How to get your spouse to answer any question

I think honestly that it's different for a husband and a wife. Speaking from the woman's point of view, and having been married for 20 years which seems like a lot for many, but not many years for someone like my parents who have nearly been married for 50 years, or my Grandmother who recently passed away and had my grandfather still been married would have been married for a little over 70 years.
I am married to a man who is very hard to get into a conversation. It didn't take me long after we were married to realize that if I wanted to get him to tell me about his day that I had to ask item specific questions, and that if I wanted information about different things than I had to ask them separately because a long winded sentence with a lot of different questions or a lot to have to siphon through would usually get a general answer that maybe had just a few words. In other words he lost interest real fast.
So what I've learned in a nutshell is 1) Make sure he's not watching television or doing something else that has his attention already 2) Make sure he's not tired 3) Make sure you don't provide a long winded story or event that really didn't catch his interest before you ask a question or you've lost his interest and he's not going to give you an answer that you want to hear, and you may find yourself agitated and feeling like he doesn't care or he isn't interested in you and you end up not feeling happy, and - and - and...... 4) Keep the question simple and to the point remember it's not that he is stupid or doesn't care it's just that he's wired differently and he's not on a mission to upset or hurt you - he's just wired differently 5) If this is an extremely important question and requires a sit down companion to companion answer don't ask him until you know that you and he can sit down face to face without any interruption ie; cell phones, home phones, television, mp3 players, children, other people around. Eliminate them all and sit down and ask him, let him know it's important enough to you that he listens and that you get his undivided attention and that you need his input.
Overall I don't think these things are any different for either one of us really. Husbands - you're not going to get a very good answer to a question if we are rushing around making dinner, or chasing two year olds around, if we are involved in a book, or a movie it's not usually a good time to ask a question.
I think most of all it's important to remember how much we love this person, and respectful to one another. I think we need to talk to each other every day just sit and talk for a half an hour. Ask question about the other persons day, for at least a half an hour a day. This advice I received from a good friend of mine who is a professional marriage and family therapist. It's made a huge difference in my relationship with my husband. We make sure we sit this time aside everyday and that we do it when there is nothing else going on that can interrupt that time. It's made us better communicators, we trust each other when we talk to each other and we have learned to become better listeners. Build on those two things, keep dating, and I guarantee that everything else will come into play.