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Val Draper Cup - Round 2
CKC lost to Charabancs
The handicap system works its magic to see the
Charas through to the semis
 Damian
returns from cruising to get the coach back on the
road
Honestly, I can't leave my lot for 5 minutes whilst
I go cruising the Atlantic (OK it was actually for 2
weeks) and have to read results which include the
lowest score of the season against the bottom team
of the season (sorry, Mike and the Opsis, just sayin').
No sooner back on dry land, and we manage to notch
up only our second win of the year against fellow
Griffiners and old rivals, CKC. Is there a
pattern here or am I just exaggerating my worth to
the team (please don't rush in with any answers).
Efficient conferring and the presence of former
captain Gerry who was our star player of the
evening, notching up three twos, helped us
considerably. The stats read six twos apiece with
the steals favouring us four to three and with three
of the four unanswereds falling to us. In
the event, the handicap played to our advantage as
we would have lost by just one point had it not been
a factor. Still, a win is a win and a
comparatively rare outcome for us these days so
we'll take it, handicap and all! We did feel going
first conveyed an advantage as we quickly built up a
big lead by half time and then saw it gradually
clawed back when CKC went first in the second half.
The points total of 73 just about met the seasonal
average.
Comic offering of the evening was QM Bob mistaking
Benny Rothman, leader of the mass trespass of Kinder
Scout in 1932, for Benny Goodman! For a moment he
had us scratching our heads wondering what
revolutionary activities clarinettist Benny could
have been involved in when not playing his
instrument? We had visions of him leading all
those hikers whilst playing his clarinet, a kind of
Pied Clarinettist of Kinder Scout.
Where the music was born
(R1/Q8)
 Kieran's
Cup doesn't quite runneth over
The cup is never what you might call fun and that
was true in spades tonight. We started four
down on the Charas and hoped for an Opsis trademark
pointsfest which would make overturning the deficit
much easier. Hope made its excuses and left town
halfway through Round One. Going first in the first
half seemed to be a huge advantage and the Charas
led by eleven at the break. However the Opsis are
seasoned quiz setters and they know what they're
doing; we won the second half by eight and the
margin of our defeat was one point fewer than the
handicap - which is always really annoying. Ours
was the only game in which the handicap decided the
result; no doubt an Opsimath spreadsheet wrangler
has taken a measure of satisfaction from that.
Didsbury's History Boy
(R1/Q3)
Martin has gone to the dogs, more or less. His
niece is having her second wedding in the space of
four months - both to the same man before you raise
an Ancelotti eyebrow. This one is taking place in
Taiwan where the groom/husband hails from, so Martin
is dog/cat/budgie/ferret/alpaca/whatever sitting the
family pets in Grimsby while his sister (and the
cousins and the aunts most likely) travel half way
round the world for a very expensive sense of déjà
vu. David and I therefore played alongside
the league's real youth policy; young Liam® (just
turned thirty) and even younger Thomas. Lowering
the space mutts average age to well below fifty
helped us not one bit as a paper more suited to
curmudgeonly old gits unfolded throughout the
evening. Musicologists Liam and David duelled
collaboratively over their Beatles knowledge with
Liam just edging it for knowing about Alan Civil's
other horn solo. David almost matched him on the
harp but even this expertise and the points garnered
were not enough for us to get the win.
The past rearing its ugly head in Spain
(R3/Q1)
Our dire situation after three rounds was such that
we were staring down the barrel of having to set two
quiz papers in three weeks and I was staring very
hard at the spectating and partly responsible Lord
Bath. Time for this curmudgeonly old git to get
moving and reel off five successive twos thereby a)
bringing some respectability to the score, b)
relieving the league organiser of a dilemma and c)
dropping Ethel right in it - sorry guys. Mind you I
had made a total bollocks of the Factory Records
question in Round One so I owed my doggie team mates
something.
Jaw-dropping, sense-mangling moment of the night was
discovering that Boney M had recorded a version,
incomprehensibly described as "excellent" in the
question, of No Woman, No Cry. Only WithQuiz
can come up with this sort of information and often
I wish it wouldn't. I wasn't sufficiently
anaesthetised by Joseph Holt's best bitter to check
it out at the time but, foolishly, have done so
since. It's exactly what you would expect - awful.
