Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 12/02/14

Results & Match Reports

The History Men lost to The Bards at the Red Lion. Ivor reports....

"It was a dark and stormy night, resulting in the Bards missing Steve, and us missing Anne. Our last meeting with the Bards ended in a victory for them by a single point. Tonight, given our recent form of consecutive ties, we were hopeful going into the final round only three points adrift; but once again we had an implosion to end up with a resounding defeat. There were 12 unanswered questions, breaking 7-5, and an unusually large numbers of steals (9 each), but the reason for the large margin of victory was the 11 twos scored by the Bards, to our paltry 6. Tony and Jim were on notable form tonight!"

At the new, improved White Swan Ethel Rodin just squeaked past Albert by a single point. James sums up:

"Down to the wire with the final Blockbuster question to Ethel. 'Give me a 'P' Bob.' After toying with poker and penis (possible contenders for 'Answer of the week') Ethel plumped for the correct retort and had their winning way."

Compulsory Meat Raffle scored a comprehensive victory over The Men They Couldn't Hang at The Turnpike. Graham gives us his take on proceedings:

"The Hangers were comprehensively beaten by the Raffle tonight at the Turnpike. QM'd by Lizzie 'Holly Golightly' Mitchell, the Raffle romped into a 9-1 first round lead which the Men were never (not a hope in hell) able to come back from. Question of the night from the majority of those at The Turnpike was 'Bingo Blockbuster' Question 6. My favourite though was the Half Man Half Biscuit question which gave me the opportunity to explain to the Raffle how mallen-streaked Dickie Davies used to present sport on a Saturday afternoon on ITV - with Kent Walton and the wrestling at 4.00 from the Bilston Hall Wolverhampton featuring Jackie Pallo, Mick McManus and Adrian Street (who lived just down the road in a flat on Queenston Road). Happy days!!"

The Prodigals lost to I've Never Been to One. Prodigal with her words, Anne-Marie sums up: "Interesting quiz from the Charas. We were well beaten by INBTO who were on top form." Unusually Kieran remains mum. Perhaps the wind came down and blew his words away.

Down at the The Fletcher Moss the home team, The Electric Pigs, kept in touch with The Opsimaths in the first two rounds but then gradually slipped behind to suffer eventual defeat. To an onlooker like me (the City game being called off), the most obvious feature of the match was the herculean task undertaken by QM, Mary, in getting any of the 8 players to hear, and then understand, the questions. The Charabancs' elegant and weighted, prosy text ended up being mangled in a sort of desperate game of Chinese whispers. For the first few rounds in the room on the left at the front (the usual venue) a group of a dozen pub crawling semi-deaf students were belting out increasingly drunken judgements on everything and nothing. Repairing to the snug on the right Mary's 'hearability' factor increased a tad but still struggled against the background ambient noise level.

As the average age of the WithQuizzer creeps ever upward so, seemingly, does the average noise threshold in our local pubs. The days of a few learned drinkers testing each other's knowledge competitively as a prelude to dissecting the problems of the world are long gone. What next? Laser projections of the questions onto the pub ceiling? Competitors issued with wifi buzzers? Armed QMs? Watch this space!

Despite (maybe because of?) all the effort that had to go into the delivery of the questions the match was the usual good-natured affair with the paper being much appreciated by both sides. There were a number of mutterings along the way of "well, I think that's definitely 'Question of the Week'" which is always a good sign.

Quiz Paper Verdict

This week the paper was compiled by The Charabancs of Fire.

An excellent well-constructed paper was enjoyed by all. The breadth of territory covered was prodigious and the variety of styles fully entertaining. I did hear a little grumble at the Fletcher Moss that the length of the Round 3 ('Father Megson wanders around Europe') questions made life a little more trying in the already challenging atmosphere (see above) but these grumbles were outweighed by the fun of the clues in this round. This style of round was (I think) pioneered by Opsimath Brian who, a few years ago, constructed a round to describe his trip from pub to pub around the centre of Manchester. As now seems to be the Charabanc rule, Rounds 7 and 8 were given over to a game of Bingo Blockbuster ensuring the quiz evening ended on a popular high. Great stuff!

Elsewhere Anne-Marie comments:

"My favoutite question was Bingo Blockbuster 'RTBC'. What a brilliant song! As soon as I got home I had to get it on Spotify. Did make me feel very old though. I remember seeing Ian Dury and the Blockheads circa 1981 at the Apollo."

...and Ivor...

"Quiz itself moderately hard but agreement all round that the questions were interesting. Tony, of course, has an aversion to 'pick your own rounds', and even the 'blockbuster' format, but tonight his team had the knack of picking the right questions!

QotW from Bards was the Thatcher Home Secretaries one but we quite liked (getting our own and a steal) the pair of Winter Olympic years. Most quizzers are well up with the summer games but the winter questions are as slippery as a luge run."

...and James from the Ethel Rodin/Albert match...

"From the QM chair it seemed to me a very good quiz - with very few unanswered questions. It's worth pointing out that two of the league's team names appear (kind of) in Pig SeMen - which was actually a finely crafted question, and my own pick for QotW."

The Question of the Week

This week the Pigs and the Opsimaths unanimously cast their votes for Rounds 7 & 8 (Bingo Blockbuster) Question 15 (the answer starting with the letters 'V' & 'A'):

Identify a pair with little in common except for the fact that both are commemorated by sculptures within a hundred yards or so of each other in Manchester. The 'V' was first concocted at 19 Granby Row by John Nicholls in 1908, and the sculpture of 'A' shows him about to reveal his nakedness at the most revelatory moment of his life.

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

Chatterbox

Next week we take a break from the relentless round of League matches and (some of us) dip our toes into 'Europe' for the semi finals of the WIST Champions Cup and the A-Trophy. The Charabancs so enjoyed the prospect of setting this week's league paper that they volunteered some weeks ago to set next week's WIST paper as well (many thanks Gerry & Co.).

Those WithQuiz teams involved in next week's matches (The Bards, INBTO, The Prodigals, The History Men and Albert) note that - with the exception of Albert who have WithQuiz opposition - whether you are home or away you are responsible for collecting the question paper from the Red Lion. Finally if anyone wants a QM the Opsimaths have been eliminated from the WIST competitions and I'd be happy to officiate - just give me a shout.

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Fellow members of the WithQuiz Eggheads team.....

Still heard nothing from Mr Egghead. Seems a bit late now if we are to be called up to Glasgow. But as soon as I hear I'll let you know.