moonshine derives from the fact that, because it was illegal, the liquor would be made at night, usually by the light of the moon. While most people associate the word with the prohibition era in the US, the word actually originated in the UK and dates back to 1785, when smuggling was rife along the coastline of Britain.

Answer: Cold

A head cold is a common viral infection. Rhinoviruses are the most common cause of a head cold. The virus enters the body through the mouth, eyes or nose. It is estimated that adults will suffer from two to three colds per year on average, and children will get four to five.

A cold fish is someone who shows no emotion or is unfriendly. The phrase was coined by William Shakespeare in 1611. In Act 4, scene 4 of 'The Winter's Tale', he writes 'a cold fish for she would not exchange flesh with / one that loved her.'

Answer: Pen

A fountain pen is a writing implement that either contains a cartridge or a reservoir of water-based ink which flows through to the metal nib of the pen and onto the paper. Though possibly seen as old fashioned - the modern fountain pen having been invented in 1884 - fountain pens are still very much in demand, particularly in China where annual sales are in excess of US300 million. In 2015, China, South Korea, Brazil, the US and France were the top fountain pen buyers. There are many collectors for fountain pens, and one of these, an anonymous buyer, purchased what is thought to be the most expensive fountain pen in the world, at an auction in 2010. The pen he/she purchased was the Fulgor Nocturnus (which means 'night glow' in Latin). One of a kind, it features 18ct gold, is encrusted with 945 black diamonds and 123 rubies, and was made by the Italian company, Tibaldi. The anonymous person purchased it for a staggering AU8 million.

A penknife is simply a small knife which has a blade that folds into the handle. If you have ever wondered why they are called a penknife, it's apparently because when they were originally used to cut quill pens, back in the early 15th century. They were later used to sharpen pencils - before the advent of the humble pencil sharpener. Even though pen knives and pocketknives differ (the pivot points are the primary difference), these days the two are fairly interchangeable. If you want an extreme pocketknife, you can always get yourself The Giant Swiss Army Knife. This has an astonishing 87 tools with 141 functions. You'd need a seriously big pocket though since it weighs three pounds!

Answer: Boot

Ski boots are essentially footwear used in skiing. Skiing has been popular for centuries (the oldest ski artefacts were found in Russia and date back to 6000 BCE). For millennia heavy leather shoes were used with skis, however in 1964, the first plastic, molded ski boot was developed by Bob Lange, an American from Iowa. Lange ski boots have come to be a renowned and respected brand, which have been worn by at least 20 Olympic gold medallists.

Bootleg refers primarily to an item that is illegally made, copied or sold. It is usually used in regards to the act of making illegal liquor, however it can be applied to illegal audio or video recordings too. The term derives from when people smuggled alcohol in tall boots in the prohibition era - these boots being the perfect shape for hiding bottles.

Answer: Side

The seaside is a place by or around a sea, bay or promenade. It usually relates to a beach or a holiday resort and is more often than not used in a pleasurable sense, such as a vacation.

A sidearm most often refers to a personal weapon - usually a gun, dagger or knife which is carried on the body, often around the hip area so it can be readily accessed. Sidearms are generally either sheathed or in a holster (so the wearer doesn't stab themselves to death pulling on a sock).

Answer: Chain

Probably what most people think of when they hear 'daisy chain' is a string of daises chained together by their own stems - and this is completely correct. However, in recent times, daisy chain also means to link together a series of things. Unfortunately there is another meaning of daisy chain that is rather less appealing than a cute flower garland; instead, it is the term for a scam where unscrupulous investors artificially inflate the price of a security so that they can then sell it at a profit.

A chain reaction is essentially a chain of events, each caused by the previous one. A chain reaction is often used to pertain to nuclear physics, and basically refers to a self-sustaining nuclear fission reaction - that is, that one fission can cause another without any other intervention being required.

(Oh, and it's also a great song by Diana Ross which was released in 1985.
'You took a mystery and made me want it/
You got a pedestal and put me on it/
You made me love you out of feeling nothing/ Something that you do...').

