TOADYNOTES EMAIL NEWSLETTER TRIVIA ANSWERS FOR JULY

01. A fortune-telling novelty in continuous production since at least the 1920s consists of a thin sheet of sodium polyacrylate (previously cellophane, and before that "onion skin" paper) small enough for the user to hold in their palm, and cut into the shape of what "miracle" animal?

ANSWER: Fish

02. Practitioners of hepatoscopy — which dates to at least the Etruscans, is mentioned in the Book of Ezekiel, and continued into the Middle Ages — looked for divine signs by examining what part of an animal (typically sheep or poultry)?

ANSWER: Liver

03. Tasseography — the practice of interpreting signs in tea leaves — is practiced by Sybill Trelawney in what blockbuster 1999 novel?

ANSWER: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (may Rowling grow a wooden tongue)

04. This spiritualist device’s name is widely believed to have come from combining two different European language words for “yes.” But Charles Kennard, whose company manufactured the device in the early 1900s, claimed he learned the name from the implement itself, and that it was an Ancient Egyptian word meaning "good luck".

ANSWER: Ouija Board

05. Madame Zita, Princess Doraldina, Gypsy Grandma, and Estrella were all historical examples. But what was the name of their most famous fortune-telling, wish granting cousin, who played a key role in an Oscar-nominated 1988 comedy?

ANSWER: Zoltar (from Big)