Factoid of the day

[listersgirl]

Did you know that Composition (as in music) used to be a category at the Olympics? From 1912-1948, in fact. Canada won a silver medal in 1948 for John Weinzweig's Divertimento for Flute and Strings.

Comments

Fascinating!!!

[starfishchick]

What's the source on that?

Re: Fascinating!!!

[listersgirl]

"100 Years of Olympic music: music and musicians of the modern Olympic games, 1896-1996" by William K. Guegold

In other words, the book I am currently cataloguing. :)

[mellyflori.livejournal.com]

Huh. Man. With the combined input of my flist I'm going to kick Matt's ASS at Trivial Pursuit tomorrow.

[listersgirl]

Too bad you can't have a flist brain implant for times like those...

[morag-gunn.livejournal.com]

That just made me think about Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (is that show still on?). Wouldn't it be awesome if you could access your flist as one of your lifelines?!?! Livejournal would quickly dominate the trivia world!

P.S. I don 't know you but good luck at kicking Matt's ass.

[mellyflori.livejournal.com]

I always wanted to be on that because my friend Chris fills in all my pointless info gaps.. we dated for a while and when we broke up he said "I'm sorry it didn't work out, but you're still my Millionare lifeline." We dream still of team Jeopardy.

But my flist? That would be even better.

[morag-gunn.livejournal.com]

What a lovely break-up line! Heh.

Team jeopardy would be AWESOME. I love jeopardy but I don't know anything about American history so I will always lose (even though Alex sneaks in as much Canadian trivia as he can). If anyone ever invents team jeopardy, I'm so going to be there!

[listersgirl]

The only problem is that most of my friends have all the same useless knowledge that I do. You want to know about musicals? I'm covered. What I need is to cultivate friends who have knowledge of American politics. And biology.

[morag-gunn.livejournal.com]

Yeah, good point. I know some biology but if there was actual team jeopardy or flist trivia, we could always rope my brother in. He has a PhD in biology.

On an entirely different note, I've been meaning to ask you for some time about the South Park movie, seeing as you're such a musical-oriented person. Did you find it offensive (with good reason) or did you find it hilariously funny given its outright mocking of musicals? I fit into the latter category but most of my friends think I'm crazy because they don't know anything about musicals. Really though, a giant clitoris speaking in the voice of Glynda the Good Witch of the North? Could it be more funny? (caveat: I don't like toilet humour and I'm not a terribly crass individual but I still think that movie is hilarious)

[listersgirl]

I found it hilarious! All the take-offs on musicals and the Canada mocking were very funny. And I'm not a particularly big fan of the show generally.

[morag-gunn.livejournal.com]

Hooray! I'm not crazy (or if I am crazy, I'm not alone)!

Trivia / South Park

[gmajor.livejournal.com]

Although I thought the songs were funny in and of themselves, the parody element made me struggle to breathe when I saw it on video the first time, because the musical arrangements are SO well done. I still have the soundtrack CD, although I can't listen to it with Gminor around. I also identified all the musicals they were making fun of.

Team Jeopardy: There is an online trivia game (multiple choice) I used to play at university all the time in teams. Myself, my girlfriend (the "Steffie" inspiration), and her two friends used to play it together, sharing one transmitter box. Between the four of us, we had all the areas of knowledge covered. History, Geography, Lit, Music (me), Movies (me), useless pop culture trivia (me), and we even had a girl who knew sports trivia ('cause I certainly don't). In one memorable evening, we scored a perfect game (15,000 points) and even got the 2000 point bonus question on the Mayans. The Boo Bar (U of Guelph) bought us our drinks for the rest of the evening (everyone had been hanging on our last few answers as our perfect game lined up) since their bar would be listed in the top ten locations based on our score alone.

Sadly, it was all downhill from there, never gotten close since. I would love to go in with a team again some time, and there are lots of bars in Toronto that have the NTN Trivia setup.

Re: Trivia / South Park

[morag-gunn.livejournal.com]

Congrats on that trivia thing. I played a similar trivia game with my brother when I went to visit him in Alabama. He said it was the only intellectual activity available outside the university where he is employed so his entire faculty went to that particular bar on trivia night. I scored them some points on the obscure historical questions. But I've never so much as dreamed of scoring a perfect game!

Glad to hear that the South Park movie brings a tear to someone's eye besides my own. ;) If you have another child, will you call it G diminished? Or perhaps G minor 7? Although, maybe that will happen when G minor is actually 7. Hmmmmmm. This is a very problematic moment for me.

Lastly, I have loved your icon for some time. The simplicity of it makes me happy.

Trivia, Gminor, Icon

[gmajor.livejournal.com]

Perhaps I will use the other keys when referring to Gminor in other circumstances. Maybe when she's home sick from school, she could be Gdim, or, as you say, when she turns 7, she'll be Gminor7. Of course, I'm hoping she won't be Gsuspended. We are not, however, having another child, so she will forever be Gminor. My wife, is of course, Gmajorette.

And thank you. It pleases me that it's appreciated.

I have a few variations on it, where I am playing the Gmajor chord on various instruments, but the simplicity (and educational moment) of the key signature appeals to me. I was jealous of the perfect simplicity of dramaqueen_23's Dairy Queen parody logo and wanted something equally iconic.

Re: Trivia, Gminor, Icon

[morag-gunn.livejournal.com]

Perhaps when she's a teenager she'll be G aug. ;) Oh, and I figure if you should ever have a second child, which you say you won't, that child could be Minor Second. :)

Re: Trivia, Gminor, Icon

[gmajor.livejournal.com]

when she's a teenager she'll be G aug

Tee hee!

[sarcasma.livejournal.com]

A piece of Weinzweig flute mayhem no less! That crazy wanker.

[listersgirl]

Somehow I can't imagine that winning today - not nearly bombastic enough!