WIDE WORLD OF WEIRD WORDS
DESPOTPOURRI
AROUND THE CELL
METER MAIDS
MOVIE MUSICALS
200
'Although it sounds like it has something to do with a Southern peanut, it really pertains to Pataki or Jeb'
gubernatorial
200
'This "Scourge of God" despot is referred to in the "Volsunga Saga" as Atli'
Attila (the Hun)
200
'6 elements make up 99% of a cell's weight: carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur & these familiar 2'
hydrogen & oxygen
200
'Her poem "On the Pulse of Morning" ends, "And say simply very simply with hope good morning"'
Maya Angelou
200
'This 2002 flick earned Oscar nominations for Queen Latifah, Renee Zellweger & Catherine Zeta-Jones'
Chicago
400
'Though it may sound like a laughing beer, it's really a hubbub, maybe in a pub, bub'
brouhaha
400
'After an anti-Roman uprising in 40 B.C., this despot fled to Rome, where the Senate elected him King of Judea'
Herod (the Great)
400
'The synthesizers called ribosomes are about 50% protein &, as you might guess, 50% this substance'
RNA
400
'Her "Aurora Leigh" is "a poem in nine books"'
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
400
'"Hello, Gorgeous!" was Barbra Streisand's first line in this musical, her first film'
Funny Girl
600
'Meaning to throw out of a window, this term gained fame after a 1618
incident in Prague where 2 officials were so thrown'
defenestration
600
'His attempt to escape Bucharest by helicopter failed in 1989, & after a tribunal he & his wife Elena were shot'
(Nicolae) Ceausescu
600
'(Jimmy of the Clue Crew motions to a diagram on a chalkboard.) During cell division, structures called spindles attach these to one end of the cell'
chromosomes
600
'This lady from an old New England family wrote "A Lady", which says, "You are beautiful and faded, like an old opera tune"'
(Amy) Lowell
600
'Donald O'Connor "made 'em laugh" in one of this 1952 movie's most famous numbers'
Singin\' in the Rain
800
'Meaning a silly or flighty person, this word with 2 sets of double "B"s was a demon's name & mentioned in "King Lear"'
flibbertigibbet
800
'Crazed with grief when his mother died in 1827, this African warrior chief forbade the drinking of milk'
Shaka Zulu
800
'By this process, water moves through cellular membranes to equalize pressure'
osmosis
800
'This American poet titled her 1960 collection "To Bedlam and Part Way Back"'
Anne Sexton
800
'In this musical Western, Clint Eastwood sings "I Still See Elisa" & "I Talk To The Trees"'
Paint Your Wagon
1000
'Sigmund knows that this is from the German for "damage" & "joy" & I'm getting a certain amount of it right now'
schadenfreude
1000
'This advisor to Ivan the Terrible was elected Czar after the death of the Czarevich Fyodor'
Boris Godunov
1000
'(Sarah of the Clue Crew demonstrates at a chalkboard.) Though its name is from the latin for "empty," this cavity in a plant cell holds a solution that's important for life'
a vacuole
1000
'Her best-known poem says, "I was much further out than you thought and not waving but drowning"'
Stevie Smith
1000
'In 1967 Tommy Steele starred in back-to-back musicals: "The Happiest Millionaire" & this "monetary" one'
Half a Sixpence
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