Greek votes, drinking labels and Sparks of delight – take the Thursday quiz

Ron and Russell Mael arrive at the 74th edition of the Cannes Film Festival. But what does Ron collect? Photograph: John MacDougall/AFP/Getty Images

It is always a good week when the quiz master can say he saw Sparks live, and will be seeing them live again the following week. In between all that excitement, time has still been found to carve out 15 questions of varying degrees of difficulty, obscurity and silliness against which you are welcome to test yourself. There are no prizes and it is just for fun, but let us know how you get on in the comments.

The Thursday quiz, No 109

1. 

   G7: Which Japanese city hosted the G7 summit at the weekend?

   1. Osaka

   2. Sapporo

   3. Kyoto

   4. Hiroshima

2. 

   ΔΗΜΟΚΡΑΤΊΑ: Greece has appointed a caretaker government until a fresh June election can be held. Who is the new interim prime minister of Greece?

   1. Alexis Tsipras

   2. Kyriakos Mitsotakis

   3. Ioannis Sarmas

   4. Sakis Rouvas

3. 

   TWO PINTS OF LAGER AND A PACKET OF CRISPS PLEASE: Which country is to become the first in the world to mandate health labelling on alcoholic drinks to alert people to calorie content, grams of alcohol, risks of cancer and liver disease and dangers of drinking while pregnant?

   1. Ireland

   2. New Zealand

   3. Finland

   4. Japan

4. 

   EUROVISION 2023: The joy continued as four songs from the contest ended up in the UK top 10 singles chart. What was the name of Käärijä's song, the first ever all-Finnish language song in the UK single charts?

   1. Ei Ei Ei

   2. Jalka Jalka Jalka

   3. Cha Cha Cha

   4. Sco Bo Tro No Flo Jo Ko Fo To Do

5. 

   MATHS WITH SUELLA BRAVERMAN: If you multiply the number of points Braverman added to her driver's licence after being caught speeding last year with the number of stints she has had as home secretary, how much do you get?

   1. 4

   2. 6

   3. 8

   4. 12

6. 

   THE ELEMENT OF SURPRISE: A series of questions about all the elements of the periodic table that is already getting boring to set. According to the Royal Society of Chemistry, which of these is NOT true about element number five, boron?

   1. Pure boron is a dark amorphous powder

   2. Boron is essential for the cell walls of plants

   3. The isotope boron-10 is good at absorbing neutrons

   4. Boron reacts vigorously with water

7. 

   ANDY ROURKE: We lost the Smiths bassist last Friday. Which of these is NOT the title of an album released by the band?

   1. Modern Life Is Rubbish

   2. Strangeways, Here We Come

   3. Meat Is Murder

   4. The World Won't Listen

8. 

   WOMEN'S WORLD CUP 2023: Is this round still going? One very much non-football question about every country appearing in the Fifa Women's World Cup this summer. How many cantons are there in the Swiss Confederation?

   1. 13

   2. 26

   3. 39

   4. 1,057

9. 

   WOMEN'S WORLD CUP 2023: The men may be world champions, but Argentina's women have never got past the group stage in a world cup. Juego del Pato is Argentina's official national sport. Which animals did it originally involve?

   1. Horses and a duck

   2. Horses and dogs

   3. Llamas

   4. 30-50 feral hogs

10. 

    WOMEN'S WORLD CUP 2023: Ireland will be making their women's world cup debut. When did the country fully adopt the euro as its currency, with Irish pound coins and notes ceasing to be legal tender?

    1. 1998

    2. 2000

    3. 2002

    4. 2004

11. 

    THE WORLD'S MOST FAMOUS BULLIES, WITH DOMINIC RAAB: This week the former deputy PM would like to know what is the name of Spongebob and Patrick's neighbour who they treat as a friend but who is a dismal grouch and sometimes works against them?

    1. Squidward Tentacles

    2. Squilliam Fancyson

    3. Perch Perkins

    4. Gavin Squidiamson

12. 

    FOR THE LONGEST TIMES WITH DARREN GRIMES: Chris Cameron is heading to Rockall to try and set a new record for surviving on the barren rock. Darren wants to know which is longer – the amount of time Liz Truss spent as prime minister before announcing she would resign, or the current record for surviving on Rockall?

    1. Liz Truss as prime minister

    2. Nick Hancock's record for surviving on Rockall set in 2014

    3. They are both the same

13. 

    ROCKING ALL OVER THE WORLD: Leyton Orient are still the champions of League Two in the English Football League, and the quiz master is still literally in this photo. Kent Teague is on the board of directors at Orient. Kent county council say that its region of England is known as what?

    1. The greenlands of England

    2. The greenhouse of England

    3. The garden of England

    4. The gazebo of England

14. 

