Wrong names, cancelled Games, and Taylor Swift’s mispressed album – take the Thursday quiz

Taylor Swift performing in Denver, but who was on her recent vinyl album by mistake? Photograph: Tom Cooper/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management

Is it Thursday? Yes. Is it a quiz? Yes. Is it a very sensible set of 15 questions about recent news events, peppered with a few jokes? Well, sort of. There is a bit of general knowledge and random nonsense sprinkled in to the mix, some hidden Doctor Who references to be spotted, two pictures this week of the official dog, and also a Pokémon. It is just for fun and there are no prizes, but let us know how you get on in the comments!

The Thursday quiz, No 117

1. 

   COULDN'T GET AHEAD: Which railway company in the UK is being forced to re-record some of its onboard train announcements as it has pronounced station names wrong?

   1. Avanti West Coast

   2. ScotRail

   3. Wales & Borders

   4. Northern Trains

2. 

   LAST ORDERS: Which Australian state has cancelled hosting the 2026 Commonwealth Games, throwing into doubt the whole future of the enterprise?

   1. New South Wales

   2. Western Australia

   3. Victoria

   4. Queensland

3. 

   DISNEY'S DREAM DEBASED: After much secrecy, the English title for Hayao Miyazaki's latest film for Studio Ghibli finally emerged. It is called The Boy and … what?

   1. The Boy and the Swan

   2. The Boy and the Goose

   3. The Boy and the Heron

   4. The Boys and the 30-50 Feral Hogs

4. 

   DOG IS LIFE: This is Willow, the official dog of the Guardian Thursday quiz, hiding under the sofa. Yes, that is a complete set of Tintin books in the picture too. She knows that someone in California has been aggressively snatching surfers’ boards. Who?

   1. A dolphin

   2. A sea otter

   3. An orca

   4. One very naughty miniature dachshund

5. 

   DOG IS LIFE (SLIGHT RETURN): A town in which European country is to pilot a DNA database for dogs so that owners who don't clear up after their pet has pooped can be traced?

   1. Germany

   2. France

   3. Switzerland

   4. Sweden

6. 

   A PAST GONE MAD: Which EU country has this week raised the bloc's largest flagpole (very much not pictured), which at 111 metres tall is hoisting a 1,110 sq metre flag (also not pictured)?

   1. Finland

   2. Ireland

   3. Portugal

   4. Bulgaria

7. 

   HIT THE NORTH formerly NORTH OR SOUTH WITH THE POKÉMON MEOWTH: Which of these islands or groups of islands is furthest north in the Atlantic Ocean?

   1. Azores

   2. Canary Islands

   3. Cape Verde

   4. Madeira

8. 

   THE DIRECTOR NEVER YELLED 'CUT': That is a Sparks song from 2008. Directors won't be yelling cut because both the Screen Actors Guild and the Writers Guild of America will be on strike at the same time in Hollywood for the first time since when?

   1. 1948

   2. 1960

   3. 1974

   4. 1985

9. 

   WOMEN'S WORLD CUP 2023: It is the final week of these non-football questions about the countries in the Fifa Women's World Cup this year, because the football should already have started before the quiz was published. European champions England are among pre-tournament favourites. When did England first LEGALLY adopt God Save the King as its national anthem?

   1. 1760 for George III

   2. 1820 for George IV

   3. 1901 for Edward VII

   4. It never has

10. 

    WOMEN'S WORLD CUP 2023: The US are the reigning world champions. The first and second amendments to the US constitution still feature in political debate today. But what did the third amendment of the US constitution concern?

    1. Quartering of soldiers

    2. Excessive fines, cruel and unusual punishment

    3. Jury trial in civil lawsuits

    4. Search and seizure

11. 

    THE ELEMENT OF SURPRISE: A round of questions about each element in turn. We've reached element 13. What is element 13?

    1. Aluminium, as it is officially and correctly spelled by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, and therefore also by the Thursday quiz

    2. Helium

    3. Silicon

    4. Sulfur, as it is officially and correctly spelled by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, and therefore also by the Thursday quiz

12. 

    CLASP HANDS: Who is going to be appearing digitally in a musical based on the songs written by the pop production trio of Stock Aitken Waterman?

    1. Rick Astley

    2. Jason Donovan

    3. Kylie Minogue

    4. Mr Blobby

13. 

    THE WORLD'S MOST FAMOUS BULLIES, WITH DOMINIC RAAB: This week the former deputy PM would like to know what is the name of the hectoring vice-principal who is keeping "The Breakfast Club" in Saturday detention in the 1985 movie?

    1. Vice-principal Richard Vernon

    2. Vice-principal Peter Venkman

    3. Vice-principal Dixon Bainbridge

    4. Vice-principal Gavin Williamson

14. 

    GLAM RACKET: Who became Wimbledon’s first unseeded women’s champion in the Open era at the weekend?

