Category Archives: Monday Quiz Challenge

Each week, Talk Wordy to Me challenges readers to beat the word nerd in a quiz challenge and post their scores in the comments.

Because I’m having trouble finding good quizzes every week, and because I’m lazy, I am going to start using the Etymologic quiz on the last Monday of each month. It’s really good, and it has a lot of questions that are randomly asked. I’ve only had a repeat question once as far as I can remember, and I play around with this quiz frequently.

Here’s the quiz. I scored a 7 out of 10 this time.

Each week, Talk Wordy to Me challenges readers to beat the word nerd in a quiz challenge and post their scores in the comments.

It shouldn’t be too hard to beat me this week. I found a really hard quiz that asks you to identify doublets, “word pairs that trace a common source.” 

Make sure to keep track of your score, this site doesn’t do it for you.

I got a 2 out of 10. Lame.

Each week, Talk Wordy to Me challenges readers to beat the word nerd in a quiz challenge and post their scores in the comments.

This week is more a game than a quiz, but it’s an old favorite of mine, Text Twist. You are given six letters and have to make as many three- to six-letter words as possible in the time given, usually two minutes. If you score high enough, you go to the next round.

Two hints: First, you can use your keyboard to type and enter the words, which is much faster than clicking the letters. Second, if you get the six-letter word, you automatically get to go on to the next round.

I went five rounds and scored 8,450 points.

OK, go play the game.

This week’s quiz challenge is from Etymologic, which I presented last December. It’s a good quiz, and the questions are random, so if you took it back then, give it another shot.

I’m doing a repeat because I’ve been off the grid the past week, and I just noticed some comments on the first quiz challenge that indicated that the site I’d been using to find quizzes, FunTrivia, tends to have bogus answer in its quizzes. The commenter, Faldone, is right. I don’t want to be spreading bad info.

On to this week’s quiz. I just got a 6 out of 10. I can do better than that, surely.

Maybe not today. Another 6 out of 10.

One thing I like about Etymologic is that some of the wrong answers are funny. Here are two I found this week:

• How did the word mortgage work its way into English? Named after a Celtic mythological figure, Mor’t'gag, who owed everything he had to trolls.
• What does the phrase I’m from Missouri mean? Literally, “I’m from the Midwest and don’t consider myself sophisticated.” Usually an apology.

Tell us how you did in the comments. And let us know if you find any bogus answers.

Last week’s quiz challenge went over well. (Although almost everyone beat me. Grr.) I think I’ll try to post a new quiz every Monday. So here’s one that has nothing to do with myths, Latin or Greek, like last week’s.

It’s on the origins of phrases that have become cliches that have little to nothing to do with their original meaning. There is one gimme in there for regular readers of this blog. I got a 9 out of 10.

• Flash verison of quiz
• HTML version of quiz (if Flash doesn’t work)

I found an etymology quiz based mostly on Greek and Roman mythology. I scored a 8 out of 15. Not my best work. Take it and let us know how you did in the comments.

• Flash version of quiz
• HTML version of quiz (if Flash version doesn’t work).