    IT'S A DOG'S LIFE: This is Willow, the official dog of the Guardian Thursday quiz. She is thinking about the Essex couple who got an insurance payout after which species escaped captivity nearby and trashed their swimming pool?

    1. 18 ostriches

    2. 18 water buffaloes

    3. 18 kangaroos

    4. One very naughty miniature dachshund

15. 

    IT'S A SPARKS SHOW: Sparks started their latest UK tour in Oxford this week, and of course the quiz master was there. But what is it that Ron famously collects?

    1. Picture disc vinyl records

    2. Pokémon trading cards

    3. Vintage radios

    4. Snow globes

Solutions

1:D - The 49th summit of the group of seven leading industrialised nations was held from 19 to 21 May 2023 in Hiroshima. Pictured is Joe Biden's Air Force One plane refuelling after the trip, by the way., 2:C - The president, Katerina Sakellaropoulou, appointed Ioannis Sarmas, 66, to replace the outgoing prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, whose centre-right New Democracy party triumphed over the leftist opposition in Sunday’s poll but failed to secure a parliamentary majority., 3:A - The health minister, Stephen Donnelly, signed the legislation on Monday and said he looked forward to other countries following the example. Alcoholic drink providers will be compelled to display the information and warnings on product packaging and also to direct consumers to the website of Ireland’s Health Service Executive for further information on alcohol consumption., 4:C - It was Cha Cha Cha, which finished second on the night in Liverpool, having topped the public vote, and should have won. It entered the UK chart at No 6. , 5:B - The minimum penalty for speeding is a £100 fine and three penalty points added to your licence. Braverman has been home secretary twice, so three multiplied by two gives you six. Braverman resigned as home secretary on 19 October 2022 after criticism for breaching the ministerial code by sending a sensitive official document to someone using her personal email address. Six days later, she was reinstated as home secretary by Liz Truss's successor, Rishi Sunak., 6:D - It does not react vigorously with water. It turns out that despite borax being known for centuries, isolating actual boron turned out to be a really difficult bit of chemistry. Stupid boron., 7:A - That was Blur's second album. Paying tribute to Andy Rourke, the Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr said: "Andy will be remembered as a kind and beautiful soul by those who knew him and as a supremely gifted musician by music fans.", 8:B - The official number of cantons was increased to 26 in the federal constitution of 1999, which designated former half-cantons as cantons. Lucky them., 9:A - Now a mix between polo and basketball, the original game involved getting a duck in a basket between ranches while people on horseback tried to get it off you. I guess there wasn't much to do in the long nights of the 18th century., 10:C - The Central Bank of Ireland says: "The Irish pound ceased to be legal tender on 9 February 2002. This brought down the final curtain on a monetary regime which had its origins some 75 years earlier with the introduction of the Saorstát pound in 1927. Although the Irish pound had ceased to be an independent currency when it was irrevocably fixed to the euro three years earlier in 1999, it was the withdrawal of Irish pound banknotes and coin that marked the currency’s departure for most people." Most people includes the Thursday quiz too., 11:A - He is probably not really a bully as such, but more a serial failure and bitter person, which still somehow seems to fit the theme of this recurring round., 12:B - Hancock's existing record is 45 days, just one day more than the "44 days in office" figure usually given to Truss's premiership, which like this question counts her announcing she was resigning as PM as the key moment, although technically the constitutional handover to Sunak took a few days longer. Hancock had hoped to stay on Rockall for 60 days, but "cut his expedition short after losing rations and supplies in a storm". Much like Truss really., 13:C - The council's website says, and we quote: "It is known as 'the garden of England' as a minimum of 75% of the land in each of the 12 districts is undeveloped." We should imagine Cumbria also has similar thoughts., 14:B - The buffaloes, who had escaped from a nearby farm, stampeded through the couple's garden, with eight of the animals taking a morning dip in the new swimming pool, causing more than £25,000 worth of damage to the property. Willow was relieved to hear that the buffalo were rescued unharmed by the farmer, and that it wasn't a very naughty miniature dachshund after all., 15:D - As revealed in the Sparks Brothers documentary, and on their official social media accounts, Ron Mael is the head curator of the Ron Mael Snow Globe Museum. Sparks play Glasgow on Friday, Manchester on Saturday, and have two dates at the Royal Albert Hall in London on Monday and Tuesday. A European tour follows. Their new album is released on Friday. The quiz master loves them and doesn't care that this wasn't really a proper question, it is his quiz.

Scores

1. 0 and above.

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

If you think there has been an egregious error in one of the questions or answers, please feel free to email martin.belam@theguardian.com but remember the quiz master’s word is final and nothing is as good as they say it is.