麻豆约拍

At the end of last week's edition听Tom asked: Why might the Velvet Fog, Foghorn Leghorn and the 2000-Year-Old Man all identify with a late satirist and film director from our side of the Pond - and who are they all?

The key is the name 'Mel'. The Velvet Fog is a nickname for the jazz singer Mel Torme; Foghorn Leghorn was one of the many cartoon characters voiced by the great Mel Blanc, and the 2000-Year-Old Man was a comedy routine devised and performed by Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner. The British satirist and film director referred to is therefore the late Mel Smith, of the Not The Nine O'clock News satire team, and director of hit movies such as The Tall Guy and Bean.

Q1听 If you raised a glass to The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, Under A Mackerel Sky, and Goosebumps - how big would it be?

Q2听(from Ivan Whetton)听 Why would a novelist who turned down the Nobel Prize, a jazz musician whose fretless solos were听often forecast, and an early proponent of the germ theory of disease, all have started off where they do things differently?

Q3听(Music)听 Which London thoroughfare is this?

Q4听 During the International Geophysical Year in the late 1950s, if citizens of America's Rhode Island state or New Zealand's Ninety Mile Beach sat down to eat Jerusalem artichokes wrapped in tin foil, why would you be right to suspect that all was听not what it seemed?

Q5听 Until recently, under canvas somewhere in the English countryside you might have encountered Norman Bates and Prince Bartlomiej听of Lithuania, alongside Harvey Willcox's community and a banana. Why?

Q6听(Music)听 What makes this an entirely logical sequence?

Q7听 Why might your progress into London once upon a time have been facilitated by Petrushka's killer, a city in Montana, a pre-Roman king of Britain, and a copse of trees whose wood is especially useful for making electric guitars?

Q8听 What single, inaudible distinction sets apart a 1950s female tennis player听from a fiery male Yorkshire cricketer; a castle-dwelling politician from another with a penchant for jazz; and an unfairly-neglected 20th century English writer from one of the most successful?

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How could the state of Louisiana, a shark that's surprisingly spotted, and Beecham's encores, all help the chicken?

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Don't write to us - there are no prizes - but Tom will supply the answer next week. Don't forget you can send us your own question suggestions at any time, using the Contact Us link on this page.