Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 24/10/12

Albert and Ethel notch their first victories of the season; the usual suspects occupy the top 3 places

Results & Match Reports

The Bards carried on their winning ways against Compulsory Meat Raffle at the Cricket Club.

Prodigals lost out at home to the History Men for whom Ivor shone with 7 twos, only being denied his perfect 8 by the 'Wrigley's Gum question' - what a bummer!! And Ivor's take on the match?

"It was a family night out for the Prodigals with Anne-Marie, her brother Danny and brother-in-law John facing questions from her sister Stella with only Cheryl representing the Bassett clan. Still I suppose a quiz night out beats staying at home speaking to your family. We played our game in the echoing fastness of the Albert Club snooker room and managed to survive an invisible tsetse fly invasion that almost nobbled a member of our team. As always in our meetings laughs all round, no doubt aided by the questions themselves."

The Electric Pigs lost the Fletcher Moss derby to Albert. Mary reports:

"Albert is celebrating its first win of the season over The Electric Pigs. It was very close all evening - both teams went into the final round level on 36 points."

The Men They Couldn't Hang ended their long run of victories against Ethel Rodin who got their season off the mark at last.

The Charabancs of Fire sank in the first half but fought their way back in the second half to come within 7 points of I Blame Smoke Fairies in a very high-scoring evening at The Turnpike. During the course of the evening the usually staid Fairies submitted their own team logo (see the 'Team Details' page for a gallery of logos submitted to date). The official title of the Fairies logo is 'Tinkerbell smoking weed'. I rather like it!! Any more logos?

Quiz Paper Verdict

This week the setters were The Opsimaths. It was a 'reet auld points fest' with an average aggregate of 84.0 - and 91 points being scored at the Turnpike where the Charas entertained the Fairies. Easier than last week (average aggregate 52), but plenty of fun nonetheless. Reviewers were largely happy with their evening's entertainment.....

Ivor from the Albert Club....

"The quiz gets an AAA rating from both teams. A high scoring affair, loads of interesting themes and questions, and only 5 unanswereds. Of the 27 twos Anne-Marie and John got 5 each, and I made up for my poor performance last week by getting 7. It was only the Wrigley Spearmint Gum that foiled me. We considered that answer but rejected it because it didn't have an obvious bottom connection - I should have remembered HOW DEVIOUS CERTAIN QUESTION SETTERS FROM THE OPSIMATHS CAN BE!!!!

This quiz sets a high benchmark for future papers - unfortunately our, as yet, embryonic offering will be first such to be delivered next week."

and James from the Parrswood....

"A very good quiz; straightforward and uncontroversial! Close until half time, but Ethel ran away in the second half to avoid a buttock clenching finish. Very few unanswereds - 8 in fact with a 5-3 split; Ethel getting the bum deal. The 'Danny Boy question' gets the guffaw of the week, and I suppose QotW! I was hoping for 'what is the Latin word for an old crone?' but maybe 'anus' would have been a bit of a tight answer. Anyway, this bunch of old farts finally got our season off to a start."

Not quite so ecstatic from the Fletcher Moss, Mary reports...

"Teams thought the quiz a bit patchy with the Mount Horeb and Wrigley's gum questions particularly obtuse examples of their respective themes."

but Anne-Marie was unequivocal...

"Beautifully constructed quiz. Well done to The Opsimaths for a great quiz (as usual)."

The Question of the Week

This week Ethel and The Men vote for Round 7 Question 7:

In 1910, an English lawyer Frederick Edward Weatherly wrote the lyrics for Danny Boy ("Oh Danny Boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling"). What tune were they set to in 1913?

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

Chatterbox

Taking into account the feedback received via the message board I sent the following email to Andrew Frazer concerning the proposed National Quiz 'Umbrella' organisation:

"I posted your email on our site when I first received it. Comments to date have not been very enthusiastic. We have a good relationship with the neighbouring Stockport Quiz League against whom we play friendlies and a ‘South Manchester Knockout Championship’ (our top 4 teams v their top 4 teams) each year. We have a number of members who have participated, or are participating, in various TV Quiz shows (Dave Rainford, the new Egghead, is one of our number). The TV show researchers beat a regular track to our door as it is and frankly most of us do not have the time or the inclination to zip off to sit in studios for hours on end. Good luck with your enterprise but I don’t think it’s for us."