If you can't resist rubbernecking musical car
crashes and you have an ample supply of Class A
drugs to hand then out there on YouTube is Barbra
Streisand 'singing' Life on Mars. Really I
swear it's true, she actually did that, and don't
blame me if you clicked on the damn link.
We have another game next week in the Parrs Wood and
we hope we'll have a special guest in our line up to
take on Tony and co, such is the stuff from where
dreams are woven. Meanwhile what passes for prayers
in our kennels will be offered that Arsenal will
continue to be utterly useless for another four days
- at least.
Maybe that's why the roof leaked
(R3/Q7)
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Very first Ballon d'Or
(R6/Q2)
History Men lost to Albert
Relative league positions win out at the Parrswood
to favour the Albert
 Ivor
celebrates Eveline's football knowledge
A
night of great success: we do not have to set the
questions next week as lowest scoring losers, and we
duly progress into the Plate semi finals.
The
game tonight was close (28-28 at the end of Round 6)
but the Albert pulled away in the last two rounds.
Albert had already won before the last pair so sadly
Eveline, answering a football question correctly for
the first time ever, was just icing on the cake
rather than the unexpected winner in Fergie time.
It was
a lively evening with the Albert being even more
raucous than ourselves. Perhaps this was due to
Jeremy, in his mustard coloured corduroys tonight,
being demob happy (he joins the ranks of we retirees
soon), and Captain MOBO sitting far back in the
audience (of one) unable to administer any necessary
discipline. However we always play fairly and
there were several occasions when total silence
enveloped us as a player was cogitating - the kind
of silence only experienced when a gallery of
Britons (not Americans) are watching a player take a
vital putt (though not followed up by whoops of
“You’re the man” afterwards). Ian and Ashton
were the Albert’s stars (4 and 5 twos each) with
Anne in Seat 3 as our MVP. She would have done even
better had she asked herself: "Would Sherpa Tenzing
really have turned up at Olive Shapley’s door?”
Ubu Imperator
(R6/Q8)
There were only five unanswereds. Sometimes theme
rounds can run out of steam by question five when
only dull, or obvious, or very hard answers, or none
at all, are left for the compiler but that was not
the case tonight. The Excel-lent round
exemplifies how best to set such a set of questions.
I was lucky to get the whooping cough question
because PERT is a word that only springs to mind
with the meaning (according to Wiktionary dating
from the 14th century) “of a part of the body,
well-formed, shapely” rather than the Wikipedia
article “PERT" (program evaluation and review
technique). I am now better informed but no
wiser about four parameter beta distribution and
excess kurtosis. We also like whimsy and there
was just the right amount with the German CO (R2
spare) and the local pub assistant (R1 spare).
I think MOBO would not have controlled any guffaws
even with the Paddle of Rebuke. The other
thing the Historymen like is history and although
the Gallipoli campaign eluded an answer we enjoyed
the 'What, Where and When' puzzles. Anne also had
happy memories of Benny Rothman (R8/Q5) whom she had
met in later life. Our most embarrassing
moment was trying to remember the track that Alan
Civil played on (R8/Q1), especially as we ourselves
had set that very question (in a different format)
only two weeks ago. Vanessa rescued us, though
admitting: “I should have read the paper”.
"Your day breaks, your mind aches"
"Leaving the note that she hoped would say more"
(R8/Q1&2)
Prodigals beat Ethel Rodin
Our league champs make short work of their handicap
to go through
 The
Prods came back from the brink of extinction says
Michael
A few weeks ago at the Ladybarn Club, Greg
pronounced confidently: "We'll get you in the cup.
We always do". And so it proved, as Ethel
brought a four-point handicap advantage with them to
the club. For the first few rounds anyway, it
felt like a lot more than four points. Indeed, it
was not until Round 6, which the Prodigals won 9-1,
that we entertained any thoughts of winning, with
only John's dredging of some inspired answers
keeping our heads above water. The gross score on
the night, therefore, did not reflect our
experience; we thought we were packing our bags for
season.
The Schlieffen Chicken
(R2/Sp)
Electric Pigs beat Bards
The Pigs knock up a stonking 48 points to storm to
the semis
Meanwhile back in Blighty history was moving on
(R5/Q5)
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This week's Quiz paper set by...
