2010 Prognostication Quiz: Post #2 (Beauty)

Miss Virginia Caressa Cameron is the new Miss America. She did not deign to list merely "vocal" as her talent, choosing instead to hawk her singing talent as "vocal pop." She did not disappoint, performing pop diva Beyoncé's "Listen" from Dreamgirls.

That means that the answer to Question 2 of the 2010 Prognostication Quiz is B. Some very special variety of vocal. These folks correctly surmised that the judges would not reward just plain vocals this year:

Topher
Ryan
Janette
Rachel H.
Cameron
Beth Z.
Larry
Beth K.
Adrian
Nad

If you took part in last year's quiz, you should give three hearty cheers to Rachel H. She was shut out of the scoring last year, so her first point is particularly exciting this year.

Death

We have our first "official" passing. A. Miep Gies passed on earlier this year, but before the entry deadline, so it didn't count. But Z. J.D. Salinger met his maker last week. That made winners of five people who guessed that the famous author would cease coming through the rye sometime this year:

Pamela
Stephanie
Eric
Peter
Cherie

The breakdown of who guessed whom for the Death question fell mostly according to the actuarial tables (most people picked at least one of A, B, C, or D). Outside of that, Kirk Douglas was a popular choice, perhaps because he has had some headline-garnering health problems (including a stroke in 1996). There was lots of ill will for Billy Graham, too. Everyone was chosen at least once, promising lots of obituary-reading fun this year. Here is the breakdown of how often each person was chosen:

a Miep Gies (20)
b Gloria Stuart (20)
c Mitch Miller (18)
d Harry Morgan (13)
e Barbara Billingsley (4)
f Martin Gardner (3)
g Beverly Cleary (4)
h Sherwood Schwartz (3)
i Yitzhak Shamir (6)
j Kirk Douglas (15)
k Ernest Borgnine (7)
l Zsa Zsa Gabor (5)
m I.M. Pei (1)
n Lena Horne (2)
o Phyllis Diller (1)
p Robert Byrd (8)
q Allan Arbus (1)
r Bobby Doerr (3)
s Betty Ford (5)
t Mike Wallace (3)
u Abigail van Buren (5)
v Nelson Mandela (2)
w Bob Feller (2)
x Billy Graham (12)
y Helmut Schmidt (6)
z J.D. Salinger (5)

Over the two previous years of the quiz, I've had two or three people either try to spell things or make other fun patterns with their answers. With the added alphabetic flexibility at the end of this year's quiz, I had high hopes. Rachel H. gave me a nice raspberry (bbbbbbbbbbbbb), which scored her a point on the Beauty question, but Peter wins the overall award for most aesthetic set of answers. He first submitted a normal entry, but then wrote back to ask that I use his celebration of the first Prognostication Quiz of this decade:

FACED DECADE ANEW

I decided that it was so nice, I let him keep his old answer, too. Peter therefore has a double chance of winning in theory, though he's 0-for-2 so far with his second set of answers.

Leader Board

We have a two-way tie for first place! Both Topher and Ryan have gone 2-for-2 in the first two questions.

2 Topher
2 Ryan
1 Rachel H.
1 Marcus
1 Pamela
1 Cameron
1 Stephanie
1 Beth Z.
1 Larry
1 Eric
1 Beth K.
1 Craig
1 Ron
1 Adrian
1 Polly
1 Nad
1 Janet
1 Keila
1 Gloria
1 Peter
1 Cherie
1 Missy
1 Janette
0 Diane
0 Mary C.
0 Ekrem
0 Zhiqi
0 Megan
0 Mike F.
0 Liz
0 Kevin
0 Leanne
0 Tina
0 Matthew
0 Rich
0 Mary A.
0 Grant
0 Todd
0 Valerie
0 Russell
0 Christopher T.
0 Michael A.
0 Zoe
0 Sarah
0 Carol
0 Ben
0 Rachel F.
0 Ellen
0 Katie
0 Chris C.
0 Peter II
0 Jeff
0 Jan

My new sorting rule for the leader board is based on the tiebreaker. If the current annual change in the Dow is extrapolated to the end of the year, the order people are listed within each total score is the order in which they would win the eventual tiebreaker.

Question 3 Update

The Super Bowl is next weekend, and for the first time in 16 years, both number one seeds have reached the big game. It will be A. New Orleans Saints vs. C. Indianapolis Colts. Of those atop the leader board (with one or two points), Ryan and Beth K. picked the Saints while Pamela, Larry, Eric, Polly, Nad, Janet, Keila, and Peter picked the Colts. If the Saints win on Sunday, Ryan will have first place all to himself with three points. If the Colts win, then we will have a ten-way tie for first with two points each. That's quite a big swing!

Question 4 Update

As the Oscars approach and academy members leak their votes, it seems to be coming down to a close race between A. Avatar and B. The Hurt Locker. Remarkably, Ryan has a good chance to win this one, too, and go 4-for-4 to start the year! He picked The Hurt Locker, which seems to be only a slight underdog to the Golden Globe winner Avatar (with E. Up in the Air a dark horse contender). Those currently on the leader board who picked Avatar include Eric, Cherie, and Janette while Rachel H., Nad, Ron, Craig, and Janet have picked The Hurt Locker.