I grew up watching Jeopardy with my family; it was a family tradition. I remember being amazed by how many answers my parents knew. Every so often, I’d sneak in with the right answer on a sports trivia category. This time together would eventually morph into family Trivial Pursuit (the board game) nights, where I’d team up with mom or dad versus one of my siblings.

I remember as a young adult being over at a friend’s house and watching their family enjoy Jeopardy together too. My friend’s father had a good approach, he would record the episodes on his DVR and then pause the screen after each question to allow everyone time to think and then blurt out their answers.

As I mentioned, I was partial to the sports categories. Although, I always thought it was quite humorous how specific and obscure some of the categories could be. I thought to myself, “Someone out there actually knows the answer to five different questions on 19th-century Danish Composers!?” (The answer is “yes,” and that person is Ken Jennings.) Then there was the inspiration for today’s discussion – Hodgepodge and Potpourri. These were the “catch all” categories where all the unrelated left-over questions could be housed together under one roof, one single header.

There is no common thread that links the four topics (or curiosities) that I’d like to discuss. Each of these topics on its own does not warrant a dedicated article, so instead today we will take the potpourri approach. Here comes a hodgepodge of financial oddities that have piqued my interest.

So, without further ado…

Links mentioned in this episode: