Skeleton Trivia for Tuesday, 2026-05-05
Vattene in convento!
Hiya Skeleton Crew,
¡Feliz Cinco de Mayo! Disfruta de unas enchiladas con mole en honor a la victoria mexicana sobre Napoleón III en la Batalla de Puebla.
¡O no! No soy tu jefe.
Answers to Last Time
- Before he did the voice & mocap for Jar Jar, Ahmed Best was a performer in STOMP.
- The Bertolt Brecht play that Ian McDiarmid starred in back in ’13 was Life of Galileo, which was about … well, the life of Galileo Galilei, don’tcha know?
Today’s Trivias
Trivia 1
Galileo’s daughter Virginia is a significant character in Herr Brecht’s Life of Galileo. In the play she gets engaged to some fella – but the wedding gets CANCELLED on account of her famous father’s famous dust-up with the Catholic Church. All very dramatic!!
But also: all very FALSE. ’Cause she ACTUALLY got shipped off by her dad to a convent at the age of 13! Mr. Galilei apparently thought she was inadatta al matrimonio (a.k.a. in English as “unsuitable for marriage”).[1] So off she went!
I caught up with her a few years later, actually. Of course, by that time she was goin by her religious name, not Virginia. She chose a very clever new name, in my opinion, ’cause it kinda referenced both her original name plus her pop’s interest in astronomy.
One other li’l fun fact ’bout Galileo’s daughter is this: she had the same name[2] as a mysteeeeeerious ship that was found floatin off the coast of the Azores in 1872.[3] Didja hear ’bout that one? The ship was floatin ’round, totally deserted, no sign of the crew anywhere, the hold still full of the industrial-strength alcohol it was carryin from NYC.
Can youse guys tell me what was that ship called?
Trivia 2
Ya might remember I mentioned the four Galilean moons of Jupiter yesterday, i.e., Ganymede, Callisto, Io, & Europa. They’re also the four largest moons of Jupiter; the fifth largest is a moon called Amalthea, named after the caprine creature that nursed ol’ Zeusy when he was just a li’l guy.
The horn of Amalthea (the mythology one, not the astronomy one) is another name for what mythological object/symbol that – contrary to what some folks think – has never appeared on the Fruit of the Loom logo?
OK then
Byeeeeeeeeeeeeee
His words, not mine! & believe me, I tried to convince him not to do it. I said, “Gigi”—(that’s what I used to call him, short for G.G., get it?)—“Gigi, don’tcha think it’s kinda rough to ship off a thirteen-year-old kiddo to a convent just ’cause YOU had her outta wedlock? Like, if I’m bein honest, that kinda sounds like more of a YOU problem, y’know?” Uff da! He did NOT like hearin that. ↩︎
(modulo a spellin variation) ↩︎
In the original version of this trivia, I suggested Galileo’s daughter might be the namesake of the ship. But a little extra checkin ’round makes me think that, nah, that’s probably not right. Which makes this connection a lot less interestin – less of a “fun fact” & more of a “kinda random coincidence”. Ah well! Didn’t keep me from writin this question, though. ↩︎