Homophones

____ is a ghost inside my house!

• Their

• There

• They're

Answer explanation

The jiangshi, a Chinese ghost, is known to move with its arms outstretched as it hops toward its victims.

Oh, no! ____ table - it's broken.

• Their

• There

• They're

Answer explanation

Tempered glass can withstand a pressure of 24,000 psi without breaking. A piece that is 11 by 16 inches with a thickness of 3/16 inch can support about 240 pounds.

I heard ___ predicting a long, cold winter.

• their

• there

• they're

Answer explanation

The coldest month of the year in Baytown is January, with an average low of 47°F and high of 62°F.

____ many cooks spoil the pot.

• To

• Too

• Two

Answer explanation

A similar idiom is "a camel is a horse designed by a committee."

___ be, or not ___ be, that is the question...

• To

• Too

• Two

Answer explanation

To be, or not to be, that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

or to take arms against a sea of troubles

and, by opposing, end them.

-- from Hamlet by William Shakespeare

Please provide me with ___ pairs of Air Force 1s.

• to

• too

• two

Answer explanation

The Nike Air Force 1 was created by designer Bruce Kilgore in 1982, and it was the first basketball shoe to use the "Nike Air" technology. Now, over 1,700 color variations have been produced, bringing in an estimated $800 million per year in sales.

She thinks she is ___ cool for school.

• to

• too

• two

Answer explanation

"Cool" meant "cold" as in temperature until the early 1900s when Black artists like Zora Neale Hurston began using it in text and audio media (see her 1935 collection, Mules and Men) to mean "unbothered, stylish," and "fashionable."

It has been _____ time since I've read Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

• a long

• along

Answer explanation

If you haven't read Allie Brosh's description of the Alot monster, you definitely should.

He's the one who likes all our pretty songs, and he likes to sing ____.

• a long

• along

Answer explanation

Kurt Cobain loved the Steven Spielberg film Close Encounters Of The Third Kind and could recite the dialogue off by heart.

Katherine Johnson is one of my personal heroes, ___.

• to

• too

• two

Answer explanation

Katherine Johnson was one of the first three people to integrate West Virginia’s graduate school. Before that, she earned a summa cum laude designation in college where she graduated at just 18 years old. Her most memorable accomplishment; however, is her computational work that contributed to launching mankind into orbit for NASA.