    1. Markéta Vondroušová

    2. Aryna Sabalenka

    3. Elina Svitolina

    4. Iga Świątek

15. 

    REBELLIOUS JUKEBOX: Taylor Swift fans have been getting a dose of a different type of music due to a mispressing of her new album which went viral on TikTok because it actually contained …

    1. The haunting sounds of the works of Igor Stravinsky

    2. The avant-garde electronica of Cabaret Voltaire

    3. The grime beats of Skepta

    4. The whimsical beauty of Kate Bush

Solutions

1:D - Quiz colleague Helen Pidd reported that it has so far pledged to put the “e” back in Burneside (currently, wrongly, silent); put the Ass into Aspatria (currently said with too much emphasis on ‘spa’, Northern believes); and pronounce Cark & Cartmel more casually, as local people do – Cark-n-Cartmel. This sounds worse than when TfL made the buses in Walthamstow pronounce George Monoux as if he was French, rather than George Monucks., 2:C - In an announcement which the Commonwealth Games Federation understated as “hugely disappointing”, the Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, said the cost of hosting the event had blown out to A$7bn from an earlier estimate of A$2.6bn. Ouch. It isn't entirely clear that "the Olympics but only for former British colonies and also Team GB competes split up for some reason" is much of a 21st-century proposition, despite the Birmingham event last year generally being considered a success., 3:C - Fans of the celebrated director queued outside cinemas in Japan early on Friday morning to be the first to see the Oscar-winning animator’s first feature film for a decade – and had no idea what to expect. Speculation about 君たちはどう生きるか (How Do You Live? in Japanese) had been building for months, not least because it is expected to be the last by the 82-year-old, who spent five years making the film after reversing a decision to retire., 4:B - Authorities are particularly concerned about one sea otter, known as 841, who was involved in multiple incidents and can be seen in a video relentlessly gnawing on a board that the aquatic mammal scared a rider off of. Reports that a note reading "I am not a number, I am a free sea otter" has been found nearby are yet to be confirmed., 5:B - Dog owners in the southern French town of Béziers are to be required to carry their pet’s “genetic passport” after the dog is given a free saliva screening. Those subsequently stopped without their dog’s genetic passport will be fined €38 (£32.60) and uncollected poop will be tested and attract a bill for street cleaning of up to €122. Willow has made no comment, knowing full well that money, bureaucracy and cleaning up poop are all human activities., 6:D - Meant to symbolise Bulgaria’s territory of 111,000 sq km – an incredibly precise round number – the giant Bulgarian flag takes the flagpole crown from Finland, which has a 100-metre pole. “This won’t make Bulgarians richer but it will raise people’s spirits,” said Simeon Karakolev, 45, somewhat optimistically., 7:A - Cape Verde, Madeira and the Canary Islands are all off the coast of the African continent, whereas Azores is at a higher latitude roughly in line with the Iberian peninsula., 8:B - It was in 1960 that the two unions were last both on strike at the same time, when the Screen Actors Guild was led by notorious militant lefty union leader and workers' rights firebrand *checks notes* Ronald Reagan. You can tell from the look on his face that the Ronald in the picture thinks you should have known that., 9:D - England does not have its own national anthem, and indeed, the singing of God Save the King or God Save the Queen to represent the UK comes from custom and practice, rather than any formal constitutional arrangement. Which means we could definitely collectively change the anthem to Vindaloo or Tubthumping or Born Slippy or something with a bit more oomph to it., 10:A - The amendment simply states: "No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law." The cost imposed of quartering British soldiers was one of many factors that led to the declaration of independence., 11:A - In 1812, a British scientist, Thomas Young, proposed the name aluminium instead of aluminum, which he thought had a "less classical sound", and every single subsequent pedantic comment about how it should be spelled can be pinned on him. And do not start wanging on about sulfur again or the whole class will get detention., 12:C - I Should Be So Lucky: The Stock Aitken Waterman musical is written and directed by Debbie Isitt and Minogue, currently enjoying a massive summer hit with the gorgeous Padam Padam, will “digitally appear” throughout the tour of the show., 13:A - You will never convince the quiz master that the "makeover" in the film of the moody goth one was any kind of improvement on being a moody goth., 14:A - The unseeded Czech completed a magical fortnight by defeating Ons Jabeur, the sixth seed, 6-4, 6-4 to become a grand slam champion for the first time., 15:B - "Please help me,” pleaded Rachel Hunter on her TikTok video as the sound of ominous drones hummed beneath a robotic voice repeatedly asking: “The 70 billion people of Earth … where are they hiding?” on the Cabaret Voltaire track. The answer of course being they were probably all in front of you in the Ticketmaster queue to get tickets for Swift's tour.

Scores

1. 0 and above.

   We hope you had fun – let us know how you got on in the comments!

If you really do think there has been an egregious error in one of the questions or answers, feel free to email martin.belam@theguardian.com, but remember your time would be better spent watching Sparks live in an NPR tiny desk concert.