Chelsea Mind Games

Team Trivia Winners, December 16, 2009

2009-12-17T20:55:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to team Vandelay Industries!

Here are some of the questions answered by our intrepid trivia fans this past Wednesday:

From the Acronyms round: What does FUBU (the name of a clothing line) stand for?

From the Classic Drinks round: What, aside from Scotch, is the other alcohol ingredient in a Rusty Nail?

From the Insects round: In what phylum is the cockroach?

From the Sushi Terminology round: If you order Surimi, what will you be receiving?

From the Founding Fathers round: Which Founding Father said, "A Spoonful of Honey will catch more Flies than a Gallon of Vinegar"?

For the bonus question, teams were asked to list all of the Dr. Seuss books that have rhyming words in their titles (Yertle the Turtle, Hop on Pop, Fox in Socks, etc.)

Frank Chang initiated this. Whee!

Go here for the complete photo set.

Check back in 2010 for new Mind Games dates!

(Answers: For Us, By Us; Drambuie; Arthropod; imitation crabmeat; Benjamin Franklin).

December 9th Vocabulary Tournament Winner

2009-12-10T11:43:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to Carolyn D'Aquila for winning our last Vocabulary Tournament of 2009! Props also to runners-up Kirsten, Jonathan, and David.

Go here for more photos.

Last Two Games of 2009!

2009-12-06T13:50:00.001-08:00

There are only two more Chelsea Mind Games on the calendar for 2009 (or, at all, actually) -- after this, you'll have to find your own forum for intellectually dominating others and/or hitting on smart people.

December 2nd Math Bee Winner

2009-12-06T13:45:00.000-08:00

Congrats to Rich Zwelling on his December 2nd Math Bee win!

From left: Runner-up Scott, winner Rich Zwelling, host Jen, 3rd place Tristan, and host Andrew.

Go here for additional photos.

November 25th Geography Winners

2009-11-28T18:08:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to Pat McCarthy for dominating the Geography Bee! Contestants drew states and countries on the whiteboard, answered multiple-choice questions, and played a game called "That's a Dirty Lie," in which I tried to fake people out with statements such as "Uganda has a port at Kampala" and "Afghanistan had its first female head of state under Soviet rule." Our five finalists answered a series of rhyming questions (courtesy of co-host Eric Walton) about foreign currencies.

From left: 2nd place Jordan, host Jen, winner Pat McCarthy, host Eric, and 3rd place Trent.

Go here to see the rest of this week's photos.

November 18th Winners

2009-11-24T13:15:00.001-08:00

Chelsea Mind Games is back for a limited, five-show run! We kicked off on November 18th, with Team Trivia. Congratulations to our winners, Team Kitten Mittens!

Here are a few sample questions from Team Trivia:

What famous novel begins with the line "It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York."
From 1897-1908, how many stars were on the U.S. flag?
The city of North Pole, Alaska, features what legendary person on its flag?
What is the plural of “attorney-at-law”? (Spelling counts!)

(Answers: Sylvia Plath's "The Bell Jar," 46, Santa Claus, attorneys-at-law)

Were you at Team Trivia? I'll bet your photo is here!

Williamsburg Spelling Bee on NPR

2009-08-19T08:40:00.001-07:00

Adults Put the 'Bee' in Orthography (streaming audio, 3:57) - from today's Morning Edition on NPR.

Spelling bees are not just for kids, as more and more spelling bees for adults sprout up across the country. A bar in Brooklyn, New York, has been hosting one for about five years. That bee attracts people just looking for fun and those who really know their stuff.

Thanks to reporter Ben Calhoun! Shout-out to Carolyn D'Aquila, winner of the bee attended by Mr. Calhoun.

We may no longer have Mind Games, but stop by the Williamsburg Spelling Bee anytime! (If, by "anytime," one means every other Monday).

Thesaurus T-Shirt

2009-08-04T09:36:00.001-07:00

I thought you should know about this t-shirt!

