The Rabbitt Ears Quiz (11 of 12)_ Hogan's Heroes

In hind sight, our blog series on "Dead or Alive" which ran on here a while back (and, yes, it was my idea) may not have been as brilliant as we thought it was. One of the things we feared was that one of the subjects might actually die between the time we posted the entry and revealed the answer.

So, while Topol of "Fiddler on the Roof" is still alive and well (to our knowledge), we regret to inform those of you may have been in a cave in Tajikistan for the last month that one of other subjects Richard Dawson (1932-2012), whom we reported as being alive, died at age 79 on June 2nd.

But, in Dawson's honor, we are posting an entry to the sitcom "Hogan's Heroes" where he starred Peter Newkirk. Dawson was an actor before becoming a game show host on the long-running "Family Feud," where he would frequently kiss female contestants.

"Hogan's Heroes," the only sitcom ever set in a Nazi POW camp, starred Bob Crane (1928-1978), who died from a still unresolved murder in 1978, as Col. Hogan. And, much has been made of Crane's dubious personal life, which was the subject of the film "Auto Focus" (2002), which starred Greg Kinnear as Crane.

In real life, Crane was married to actress Sigrid Valdis (1935-2007) who played the now politically incorrect character Hilda.

The show's successful run from 1965-71 can also be attributed to the lovable antagonists, such as Col. Klink (to the right of Hogan) who was played by the late Werner Klemperer, who was ironically known for his serious roles before being on the sitcom. And, the late John Banner played Sgt. Schultz (to the right of Hogan).

So, today, we are simply asking just how many episodes were there to "Hogan's Heroes." Is the answer:

A) 157

B) 168

C) 177

D) 181

Things We Learned on Google Today- Latvia's Second Largest City is the Same Size as Roanoke, Va.

On Google today, we learned that the former Soviet republic of Latvia's second largest city, after the capital Riga, is Daugavplis. With a population of between 102,000-111,000, it indeed has the same population as my hometown of Roanoke, Va.

Daugavplis, Lativa, is located on the Daugav River, which is where the city got its name. The city is also surrounded by lakes and nature parks, according to Wikipedia (I have never been to Latvia myself).

As for the country of Latvia, they are known for beer and folk dancing as well as bob sledding, including Mihalis Arhipovs, 26, who competed at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.

It should be pointed out that we had problems getting an image of Latvian bobsledders, so we settled for an image of the Jamaican bobsledding team instead!

This is the tenth entry in our series of former Soviet republics which are now independent countries; the last one we profiled was Tajikistan, which is, assuredly, a long way from Latvia.

Things We Learned on Google Today- When in Tajikistan...

When in Tajikistan, the latest country we are looking at in our series on former Soviet republics that are now independent countries, one should speak Tajik. It is the official language of Tajikistan, and according to Google and Wikipedia, the Persian-type language is also spoken widely in neighboring Uzbekistan.

Here are some other facts about the landlocked nation:

1) The capital and largest city of Tajikistan is Dushande.

2) Tajikistan was part of the Samandi Empire (existed from circa 800-1000 A.D) which also included parts of Afghanistan, Iran and Russia.

3) The Russians Are Coming was perhaps first uttered in 1864 when the Ruskies invaded Tajikistan, which later lead to it becoming a Soviet republic.

4) Sadly, Tajikistan is the poorest country in central Asia, and the country suffered a major famine in 2001.

5) Amazingly enough, there is a small Jewish population in Tajikistan; they call themselves the Bukhara Jews.

6) Tajikistan is a land-locked country that borders Afghanistan, China, Uzbekistan and Krgyzstan.




SIDEBAR: Tomorrow, we will start a special three-part series on the 10th anniversary of September 11th. Among the entries we hope to post is one Marie-Rae Sopper, who was slated to become the new women's gymnastics coach at the University of California-Santa Barbara. She was killed on her way to California aboard Flight 77 which crashed into the Pentagon. Sopper, who was a collegiate stand-out at Iowa State, was 35 years old.

Quote of the Day- Lars von Trier

Today, we begin our series of quotes from famous Scandanavians with a quip from the provoacative, innovative and highly controversial Danish film director Lars von Trier, who has directed plenty of subersive films, usually with over political themes, including "Dogville" with Nicole Kidman and more recently "Anti-Christ."

The later film about a married couple with a fairly messed up, kinky relationship (to put it mildly) starred Willem Dafoe and the great Anglo-French actress/singer Charlotte Gainsbourg.

We are highly jealous of her long-time romantic partner actor/director Yvan Attal, whom she apparenly has never officially married. The couple had their second child on July 16, just five days before Gainsbourg turned 40.

Here is the quote from von Trier, which seems ironic, since one would never accuse him of modesty:

"I grew up in a culturally radical home, where strong emotions were forbidden."

