Day 135 (4 October 2011) - 'There are more questions than answers...

...pictures in my mind, something, something, something' etc.


No idea what that song is, but takes me back to a Question of Sport when it used to be on a Tuesday night with Bill Beaumont and Willie Carson.


The reason for the quote is (fanfare please) - Task 11 - Win a Pub Quiz (Kat).  Ta-dah!!!!


I have always loved a quiz.  I can clearly remember sitting in front of the TV as a wee nipper shouting the answers to Celebrity Squares and Sale of the Century at Bob Monkhouse & Nicholas Parsons respectively (who were on said TV - they never popped round for a Scotch Egg and a Bird's Trifle).  I've also been blessed with the ability to retain random facts (although I've noticed this has declined in recent months - possibly something to do with a corresponding increase in alcohol consumption!) and have always loved learning new things.  Why just this week, I've learned the following:


1. The actor who plays the eldest child in BBC sitcom Outnumbered, is the real-life son of legendary porn star, Ben Dover
2. Tyburn, the site of many hangings throughout history, includng the marvellously named Perkin Walbeck, is actually at the present site of Marble Arch
3. Both Matt Cardle and Liam from One Direction (or Wand Erection) only have one kidney


In short, I like to think of myself as a poor man's Rain Man with slightly better teeth - but sadly only with the ability to remember inane facts rather than really important stuff.   From the Sunday night pop quiz at the Larwood and Voce pub under Trent Bridge cricket ground, Nottingham, which I barely missed in two years (and where a fishman would rock up during the interval to be greeted with standard cry of 'don't be alarmed ladies, it's only the fishman' and 'got any crabs on ya, cock?') via the Monday nights at the Unicorn, Trumpington, to Thursdays at the Volunteer, Cambridge, I've always loved a good pub quiz.  Since living in London, however, I've probably only been to about five in thirteen years - most of which have been with the very, very clever Kat who's a bit of a quiz whizz (she'd be one of my 'Phone a Friends').


Over the years I've won a few (not many, but a few), come close several times (most notably during a work quiz night where we lost because I couldn't remember the term for a collective noun of rhinos - I kept smashing my fist into the other hand saying 'it's a smash, a thwack, a collision or something'...it's actually a crash) and have never come last; or if I have I've blocked it from my mind along with the denim jacket, my impressions of Margaret Thatcher and art classes.  If I haven't ever come last, this is because, and let's be honest here, a surprising number of people in this country have little or no general knowledge at all - think Jade Goody -  so there’s usually one team of thickies.  Of course, this can be quite amusing, particularly if answers given are truly awful.  To this day few things make me laugh more than the list of terrible answers from Family Fortunes.  My favourites are as follows:


A number you might have to memorise - seven
A slang word for a girl - slag
A song from the Sound of Music - Dancing queen
Something you open other than a door - your bowels
A dangerous race - the Arabs
A kind of ache - filet-o-fish (??)
Something that flies that doesn't have an engine - a bicycle with wings
A bird with a long neck - Naomi Campbell
...and my all-time fave:
Something red - is it my cardigan?


Fortunately, Steven, Piggy and I didn't come up with anything quite so inane when we found ourselves at the weekly quiz night at the Arab Boy, Putney's oldest pub apparently!  Despite having lived within a stone's throw of the pub for five years I'd never been inside as it always looked like the sort of place where everyone had their own seat and where some old soak would be sitting at the bar having arrived for a swift half in 1972.  I was, however, pleasantly surprised as it turned out to be terribly pleasant with a typically Putney-esque middle-class clientele, a landlord and quizmaster who looks like Dennis Norden and, of course, the cheek to charge £2.50 for an orange juice and lemonade.


Having surveyed the competition, which included a team of older people all peering over the tops of their specs (which I always take as a sign of intelligence), I'd decided that we weren't in with much of a chance, so having paid our £1 entry fee and christened ourselves 'Piggy's Trotters' we decided to get involved in some burgers.  But when the sheets were handed out and it was announced that one of the rounds was 'Pop Music' I began to think that we might just challenge for UEFA Cup if not Champion's League. 


There were five rounds in total:

1. Famous Restaurants - Steven is a big foodie, so I thought we might be OK here
2. Famous Buildings - hmm, not so confident although between the three of us we are quite well travelled
3. Famous scientists -  I looked firmly in Piggy's direction on this one.  He responded by attempting to hide behind his bap.  Not a sign of confidence
4. Famous No 1 hits - my home territory.  When it comes to music I am borderline autistic.  So much so that I have to confess to having kept a written record of every Top 20 chart since 1989.  That last sentence alone probably goes further to explaining why I'm single than anything!!  I confidently suggested we play our joker (double points) on this round
5. Famous People Aptagrams - what's an aptragram I hear you cry?  Well it's an apt anagram.  This is the sort of round which drives a man to drink (probably why pubs first started holding quizzes).  There were ten of these bad boys in total.  See how you get on:

• (sportsman) TAKEN IT FOR A RIDE
• (actress) NO ALIENS DARLING
• (politician) IM AN EVIL TORY BIGOT
• (leader) HE BUGS GORE
• (actor) OCEAN IDOL OR A DRIP
• (personality) ASCEND IN PARIS
• (actor / director) OLD WEST ACTION
• (scientist / inventor) AHA IONS MADE VOLTS
• (leader - dead) UNS SAID HES MAD
• (19th century heroine) ANGEL OF THE RECLINING

..answers next time.


To be honest we didn't think we'd done that well.  Steven played a blinder on the aptagram round, so much so that I fully expect to see him on Channel 4 in the near future asking for 'two from the top and four from anywhere else you choose'.  He also came up trumps on the restaurant round, where I was sadly lacking (but only because none of the answers was The Brewers Fayre).  Piggy also made some telling contributions including the introduction of ketchup to the quiz sheet (mucky pup).  When the scores finally came in we'd done as follows:

1. Famous Restuarants - 7/10
2. Famous Buildings - 6/10
3. Famous Scientists - 5/10
4. Famous No 1 Hits - 20/20 (joker played). 
5. Aptragams - 9/10

Total score - 47, which amazingly was enough to secure the £40 first prize.


I would say I was proud of securing top marks in the music round, but when I tell you that the answers included Mr Blobby, Clive Dunn, Steve Brookstein and the Macarena, you'll understand that my sense of pride is tinged with that of sheer embarrassment.


Having collected our prize to a polite ripple of applause and some murmerings of 'bastards' coming from the bespectacled table, we took the following celebratory shot

We donated the £40 to Steven's Rob Roy Challenge fundraising efforts and ambled home with a sense of pride in a job well done and another challenge ticked.


PS I won't mention that we returned last week and got trounced!