July 15 Grand Finale

2009-07-17T12:59:00.000-07:00

33 contestants and many spectators came out to the Chelsea Market for the final installment of our long-running intellectual game show. Players completed challenges in geography, math, vocabulary, and trivia.

Winner: Carolyn D'Aquila

Runner-Up: Johnny Lu

Finalists (in no particular order):
Rich Zwelling
Tristan Higgs
Keith Burdette
Chris Wyant
Isaac Greenbaum

Winner Carolyn with hosts Soce and Jen

Soce with Johnny Lu's perfect-scoring answer to the challenge "Draw Panama, label its capital, and draw and label its border nations."

I should also like to point out that Carolyn D'Aquila has managed to win the Grand Prize at both the Williamsburg Spelling Bee and the New York City Spelling Bee. I had no idea she could also do math, which she did, both in completing her individual challenge and in nailing the following bonus question to put her over the top:

If a=1, b=2, etc., add the values of the letters in the name of the capital of Belgium. Divide by the cube root of 125. Add the number of Angelina Jolie's children who are not adopted. If the seasons were numbered 1-4 with fall as 1, winter as 2, etc., divide by the number of the season the word "hiemal" refers to, add the number for the season the word "vernal" refers to, and multiply your answer by the fourth digit of pi. (Post your answers in the comments? Carolyn knows!)

What fun looks like!

A new Mind Games someplace else? I shall keep you updated!

Click here for more photos.

xo,
Jen

The End of Mind Games; Long Live Mind Games

2009-07-17T12:57:00.000-07:00

Chelsea Mind Games, sadly, has been canceled by Chelsea Market.

We lasted a year and a half! We gave out lots of silly prizes, and a smaller number of the more-coveted envelopes-of- cash-that-also-prove-you're-a-genius (the best kind of currency). And, of course, hundreds upon hundreds of smart people from all over the city — from ages 7 to at least 70 — came and competed, and, I think, enjoyed second dates free from the bar scene, and met people who wanted to discuss probability and combinatorics, and shouted out “Ouagadougou!” when asked for the capital of Burkina Faso.

I will keep you updated on what's next.

July 8 Geography Bee

2009-07-13T08:29:00.000-07:00

Winner: Trent Williams

Winner Trent (2nd from right) with runners-up Noam and Sarah and hosts Jen and Abbi

Is it a principality? A sultanate? A federal democratic republic?

Click here for more photos.

July 1 Vocabulary Tournament

2009-07-02T08:25:00.001-07:00

Winner: Tristan Higgs

Winner Tristan (tall, kneeling) with runners-up Chris and Brooke

Click here for more photos.

June 24 Team Trivia

2009-07-01T08:31:00.000-07:00

Winners: Yellow Fever

Team Yellow Fever with hosts Michael and Jen

Click here for more photos.

June 24 Trivia: Sample Questions

2009-07-01T08:21:00.000-07:00

Pirates

Name the pirate who captained the Queen Anne’s Revenge and was said to fight with lit cannon fuses in his hair to intimidate opponents.

Name the pirate knighted by Queen Elizabeth who later went on to serve as second-in-command in the defeat of the Spanish Armada.

Name the two US Presidents to have fought declared wars against the Barbary Pirates.

In pirate lingo, what is a hogshead?

In pirate lingo, what is “Davy Jones’s locker”?

Jeans

The word “jeans” comes from the French word for the town of the Italian sailors who were known for wearing them. What town?

What denim dye was imported from India to Europe as early as the Greco-Roman era?

What innovation did Levi Strauss and his partner Jacob Davis add to jeans and receive a patent for?

From what language does the word “dungarees” come into English?

Why did the US Navy introduce bell-bottom trousers in 1817?

Advertising Catchphrases

What “Tastes Good Like a Cigarette Should”?

What is a relief when it goes “plop, plop, fizz, fizz”?

“We’re number two; we try harder”

"With a name like ________, it has to be good."

