Withington Pub Quiz League - quizbiz 14/01/15

Even Steven at the top of the table as Ethel and The Bards take a tumble, and the Opsis and the Donuts win

Results & Match Reports

Ethel Rodin slipped up against Albert at the Ladybarn Club and thus dropped down one place in the table - from second to third. With the season just one round of matches past the half way mark there are now four teams equal on 16 points at the top. Score differences could well be the deciding factor this season - and on that measure the Opsimaths have hit the front. Might Albert also join the scrap for first place, being just three points behind the leading pack?
James offers a perspective from the losing camp....
"Ethel lost quite convincingly. Never really got going. We probably got the tougher half of the questions but Albert were worthy winners."

The Electric Pigs beat The Men They Couldn't Hang at the Fletcher Moss. Andrew's succinct summary....
"Very entertaining quiz. Good fun opposition. In Gerry's words 'a very good quiz - and I don't say that often!' And question of week round 6 question 7. Indeed this was both the question and answer of the week as Dave Barras managed to work out the answer drawing an appreciative round of applause from all present for his logical train of thought."
Graham, however, saw things in 1956 Queen Motherly terms...."And approaching the line it's Devon Loch with its nose in front from the Electric Pigs ..... Devon Loch has led from the off .... Devon Loch ..... Oh no, he's fallen over ..... again."

In the second shock result of the night The Bards of Didsbury lost at home to the three-handed Prodigals. Prodigal Danny describes it for us....
"Arguably the shock of the season as a depleted Prodigals manage to fluke everything and run out comfortable winners. We were minus Anne-Marie, Mark, Ed and Egghead Dave tonight, but were lucky to find a quiz that suited us rather than the mighty Bards. We lost the toss and were put in first. As it turned out this was a huge advantage and by half time we had run into a 27-16 lead. Early points on the board proved vital as we could only manage 5 points in the last three rounds! A fun night with the Bards as most gracious hosts."

The Charabancs of Fire lost to a rapidly recovering Dunkin' Dönitz. Kieran tells the tale....
"The awesome foursome reunited at last. Barry is so well on the road to recovery that he's considering returning to work, whilst David's just about getting over the Christmas lurgy that has spoiled the festive season for so many. Our fifth successive victory and our most convincing of the season - we even have a positive points difference now!
We were somewhat disturbed during the evening to discover we were being observed from some Theresa May wet dream control room above the bar. When Barry tried to vape he was immediately told to stop on the orders of 'Humphrey, the miserable bastard who owns the place'. At least that's what the barman called him. When Barry, who is presumably now on every no-fly and watch list in the western world, and myself, went outside to (in his case) vape where we are still allowed such pleasures, we noticed that said miserable bastard doesn't have his name above the door or anywhere else outside the Turnpike. Could m'learned friend - yes I'm looking at you Tony - enlighten me as to whether this is still a legal requirement. And, if it is, the dispossessed nicotine addicts and state-sponsored spying victims may well be tipping the wink to Greater Manchester's finest very soon. While I'm on about it, just what liberties are we still defending? I didn't see a single Gauloise lit in anger on Sunday's march but I did see myriad human rights abusers walking in defence of freedom of expression.
Still it was a very decent evening. There were plenty of points on offer and many interesting questions to be answered."
Damian sums up for the losers....
"Despite me being forced to wear a woolly hat from New York which Roisin optimistically assured us would bring good luck, the Charas' positive finish to the first half of the season quickly came to a shuddering halt as the reality of the new year, the second half of the season, and a resurgent team of Dönitzers, swiftly kicked in! Our esteemed opponents started off with a lead which steadily increased with time. It was all we could do to claw back a half-time deficit of 16 points to a slightly more respectable 11 by the end of proceedings. Once again, the team from The Griffin with the ever changing name had well and truly stuffed us. Now we will have to wait until 2016 to get our revenge!"

