1st and 3rd periods. In these periods, your team will choose a category and be read ten questions. After each response, the moderator will indicate whether or not it was correct. If you are incorrect, the other team will have a chance to answer.

dioxideBonus Category: Also a TV show

Each correct response in this category will also be the name of a television show.

1. These come in rational, real, irrational, imaginary, counting, natural, and integer varieties.

answer: Numbers (technically "Numb3rs")

2. This 1700's Braintree, Massachusetts family included John, Abigail, and John Quincy.

3. What is the number of sides of a dodecagon [DOE-deck-a-gon] plus the number of interior angles of a dodecagon?

answer: 24 [both quantities are 12]

4. In the bible, this woman had a sister named Mary. Jesus brought her brother Lazarus back from the dead.

answer: Martha

5. The Oval Office is contained in what part of the White House?

answer: The West Wing

6. This word means happiness, and perhaps WB was happy with the ratings that Kerri Russell got.

answer: Felicity

7. Pencil and paper ready. It takes Dave 2.4 [two point four] minutes to read a page. How long would it take Dave to read a 25-page short story? (give 10 seconds)

answer: 60 minutes

8. Hoover dam is located near what city?

answer: Las Vegas

9. According to a scale developed by the Dutch ophthalmologist Herman Snellen, this is normal vision.

answer; 20/20

10. Characters located in this land include Glinda, Miss Gulch, Professor Marvel, and a Monkey Officer.

answer: Oz [Gulch = wicked witch, Professor = Wizard]

Bonus Category: Picture This

1. A Greek term meaning "drawing with light", what is the practice or profession of taking pictures?

answer: photography

2. Gilbert Charles Stuart famously painted what statesman, a portrait that appears on the one-dollar bill?

answer: George Washington

3. A Frenchman might say a picture is worth "un mille mots" [UNE MEAL MOW]. Translate this phrase.

answer: one (a) thousand words

4. If you were looking at an X-ray of your cranial bone, what part of the body would be pictured?

answer: skull or head

5. Pencil and paper ready. A picture frame has a width of 12 inches and a height of 5 inches. In inches, what is the distance between the top left and bottom right corners of the frame?

answer: 13 inches [by Pythagorean Theorem]

6. A picture might be taken with this type of lens, which is curved like the outside of a sphere, thickest in the middle.

answer: convex

7. The headquarters of Eastman Kodak is located in Rochester, New York. On what body of water is this city located?

answer: Lake Ontario

8. What term for a soft, subdued shade is also the powdered pigments mixed with gum used by Degas in his portraits?

answer: pastel

9. The picture of Dorian Gray was featured in this 2003 film based on an Allan Moore comic book. Other characters included The Invisible Man, Tom Sawyer, and Captain Nemo.

answer: The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

10. The picture of this current North Korean dictator is plastered everywhere in Pyongyang, but some started disappearing in November 2004.

answer: Kim Jong Il

Bonus Category: It sounds alike

Given a pair of definitions, identify the homophonic words. For example, a number coming after one and a word meaning "also" are both pronounced "two", although the latter is spelled T-O-O.

[Moderator note: the teams need only give one of the given answers for credit]

1. Someone designated to receive an estate, or a combination of oxygen, nitrogen, and other elements.

answer: heir / air

2. The number sequence 0, 1, 2, 3 and so forth, or a "black" object surrounded by an event horizon with massive gravity.

answer: whole / hole

3. An assembly such as track runners about to compete, or the industry that is the subject of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle.

answer: meet / meat

4. The past participle of the verb "bear", or a spy character depicted by Matt Damon.

answer: born / Bourne

5. A term describing Jay Gatsby in a Fitzgerald work, or to reduce to small particles with friction against a rough surface.

answer: Great / grate

6. To take away by force, or a period of silence depicted in music with a black rectangle.

answer: wrest / rest

7. A kind of Japanese theater, or what a Russian is saying with the word "nyet" [KNEE-et].

answer: Noh / no

8. A fundamental principle on which something stands or rests, or objects placed ninety feet apart in a field.

answer: basis / bases (accept base)

9. The number of Horsemen in Revelation's apocalypse, or a kind of loop in Java and C++.

answer: four / for

10. The kind of "Deal" Harry Truman tried to get Congress to enact, or a price to be conveyed.

answer: Fair / fare

Bonus Category: Two-letter answers

All correct answers in this category are two letters long.

