Skeleton Trivia for Wednseday, 2026-09-23
I can’t believe Mr. S forgot the resource cubes, a critical gameplay component
Hiya Skeleton Crew,
We’re only three days into the new season & we’ve already stumbled upon … MISTER SKELETON’S OFFICIAL POORLY CONCEIVED QUESTION OF THE SEASON™!!!
Answers to Last Time
- My weird rhyme yesterday was tryna get ya to answer conserve, which Wikipedia defines as “a preserve made of fruit stewed in sugar”. But the whole thing kinda depended on conserve rhyming with manoeuvre – & though Rhymezone says it does … I dunno, it seems like a stretch! Anyways, if ya answered compote I gave ya credit, since it seems like a compote is basically the same thing as a conserve, just served as a dish in & of itself, not just done as a preservation method. ANYWAY the folks responsible for this question have been sacked. (OK, not actually, it was ME who was responsible, I did it, & unfortunately if I get sacked then there’s no more newsletter. But I guess ya can email me if ya feel like ya were done dirty by this question.)
- This one was more straightforward: it was Mr. Ingmar Bergman who directed Wild Strawberries.
Today’s Trivias
Trivia 1
If ya take the name Bergman & stuff it with a scrambled Ford & a good, ya get the famous retailer Bergdorf Goodman! (How’s THAT for a segue?)
Bergdorf’s is one of those spots that teevee & movies like to use as an embodiment of “posh New York City vibes”: it’s where the ladies from How to Marry a Millionaire went millionaire-fishin; it’s a favorite shopping spot for Carrie Bradshaw of Sex and the City fame; & it’s the spot where a certain Dudley Moore title character goes for a mood-boostin shoppin spree with his valet & spots Liza Minnelli’s character engagin in a spot of shopliftin. That last one’s the meet-cute from what 1981 movie, which features precisely zero anthropomorphic aardvarks?
Trivia 2
If ya take the name Ingmar & stick it into terraforms, ya get the well-regarded board game Terraforming Mars. The game’s premise is that the players are interplanetary developers who’re … well, they wanna terraform Mars! It’s a pretty straightforward name.
As for the gameplay … well, it’s less straightforward. But nothin to panic over! All ya gotta do is get the most victory points! Easy, right? Ya get those points by doin stuff that makes Mars more liveable: addin greenery, makin the temperature & oxygen levels on the planet juuuuust right, that sorta thing. Plus also there are cards that give ya points. Or ya can claim milestones, those are also worth points. & I guess there are also awards? Though it seems like ya gotta make sure the awards get funded …
OK, so maybe it’s somethin to panic a little about. But I’ve been assured by my pal Milo that the game is VERY FUN once ya have a sense of the rules, which only takes like six or seven play-throughs to really get a sense of.
I will say that, after lookin into this game a bit, I do appreciate the game board itself. It’s got all these real-life Martian features on it, spots like Ascraeus Mons & the Viking landing site & the Ritchey impact crater. There’s even a li’l spot on the side of the board where ya can build a city (they call it a “Space Haven”) in orbit on what largest Martian moon?
OK then
Byeeeeeeeeeeeeee