Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 18/02/09

In tonight's clash of the Titans SPW outgunned the Charabancs making themselves odds on for yet another league title

The Results

Ethel Rodin just kept their noses in front at the White Swan against the History Men - Ivor writes:

"The Stadium of Murk had jazz upstairs tonight. The thumping of (presumed) dancing led to some intermittent ethereal flickering of the fluorescent strip lighting - but at least it is less of a health hazard than the concomitant darts. Ethel Rodin were never behind, racing to a 6 point lead at half time. The History Men edged closer towards the end so that it was delicately poised. Then the last pair of questions were 'unanswerables' and it was all a bit anticlimactic."

At the Griffin SPW came out on top against Charabancs of Fire in what will probably be viewed in a few weeks time as the league title decider

Snoopy's Friends (happily with a recovered Sheila back in the team) notched up a comfortable victory against TMTCH

X-Pats trailed at home to the Getaways who recorded the highest score of the night - Clive comments:

"Cheryl very proudly sang her answer to the British Grenadier question. Just as well it wasn’t down to me as I only know the schoolboy version!!"

Albert lost the derby match at the Fletcher Moss to the Electric Pigs

The Paper

This week the questions were set by the Opsimaths.

Well, a mixed reception after last week's universal thumbs up for TMTCH. Tony thought it a "b. awful" paper. At the Griffin it was pretty well received by both SPW and the Charabancs - though (acting as QM) I decided to read a spare rather than use the trick question referring to the Mount Rushmore sculptures as a 'Rock group'.

The Pigs certainly liked it citing "Mary's wonderful diction" as a major factor. Perversely they thought the 'Rock group' question was QotW.

The Getaways clearly flourished notching the evening's highest score. They thought the Carlsberg Special question was a corker.

Meanwhile at the White Swan Ivor reports in:

"The idea of mini bingo was interesting. It certainly speeded things up as there was less toing and froing through several sheets of paper as is the case with larger groupings of bingo questions. It also allowed the harder questions to gravitate to one round. In our case Round 6 was a killer with 6/8 unanswerable by anyone and the only points scored being two 'steals'.

Did we enjoy the quiz? Plenty of tricky questions, some falling right and some not (e.g. the Portsmouth districts fell to Peter from Portsmouth). On balance, however, a good test. As always you never quite enjoy it as much if you lose - and tend to reflect on the ones that got away such as my guess of 1530 for the union of Wales with England. Had I said 1531 and got 2 points the game would have swung our way.

A few questions tonight deviated from the straight road of traditional quizzing towards the convoluted paths of Round Britain Quiz. Our QotW is one of these atypical questions; namely the rock group with its members dead and one assassinated (it certainly earned a groan).

Tonight's result makes the race for 4th place at least a 3 (if not 5) horse race."

....and Ivor's opposite number in the Ethel/History Men clash, Roddy, adds:

"We answered 'Tottenham/Battle hymn of the Republic' for the question about football chants, which to our chagrin was disallowed. Surely everyone knows that Spurs supporters began singing this chant in 1960!! Some discussion ensued after which we were refused a spare by the History Men. Retribution was immediate since they chose for their very next question the one about the rock group, which should have remained in the Christmas cracker.

The biggest cheer of the evening came when Roz answered a football question correctly (Thierry Henri).

Apart from the horror of Round 6 there were seven unanswered questions which seemed reasonable."

The Question of the Week

This week the vote comes from Snoopy's who opted for Round 3 Question 6:

What part does sodium ricinoleate play in British television history?

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

Chatterbox

I've had an email from a guy living locally who fancies joining one of our teams. His name's Dave Call. He's seen the website and is keen to have a go. He reckons he can get about 15 of our questions right most weeks (sounds OK to me). If you want to contact Dave I have his details - just let me know.

Fr Megson

I am the Walrus

SPW's Freudian nightmare fails to materialise.....for now

Relax, guys. nobody is going to steal your trophy - this season at least - .....but don't cancel all your visits to the shrink just yet, it has not gone unnoticed that your projected walrus-image is grievously lacking in the tusk department..........

Fr M.

(Ed: Not for the first time I find it hard to understand what Fr M is driving at here - unless the 'W' in SPW stands for Walrus. If so what do the 'S' and 'P' mean?)