Withington Pub Quiz League

Ethel stay top despite tying; Bards and Albert win to keep up the chase; Pigs move off the bottom with an impressive away win

Opsimaths lost to Bards

History Men tied with Ethel Rodin

CKC lost to Electric Pigs

Albert beat Prodigals

Latest WithQuiz League Table

History Men tied with Ethel Rodin

A thrilling tie at the Parrswood pegs the league leaders back

Ivor can't tell his Its from his Sweaters

The second of our four consecutive home games at the Parrswood; this time against Ethel Rodin.

This was a very good-humoured battle (we usually offer and expect no quarter) but could it be otherwise with Michael on one side and Anne on the other exchanging comments and quips like volleying tennis masters. We were of course lucky to get the draw (we went second). We found ourselves six points ahead after Round 2 but going into the last round Ethel were a point ahead. In Round 8 the first six players got twos, then I lost my nerve with the 1936 clashes (was it Cable Street or Cannon Street? - then other streets like Cato Street, Sidney Street and Balcombe Street addled my brain) and so I settled for one point. It fell to Greg to get one point for victory with the politically correct term for a brainstorm. Despite brainstorming with his colleagues a correct answer was not forthcoming. This gave us the chance of victory with a steal. Sadly (for us) no amount of cogitation helped. What a shower we are! Stats for the game: both teams got 12 twos; Ethel outdid us in steals (5-3) and it was their bad luck to cop it for 8 unanswereds to our 4.

Sleep grows his homunculi

(R4/Q7)

The quiz itself was done and dusted by 10.00 with few constipators, though not without some reflections on questions that were too hard (for us) or too easy (for them) and the usual dilemma of unbalanced pairs. However, I am never one to criticise the setters as we all know. What a tricky job it is, and if the delicacy presented for our enjoyment means that it is you who accidentally eat the chilli or the bay leaf, then so be it. We always learn something new too - though I doubt the names of small New Zealand towns often crop up in everyday conversation. Worse, no-one remembered the names of our (non football playing) world class sportspeople.

We did enjoy the 'Cold' round - luckily I didn't get the Lana Turner question since I thought she was an 'It' girl - and 'Colditz' might have been a confounder. There were a few traps for the unwary: did anyone else go for The Mystery of Edwin Drood having missed the word 'completed' in the question? Another mystery was how Steve, our expert on 20th century music, came up with the Lonnie Donegan hit Northumberland Gap (these county reorganisations have a lot to answer for) but he redeemed himself with the Bob Dylan lyric and the deceased Iain McGeachy. Plenty of zig or zag questions too: 'Umbrella Man' and 'Babushka Lady' (JFK, or RFK, or Georgi Markov?). David was as always our vexillologist who never fails.

Round of the week was the hidden theme round with album titles. That eluded both teams until the last two questions which is pretty cunning for a setter. QotW? How about the only Englishman encountered in paradise in the Divine Comedy.

Even geekier than pub quizzing

(R2/Q1)

James reports neological info from the British Epilepsy Society

Our game was generally close throughout (but for a couple of rounds where one team won heavily - and fortunately these were shared). The game ended in a tie.

This felt a bit harsh at the time because the very last question was one of the 8 unanswered questions that fell to Ethel. The History Men had only 4 unanswered questions. The fact that every other question in that final round had been very straightforward made the fact that the last question was so obscure all the more disappointing ... and even more so because our answer of ‘lightbulb moment’ was actually a better answer than the totally forgettable real one ('shitshower' or something), which nobody in the room had ever heard of. Our answer kind of fitted the theme, and wasn’t wrong.

(What's more, apparently the British Epilepsy Society long ago gave the green light to the word 'brainstorm' and dismissed alternative neologisms as unnecessary political correctness.)

Overall it was an enjoyable evening. The quiz was pacy and left plenty of time for a good chat afterwards, during which we discovered how the History Men first met each other, and then considered the pros and cons of DNA testing for ancestry purposes. These were two separate topics of course.

"an electrifying guitarist and singer who blurred the boundaries between folk, jazz, rock and blues"

(R3/Q6)

Big Sister's desperate for a wee

(R1/Q3)

CKC lost to Electric Pigs

A high-scoring win for the Pigs gets their season up and running

At last Kieran tells us what he really thinks

We were already dreading the evening when we saw who was setting and the contest met our expectations. I'd better make it clear that the Pigs were very worthy winners and my comments on the paper are not sour grapes. The clear difference between a Charas quiz paper and eating a Chinese meal is that thirty minutes after digesting 64 Charas questions you absolutely never want to repeat the experience.

Playing devil's advocate I could say that spending a couple of hours answering Charas questions makes coming across the patronising piffle published daily by the Guardian (however hard you try to avoid it) seem almost bearable in comparison. However I went cold turkey on the hellscape of King's Place a couple of months ago; my mental health is much improved and I've no wish to descend into that slough of despond again.

The most annoying part of this is that it was the first time we'd seen Bob the Hat in months and I had wanted to build my match report around the charming man's reappearance. That will have to wait for more than a month. He's fine, he's in good humour, he's the best QM in the league and we are very privileged to have him. See you soon (ex) El Presidente.

