Trivia Dominoes II — Play Off the Last Bit of Trivia — continued! (Part 1)

According to the character backstory, Big Boss Man of WWF (back then) wrestling was a former correctional officer from Cobb County, GA. Ray Traylor, the Big Boss Man’s real name, actually was a correctional officer from Cobb County, GA before entering wrestling.

Actor and dancer Gregory Hines once observed, when he appeared on Late Night with David Letterman, that he had played characters named Ray three times, in Running Scared, White Nights and Deal of the Century, in a two-year period (1983-85). He admitted he didn’t know why casting directors saw him as “a Ray.”

Duncan Hines was a real person – he was a traveling salesman in the first half of the 20th century, who put together a list of good restaurants he had encountered during his travels. Hines’ list evolved into a series of books, featuring his ratings of restaurants and hotels, as well a syndicated newspaper column.

Hines also licensed his name for a variety of food products, including a line of cake mixes, which still exists today.

Duncan Hines’s restaurant ratings are mentioned in Robert A. Heinlein’s 1947 science fiction short story “It’s Great to Be Back!”, in which a former resident of a large Earth colony on the Moon notes with pride that a restaurant there has top marks.

In 1929, Robert Heinlein graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland and served as an officer. A Heinlein has fought in every US war since the American Revolution.

The only baseball stadium that I have not yet visited. I count a visit as attending a game at the team’s home ballpark. So I count Shea Stadium as having attended a NY Mets ballgame, even though they now play at Citi Field (I’ve been to a game there too, but you get the idea). I do need to visit Truist Park, and I will, God willing.

In play:

Over the years, 20 USNA football players have been drafted out of the Naval Academy. One of the most famous is Napoleon McCallum, running back, who was drafted by the Oakland Raiders in 1986. Clearly the most famous is QB Roger Staubach, an NFL Hall of Famer and Heisman Trophy winner. Staubach was drafted in 1964 by the AFL’s Kansas City Chiefs. Staubach was also drafted by the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys, and that is where he played for his entire pro football career. All of the other Annapolis draft picks were taken by the NFL except for one (besides Staubach). In 1961, halfback Joe Bellino was drafted by the AFL’s Boston Patriots.

It was possible for both the Kansas City Chiefs and the Dallas Cowboys to draft Roger Staubach in the 1964 drafts because at that time the Chiefs and the Cowboys were still in two separate leagues – the American Football League and the National Football League, respectively. The two leagues would not effectively merge until the start of the 1970 season, although a formal announcement of the pending merger was made as early as June 1966.

-“BB”-

Heh. I’ve seen games at Fulton County Stadium and Ted Turner Field, but have yet to see a game at Truist Park.

In Play:

The final AFL-NFL Championship Game (and the second such game to be called the ‘Super Bowl’) was played in January of 1970 at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans. The AFL Champion Kansas City Chiefs faced the NFL Champion Minnesota Vikings. Despite the victory a year earlier by the New York Jets of the AFL, it was still widely believed that the NFL was superior to the NFL. As a result, the Vikings entered the game favored by as many as 13.5 points. But the Chiefs jumped to a 16-0 halftime lead and won the game 23-7.

Viking DNA analyzed in 2020 suggests that the stereotype of the tall, blond Scandinavian doesn’t reflect the diversity of Vikings as a group.

Researchers analyzed DNA from 400 skeletons buried in Viking graves and were surprised to find genetic contributions from southern Europe and Asia in Viking DNA.

Skeletons in Scotland were found buried in the Viking tradition along with Viking artifacts, yet DNA analysis revealed no connection to any group in Scandinavia. This suggests that being a Viking was more of an occupation than an ethnicity.

No team has ever been shutout in the Super Bowl, but two teams have come close in scoring only 3 points: the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl VI (losing to the Dallas Cowboys 24-3), and the Los Angeles Rams in Super Bowl LIII (losing to the New England Patriots, 13-3).

But a team’s offense has been shutout, when the Minnesota Vikings scored only 6 points against the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl IX. The Steelers won 16-6 and the only Vikings points came on a blocked punt recovered in the end zone for a touchdown. That TD was scored by the Vikings defense. Even the PAT kick was missed.

Not a single player on the 2021 Minnesota Vikings 68-man roster had even been born the last time the Vikings played in a Super Bowl (1977). The same holds true for their new head coach, 36-year-old Kevin O’Connell (born in 1985), who was named to the position following the 2021 regular season.

-“BB”-

The first photo from the surface of Mars was taken by Viking 1 on July 20, 1976 - the 7th anniversary of the day people first landed on the Moon.

On May 14, 2021, the People’s Republic of China’s Zhurong became the first non-American rover to successfully operate on Mars. Per Wiki, the rover “is named after a Chinese mytho-historical figure usually associated with fire and light, as Mars is called ‘the Planet of Fire’ (Chinese: 火星) in China and some other countries in East Asia. It was selected by a public online vote.”

NASA’s robotic rover Opportunity was operational, conducting missions on Mars, for over 14 years, or about 57 times its originally-projected mission duration.

Opportunity landed on Mars in January of 2004, and functioned until June of 2018. At that point, the rover’s team placed it into hibernation mode due to an incoming dust storm; NASA was unable to re-establish contact with the rover after the dust storm, and its mission was officially declared complete in February of 2019.

Nitpick: Centerfielder. It is true he was one of the most hated men in baseball.

Olympus Mons on Mars is the tallest volcano known on a planet in the Solar System. It is 16 miles high and has a diameter that is approximately the same as the state of Arizona. Extremely high altitude mountains and volcanoes are possible on Mars because its gravity is only 37% that of Earth’s.

Dust storms on Mars are, in reality, never as strong or as impenetrably thick as shown in the movie The Martian, directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon and Jessica Chastain.

NASA has posted sounds recorded on Mars. However these are not the first sounds recorded on another planet. Venera 14 recorded sounds from the surface of Venus on March 5, 1982.

“Venereal disease” is a term which refers to a sexually-transmitted infection – that is, an infection or disease which is spread through sexual activity.

The word “venereal,” which means “of or pertaining to sexual desire or intercourse” comes from the Latin word venereus, meaning “of Venus” (the Roman goddess of love) or “of sexual love.”

The wheel was invented thousands of years ago, but the exact year is not known. Mesopotamian civilization is credited with its invention, which means the wheel may have been invented some (roughly) 5,000 to 10,000 years ago. But predating the invention of the wheel is the invention of sex toys. Upper Paleolithic art dating back 30,000 years depicts people using dildos to pleasure themselves and others. Italians provided the word diletto, meaning “to delight,” from which the modern English word “dildo” evolved.