1. These two letters are the postal abbreviation for a southern state whose nickname is the Natural State, and for a Nobel Gas that has atomic number 18.

answer: Ar [Arkansas and Argon]

2. This is the objective case of the first person singular pronoun.

answer: me

3. Males have one copy of each of these chromosomes.

answer: X and Y

4. This Greek letter denotes the ratio between a circle's circumference and its diameter.

answer: pi

5. Though they are sometimes now designed with "CE" meaning "Common Era", years in the Gregorian calendar originally were given this two-letter designation which means "in the year of our Lord".

answer: AD [anno domini]

6. This longest river in Italy flows past Turin on its way to the Adriatic Sea.

answer: Po

7. In the solmization scale of naming notes, it is the seventh. As sung about in the Sound of Music, it is a "drink with jam and bread".

answer: ti [TEE]

8. This field in computer science attempts to teach computers to think for themselves. You may remember the 2001 film by this title in which Haley Joel Osment played a android.

answer: A.I. (do not accept "Artificial Intelligence" because of the instructions above)

9. Sigmund Freud said this was the part of the unconscious mind where wishes were generated.

answer: id

10. This number measures the strength of hydrogen in a compound. Products such as body wash or eye drops often sell themselves as being balanced with respect to this chemical property.

answer: pH

Bonus Category: The Mystery Category

The answers in this category have something in common. Solve the mystery and you will know the answer to question ten.

1. To what state would you travel to visit Yosemite National Park?

answer: California

2. What element, atomic number 94, follows Neptunium on the periodic table?

answer: plutonium

3. Remembering that a term starts the year after an election, in what year did Ronald Reagan begin his second term of office?

answer: 1985

4. Pencil and paper ready. A train travels 80 miles per hour for two hours, and then 100 miles per hour for three hours. What is its average velocity in miles per hour during this time?

answer: 88 miles per hour

5. Joining Wyatt Earp at the Old West gunfight at the O.K. Corral, by what name is John Henry Holliday better known as?

answer: Doc Holliday

6. Sepia, bronze, and chocolate are shades of what color?

answer: brown

7. Because of his Parkinson's disease, what actor often hid his right hand in a pocket during episodes of Spin City?

answer: Michael J. Fox

8. Made into a 2002 film, in what H.G. Wells work does a traveler go into the far future and help the Eloi people in their struggle against the Morlocks?

answer: The Time Machine

9. Who developed the DMC-12, a car known for its stainless steel and "gull-wing" doors that opened upward?

answer: John De Lorean

10. In what film does Doc Brown say, "I'm sure in 1985, plutonium is available at every corner drugstore, but in 1955 it's a little hard to come by"?

answer: Back to the Future (Part I)

2nd period: This period contains twenty tossups worth 10 points each. When you think you know the answer, signal with your buzzer and your team will have five seconds to respond.

1. Warning: two answers required. Name any two of the four minor characters on The Simpsons that are voiced by Hank Azaria. They are a doctor, a bar owner, a convenience store owner, and a police chief.

answer: Doctor Nick Riveiera, Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, or Chief Clancy Wiggum

2. What position was previously held by Tom Foley and Newt Gingrich and is currently occupied by Dennis Hastert in the lower chamber of the U.S. Congress?

answer: Speaker of the House

3. If you draw a circle on the outside of a square such that the circle touches just the corners, the circle is said to be what kind of figure around another?

answer: circumscribe(d) (accept word forms)

4. Her father Carson has a household servant named Mrs. Gruen, and other characters include George Fayne, Bess Marvin, and her boyfriend Ned Nickerson. Who is this female sleuth authored by Carolyn Keene?

answer: Nancy Drew

5. Its name comes from a defense that Dutch colonists built in 1652 to keep out the Indians. What is this street, home to the New York Stock Exchange?

answer: Wall Street

6. Its name means "the coming of the Saviour". What is this season in the Christian church including the four Sundays preceding Christmas?

answer: Advent

7. What major key contains four flats in its key signature?

answer: A flat

8. Every year the home crowd hopes for a Tim Henman victory. Which of tennis' Grand Slam events is played on a grass surface, and held in England each summer?

answer: Wimbledon

9. Now a slang term referring to a signature, what officer of the Continental Congress signed the Declaration with a large signature "so the King could read it"?

answer: John Hancock

10. Whose jobs included Provost of Stanford University and National Security Advisor before she became the current Secretary of State?

answer: Condoleeza (Condi) Rice

11. Encke's has an elliptical orbit of three years, while the one called Hyakutake takes about 10,000 years to orbit the Sun. What are these astronomical objects, the most famous of which is Halley's.