And a historical favorite: what company's slogan was once “Born in fire, blown by mouth”?

Answers: Blackbeard, Francis Drake, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, a keg, the bottom of the sea (death by drowning, etc.); Genoa, indigo, copper rivets, Hindi, to roll them up while washing decks or to take them off quickly if thrown overboard; Winston, Alka-Seltzer, Avis, Smuckers, Waterford Glass.

June 17 Math Bee

2009-07-01T08:14:00.000-07:00

Winner: Rich Zwelling

Click here for more photos.

June 10 Geography Bee

2009-07-01T08:07:00.000-07:00

Winner: Trent Williams

Trent with hosts Abbi and Jen and runner-up Kate.

Click here for more photos.

June 3 Warmup Quiz Hilarity

2009-07-01T07:59:00.001-07:00

On the June 3 Warmup Quiz, I challenged players to draw a firkin, a bodkin, a yurt, a thurible, a byre, and a narwhal. (Roughly speaking, these are a keg, a knife, a hut, an incense burner, a cowshed, and a whale with a horn).

I got a lot of narwhals, and a good number of yurts.

Some people decided to draw something, anything -- just in case it turned out that a thurible was, for instance, a clown on a bicycle. Here are some of my favorite entries:

June 3 Vocabulary Bee

2009-07-01T07:51:00.000-07:00

Winner: Ted Phillips

Winner Ted Phillips with runners-up Marcia and Travis

Click here for more photos.

A Little Behind In Our Updates

2009-06-09T11:21:00.001-07:00

Wow, how did I fall so far behind in these updates? Perhaps I can argue that Mind Games has been going fantastically, thus resulting in a wealth of content, thus resulting in the deceleration of my blogging.

More soon!

May 27 Team Trivia

2009-06-01T09:22:00.000-07:00

Winners: Caublasians

Click here for more photos.

May 20 Math Bee

2009-05-26T09:02:00.000-07:00

Winner: Scott Matthews

Winner Scott (center) with hosts Andrew and Jen and runners-up Idan and Andy

Click here for more photos.

Next week (May 27) is Team Trivia!

May 20 Warmup Quiz Answers

2009-05-25T23:14:00.000-07:00

Nobel and Pulitzer Winners

Who won 2008’s Nobel Peace Prize? MARTTI AHTISAARI (no one knew this!)

What New York Times writer won 2008’s Nobel Prize in Economics? PAUL KRUGMAN (some people knew this)

The 2008 Nobel Prizes in “Physiology or Medicine” went to the discoverers of what two viruses? HIV & HPV

Who won the 2009 Pulitzer in music? STEVE REICH

In fiction? ELIZABETH STROUT

In poetry? W.S. MERWIN

Please list all the UK Prime Minsters serving after Churchill:

(The list of all UK Prime Ministers may be found here. One note: Churchill served three terms, with one Clement Attlee between the second and third terms; Attlee counts. Also, incidentally, as one point was awarded per prime minister listed, the winner of the quiz was pretty much the person who knew the most prime ministers -- good work, Norm!)

May 13 Warmup Quiz Answers

2009-05-25T22:56:00.000-07:00

(JACK CONNER, TOM MORGAN, AL SMITH, BILL WELLS)

(ACQUIT, BAZAAR, CRUNCH, FRILLY, GAZEBO, HYPHEN, JARGON, KNIGHT, LAGOON, MELODY, ORPHAN, PSYCHE, ROTUND, SOUGHT, UNKIND, WREATH. Unfortunately, many people came up with the lovely word "fright," which works, but then leaves the contestant with "soully," which is a sad attempt at an adverb. The correct match, as above, is "frilly" and "sought.")