Answer: Cream

Ice-cream probably doesn't need a definition other than it is yummy and comes in every flavour imaginable - from the classic strawberry, vanilla and chocolate flavours to the rather more adventurous wasabi, oyster, curry, jalapeño, squid ink, and smoked salmon flavours. The proper definition of ice-cream is a soft, sweet frozen food, typically made with milk, cream and sugar with flavours added. In 2021 the global ice-cream market was valued at USD113 billion per year. The biggest consumers of ice-cream are apparently the New Zealanders, Americans, Australians and Scandanavians.

Cream cheese, as the name suggests, is a cheese made from unskimmed milk and cream. Unfortunately - for those who love it like me - it does have a higher fat content than a lot of cheeses.
Cream cheese came about in 1872 when a dairy farmer in New York, William Lawrence, tried to replicate a cheese that was popular in Europe: Neufchâtel. He failed because he added too much cream, but then he realised his new product was spreadable and delicious... and cream cheese was born. Today cream cheese is enjoyed globally, being a very versatile ingredient. The worldwide cream cheese market value in 2021 was estimated at US$ 6,312.5 million.

Answer: Rock

A shamrock is a plant which is native to Ireland. Though it is a highly recognised emblem which is very symbolic of Ireland and Saint Patrick's Day, it is apparently not the official national emblem; instead this is the harp. The shamrock plant has leaves divided into three leaflets - examples of which are clover and wood sorrel. For every 10,000 clovers, 9,999 will be three-leaf, while one will be a four-leaf clover, which is why four-leaf clovers are considered so lucky. The name shamrock comes from the Irish Gaelic word 'seamróg', which means 'young clover'.

A rockslide is essentially an avalanche of rocks or other stony matter down an incline. Rockslides usually occur when there has been excessive rain or where excavation or erosion have occurred. Alternatively they can be triggered by earthquakes. One of the most deadly rockslides in history occurred in Alberta, Canada in 1903. The residents of a town called Frank were woken by an horrendous rumbling at 4.10am on April 29. Just a minute or so later more than 90 people were killed when approximately 100 million tonnes of rock fell down the mountainside. A mining town, it is thought that coal mining operations, a wet winter, and the general instability of the mountain led to the disaster.

Answer: Nest

An empty nest is a household where the children have left home and only the parents (or parent) remain, and is akin to how birds leave the nest when they reach maturity. The term 'empty nest' gave rise to 'empty nest syndrome', a condition which occurs when the parents experience grief or loneliness as a result of their children leaving the family home.

A nest egg is a sum of money saved for the future. The terminology, when referring to saving money, dates back to at least 1686. However, 'nest egg' in the 14th century was the practice of putting a real or fake egg into a hen's nest as an inducement for the hen to lay eggs.

Answer: Board

Cardboard is a material made from wood pulp or cellulose fiber. It can come in many thicknesses, but in general, is thicker than paper. The material cardboard was first made in France in 1751 and was used initially to reinforce playing cards, hence its name. However, the first known reference to the word cardboard wasn't until 1789. Interestingly, the Kellogg's brothers used cardboard for their early cereal boxes, but they put the cereal straight in the box and then wrapped a wax paper on the outside of the box and then printed the brand name on that. Now of course, it is the other way around.

A boardwalk generally refers to wooden planking which forms a walkway, usually across marshy or sandy ground. One of the earliest known boardwalks was built in 3807 BC in Somerset Levels, England. Called the Sweet Track, it was built by the Neolithic people and was made of crossed wooden poles which were driven into waterlogged soil so a walkway, consisting mainly of oak planks, could be laid. These days, boardwalks can be made of recycled plastic or even concrete.

Answer: Book

A pocketbook in the US refers to a wallet, purse or handbag. In Britain and Australia though, if you purchased a pocketbook, you'd be essentially buying a notebook. The first time the word pocketbook was used in the sense of 'a small book carried in the pocket' was around 1610. It started to be used to mean a 'women's purse' over two hundred years later, in 1816.

A bookmark is a device - usually a strip of material, cardboard, plastic, leather or ribbon - used between the pages of a book to mark a place. Sometimes bookmarks are attached to books, though these are generally made from thin ribbon. The earliest known bookmark is from the 6th century AD. Made of ornamented leather and lined with vellum on the back, it was attached with a leather strap to the cover of a Coptic (meaning the last stage of the Greek language) Codex (meaning ancient manuscript). Collecting bookmarks is a popular hobby for many people but especially for Frank Divendal, a man from the Netherlands, who has collected 120,000 of them since 1982.

