Monday, September 08, 2008 | 10:19 a.m.

Trivia Bits by Stan Newman

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Stan Newman

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  • Trivia Bits, September 8
    Word of the week: "haplography." From the Greek for "single writing," it's the accidental omission of a letter or group of letters that should be written more than once, such as "Missippi" instead of "Mississippi.…

  • Trivia Bits, September 6
    STAN'S WEEKLY TRIVIA CHALLENGE CONTEST NO. 101 Who was the first American whose last name begins with "O" to be honored on a U.S. postage stamp? HOW TO WIN: Send your answer, with your full name and address, either by e-mail to TriviaBits@…

  • Trivia Bits, September 5
    Have you ever noticed that, of the four seasons, only "winter" and "summer" can be used as verbs? A search of our unabridged dictionaries could find no "seasonal" verb for "spring," "fall," or …

  • Trivia Bits, September 4
    Eponym of the week: William Mathias Scholl, the Dr. Scholl behind the foot-products company. Working in a Chicago shoe store as a teen around 1900, he started taking night classes in podiatry, eventually getting a medical degree but never practicing.…

Trivia Bits, July 23

Thanks to intrepid Trivia Detective Sher Garfield of Bellevue, Wash., who passed along these additional common phrases, each of which has exactly one occurrence of each of the five vowels: house paint, peanut oil, freaking out, and milk moustache. While "milk mustache" gets more Google hits, that last phrase is correctly spelled with the "o." How do we know? See www.milkmoustache.com.

Emcee Squared: Three years after Art Fleming's last appearance as "Jeopardy!" host, and a year after Pat Sajak became the host of "Wheel of Fortune," they both appeared in the 1982 spoof film "Airplane II: The Sequel." Fleming can be seen in front of an in-flight Jeopardy board in the film, and Sajak portrays a TV newscaster.
Sorry, they don't appear on screen at the same time.

Appropriately, the state flower of Massachusetts is the:
A) Boston fern
B) Cape Cod carnation
C) Mayflower
D) Bay lilac

Previous answer: In the Jonathan Swift book "Gulliver's Travels," the ship on which the title character serves as a physician is wrecked near Van Diemen's Land, which is known today as Tasmania.

TRIVIA FANS: Send the trivia questions you've always wanted answered, or original TriviaBits ideas of your own, with your full name and hometown, to Stan Newman at StanTrivia@aol.com or on a postcard to P.O. Box 69, Massapequa Park, NY 11762.



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Originally Published on Wednesday July 23, 2008

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Click on the title to read Stanley Newman's article from Newsday, "Exercise Your Puzzle Muscles", which explores the ways that puzzles can keep you mentally fit as you age.

Also, see the Editors's Note from this edition of Newsday recounting the history of the Newsday crossword puzzle and Stanley Newman's pivotal role in revolutionizing it.
 
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