Stolen shamelessly from The Llama Butchers.
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1. Beatles, Stones or Beach Boys? I suppose the Beach Boys, because they've more or less hung it up, unlike Jagger and the surviving Beatles. I don't like any of these people.
2. Kant, Hegel, Marx? I'll take Hegel, 'cause I used to cheat my way through college bull sessions using his synthesis as a sledgehammer. Only in the academy could claiming purity of principle due to one's position as the thesis-maker (and subsquent noble granting of the occasional antithesis) get you anywhere. Steve was right: Kant is annoying. I hate idiot philosophers who think that the entire human experience fits neatly into a little treatise.
3. Cluedo, Monopoly, Scrabble? I'll take Monopoly, because where else can I buy the whole Pennsylvania Railroad? That is, if you land there before I do, I will stab you.
4. Paul Newman, Jack Nicholson, Robert Redford? Toss-up between Newman and Redford. The latter made movies that I really enjoyed---The Natural and Sneakers, but I can't actually speak words condemning Paul Newman.
5. Bach, Beethoven, Mozart? As Ace Rothstein used to say, "I have no opinion on that."
6. Australia, Canada, New Zealand? Australia, with all thy faults! Thou hast given me Cate Blanchett and Nicole Kidman, with Naomi Watts on the side. How could there be any other answer?
7. Groucho, Chico, Harpo? Eh, er...I claim youth and inexperience.
8. Morning, afternoon, evening? Evening. I hate mornings.
9. Bridge, Canasta, Poker? None of the above!
10. Fargo, The Big Lebowski, O Brother, Where Art Thou? I've got to go with O Brother, Where Art Thou?, easily. Now is you, or is you not, my constituents?
11. Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau? Hobbes, of course. There were points in college philosophy classes for those who took up his banner and defended it against the smug Randroids or the naive devotees of other philosophers. Yeah, I was real fun in college.
12. Cricket, football (soccer), rugby?. Why, football of course. D.C. United for life.
13. Jane Austen, Charlotte Bronte, Emily Bronte? Er, I was busy examining my eyelids for structural cracks that day in AP English.
14. Parker, Gillespie, Monk? None; I've got better things to do with my musical tastes.
15. Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham? D.C. United, thank you.
16. Cheers, Friends, Seinfeld? I'll have to go with the Boston-centric sitcom, since that's the only one I really saw.
17. Henry Fonda, Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart? Sheila O'Malley will have my hide for this, but it's not Cary Grant. Although I liked Henry Fonda in Fail-Safe, I have to go with the man who was pilot-qualified in the Convair B-36 Peacemaker and the Boeing B-47 Stratojet: Jimmy Stewart.
18. France, Germany, Italy? I expected better from the Butchers, but I'll take France. Why? Well, the TGV Paris Sud-Est, Atlantique, and Reseau, their hand in the Concorde, Catherine Deneuve, Laetitia Casta and Melissa Theuriau, Joan of Arc, the Richeliu-class battleships, and several good-looking jet fighters. Plus, Paris.
19. Apple, orange, banana? Orange, please.
20. Statham, Tyson, Trueman? These appear to be cricket players, but I haven't the foggiest.
21. Rio Bravo, El Dorado, Rio Lobo? Never saw 'em.
22. Katharine Hepburn, Meryl Streep, Ingrid Bergman? Er, scores of Internet tests say 'Katharine Hepburn'. Enh, I suppose so, once I punctured both my eardrums so as not to hear that nails-on-a-chalkboard accent of hers.
23. Chinese, Indian, Thai? They all look like toxic waste to me. Curry powder ought to be considered something of a chemical weapon in and of itself.
24. Handel, Scarlatti, Vivaldi? Handel, without question. His Messiah is one of my favorite classical works.
25. Oasis, Radiohead, Blur? Blur, if only for the song used in trailers for Verhoeven's Starship Troopers and for the reason that Damon Albarn used to be linked to Elastica's Justine Frischmann. I've got no bloody use for the Gallagher brothers, and Radiohead can go soak its head.
