Wow! Big turnout at the Lion & Crown in Allen last night. The joint was hoppin'! Cold
weather makes you want to come inside, get warm on your outside and your inside, too!
And what a fantastic game we had! The competition was incredibly fierce with a five
way tie right out of the gate in Round One! The action was really like a real race,
with a pair of ties in Rounds Two and Three, then a lead emerged in Round Four with a
tie for second position, only to be followed by a three way tie for first in Round Five!
Round Six produced another tie for second! We didn't get a break out until the final
round with a solid delineation of winners. Whew!
A great big congratulations is in order for Beer Logic, who won first place after a very
long dry spell of victories. Well done, John and team! (Just for posterity, I posted
three pix of youse guys!) Street Smarts, those sassy contenders, snagged second place
prizes while Stealth Texas got a solid third.
A big welcome to newbies Win or Booze, a plucky duo who joined in the fun and whom we
hope will play again. Welcome back Jarvis, and bone up on that pop culture stuff! And
it's always fun to see the Rockafellers do their thing. The Deadly Alliance landed
outside the winner's circle this week. Unusual for them, but most unusual of all,
irregulars, Shredder Squad also defied the odds because whenever they show up, they
usually win or place. Not so last night. A bad Double-or-Nothing left them goose egged
in Round One, a move that handicapped them for the rest of the evening. A spate of
failed DoN's afterwards (in a bid to bridge the point gap) created a devil-may-care
strategy that put them last. Oh, the ignominy...
Our Picture Round, Acting Presidents - Identify the movie/TV show featuring the fictional
president - produced the night's best style point answer. Michael Douglas' turn as
prez was misidentified as Commander-in-Love! After a nice guffaw on that brief meditation,
Quiz Master Lou led a toast in honor of the passing of Mike's illustrious dad, Kirk, who
just recently passed at the venerable age of 103. With raised hand (I didn't have my
imbibement with me on stage), I invoked, "I'm Spartacus!!!" Which produced the desired
results.
Have a liberating weekend.
Our KTPQ had us going Thursday night at the Lion & Crown in Allen when we kicked off the
General Knowledge Round with What is the first Federal Holiday of each year? One might
ask, what constitutes a Federal Holiday? Actually, someone came up to Quiz Master Lou
and did just that. And I said, "You know, the banks and all the federal government
offices are closed." And he said, "Yeah. That's what I thought." That's when Quiz
Master Lou thought, "Why are the Fed offices and the banks closed? Are the banks part
of the government? Is it because of the FDIC thing? Is the Federal Reserve part of
the government? Is a financial collapse/reset actually going to occur? Who'd win a
boxing match between Maynard Keynes and Friedrich Hayek? My recently invented drink,
the Chief Petty Officer, needed a refill. And somebody spoke and I went into a dream..."
I was sitting at the large, boardroom table of the Very Big Corporation of America when
Harry said, "That's right, yeah. I've had a team working on this over the past few weeks
and what we've come up with can be reduced to two fundamental concepts... One, people are
not wearing enough hats and two, Matter is energy. In the universe, there are many energy
fields which we cannot normally perceive. Some energies have a spiritual source which
can act upon a person's soul. However, this soul does not exist ab initio, as orthodox
Christianity teaches, but has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self
observation. However, this is rarely achieved owing to man's unique ability to be
distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia."
And then I was back at the pub again and Steve was tugging on my elbow saying, "What was
that about hats, again?" But it came out as "Reprinted without permission..." Stealth
Texas won the night with a carefully placed Double-or-Nothing. Deadly Alliance (aka
Blood, Bath & Beyond) took second while Street Smarts took third. Thanks to newbies
Whiskeypedia and Dante's Inferno for playing. Have a great weekend, everybody!
Wow! History was made at the Lion & Crown in Allen last night! Tie breakers are common
enough in this game, and this quizmaster in particular marveled when he had his first
three way tie breaker a while back. But never has Quiz Master Lou presided over a four
way tie breaker! Incredulity and amazement! And yet, the numbers don't lie. There it
was... Four teams tied for first place with 40 points each! The tie breaker question
was able to sort out the order, with the winner who got closest to the number getting
first place and all others winning second and third in descending order. If any team
went over, they were out. That possibility did not occur fortunately, and an orderly
spread of numbers was presented from each team. QM Lou's only dilemma is how the score
spread is going to display in King Trivia's 'If-Then' calculator. (Incidentally, the
tie breaker question asked, "What was the longest kiss per Guinness World Records?")
Stealth Texas got closest, then Deadly Alliance (aka Blood, Bath & Beyond), then team
Rockafeller, narrowly acing out the Ninja Turtles. Whew! Speaking of history, last
night's quiz was pretty heavy with some dandy history and literature questions. From
Napoleon to Homer, it was a fairly brainy set and the crowd loved it, even though their
confusion was evident.
Thanks to newbie teams Michael Scott Paper Company and Sisters for playing. We hope
you'll return. Thanks to Jarvis, Too Drunk To Remember and The Bald and the Beautiful
for coming back. Shout outs to Incognito, Beer Logic and Street Smarts!
Have a mellow weekend brothers and sisters. And in the immortal words of Jed Clampett,
"Y'all come back now! Ya hear?"
* Won Tiebreaker