Famous People Anagrams - Unscramble to Spell the Name of a Person Matching the Clue (1 point each):

LOUD MAD SAGAS (an author at the end of the universe):

MERRY WARDROBE (she’s just not that into you):

DEMON JABS (a suave fictional character):

ONLY I CAN THRILL (never made it out of the primaries):

GERMANY (really liked to eat pie in the ‘80s):

PURITANS (pulled strings in Russia while the czar was away):

(DOUGLAS ADAMS, DREW BARRYMORE, JAMES BOND, HILLARY CLINTON, MEG RYAN, RASPUTIN)

May 13 Geography Bee Results

2009-05-15T14:43:00.000-07:00

Winner: Frank Chang

Winner Frank Chang (center) with runners-up Johnny and Bev and hosts Abbi and Jen

Frank Chang won in a knockout geography battle including a new round called "Country (and Territory) Truths and Lies." Contestants were each given five statements about a country and asked to separate the truths from the lies. Example (answers below):

The Philippines is named after King Philip II of Spain
The Philippines declared independence from the U.S. after WWI
The Philippines consists of 18 islands
The Philippines currently has a female commander in chief of the armed forces
The Philippines exports more oil than coconuts, measured monetarily

Click here for more photos.

Answers: TRUTH, LIE (after WWII), LIE (it's over 7,000!), TRUTH, LIE

Answers to May 6 Warmup Quiz

2009-05-13T15:46:00.000-07:00

Name the 2 largest nations by land mass: RUSSIA and CANADA

Name the 2 smallest nations by land mass: VATICAN CITY AND MONACO

List the top 10 websites in the U.S. in any order (our source is today's Alexa rankings). Hint: includes 3 search engines, one video site, 2 social networking websites, and one online encyclopedia.

(Note: the list is also here, although it may have changed since the date of the quiz).

Google
Yahoo!
Facebook
YouTube
Myspace
Microsoft Network (MSN)
Windows Live
Wikipedia
Craigslist.org
eBay

May 6 Vocabulary Tournament Results

2009-05-12T15:56:00.000-07:00

Winner: M.G. Duke

Winner M.G. Duke with host Jen and runner-up Johnny Lu

A full complement of 20 competitors vied for the vocabulary championship this month. In round one, as always, contestants were given three difficult words and asked to make up a sentence including all three. In round two, we played "Synonym Antonym True False" -- for example, trying answering Synonym Antonym True, or False to each of the following questions, as fast as possible (answers below):

realistically contains two a’s
a jodhpur is a weapon
erroneous infallible
the plural of synopsis is synopsis
perfidious staunch
an emollient is a salve
a quindecasyllabic word has 14 syllables

Finally, in round three, we tried a crossword-style challenge, one example of which came out looking like this:

M.G. Duke was far and away the winner, but many grandiloquent individuals had copious fun perambulating the Market, cerebrally jousting, and engaging in affable badinage.

Click here for more photos.

Answers: TRUE, FALSE (they're pants), ANTONYMS, FALSE, ANTONYMS, TRUE, FALSE (it has 15)

April 29 Warmup Quiz Answers

2009-05-06T16:01:00.002-07:00

5 points: Take the first letter of the Spanish word for “today” (also the name of a popular Spanish language newspaper). Follow it by the first name of the current president of Liberia. Follow it by the initials of the term used to describe the boundary that separated the Warsaw Pact countries from the NATO countries from about 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. These letters together will form an adjective describing the study or spread of a particular ancient culture after that culture’s decline. Answer: HELLENIC

Name the first 5 U.S. states by population:
CALIFORNIA
TEXAS
NEW YORK
FLORIDA
ILLINOIS

Name the last 5 U.S. states by population:
South Dakota
Alaska
North Dakota
Vermont
Wyoming

April 29 Team Trivia

2009-05-05T21:44:00.000-07:00

Winners: O'Trivia Newton John and The Date Rappers

Here are some sample categories and questions from last week's trivia game:

American Cities and States

The “Old North State” is actually in the South. What is it?
If you are visiting a downtown area called The Loop, what metropolis are you in?
What southern state was known as Land of the 4 C’s, after the Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, and Choctaw tribes?