26. Fawlty Towers, The Young Ones, Yes Minister? Never saw 'em. PBS wasn't a staple of my earlier years.
27. Chekhov, Ibsen, Shaw? "I never forget a face, Mister....Chekhov." Well, that's not the Chekhov they're talking about, but one does what one can.
28. American football, baseball, basketball? What, is this some sort of test to be administered to the German infiltrator in Stalag Luft 17? The answer is baseball, without question. Followed eventually by college football. The NFL and the NBA may pleasantly rot, although I hope the Pats bring it home again.
29. FDR, JFK, Bill Clinton? Although I grind my teeth saying it, the "other" Roosevelt. He at least liked railroads, from what I understand.
30. Lenin, Luxemburg, Trotsky? Trotsky, without a doubt. Why? Because I was once told in college that Trotsky was the one who should have succeeded V.I. Lenin. This was not said because the speaker was pro-Communist; rather, it was said from a very Western position of interest. The man's angle was that Trotsky would have gotten to the helm of the USSR and promptly demanded worldwide revolution, acting towards it as best the Comintern could. Such actions would perhaps have gotten the attention of a lot of Western European governments (and perhaps ours as well) and thus warranted a decisive military response in the later 1920s.
Strangling Communism in its cradle circa 1927 or so, with Stalin exiled to Siberia beforehand, could only have been good for the world.
31. Paris, Rome, New York? Having been to all three, I'll go with Rome. St. Peter's is really hard to beat. Pick New York? I'd just as soon kiss a Wookiee.
32. Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Steinbeck? Fitzgerald. Although I've only read The Great Gatsby, that was good enough. Uncle Ernie suffers from his lifestyle, thanks to accounts from Andy Rooney.
33. Blue, green, red? Yes, please. Pevler blue, dark green locomotive enamel, and Tuscan red. All look mighty fine on the flanks of diesel-electric or pure electric locomotives.
34. Guys and Dolls, My Fair Lady, West Side Story? I'll go with My Fair Lady, mostly because of Julie Andrews. If not that, then Guys and Dolls. West Side Story probably was a harbinger of the flood of cultural rot and decay in the coming decade. Plus, it's annoying.
35. J.S. Mill, John Rawls, Robert Nozick? Punt. I don't know anything about the latter two, and I usually wanted to strangle Mill's corpse in college.
36. Armstrong, Ellington, Goodman? Er, Benny Goodman. But that's a stretch.
37. Ireland, Scotland, Wales (at rugby)? Since I don't know my ancestry, Erin go bragh.
38. The Sopranos, 24, Six Feet Under? Pass. Never actually watched any of 'em.
39. Friday, Saturday, Sunday? Saturday. College football, don't you know.
40. Hamlet, Macbeth, King Lear? Macbeth, 'cause it's creepy.
41. Fried, boiled, scrambled (eggs)? Scrambled, boy.
42. Paths of Glory, Cross of Iron, Saving Private Ryan? I've only seen the last one in that string, so I'll punt.
43. England, Australia, West Indies (at cricket)? England.
44. Chabrol, Godard, Truffaut? Huh?
45. Bringing It All Back Home, Blonde on Blonde, Blood on the Tracks? None of the above; I don't like Bob Dylan.
46. Trains, planes, automobiles? Trains. Did you have to ask? Be it the Broadway Limited or the Powhatan Arrow, I can't imagine a better way to travel than by rail. Unless of course it's by a vessel of the White Star or Cunard lines, but that's a different issue.
47. North By Northwest, Psycho, Vertigo? Not a Hitch fan; don't know.
48. Third, Fourth, Fifth (Beethoven Piano Concerto)? Cultural ingrate here; don't know.
49. Coffee, tea, chocolate? Tea, Earl Grey, hot. Alternatively, tea, sweet.
50. Cardiff, Edinburgh, Dublin? Er, I don't know. All three?
Posted by Country Pundit at January 5, 2006 10:14 AM | TrackBack