1.

If the Holy Grail is the cup from which Christ drank at the Last Supper, what was the Holy Rood? A. How about the cross to which Christ was nailed. This according to one theory is the origin of the phrase "touch wood". Pieces of the Rood were supposed to be available during the middle ages, and these were supposed to bring luck. Another theory deals with wood fairies and nymphs of Norse or some other equally obscure mythology, who used to be pretty mischievous, when they heard of a good thing, they strove for its prevention and it was customary to knock on wood while talking of the good thing so that those partially deaf things couldn't hear the words. If you got any more theories, don't let me know cause I got enough theories about half the inconsequent things on Earth already. 2.On December 30, 1929, King George V refused to shake hands with Grigorie J Sokolnikov, the new Soviet ambassador to Great Britain for a very specific reason. What was the reason? A. His Royal Highness was unwilling to shake the hand of any representative of Soviet Russia, for it was the Soviet government which had decreed the assassination of a brown bearded, nervous little man, known to the world as His Imperial Majesty, Nicholas II, Tsar of all the Russias (He hoped), known still to George V of great Britain as "Dear cousin Nicky". Boy, talk about ties that bind. 3.Before he was 20, he ran away from his home in Washington D C, where he had learnt to sing in the synagogue with his father. He got a job barking for a side show and later went into Vaudeville, started blackening his face because he noticed that crowds always laughed at a black man. He was the first minstrel to get down on his knees when he came to the word 'Mammy'. Later a multimillionaire, he liked to take long motor trips without planning them, singing all the way. So who is this famous actor-singer of the 20's and 30's? A. Al Jolson, formerly known as Asa Yoelsen. 4.Around the 1920's, it was found by telegraph linesmen, that all across the African veldts, lines were being mysteriously destroyed. It took some years for the actual cause to be discovered. What caused the break down? A. My favorite question this one. The long suffering telegraphmen found that languid giraffes were in the habit of resting their tired heads on the lines which seemed to be at an ideal height. Due to scarcity of attempts here, I think I'll award half points for the mere mention of Giraffes. 5.At 17, he got into Union Pacific shops as an apprentice machinist for 5 cents an hour, glad for a chance to learn. Mechanical engineering became his life. When he wanted a shotgun, he made himself one. When he went to the Chicago automobile show in 1905, he was entranced by a beauteous white locomobile costing $500.He bought it with $700 which he had and borrowed the rest. His wife was not pleased, especially when she discovered that her husband did not mean to get some good out of his extravagance by driving it around. Instead, he took it all apart and put it all back together again and then repeated the process. Later on, he became one of the greatest re-builders of automobile companies, among the companies he took in hand were Buick, General Motors, Maxwell, Willys-Overland, et al. So who is this genius of the automobile industry?

A. Walter P Chrysler. 6.How do we know the following event : in 1929, one of George "Bugs" Moran's booze peddling depots, whaich was disguised as a garage of the S M C Cartage Co. was raided by 4 men, 2 in police uniform, carrying sub-machine guns, and 2 in plain clothes with stubby shotguns. The visitors lined up the seven occupants of the garage against the north wall and frisked away hidden guns. When one of the men at the wall tried to inquire, the answer was "Give it to 'em" . Of the hundreds of bullets that were fired, only eight ever reached the brick wall behind the targets. The only survivor was a police dog owned by one of the dead men. When the real police, finally came jostling through the gabbling crowd that had quickly gathered, they counted a neat row of bodies by the wall six dead, one dying. So what is the famous name by which this incident is known and who were the visitors, if they weren't the police ? a. Valentine's day massacre. The phony police dudes were Al Capone's men who liked to masquerade around town. I can't give their names for two reasons: I 've been threatened with extinction and the better reason is that I can't quite recall their names. But one thing, the Guys from Bugs' gang got even the next week when they executed the executioners and dumped their rotten carcasses in a place called Spooner's Nook.