Recession Round

What is the name of the insurance-like contracts that promise to cover losses on certain securities in the event of a default and in which the buyer makes periodic payments to the seller, in return receiving a payoff if an underlying financial instrument defaults?
Name the economist whose views, espoused in General Theory of Employment Interest and Money, encouraged deficit spending as a cure for the Depression of the 1930s.
Name the 1977 Broadway musical containing the song "We'd like to Thank You, Herbert Hoover"

Mathematical Formulas

In Eintein’s e=mc², what does c stand for?
What does the m stand for?
The equation a² + b² = c² was named after what Greek mathematician and mystic?

Those questions aren't so hard, but here's where things get confusing.

The Date Rappers were awarded first place, and we took their picture and we think they're swell. But then, after many people had left, O'Trivia Newton John (best team name EVER!) approached us, suspicious that they hadn't even been named in the top 5 teams when we announced Honorable Mentions. Turns out the team grading their answer sheet CAN'T ADD. We added. O'Trivia Newton John won by half a point. O'Trivia Newton John was offered a cash prize, but these guys didn't even want it -- they just wanted the recognition. Classy! The Date Rappers and O'Trivia Newton John are both seriously smart. Check 'em out here:

O'Trivia Newton John

The Date Rappers

My co-host Michael and I will check everyone's math more rigorously in the future.

Click here for more photos.

(Answers: North Carolina; Chicago; Alabama; credit default swap; Keynes; Annie; the speed of light; mass; Pythagoras).

April 22 Warmup Quiz Answers

2009-04-25T09:56:00.000-07:00

Identify the Organs of the Digestive System (1 point each):

esophagus
liver
gallbladder
colon
appendix
small intestine
stomach
pancreas
colon

April 22 Math Bee

2009-04-25T09:42:00.000-07:00

Winner: Scott Matthews

Winner Scott Matthews (2nd from right) with hosts Andrew and Jen and runners-up Viveca and Alex

This month's math bee began, as usual, with "Fifteen Seconds in Math Heaven." For instance, imagine I start the clock and then ask you:

12 times 11! (132)
Fifteen quarters and five dimes! ($4.25)
80 minutes after 9:32! (10:52)

Etc.... Contestants picked up anywhere from zero to four points in this endeavor.

In round two, contestants answered longer, more involved questions, and could use the whiteboard. Here is one question from this past week (written by Andrew Singer):

You're on a distant planet when you run into a hot babe. When you first see her, she has 12 arms, 18 legs and 5 heads. Each leg weighs 30 pounds, each arm is 20 pounds, and each head is 40 pounds. All of a sudden, she morphs so that she has 8 heads and 12 legs. Assuming her weight remains the same, how many arms does she end up with?

Jen commented that this problem illustrated "the law of conservation of hot babe." (The answer is 15).

In the third and final round, in which all questions are posed to all contestants and speed is of the essence, Scott pulled ahead by calculating with lightning speed.

See you next week for Team Trivia!

April 15 Warmup Quiz Answers

2009-04-19T17:42:00.000-07:00

Name all 4 of the Monkees (first names only):

Micky

Davy

Michael

Peter

All 3 of the Jonas Brothers (first names only):

Nick

Joe

Kevin

All 3 authors of The Federalist Papers:

Alexander Hamilton

James Madison

John Jay

All 5 permanent members of the UN Security Council:

China

France

Russia

9 Reflexive Pronouns:

myself

himself

herself

yourself

itself

oneself

ourselves

yourselves

themselves

thyself

(That's 10 -- any 9 would do. "Theirselves" is a regionalism on par with "y'all" and is listed in dictionaries only as "Vulgar English." Incidentally, the "Vulgar English" lexicon also includes "hisself," at which point you really ought to just start playing the washboard as an instrument.)

