Christmas quiz: 2009

1. "I'm finally beginning to learn how to paint," said Gordon Brown in January. Who was he quoting?

2. What became, in February, America's longest-running prime-time TV series?

3. Swimmer Michael Phelps, former tennis player Andre Agassi, baseball star Alex Rodriguez. Who's the odd one out?

4. Who in September was made the first freeman of Ennis, County Clare, 140 years after his great-grandfather left there for the US?

5. Which thriller series from the late 1960s and early 1970s, starring an actor who died in November, began life in 1967 as the Armchair Theatre play "A Magnum for Schneider"?

6. According to reports, whose April viewing included Raw Meat 3 and By Special Request?

7. What did Carrie Grace controversially reveal on live television?

8. In June, which city beat Los Angeles, Venice and Cannes to become Unesco's first City of Film?

9. Rachel Wardell, a 35-year-old housewife from Sleaford, Lincolnshire, was the first. Emma Burns, a 30-year-old medical photographer from Darlington, was the last. To do what?

10. In July, which stadium became the 100th to stage a Test match?

11. Ruppy the beagle was the first of a batch of clones produced in South Korea in May. What was special about them?

12. Who left the county in September after a 2-1 defeat by Morecambe?

13. Jacques-Henri Lambertye and Lady Pat – widely seen as fictional versions of whom?

14. Who did Dr Les King and Marion Walker follow in November?

15 Who, it was revealed in the autumn, has 16 trains and 19 stations reserved for his exclusive use?

16. Which pop duo, which finally split this year, were sampled by Eminem for his song "My Name Is" and once opened for Led Zeppelin?

17. What came back to life in Switzerland in November after 14 months of inactivity?

18. What did Richard Wright win?

19. Irene of Greece, Sea Horse of Lebanon, Lynn Rival of Great Britain. What's the connection?

20. Of what did JG Ballard, who died in April, write "this massive concrete motion-sculpture is an heroically isolated fragment of the modern city London might have become"?