For the past seven years, the team at QI have been collecting their favourite finds over the previous 12 months to create a new QI fact book for Christmas.
This year's publication of 2,024 QI Facts To Stop You In Your Tracks is the last in the series and brings the total number of facts up to a staggering 10,000.
That is the same as the number of planes in the sky at any one time, the number of shipping containers lost from ships each year and the number of troops Caesar once sent to try to find the source of the world’s frankincense.
The QI elves have created this New Year quiz for The Irish Times and wish you the very best of luck.
There is 1 point per correct answer but minus-2 if you hit a klaxon in the General Ignorance round.
Round One: Multiple Choice
1 Where did the inventor of the bar code first draw it?
A - On the back of a napkin
B - On a bathroom mirror
C - In the sand at a beach
2 In 1st-century Denmark, rich people were buried with a chicken, what were the very rich buried with?
A - A porpoise
B -A goose
C - A guinea-pig
3 Which of these was not a Greek Ocean deity?
A - Poseidon
B - Norris
C - Doris
4 How many species of tea plant are there?
A - One
B - 17
C - 58
5 Which sandwich has been Marks & Spencer’s bestseller for over 30 years?
A - Prawn mayonnaise
B - BLT
C - Cheese and pickle
6 What has Beyoncé released more of?
A - Studio albums
B - Perfumes
C - Clothing collections
7 Which of these happened to Liechtenstein when their team arrived at the 1936 Olympics?
A - All of their athletes lost their luggage on the journey over
B - Their country’s name appeared as ‘Licktenstein’ on their kit
C - They discovered they had the same flag as Haiti
8 What was the name of the first mass-produced bicycle for women?
A - The Ladies’ Pleasure
B - The Ladies’ Psycho
C - Bertha
9 Why was the first director of Jaws fired?
A - He kept calling the shark a whale.
B - He was scared of sharks
C - He broke the mechanical shark on the first day of filming
10 In 2017 a book was returned to a San Francisco library 100 years late, what was it called?
A - The Time-Traveller's Companion
B - 100 Years of Solitude
C - Forty Minutes Late
Round Two: Quiz of the Year
1. Ahead of the New England Patriots’ Super Bowl match against the Philadelphia Eagles, the Boston Waterfront banned Philadelphia cheese, as well as any songs by which musician and actor – due to the fact that he’s West Philadelphia born and raised?
2. The largest theft in the history of the world took place in Japan this year, when $534 million worth of what was stolen?
3. Who was The Australian newspaper's Australian of the Year in 2017, who fell from grace so badly this year that one Brisbane store put his autobiography in the True Crime section?
4. Who is currently on tour in the US with a show called Make America Horny Again?
5. Antoine Griezmann celebrated his goal in the World Cup final with a dance called ‘take the L’. Where did he learn that dance? And, for a bonus point, what was the related dance that Dele Alli performed when he scored in the FA Cup semi-final?
6. Which person who died this year said that one of their greatest regrets was that they never ran over Margaret Thatcher’s toes?
7. What links the new president of Liberia with the new prime minister of Pakistan?
8. The German city of Trier sold ‘zero euro’ banknotes to celebrate the 200-year anniversary of the birth of whom?
9. One of the buzz-words of the year in Africa was ‘Zexit’. The -exit part is self-explanatory, but what does the Z stand for?
10. At the end of November a giant cow from Western Australia made headlines around the world for weighing a whopping 1,400 kg but what was his name?
Round Three: General Ignorance
There are four ‘General Ignorance’ questions hidden in this round, where the obvious answer is incorrect. If you fall into one of our traps you will lose 2 points.
1. Which planet is closest to the Sun?
2. In which organ would you find most of your serotonin?
3. Where is Shropshire Blue cheese from?
4. Who wrote the play Cymbeline?
5. In which country would you find the world’s largest sculpture of Jesus?
6. The best-selling album of 2018 so far is the soundtrack to which movie?
7. What is the preferred food of a koala?
8. How many edges does a STOP sign have?
9. In the Chronicles of Narnia, who is the eldest of the Pevensie children?
10. Which bird has the scientific name Puffinus Puffinus?
Round Four: Anagram Round
1 Which chemical has the symbol RN in the periodic table?
2 This opening line appears in which novel: “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”
3 Which TV talent show judge left Strictly Come Dancing to join the judging panel on Britain's Got Talent?
4 Which sport are Dan Carter, Gareth Thomas and Dylan Hartley known for?
5 What word represents ‘H’ in the NATO phonetic alphabet?
6 I am the Very Model of a Modern Major General appears in the Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera The Pirates of ______?
7 What was the name of the series of children’s books written by RL Stine and advertised with the tagline ‘Reader beware – you’re in for a scare?’
8 Which BBC programme holds a Guinness World Record for being the world’s longest-running TV current affairs series?
9 Blenheim Orange, Wolf River and Fiesta are all varieties of which fruit?
10 The first letters of the previous nine answers are an anagram of a nine letter word – what is it? Hint - it starts with a P.
Answers
Multiple Choice
1 C
2 B
3 B
4 A
5 A
6 B
7 C
8 B
9 A
10 C
Quiz of the Year
1 Will Smith
2 Cryptocurrency (accept Bitcoin)
3 Steve Smith
4 Stormy Daniels
5 Fortnite & Flossing
6 Stephen Hawking
7 Former sportspeople
8 Karl Marx
9 Jacob (Zuma)
10 Knickers
General Ignorance
1 Mercury
2 Intestine (lower) Klaxon: Brain
3 Scotland Klaxon: Shropshire
4 Shakespeare
5 Poland Klaxon: Brazil
6 The Greatest Showman
7 Eucalyptus leaves
8 Eight
9 Peter
10 Manx Shearwater Klaxon: Puffin
Anagram Round
1 Radon
2 Anna Karenina
3 Alesha Dixon
4 Rugby
5 Hotel
6 Penzance
7 Goosebumps
8 Panorama
9 Apple
10 Paragraph
2,024 QI Facts To Stop You In Your Tracks is available from all good bookshops.