SIDEBAR: As the six people who regularly read this blog know, we have a series that deals with countries that were once republics of the Soviet Union. Tomorrow, we are hoping to profile yet another one of these countries, perhaps Tajikistan, unless we've covered them before.

But, we learned today from the public radio show "The World" (we were alas not able to listen to the broadcast) that the Chu River Valley, which borders Kazakhstan and Krgyzstan, two former Soviet republics with mostly Muslim population that we have featured so far in the series, happens to ironically be a vast haven for marijuana growth!

Weekend Road Trip- Maryland to Tennessee (6 of 20)

Hi kids. Be sure to tell all your friends about out blog to make it worth our time. Hmmm, yes, we are beginning to sound like a PBS station.

Today, we focus on the distance between Hagerstown, Md, home of the Hagerstown Suns (if you left off the 's,' one might think it was the town newspaper!), and Chattanooga, Tenn., home of the Chattanooga Lookouts, which is a reference to nearby Lookout Mountain. But, yes, we were wondering what exactly a 'lookout' is too; is it like some kind of TSA agent? (We hope our friends at the ACLU like the joke, or that someone does!).

Currently, the Hagerstown Suns are in Lexington, Ky., where they will be play the Lexington Legends tonight. The team's next home game is against the reigning South Atlantic League champs the Lakewood Blueclaws, who play in Lakewood, NJ.

The Chattanooga Lookouts are also on the road in Alabama as they are playing the Birmingham Barons, a team that beat them 6-2 yesterday. The next home game for the Lookouts, who are in the Southern League (so they can't play the Suns) is on Monday against the Hunstville Stars from Huntsville, Ala., which should not confused with Huntsville, Tex., where they execute more people than they do in Saudi Arabia (I guess by now, it's obvious that I'm not exactly a right-wing Tea Partier).

To look at the distance between the two cities, we took the address of the Oasis Hookah Lounge in Hagerstown, Md., and the address of the City Cafe (Carter Street location) in Chattanooga, Tenn.

It should be pointed that we are using the Turkish shadow puppets of Karagoz and Hacivat, which are proudly from the city of Bursa, Turkey, instead of the image of a hookah pipe to be kid-friendly and because images of the pipes are surprisingly difficult to hot-link.

And, of course, the choo choo is because Chattanooga is famous for (I think everyone outisde of Tajikistan knows this) The Chattanooga Choo Choo.

So, what is the answer? If you know, I will give you either an eight-track tape of the Oak Ridge Boys' Greatest Hits or a vinyl record from Captain Tanille unless you are related to me, which disqualifies any siblings residing in Goteborg, Sweden (in-joke...hmmm...they may not get it either).

Is the answer:

A) 11 hours and 50 minutes

B) 12 hours even

C) 12 hours and 10 minutes

D) 12 hours and 20 minutes

The answer to last week's question was A) 12 hours and ten minutes. We have no idea which PBS station serves Chattanooga, and we are too lazy/tired to look it up. But, we do know that Maryland Public Television serves Hagerstown, and we wonder if they still show "Dr. Who" reruns on Saturday night!

DC Diary- I Ate a Whole Anchovy Pizza

Well, we were going to give our crew a long-needed and well-deserved vacation, but then I listened to a Newt Gingrich speech on C-SPAN and decided "Bah Humbug! These guys need to earn their $3.22 an hour."

We haven't run into the former house speaker here in Washington, DC, today, but there have been plenty of things to write about.

I've decided it's perhaps best to have a day of reflection, so I will focus on yesterday which was our first official day in the nation's capital.

Along with my mom, my sister Eva and her husband Sven from Goteborg, Sweden, we went out to dinner at Red Rocks, a Nepalese pizzaeira in DC, and after looking over the menu items carefully, I decided to make the most radical culinary decision I made since I ate goat kebab in Denizli, Turkey, some 25 years ago.

I decided to order an 11-inch anchovy pizza! My feeling was: "You know, I am on vacation, and this is one of the few times I've been able to get out of Virginia and North Carolina all year (I live between the two states), so why not get an anchovy pizza?"

It was surprisingly delicious. The pizza also had several cheeses and peppers. And, I drank it down with some tangy pineapple juice.

But, anyone who has gobbled up an entire 11-inch pizza, irregardless of topping choices, should know full well that he or she will pay the consequences for it later that night. Sure enough, I was stuffed and I felt like a walking Sumo wrestler as we walked back to our hotel in Bethesda, Md. (forgive the DC humor which may not go over well to our readers in Tajikistan!).

Incidentally, I saw a guidebook for the remote former Soviet Republic of Tajikistan today, but that's enough for tonight's entry.... I need to go watch some "Sanford and Son" reruns on TV Land, a network I don't get at home!