The Roman Empire

I Have Sense Enough To Be Lazy

hroman — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 04:50:04 +0000

I still need to do an update proper, but I’m going to postpone that for a few days yet (I know, I know).

Until then, here’s three of my favorite Salinger short stories:

A Perfect Day For Bananafish.
For Esme – With Love And Squalor.
Pretty Mouth and Green My Eyes.

RIP, Mr Salinger.

A Genius Is A Guy Like Norman Einstein

hroman — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 04:59:37 +0000

We had to endure three tedious, lopsided matches, and the prospect of a lost weekend before we got a decent NFL playoff game. But boy, was it ever decent. Here’s hoping this mini-quiz is as exciting as the Cardinals/Packers tilt was.

The following are OLD logos that current NFL teams once used as either their primary or alternate logos. Can you identify all twelve teams? Good luck.

It’s Not You, It’s Me

hroman — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 05:40:25 +0000

Happy New Year to you. Here are a few unscrambling puzzles to kick off the new year. Bonus points if you can identify everything in the list. Good luck.

Question 1
Unscramble the following letters to find the Word/Phrase that is not a GANGSTER MOVIE.

AACCEFRS
EHT ADEFGHORT
ADEFGLLOOS
EHT ABCEHLNOSTUU
EHT CEINPRSS BDEIR
EILLMRS CGINORSS

Question 2
Unscramble the following letters to find the Word/Phrase that is not a BEATLES SONG.

EHY DEJU
EHILLRRT
AEELNOR BGIRY
AEHINPPSS IS A AMRW GNU
ELLOWY ABEIMNRSU
EHLP

Question 3
Unscramble the following letters to find the Word/Phrase that is not a SPORT.

ABFLLOOT
AABBEKLLST
AERTW
CEFINNG
ACEHRRY
CEHKOY

Question 4
Unscramble the following letters to find the Word/Phrase that is not an ITEM OF FURNITURE.

AEERSTW
ACHIR
AMNOOTT
ADERRW
CEEILNRR
ACEHIS

Jingle Bells, Batman Smells

hroman — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 05:30:56 +0000

I’ll post some time-wasters over the next few days for those of you stuck working over the holidays. Meanwhile, see how many of the following 15 Christmas movies you can identify (click for a larger image).

Have a Merry Christmas!

Gimme Ape Tit For 400

hroman — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 02:34:41 +0000

A thematic quiz for you today. Nine trivia questions. The first letter of each response, stringed together, forms a relevant word. Good luck.

Google Goggles

hroman — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 16:14:07 +0000

Ridiculously cool experimental app from Google:

Reminds me of the TED Lecture from Pattie Maes and Pranav Mistry on MIT’s “SixthSense”.

Cuz I Been Sitting On My Butt All Day Playing Video Games, That’s What

hroman — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 19:48:14 +0000

Picked up the New Super Mario Bros. Wii game, and it is ridiculously fun and addictive. But it’s going to take me a while to get up to speed with these “Super Skills.”

In particular, the following is a video-grab of four people playing World 1 Level 3 with the help of Yoshi. If you notice, Luigi is quite lazy!

That was impressive.

They Call Me Unkie Ham

hroman — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 06:48:37 +0000

A somewhat topical new quiz I have up on Sporcle:

Can you name the Famous Uncles?

Crazy week!
Good luck.

The Answer Is In The Fifth

hroman — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 04:22:42 +0000

Here’s a puzzle, “Dominant Fifth,” from William Wu’s archive attributed to Nootch. I love it for its simplicity.

“What’s the Dominant Fifth?” asked Dr. Dingo, as his daughter Cicely came in from school.
Cicely blushed. “Just a secret society,” she said. “I’m one of the vice-presidents.”
“And you’re meeting tonight; is that right?”
“How on earth did you know?” asked Cicely.
“You left this lying about. That’s no way to keep secrets, my girl.” He handed Cicely this paper:

Dominant Fifth

REASM NCNVE OTMLE SEHST TAOEI

“How did you manage to read it?” asked Cicely. “The code is known to only about eight of us.”
“Change it,” said Dingo. “Any fool can read that.”

Where and When is the next meeting scheduled?

While you’re chewing on that, here’s a classic puzzle:

You have twelve balls that seem to be identical, but one of them is actually slightly heavier or lighter. You also have a balance scale with pans that will hold the balls. Using only three weighings, how can you tell which ball is different and whether it is heavier or lighter?

Here’s a great answer to that puzzle from Marilyn vos Savant’s Parade column.

You Can Venn Diagram Pretty Much Anything

hroman — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 22:19:52 +0000

Here’s a pretty Venn Diagram from Unwin and Carline sent to me by Dan on one of his frequent trips to the internet abyss.

Click for a larger version:

I know what you’re thinking. How awesome is a Mermahuataur (half human, half bull, half narwhal), and what on earth does it look like? Here are two depictions (click for sources):

My Halloween costume idea is two weeks late!

Sporcle Items of Canadian Miscellany

hroman — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 05:13:55 +0000

Folks, I have a quiz up at Sporcle.com for you to try (link below):

Canadian Miscellany

You have 8 minutes to get as many answers as possible. Good luck!

Do Not Make Me Tell You Again About The Scooching

hroman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:13:18 +0000

Plastered all over the interwebs, you’re more than likely to have seen Christopher Walken perform Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face” on BBC1. If not, you’re in for a laugh:

Naturally, nostalgia reigns supreme at these moments: who could forget the original, Walken performing “Three Little Pigs”?

And there’s the classic Simpsons take – with the scooching.

We Have To Steal The Declaration Of Independence!

hroman — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:51:04 +0000

Nicolas Cage would have no trouble with these puzzles:

The first one is from the Mensa “Genius Quiz-A-Day Book”

Each of the following four words has had the same vowel removed. At least three of that vowel are missing from each word. What are the reconstructed words?

PRMAT … RHARS … TNAGR … FORSR

The next one below has a single word as an answer. No other clues!

Good luck!

A Trio Of Use It Or Lose It Puzzles

hroman — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 22:58:40 +0000

The following three puzzles are from the daily puzzle calendar “USE IT OR LOSE IT.”

Question 1
Doubling the perimeter of a triangle, keeping the shape the same, multiplies the area by how much?

Question 2
A woman has a job that requires her to work eight straight days and rest on the ninth day. If she started work on a Monday, the twelfth time she rests will be on what day of the week?

Question 3
The following words were in a sentence in the following sequence:
XYere; ZYere, Xere.
What letters do X, Y, and Z represent?

BONUS QUESTION
Can you reveal the city this picture represents?

Where The Devil Are My Slippers?

hroman — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 01:41:20 +0000

A handful of rebuses for your Monday morning.