Delayed games, power cuts and rescued stolen dogs – take the Thursday quiz

This golden labradoodle isn’t a rescued stolen dog, but it has some questions about one who is … Photograph: Louis-Paul st-onge Louis/Alamy

Welcome to the Guardian’s Thursday quiz, which last week unfortunately revealed that when it comes to picture editing, it cannot tell the difference between a gecko and a frog. Never mind, eh? Not many geckos or frogs do the quiz, so nobody was offended much. Since today is Galentine’s Day, and tomorrow is Valentine’s Day, this week’s quiz is very loosely themed around love, friendship, relationships, and that perennial quiz favourite – very naughty little animals. There are no prizes, but let us know how you got on in the comments.

The Thursday quiz, No 197

1. 

   Everybody loves seeing a pop star taken down a peg or two. What did police in India stop from happening this week?

   1. Olivia Rodrigo from using lasers

   2. Sam Smith from going topless on stage

   3. Ed Sheeran from busking

   4. Chris Martin from falling through a trapdoor

2. 

   Which city has fallen out of love with a building that was declared Britain’s best new building in 1996 and is now planning to usher it out the door marked "do one" by demolishing it?

   1. Cardiff

   2. Salford

   3. Bradford

   4. Bristol

3. 

   This is Willow, the official dog of the Guardian Thursday quiz. She heard that a very naughty animal was being blamed for a nationwide power cut in Sri Lanka after it interfered with a transformer, and Willow absolutely loved the mischief of it. What type of animal was it?

   1. A golden jackal

   2. A monkey

   3. An elephant

   4. 30-50 feral hogs

4. 

   Talking of dogs, this absolute beauty was reunited with her Norfolk owners having been stolen more than seven years ago. Awwwwww. What is her name?

   1. Daisy

   2. Petal

   3. Flora

   4. Rose

5. 

   Which pop star loves Eric Morecambe so much that he paid £20,000 for a pair of his famous glasses?

   1. Ed Sheeran

   2. Elton John

   3. Robbie Williams

   4. Ronald Mael

6. 

   Valentine's Day is usually red-themed, and a river in which South American country decided to join in the celebrations thanks to a grim-looking suspected chemical leak?

   1. Uruguay

   2. Bolivia

   3. Argentina

   4. Venezuela

7. 

   Which marriage-wrecking simulation computer game has announced that this year's version has been cancelled due to production delays?

   1. Football Manager

   2. Sim City

   3. Grand Theft Auto

   4. Horace Goes Skiing

8. 

   This is Twiglet, a rescue lurcher that the quizmaster met in the pub on Monday who wanted everybody at the Thursday quiz to adore her snoot and see how well she can hold paws. She wants to know which obscure ancient chocolate treat wrapper was found at Cambridge University Library?

   1. Mackintosh's Golden Cup

   2. Terry's Neapolitans

   3. Fry's Crunchie

   4. Mael's Chocolate Sparkles

9. 

   Which legendary comedy figure this week did not love getting heckled and had audience members ejected from their massive show at Manchester's AO Arena?

   1. Jimmy Carr

   2. Peter Kay

   3. David Walliams

   4. Liz Truss

10. 

    How many points do you get in a standard Scrabble set with the four letter tiles that spell love?

    1. Five points

    2. Six points

    3. Seven points

    4. Eight points

11. 

    Valentine Falls is in which Australian state?

    1. New South Wales

    2. Victoria

    3. Queensland

    4. Western Australia

12. 

    Who played the titular character in the 1989 movie version of Shirley Valentine?

    1. Julia McKenzie

    2. Alison Steadman

    3. Nicola Bryant

    4. Pauline Collins

13. 

    Which of these bands did Courtney Love front?

    1. L7

    2. Bikini Kill

    3. Hole

    4. Daisy Chainsaw

14. 

    Some wags in Denmark have responded to US threats over the sovereignty of Greenland (pictured, Denmark is flatter than that) by suggesting they would love to buy which US state?

    1. Texas

    2. California

    3. Florida

    4. Alaska

15. 

    And finally … estate workers in a UK location where lynx were recently released into the wild are now having to deal with some feral pigs (though not the exact ones in the picture) that have been released into the wild. Where?

    1. Bannau Brycheiniog

    2. Dartmoor

    3. Pennines

    4. Cairngorms

Solutions

1:C - Police said event organisers had been refused permission for the performance, and a police officer walked up to Sheeran while he was singing and unplugged the microphone, presumably to huge relief in some quarters, 2:B - The Centenary Building in Salford was described as 'dynamic and sophisticated' when it won the first Stirling prize, but is now likely to be described as 'a big twisted heap of old broken stuff that's just been blown up', 3:B - 'A monkey came into contact with our grid transformer, causing an imbalance in the power system,' the energy minister, Kumara Jayakody, told reporters, with a completely straight face, 4:A - Kim Walters, an RSPCA inspector, found Daisy, now 13 years old, 200 miles away during routine investigations in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, 5:C - While his recent biopic revealed that nobody in the US had ever heard of him, Williams has concentrated on putting his money where his fandom is, 6:C - Residents near the Sarandí, which runs through the municipality of Avellaneda six miles south of the capital, have long complained about industrial pollution in the area, 7:A - FM25 wasn't going to be ready until March at the earliest, which is too late in the season to release it, so the developers are aiming to launch FM26 in Q4 instead. GTA VI is still, despite the fears of millions of online nerds, slated for later this year too, 8:C - The orange packaging and the price of sixpence indicates that it was produced before 1971, and at some point it fell down the back of some bookshelves, 9:B - One of the hecklers kept shouting 'garlic bread', 10:C - Yes, a V is four points and the other three are one point each, adding up to seven. Of course, in an actual game you might also put them on a special square that would change the score, but now we are over-complicating matters, 11:A - It is in Kosciuszko national park , 12:D - It was written by Willy Russell and directed by Lewis Gilbert, 13:C - The band was formed in LA in 1989, 14:B - More than 200,000 Danes have signed a satirical petition to buy California from the US, 15:D - The animals were first spotted near the Uath Lochans area, close to the village of Inch and only 5 miles from where four lynx were illegally released last month. The sighting of the pigs has prompted further concerns about rogue activists intent on rewilding the Highlands by stealth. So far there have been no signs of any escaped macaques in the area

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 – and can show your working and are absolutely 100% positive you aren’t attempting to factcheck a joke – you can complain about it in the comments below. Why not watch MS 45 by Stella Rose instead?