A final challenge asked participants to guess the blacked-out words on these covers:

Hilarity ensued. Here are the complete covers:

In other words: muscle, fat, sex, abs, pains, rich, health, fantasy, confidence, boxers, sex, gay, and rape. Many people suggested that perhaps the boyfriend had not changed his sheets; one person suggested that there might be a new kind of date "rap" we should know about.

April 15 Geography Bee

2009-04-19T17:21:00.000-07:00

Winner: Halina Pavels

Winner Halina (second from right) with hosts Abbi and Jen and runners-up Altin and Raeli.

Given the word list Republic, Kingdom, Sultanate, Principality, State, States, Federation, Confederation, Islamic, Arab, Hashemite, Oriental, Bolivarian, Democratic, Federal, Socialist, People’s, United, and of, could you tell us what kind of country Mauritania is? (It's an Islamic Republic). Spain? (A Kingdom). Somalia? (A Democratic Republic). This and other challenges faced contestants at last Wednesday's geography bee. (In case anyone's wondering, word order doesn't count, since many country names are, of course, translated from other languages).

Rather wonderfully, Libya's full name is "Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriyya," although, for that, reason, Libya was not a question at Wednesday's bee.

Click here for more photos.

April 8 Warmup Quiz Answers

2009-04-11T08:01:00.000-07:00

Each week at 6:30 we put out a warmup quiz. The quizzes are due at 7:30, and the rule is "anything goes" -- logic puzzles, history, math, geography, pop culture, etc.

The idea is that no one person could possibly get the whole thing right -- a winning score is often something like 22/40 points (so don't feel intimidated!)

Last week's warmup was won by Rich Zwelling.

Warmup winners win a small handful of free beer tickets, which we hope will keep them from totally dominating the game to follow ;)

April 8 Vocabulary Tournament

2009-04-10T07:05:00.001-07:00

Winner: Jenny Brown

Winner Jenny Brown with host Jen and 2nd runner-up Paul (runner-up M. G. Duke not pictured).

In round one, in which contestants are given three words that they must use correctly in a single sentence, our two child competitors, Ryo and Ayumu, gave us, "My mother is a murderous warlock who is sometimes intellectual" and "My brother is a rhythmic nuisance, and that's really tardy." And from one of our adult contestants: "I went to visit my grandmother, who was looking really oblique because her bones were ameliorating, as she was suffering from a bad case of antithesis."

In round two, contestants were given a list of three words (one of them made up) and two definitions, and asked to match the words with the definitions. For example:

THE WORDS:

ceruminous
apious
susurrant

One of these words means "WHISPERING." One means "EARWAXY." Which is which? (Answer at bottom).

In the third round, we tried a new challenge called SYNONYM ANTONYM TRUE FALSE: contestants were given thirty seconds to answer as many questions as possible with only the answers synonym, antonym, true,or false. Most contestants were able to answer between 3 and 7 of these within 30 seconds. Here is a sample (imagine you and me speeding through these as fast as possible -- answers are below):

lachrymose ebullient

bastinado is a form of torture

reticent taciturn

pastime has two t’s in it

the plural of neurosis is neuroses

gammon is a meat

withdrawal contains two a’s

ingenuous candid

deciduous trees do not shed their leaves

Jenny Brown led the pack, with 8 correct in the final round and 18 points overall!

Click here for more photos.

Come on out next Wednesday, April 15, for Geography!

(Answers: Ceruminous is earwaxy; apious is made up; susurrant is whispering. ANT, TRUE, SYN, FALSE, TRUE, TRUE, TRUE, SYN, FALSE. Obviously, the spelling-related ones are pretty obvious when you're reading them, but much more challenging when read aloud).

Welcome to the Chelsea Mind Games Blog

2009-04-09T10:12:00.000-07:00

I've been posting "Winners and Photos" on a page of that title on the Chelsea Mind Games site for awhile, until that page started looking a lot like a blog, and I figured this would be easier. Want to see previous games' results?

Click here for the Winners and Photos from April 23, 2008 (the first-ever Mind Games) through April 1, 2009.