The Opsimaths trotted out a comfortable victory over a three-handed Compulsory Meat Raffle at the Albert Club. A delightful evening with Liz, David and, of course, Rachael who quickly scotched the rumour that she and Adam might have moved from the 'engaged' status to the 'hitched' status over the Christmas break. Christmas 2015, I gather, is more likely to be the date!
During the course of Round 3 Rachael was able to confirm (what I'd thought hitherto was an urban myth) that the King of Rock & Roll did indeed step onto British soil at Prestwick Airport in Scotland on his way to Germany as a GI. She knows for sure because her Aunt Carol, who at the time was some senior official in the UK branch of the Elvis fan club, was at the airport screeching her adoration and the family have a photo to prove it. Furthermore, confirming her status as Didsbury pop royalty, Rachael let on that her Dad (a session guitarist at the time) played on the Kinks' recording of Waterloo Sunset. Less convincingly, however, she was a 'Pop Flop' in Round 7 when she failed to answer the 2013/4 question about someone called George Ezra clearly designed by the History Men with Rachael in mind. Apparently he's not 'contemporary'.
On the Opsimaths side of the fence, hot from his victory on Monday's Only Connect, Nick starred again with 6 twos. The greatest laugh of the evening came on the 'Choose Your Own Subject' whisky question. I'd been begging my teammates to leave this one for me throughout Round 7 expecting a nice Scottish island reference or some such. When it came to my turn and I chose the question, Ivor (our excellent QM) let on that actually David not Tim had set this one and it was about Welsh whisky. I was mighty grateful to have Howell on hand to provide the answer. Welsh whisky, whatever next?

Quiz Paper Verdict

The paper this week was set by The History Men.

Most of you agreed this was an excellent start to 2015. Plenty of variety and interest with idiosyncrasy given its head in Round 6 (which nevertheless provided the Question of the Week). The target average aggregate of 75 (a bit of a hostage to fortune maybe) was missed but only just (72.2 was the overall average aggregate across all the matches). There were a few worthy nominations for QotW which is always a good sign. Whether every participant went home having scored at least one '2' (another hostage to fortune stipulated by the setters in the paper's preamble) I can't tell.

In the Opsimaths/CMR match I think Liz was the last of us to get a two and she got a good round of applause when she did. As well as the question in Round 6 that won the QotW vote (see below) we particularly liked the Round 7/8 questions about US Women and US Geography. Both were on our QotW shortlist.

One slight gripe: the two pictures of French composers were unnecessary. No-one in our match recognised either (and I doubt whether anyone in any of the other matches did) but we did get both answers right based on the information read out. Shouldn't recognition of a picture always be a key component of getting points for a picture round question?

Other comments....

Kieran:

"A very decent Historymen paper and we pretty much hit the projected aggregate score though sadly one of the eight went home without a single two to cherish.

I have to say that Ivor (I assume it was the protestant streak in him coming out) is taking a serious risk in mocking all 18 of the holy foreskins of the Messiah. You may think this sort of thing is funny Mr. Cartmill but I'm pretty sure that the Holy Mother Church knows where to put its hands on a stack of AK47s and has a rocket launcher or two lying around for just these circumstances. I hope you can sleep at night with the thought of the collateral damage to innocent quizzers all over Withington and Didsbury which you may cause with your disrespect. It's not big, it's not clever, most of all it's not funny! Do you understand what the Christian Brothers in full-on attack mode are capable of?

And finally....I've long thought that there was an informative, tantalising and enjoyable round on the Scottish borders just waiting to be written. This wasn't it."

Damian:

"The phrase 'a bit of a curate's egg' was bandied about in reaction to tonight's offering from the Historymen encompassing as it did a breathtaking mixture of the familiar and downright obscure. On the plus side, Ivor's assurance that all of us would score at least one '2' almost came true with all but one of us justifying his trust. The Prime Numbers round and the last 2 rounds of 'Pick Your Own Subject' were predictably well received. The latter were the only rounds in which we came close to matching our opponents! On the minus side, did somebody recently go on a walking tour of the Borders and decide to use every place they visited as the subject of a question? In which case, heaven help those of us who had never been to the Border Country!
QotW: I quite liked the one about which prime minister was the only one never to be seen in public with his sleeves rolled up due to an inordinate fondness for body painting (my paraphrase)."