... The Opsimaths
Average Aggregate score 78.5
As
one of the setters I know I'm not allowed to pass
comment on this week's paper so I turned up at the
Griffin (CKC v Charabancs) and jokingly told Bob
that I was there as a sort of WithQuiz 'Of-QM' to
check on the standard of QMing (Bob used to be a
headteacher so he appreciated that - and indeed told
me a few Ofsted tales from his own back catalogue).
As
ever Bob was excellent. He was clear of voice,
patient of repetition and made everyone feel welcome
at the start. We forget sometimes how much we
owe Bob and his likes each week. He even had
some comforting words for Fr Megson in the light of
the Donald's recent blasphemies (come to think of it
Gerry owes us a few apologies from down the years
for his own blasphemies - but there we are).
Bob's
only slight hiccup was confusing everyone by having
Benny Goodman playing his clarinet atop Kinder Scout
in the 1930s. But of course we forgave him his
trespasses!
The Maiden's Tresses in NW Scotland
(R5/Sp2)
P.S.
As I sat listening to Bob intone the questions last
night, my mind wandered off to the back room at the
Albert Inn (now the Fletcher Moss), sometime in,
say, the mid 1970s. There down the right hand
side around that long table sat Seamus, Olive, the
Dalai (or Dazza as we used to call him) and Nicholas
Hytner arguing the toss, when in strolled Bob fresh
from his gig at the ABC on School Lane. Wonder
what their conversation was? "Can you tell
those f***ing quizzers to shut up? They think
they own the place!" I think we have the
makings of the lyrics for a new song there -
Didsbury Pie maybe?
Didsbury boozer
(R1/Q2)
...
so what was Damian's view ...
Tonight's paper was set by the Opsimaths who have
traditionally been our favourite setters. We
usually do well on their questions. There was the
usual variety on offer with especially good rounds
on Didsbury and the 'What happened on this date in
history' round. We didn't manage to guess the hidden
theme but found the chicken-related round amusing.
...
and this was Ivor's verdict ...
We all enjoyed the quiz tonight with its varied
themes and formats, and questions composed so that
there is always a chance of coming up with the
answer.
...
and Michael T's ...
As for the quiz itself, a sense of dread befell us
(well, Richard and me) over the first few rounds, as
questions about old, local things were apt to
confound; indeed, I think Round 2 was the first I
can remember where I genuinely had no clue as to any
of the eight answers. Things definitely picked up,
though. The 'Who, What, Where?' round was a nice
innovation, while nobody can complain about getting
questions on subject matter as diverse as Tractarian
theology, West African civil wars, and celebrated
guitarists.
Question of the Week
Looking on at the Griffin one of the highlights was
watching both teams in turn trying to fit the parts
of a musical instrument into the frame of a chicken
(or vice versa). "Don't violins have necks?"
"Does a cello have a breast?" Neither team
navigated their way to the actual answer - and when
Bob read it out there was a great "of course!" - so Round
2 Question 3 gets this week's 'Ballon de WithQuiz'
...
Although maple
and oak are sometimes used, hickory is the most commonly used
wood to make which parts of a musical instrument? Metal
and carbon fibre are also occasionally used.
For the answer to this and all the week's other
questions click
here.
No need to forgive his Trespass
(R8/Q5)
... and also
One
of the traditional moans of the WithQuiz grump is
that we are all getting ancient together, we've got
no new players and the league will die with us.
Well
... nonsense!
I'd
like to think that the Opsimath line up over the
past couple of seasons has demonstrated otherwise,
and this week at the Griffin Liam and Tom showed how
the average age of serial league winners, CKC, has
dropped a decade or more and still left the team
ultra-competitive.
.. she's the true trespasser
(R5/Q8)
Over
in Ladybarn too, Ethel's team has shown some fresh
faces with Michael and Rob joining the line-up.
Rob is Professor of Political Science at Manchester
University and lately a regular voice on political
shows and podcasts across the airwaves nationally;
he's a sort of slightly more kempt version of
Sir John Curtice - who Rob knows well and has
worked with frequently. In such turbulent
political times its crucial that both the students
and the wider public have an expert to make sense of
it all. Well, Rob's your man.
This
week my colleague, Don Berry and I welcomed Rob to
our ALL FM radio show (Vintage FM) where he told his
story (and selected his music - he loves R.E.M. as
it happens). It's a good listen. Catch
it
here.
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