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1. (From John Collins) Why would Sportin’ Life, Rumpole and Columbo make a flush with the King of Diamonds and the Jacks of Hearts and Spades?Ìý

2. (From Mark Frost) Why might one be fearful after a mix-up between Lebanese timbers, a hardcore band of revolutionary fighters, and the status of a holy relic?

3. Music question: Put these folk in order, and say why.

4. Music question: Can you string these together and identify each of them?

5.Why might you have to be wary in the vicinity of a glass and steel vegetable, on the easternmost site of the Normandy landings, or in a classy old Reliant?

6. Which mythical giant might cast an envious eye at Zaphod Beeblebrox, Steve Martin, and a creature described by Iago – and why?

7. How can you turn a virtuoso saxophonist, a jazz drummer and an Egyptian sun-god into a zany, a dummy and a murderer, by simply adding five?

8. (From Tony Atkins) If Portugal was torpedoed and North Africa held a world speed record, explain why Ireland is a Scottish football team.

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We asked why Gavin Maxwell would probably have taken in a Swedish mezzo and two characters from Ben Jonson's Epicene?

The Scottish naturalist and writer Gavin Maxwell (1914-69) is best known for his books chronicling his life on Scottish islands looking after otters – Ring of Bright Water being the best known. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

Anne Sofie von Otter (b.1955) is a world-renowned Swedish mezzo-soprano.

The two characters in Ben Jonson’s play Epicene, or The Silent Woman (c.1609) are the henpecked Captain Tom Otter and his formidable wife Mistress Otter.

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What would Allan Quartermain and the daughter of two Muggle dentists be likely to do to a book?

No need to write or email with the answer - there are no prizes - but you can see if you arrived at the same answer as us, when Tom reveals it at the beginning of next week's edition.