answer: comet

12. Remarkably, a protein that aids in spinal cord development is named after this character. This fifteen year-old is from the planet Mobius. Name this blue Sega hedgehog.

answer: Sonic the Hedgehog

13. Italian, Spanish, French, and Romanian are called Romance languages because they are derived from what language spoken by the ancient Romans?

answer: (Vulgar) Latin (accept early: Romance language, prompt on "Roman" before given)

14. Besides Bolivia, name any country that Simon Bolivar is credited with helping gain its independence from colonial powers.

answer: Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru

15. What section of the orchestra includes such instruments as the glockenspiel, gong, triangle, and drums?

answer: percussion

16. What elementary particle with a charge of plus one is often found in the nucleus of an atom?

answer: proton

17. Pencil and paper ready. A television show lasts 60 minutes, but when you watch the DVD without commercials, it is thirty percent shorter. What is the running time, in minutes, of the DVD?

answer: 42 minutes

18. A nexus is the relation between it and the subject. Name this part of a sentence containing a verb modifying the subject.

answer: predicate

19. It has a Tibetan name meaning "Goddess Mother of the World" and John Krakauer's book Into Thin Air was set there. What is this mountain in the Himalayas, the highest in the world?

answer: Mount Everest

20. What author wrote The Tale of Peter Rabbit, and has a name suggesting she spent time with plants?

answer: Beatrix (Helen) Potter

4th period: This period contains twenty tossups worth 15 points each. When you think you know the answer, signal with your buzzer and your team will have five seconds to respond.

1. The builders of Machu Pichu in the Andes Mountains, what Native American empire was centered in Peru?

answer: Incan Empire

2. In March 2002, a thirteen year old girl was killed by one at a Columbus Blue Jackets game. It is vulcanized, an inch thick, and three inches in diameter. Name this disk used in a sport.

answer: (ice hockey) puck

3. Extending around the coast of Australia, what is the largest deposit of coral in the world?

answer: Great Barrier Reef

4. In Texas Hold-Em poker, what name is given to the first three community cards, that come before the turn and river and are shown together?

answer: flop

5. Paul Cezanne and Henri Matisse were known for paintings depicting fruit or flowers. By what name are these paintings of inanimate objects known, suggesting that they do not move?

answer: still life

6. What two-word phrase was used to describe the controversial 2005 proposal of allowing fifty Senators to end filibusters on judicial nominees?

answer: nuclear option

7. A term by the Frenchman Lamarck, what science includes the fields of botany and zoology, and is named for these two components?

answer: biology

8. What city in the Irish province of Munster lent its name to a form of poetry whose rhyme scheme is A-A-B-B-A?

answer: Limerick

9. In the calculation twelve divided by four equals three, the number three is an example of what result of a division problem?

answer: quotient

10. In what tense is the sentence: I have watched.

answer: present perfect (prompt on partial answer)

11. Though Helena is Montana's state capital, what is its largest city in terms of population?

answer: Billings [at a whopping 90,000 people]

12. Passengers included Ham, Shem, and Japheth. By tradition it landed on Mount Ararat, and expeditions have looked for timbers there. What is this watercraft that in Genesis contained two of each animal?

answer: Noah's ark

13. It consists of a grooved wheel or disk within a housing, and a rope or cable threaded around the disk. What is this simple machine that can lift objects?

answer: pulley

14. It cost fifteen million dollars and is the largest acquisition of territory by the U.S.. What was this purchase of Thomas Jefferson that included a namesake state at the mouth of the Mississippi River?

answer: Louisanna Purchase

15. This composer's third symphony was originally dedicated to Napoleon. Who is this composer whose ninth symphony includes the choral "Ode to Joy"?

answer: Ludwig von Beethoven

16. This band's name was borrowed from a friend at University College London, who thought the name was depressing. Their albums include Parachutes, A Rush of Blood to the Head, and X & Y. Name this alternative group.

answer: Coldplay

17. The Cyrillic one has 33 members, while Hebrew has 22. The term we use comes from the first two Greek letters. What is this collection that in English has 26 vowels and consonants?

answer: alphabet (prompt on "letters")

18. In this text by Gaston Leroux a chandelier falls in a Paris performance house. Name this work featuring Raoul and Christine Daae [DIE-ay], also a film and Broadway musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber.

answer: The Phantom of the Opera

19. Pencil and paper ready. Butane has molecular formula C₄H₁₀. If the atomic weight of hydrogen is one, and carbon is twelve, what is the molecular weight of butane?

answer: 58

20. Into what port was the Titanic bound when it sank on its maiden voyage in 1912?

answer: New York City, New York