It Costs an Arm and a Leg
The Ask a Silly Question
by Randy Cohen in
GAMES July/August 1981
Fit as a fiddle ... quick as a wink ... as smart as a whip.
Common phrases we use without a second thought. But did you ever
stop to think just how fit a fiddle is or how quick a wink is?
Or just how smart is a whip?
Below are fourteen overworked
expressions; see if you can guess their literal meanings. May
you be as wise as an owl -- or have the luck of the Irish ...
1. How blind is a bat?
A. Totally blind
B. Partially blind
C. Venetian blind
D. It depends upon who's swinging it
2. How long a way is it to Tipperary?
A. 4,410 miles from Knsas City
B. just west of Gore
C. 3,381 miles from Manhatten
D. 358 miles form Gloccamora
3. How cheap is a cheap joke?
A. $2 million dollars per episode for prime TV Comedy
B. "Take my wife -- please!
C. $45 per joke on The Tonight Show
D. Free if you steal them
4. What is the cost of an arm and a leg?
A. A leg of lamb costs $11.50 per pound
B. The Bionic Man's arm and leg cost 3 million dollars
C. Venus de Milo's recently discovered arms were
auctioned for four and a half million dollars
D. At a mannequin supply house, legs go for $20
5. How much is a bellyful?
A. 8 quarts for a pregnant woman
B. 2 quarts for the average adult
C. Mr. Pleacher expounding on any math theorem
D. 5 quarts for the average male
6. How many is as many as the hairs on your head?
A. For brunets like Ronald Reagan, about 200,000
B. For red heads like Lucille Ball, about 75,000
C. For blondes like Goldie hawn, about 140,000
D. For ex-catchers like Joe Garagiola, about 55
7. How early is the early bird?
A. It rises about a half hour before dawn
B. It rises at sunrise
C. It gets up whenever the worm does
D. It always takes a 6:00 AM wake-up call
8. How high is the moon?
A. 153,758 miles from earth during a new moon
B. The equivalent of 3 billion McDonald's cheeseburgers stacked end to end
C. Not too high -- a cow jumped over it
D. On the average, 238,857 miles from earth
9. How deep is skin deep?
A. 2/3 to 3/4 inch deep
B. 1/16 to 1/8 inch deep
C. It varies -- some people are thick-skinned, others thin-skinned
D. 7/4 feet for an elephant
10. How slow is a snail's pace?
A. Brazilian tree snails move one foot per minute
B. Darned fast when Julia Child eyes it hungrily
C. Land snails move about two inches per minute
D. As slow as most Amtrak express trains
11. How fast is greased lightning?
A. It varies with air temperature
B. 186,00 meters per second
C. 299,792 kilometers per second
D. 2,000,000 miles an hour if it's greased with Crisco
12. How heavy is a ton of bricks?
A. 2000 pounds
B. 1000 pounds
C. about 5 bricks
D. who cares ...
13. How would you drink if you drank like a fish?
A. Like Dean Martin
B. You wouldn't
C. With fin-esse
D. Till you're stewed to the gills
14. How light is a feather?
A. Duckfeathers weigh .013 to .063 grams
B. Downfeathers weigh upwards of 3 to 4 grams
C. Horsefeathers is ligh entertainment
D. The rare feathers of the Rara Avis weigh about .00001 to .00002 grams