Danny:

"A good Historymen effort. We had the rub of the green by going first. I think the result would have been a lot closer if we had gone second. The lowest scoring round by far was the Scottish Borders round where only 4 points were scored in total. The quiz rattled on at a pace and we were finished by 10.30 which suited everybody."

James:

"The quiz was well constructed, with plenty of opportunities for intelligent guesswork. However neither team will be writing a great deal of praise on the esoteric Borders questions (we won that round 3-2 with 5 unanswereds).

I must thank the headmaster of my old school for his after-dinner speech anecdote which provided the heads up (tip-off?) that enabled us to score a point for the holy relic. This was the second quiz running featuring reference to the blessed organ, I think. Mike might want to check this out, but I'm pretty sure there are nearly a dozen heads of John the Baptist on various plates around Europe; enough wood from the cross to build a boat; and enough holy nails to hold it together. There are probably enough bits of cloth to make a decent sized sail too.

I've always thought this explains why the supreme figures of most religions end up being ascended into heaven. They clearly knew how tawdry it would be if bits of them were ever dug up and made into cynically moneymaking relics. So we're left with what could have reasonably been left behind - i.e. not very much at all (holy toenail clippings anyone?!)."

......and a later text from James: "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relics_associated_with_Jesus . There's some divine umbilical cord in Rome somewhere, but disappointingly no nail clippings."

and finally from Mike O'B:

"One of the best things about this quiz was that the questions, with the exception of the US geography question in the Bingo Round, were mercifully concise which made for a quick tempo. Both teams scored well and justified the hope of the setters that the score would be in the 70s. The Scottish round was the only one which appeared to be beyond the range of the knowledge any of the players."

The Question of the Week

This week the majority vote goes to Round 6 (the tough round from History Man Tim on the Scottish Lowlands) Question 7 (the one about crustulostannology):

Near Duns in Scotland is the home of Lord Palmer. It was rebuilt in 1901-03 and the architect was told there was no limit to the budget. It boasts a cantilevered staircase covered in silver. Called Manderston House it contains the world’s largest collection of which decorative but functional collectible?

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

Father Megson

Two more ringers sign up for WithQuiz

Even the Charabancs are doing it now. Signing up ringers in a frantic attempt to win a quiz. Ron and Len were originally thought to be on their way to Old Trafford but shortly after meeting Louis van Gaal they desperately tweeted Fr Megson: "No way, José. Mad as a box of frogs. See you in the Turnpike."

A spokesman for Fr Megson said he was currently resting after a hectic bit of business that had left him tired and emotional. Earlier he had told TalkQuiz that he was: "Over the moon - supralunatic. You wait ages to sign a Welsh international and then two turn up at once. Marvellous. How much are you tossers paying me for spouting this bilge?"

Mike was at Withquiz HQ early this morning sorting out the paperwork and was confident that he could get the players registered in good time for the Chara's first game after the winter break. Even if their application for Jobseeker's allowance is turned down there shouldn't be a problem. Ron already holds a licence to drive a minicab and Len is often mistaken for a postman. Mike promised to pop into Wythenshawe sorting office later on and see if that part-time vacancy is still going.

Mike then finalised the pleasantries by grabbing Len warmly by the throat and welcoming him to Withquiz before pinning Ron to the wall and warning him to clean up his act before their game with the Opsimaths.

"There's no way Jitka would tolerate an opposition player dropping his hand like what you are doing in that mucky photograph and I'm not even sure if Howell would be happy with it. I know from bitter experience how tetchy he gets if you happen to put your hand on his knee when he is trying to blurt".

Over at Old Trafford meanwhile, Mr Van Gaal told TalkQuiz that he was feeling frustrated....

"Ja, frustrated forsure and maybe even a little bit mad. I think my team played in red tonight and from right to left in the first half. Maybe you can think that the manager of Liverpool can also say this but I am confident forsure that my team is different. You know, sometimes it is imperative that you make things alter in a game and so for this reason I have instructed my players to play from left to right in the second half. It was a big deschision forsure but I am paid to make big deschisions. OK, you can say we still lose the match but I am confident forsure that if I do not make this big deschision then perhaps we lose bigger forsure. I am hopeful for my defenders and I think forsure that they have perhaps played beyond hope tonight. Dutch cap, anyone?"