Best - only - laugh of the evening was when Andrew Pig asked for my nomination for question of the night.

😂😂😂😂😂😂

A Rose by any other name

(R4/Q6)

Albert beat Prodigals

Albert destroy last season's champs racking up a massive 49 points

MOBO reveals he is all over Deadwood

The atmosphere at The Sun appears to have become more raucous since the demise of the owner although it is harder to QM when Eveline fires her gun into the ceiling yelling "Yeehaw Buckaroos" every time she gets a correct answer. Mind you I did find myself getting carried away by the Calamity Jane question:

"Oh the Deadwood Stage is a' comin on over the hill / where the Injun arrows fly quicker than a porcupine quill"

It is a less well known fact that the Deadwood Stage ran from Yankton to Deadwood, and among the sites of Yankton is the grave of Jack McCall, the man who shot Wild Bill Hickcock in the back.

Inside ONE of Northern Lights' Greater Manchester cinemas

(R5/Q3)

Opsimaths lost to Bards

Bards extend their run near the top with a narrow victory

'Shouty' Mike just about QMs his way through in a noisy Club

A very close match, with the Bards just clinging on to win by a single point. I joked with Bard John at half time that the result might be an echo of United's match against Roma the previous evening with the home team collapsing early on and then, against all the odds, snatching victory at the death. I was almost right as it turned out.

Bards Tony, Robin, Jim and John were pitted against Opsis Howell, Charlotte, Brian and Paul in the Club's back room. A flimsy curtain divided us from a very noisy main lounge where football on the telly and an exceptionally noisy (and getting even louder as the evening progressed) group of women did all they could to stifle our aged ears. I was QM and by the end of the evening I think they could hear me in Leipzig so much did I have to shout. I think I did OK but was roundly mocked by the Bards for my Italian and French pronunciations.

As ever it was a very friendly affair with Charlotte's thought-shower at the last not quite enough to rescue the Opsimaths from ending the evening at the foot of the table.

Wood's masterpiece;

Lunch at HWD Components

(R2/Q8)

This week's Quiz paper set by...

... The Charabancs of Fire

Average Aggregate score 76.8

Healthy average scores with plenty of twos to be had. Interesting? Well, in parts. A few slips along the way: there are Northern Lights cinemas in Stretford AND Sale it transpires; 'Corriere' can mean 'Post' as well as 'Courier' in Italian; and 'Enzo' can be an abbreviation for 'Lorenzo', 'Vincenzo', 'Innocenzo' or 'Fiorenzo' according to Google but nowhere does it mention Enrico. On the whole, however we did enjoy this paper unlike ...

1936: Fascists v Anti-fascists v The Met

(R8/Q7)

... so what were Kieran's views ...

We don't like Charas papers, never have, never will. We find them tedious and more than mildly irritating. The Venn diagram showing the overlap between the Charas and CKC has the smallest area of commonality of any pairing in WithQuiz. Tonight was no exception. An avalanche of anodyne TV programmes and so many questions to which the only reasonable response was "who gives a f**k?" As for Enzo/Enrico and Henry/Harry - I think other teams have more spleen requiring venting so I'll leave the column space to them.

Acid Drop flavour were my favourite

(R3/Sp1)

... James' views were more nuanced ...

There were many strengths to this quiz:

The 'Beatles album names' theme was very well disguised - and the final question in that round rewarded those who had worked out the theme. Overall there were lots of solid pairs and plenty of interesting content.

We didn’t mind 'Enzo' and the other Italian questions. Annoyingly we mixed up day and evening for 'della Sera' (on reflection it had to be the same etymology as the French word 'soir'). An occasional set of questions that challenges the traditionally more successful teams and levels out the playing field for the rest is no bad thing.

It wasn’t all good, however. There were a few mismatched pairs (the pretty much guaranteed two points for ER being one example; on paper Green Wing/ER may seem well matched - but when one of these has already been excluded and the exact location of the other is provided, it becomes less so).

Older TV series - like Juliet Bravo, which was decidedly average quality even when first broadcast, and these days is limited to very occasional airing on the most obscure cable channels - are perhaps not fair game to players under 65. Juliet Bravo ran from 1980 to 1985, so anyone aged between 7 and 12 was probably not its target audience back then.

Of course the same argument can be made for books, music, politics and all sorts of things. But in general we acquire knowledge throughout our lives mainly according to things that have been, or still are, culturally or socially significant. Call me elitist, but Juliet Bravo wasn’t either of those things.

Slow eating

(R8/Q2)

... and this is MOBO's feedback ...

On the whole a sound traditional quiz with a wide variety of questions. It appears to have been a good toss to lose since the Prodigals picked up more unanswerables. Some of these contained fascinating info: Dante running into the Venerable Bede; and a puppet turkey competing for Ireland at Eurovision. Our favourite question was the quotation from the Book of Daniel - difficult to answer although it was hiding in plain sight. The aggregate score suggests that it was a fair quiz.

Donegan's mountain pass

(R6/Q3)

Question of the Week

This week Ivor plumps for Round 3 Question 7 ...

Who has the distinction of being the only Englishman encountered in Paradise by Dante in The Divine Comedy?

For the answer to this and all the week's other questions click here.

Bennett's masterpiece

(R1/Sp2)