Answer: Stick

A joystick (sometimes called a flight stick) was originally a pilot's slang term for the device used on an airplane to control the direction and height of a plane. The term was coined in 1910. Until the advent of gaming, not many people had ever had the opportunity to touch a joystick. These days though, a joystick can be found in millions of homes around the world, gamers using them as a device to control the movement of a pointer or cursor.

A stick insect is a usually wingless, phasmid insect with a long cylindrical body that resembles - no surprises here - a stick. Stick insects are not harmful to human beings and for this reason, they make a good pet, but they do contain a venom which they can spray at a predator. They like tropical and semi-tropical environments. Vegetarian and nocturnal, they tend to have a lifespan of about a year.

Answer: Lock

The word gridlock, meaning severe traffic congestion where there can be no flow, is surprisingly new, the term having apparently been coined during a strike by New York city transport workers in April 1980. It came about when two New York Traffic Department transport engineers said that they believed the 'grid' system (used in New York) would 'lock-up' and all traffic would grind to a complete halt. This, in fact, is exactly what happened; the traffic congestion being so bad that there were continuous queues of traffic at every intersecting street, meaning there could be no traffic flow at all. The engineers soon started juxtaposing the words 'grid' and 'lock' to gridlock and this thereafter became a common term. Just as an aside, apparently if there is 'flow', this is simply a traffic jam.

A lockdown, as most people know, is a state of isolation or restricted access, usually instituted as a security measure. Before Covid, the term lockdown was most often used in prisons. It meant prisoners would be confined to their cells because the prison was experiencing a riot or similar emergency. As an interesting aside, the word 'lockdown' was chosen by The Collins dictionary as Word of the Year in 2020. I'm not sure about anyone else, but if I never heard the word again for the rest of my life, it would still be too soon!

Answer: Dog

An underdog is a person who, in a competitive situation such as a sporting event, is usually at a disadvantage and therefore largely expected to lose. (Conversely, if a person is expected to win, they are called the top dog or, less frequently, an overdog.) The word underdog originated in around 1887 where it was seen in British newspapers and referred to a dog defeated in a dogfight.

A dog sled (sometimes called a dog sleigh) is a vehicle with runners that is dragged across ice or snow by either a dog or a team of dogs. The oldest archaeological evidence of dog sledding goes back to around 1,000 A.D, although it is quite possible it began even before that. It is believed this mode of transport was invented in the northern parts of modern day Canada by the natives of that area. 'Sled' by the way, has its roots in the Middle German 'sledde' which in Middle English is 'slide'. The dogs used for dog sledding are generally ones with very thick coats such as the deliciously cuddly-looking Samoyed, Alaskan Malamute and Siberian Husky breeds. Sled dogs can travel around 90 miles (145 kilometres) in a 24 hour period.

Answer: Bottle

One meaning of a bluebottle is that it is a common blowfly with an iridescent metallic-blue body. The female is the one who breezes into your house; and she's doing this because she wants to find a suitable food source on which to lay her eggs. Yuck. Bluebottles are noisy little critters (in fact they are the noisiest fly) and this has to do with how fast they beat their wings. Calliphora vicina (or bluebottles), beat their wings at a staggering 150 beats per second. This creates air vibrations of 150 hertz, roughly equal to a 'D' in music. Another type of bluebottle is a polyp which is commonly referred to as a jellyfish, even though it is actually a siphonophore. These are found in the Indian and Pacific oceans, and give a very nasty sting if your are unlucky enough to tread on one. (They even sting you if they are dead!) Contrary to popular belief, vinegar should not be used on bluebottle stings as this will make the sting worse. Instead the sting should be immersed in hot water.

A bottleneck originally meant - as the word implies - the neck of a bottle, and it is does still mean this. However, because the neck of a bottle effectively limits outflow, the term bottleneck gradually started to refer to someone or something that hinders or stops free movement. In 1922 it entered our vocabulary as 'a narrow section of road or a junction that impedes traffic flow'. It can also mean a style of guitar playing whereby glissando effects (a continuous slide between two notes) are created by sliding an object - such as the neck of a bottle - along the strings.