WWTBAM Bored

Linda Saracco
Darien, IL



$100
Which of the following is a traditional activity for children on Halloween?

A: Caroling B: Decorating eggs
C: Trick-or-treating D: Barfing up candy apples


$200
Also the title of a popular comic strip, "For Better or For Worse" is a well-known phrase from a what?

A: Wedding vow B: Presidential speech
C: Folk song D: Shakespearean sonnet


$300
A screw with an X-shaped indentation on its head is known as a what?

A: Slot head B: Hexagonal head
C: Phillips head D: Robertson head


$500
What sports term is featured in a 1963 surf anthem by The Surfaris?

A: Strike Out B: Hole Out
C: Side Out D: Wipe Out


$1,000
What is the total number of Commandments and deadly sins traditionally recognized in Christianity?

A: 13 B: 17
C: 21 D: 25


-- Commercial Break --


Linda would have been in trouble if she missed the last question, after 14 years of Catholic education. At one point, she even wanted to be a nun.

Meredith: You did? What happened?

Linda: I think a couple of those vows might have messed me up.

Linda's mom, Annette, is in the audience. Linda and Annette went to see Jersey Boys last night.


$2,000
Which of these words is derived from two Greek roots meaning "loving" and "man"?

A: Democracy B: Metropolis
C: Philanthropy D: Psychology


$4,000
Famous militiamen of the Revolutionary War, the Green Mountain Boys were based in a territory that later became what U.S. state?

A: Pennsylvania B: New York
C: North Carolina D: Vermont


$8,000
A slacker son named Marmaduke is featured on what TV series that debuted in 2007?

A: Reaper B: Carpoolers
C: The Big Bang Theory D: Aliens in America

Linda says she should watch more TV, but she works a lot.

ATA: A: 10% B: 48% C: 17% D: 25%

50/50 leaves A & B.


-- Commercial Break --


Linda has been having a wonderful time. It's much more than she expected.


$16,000
The word "tantara" derives from and refers to the sound made by which of these instruments?

A: Trumpet B: Cello
C: Piano D: Harp

Linda thinks it would be a stringed instrument, since three of the choices are strings.

PAF: Linda calls her brother-in-law, Terry. She spells tantara while reading the question and answers.

Terry: Tantara?

Linda: T-A-N-T-A-R-A. Trumpet, cello, piano, harp. I think it's strings. Cello, harp, piano? Tantara. T-A-N-T-A-R-A.

Terry: Linda, I don't have a clue.

Linda: And neither do I. I'm very happy to get where I was and I appreciate everything. I'm gonna take it and run. I'm going to stop now.

Linda walks with $8,000.


-- The Horn --


Answers:
$100: C: Trick-or-treating
$200: A: Wedding vow
$300: C: Phillips head
$500: D: Wipe Out
$1,000: B: 17
$2,000: C: Philanthropy
$4,000: D: Vermont
$8,000: B: Carpoolers
$16,000: A: Trumpet

I was watching this show with my son's, age 12 and 9. After Linda used the 50/50, my 9-year-old started yelling at the TV "She wasted that lifeline! She just wasted the 50/50!" (He had no prompting from me). I just thought the bored should know.

slam wrote:I was watching this show with my son's, age 12 and 9. After Linda used the 50/50, my 9-year-old started yelling at the TV "She wasted that lifeline! She just wasted the 50/50!" (He had no prompting from me). I just thought the bored should know.

With a top vote-getter of 48 and a spike for 25, I disagree.

It is awesome that your son is paying attention to the strategy, and probably he will find some agreement here.

I play the trumpet and I've never heard of tantara. Although I guessed trumpet 'cause tantara sounds sort of like fanfare. Which is what it means.

I like words, although I only play with them for fun, and I have never heard of "tantara".

I suppose one might find "ta-ta-ra-ta" used in a more obviously imitative fashion, for a fanfare, or a flourish. To represent, for example the beginning of the "Mickey Mouse Club" theme. The chorus in "Iolanthe" gets to do a fairly long imitiative flourish, and while they do sing "tantara", and longer phrases, those phrases would not be considered "words" as such. l

The logic involving "strings" was illogical. I might have been willing to go with "trumpet" sans aide , since each syllable does sound like a trumpet note.

The word, however, is almost a non-word, in the sense that it is non-used. The large "corpora" of accumulated current English usage, American and British, reveals exactly one example, in a fantasy novel from 20 years ago.

The larger but different corpus represented by the web is not much more helpful, with "Tantara" and variants, especially the resort name "Tan-Tar-A", turning out to be almost always proper names.

If I am feeling enthusiastic, I will post links, eventually.

$8K: Haven't seen any of these shows. I would also ATA.

$16K: No clue on this either. PAF.

etaoin22 wrote:I like words, although I only play with them for fun, and I have never heard of "tantara".

I suppose one might find "ta-ta-ra-ta" used in a more obviously imitative fashion, for a fanfare, or a flourish. To represent, for example the beginning of the "Mickey Mouse Club" theme. The chorus in "Iolanthe" gets to do a fairly long imitiative flourish, and while they do sing "tantara", and longer phrases, those phrases would not be considered "words" as such. l

The logic involving "strings" was illogical. I might have been willing to go with "trumpet" sans aide , since each syllable does sound like a trumpet note.

The word, however, is almost a non-word, in the sense that it is non-used. The large "corpora" of accumulated current English usage, American and British, reveals exactly one example, in a fantasy novel from 20 years ago.

The larger but different corpus represented by the web is not much more helpful, with "Tantara" and variants, especially the resort name "Tan-Tar-A", turning out to be almost always proper names.

If I am feeling enthusiastic, I will post links, eventually.

How about the introduction to "76 Trombones"?

Harold Hill:
As sure as the Lord made little green apples
And that band's gonna be in uniform-
Johnny! Willy! Teddy! Fred!
And you'll see the glitter of crashing cymbals
And you'll hear the thunder of rolling drums
And the shimmer of trumpets!
Tantara!
And you'll feel something akin to the electric
thrill I once enjoyed when Gillmore, Liberatti, Pat
Conway, The Great Creator, and W.C. Hamdy, and
John Phillip Sousa all came to town on the very
same historic day!

slam wrote:I was watching this show with my son's, age 12 and 9. After Linda used the 50/50, my 9-year-old started yelling at the TV "She wasted that lifeline! She just wasted the 50/50!" (He had no prompting from me). I just thought the bored should know.

You're raising a true Bored Buddy there, slam!

Thousandaire wrote:I play the trumpet and I've never heard of tantara. Although I guessed trumpet 'cause tantara sounds sort of like fanfare. Which is what it means.

I think the word is used in the war-trumpet sense, rather than for civilian music. And, yes, it's onomatopoeic.

It was interesting that Linda tried to read the question writers' thoughts and got tripped up by that: three string choices so it probably isn't the brass instrument. Except when it is.

Now if only Terry had been using Google. Linda spelled it for him and everything...

Definitely an easy Google with plenty of time to spare.