Any questions?

"Lotus, where do you get your questions from?" People sometimes ask me this in-world, and so I thought today I'd share my question writing process with you. Lette has blogged about this already, but what's the harm in a bit of brazen plagiarism? She has also touched on this subject in her interview with Shale and Chadd,, and I was really very impressed with the trouble they take over question writing.

But in an average week I ask 16 questions in each of two Lilly's main events, and then another 20 if I do Early Birds and Night Owls, which is most weeks. So that's OMG, 52 questions every week to write. And with that number of questions my motto has to be "Pile 'em high and sell 'em cheap". I like to run at least 100 questions ahead, and that means I have to keep the questions coming.

So where do my questions come from? I stole one from Gogomodo, and two from a quiz book I bought. All the rest were written with my own fair hands. And, in spite of the impression I might have given you, I do like my questions to be accurate, and I do take some care over framing the question and researching the answer. Wiki I love you so, did I tell you today?

My questions spring from three main sources. Inspiration is good, and sometimes I think of a good question and I write the idea down to frame a question later. But for churning out 25 questions, nothing works better for me than sitting at my keyboard for an hour or two's focused question writing.

My first focused method is my subjects card. I have a card with about 30 subject headings on, and I work through them in turn. So we go history, fashion, exploration, TV, literature, booze, nature... you get the message. It works well for me provided that I don't make the fatal mistake of logging onto SL. SL and serious question writing just do not mix.

And my other method is this wonderful book. The author of "The A-Z of Almost Everything" is a serial quiz show contestant, and it's aimed at quiz compilers. I can just sit and work through the book pulling out questions... films, No.1 singles, fashion designers, bingo calls, sports, capitals, cocktails... and so much else. It's a British book so I have to declare a Cultural Bias Alert, but it gets my questions written.

Oh yes, let me tell you I wrote my 1000th question for Lilly's a couple of weeks ago. I haven't asked it yet, but when I do I'm going to do something special. I'm not sure how yet, but when I do it'll for sure involve lots of Lindens.

OK, I've had enough of her, I hear you say, when is she going to hand out some Lindens? And quite right too, answer in comments please, first right answer gets 10L, paid in-world. It might be a few days before I pay you, but pay you I will. I do, of course, need your SL name to pay you.

What do the letters stand for? (* denotes UK Cultural Bias Alert, **US CBA)

1. 24 HITD?

2. 7 COTR?

3. 10 DS?*

4. 50 WTLYL?**

5. 8 PIAG?

6. 1 RTRTA?

7. 1600 PA?**

8. 12 MITY?

9. 1066 BOH?*

10. 64000 DQ?**

11. 20000 LUTS?

12. 76 TITBP

13. 7 DS?

14. 1760 YIAM?

15. 10000 HIBL?* This one's hard I think, 60L if anyone gets it before I post a clue in 24 hours' time.