Last week there had been no quiz. It had been a respite for us, a release from the relentless battering the 3nonBlondes had suffered of late. The year had started with such hope, such promise. Three consecutive wins had put us ahead, but that was in January and now an ever fading memory, only kept alive in the archives of an obscure blog. A time gone past of a simpler age. A time when no one had heard of the Credit Crunch. A time when Stoke City were just a midling midlands Championship football club. A time when The Blondes were winners. We needed to turn thing around, and quickly, but yet again we were shorthanded. The missing Blonde Debbie was 400 miles away and out of reach. We steeled ourselves for the battle to come as we stretched out of the car into the rain soaked unusually chilled May night air. The slow crunch of a tyre on gravel signalled the arrival of a rival. I looked back as Gaynor from the SixthSense team parked under the protection of the sight-screen. A mutual wave of the hand signalled a greeting. For now we were all friends, but once that hammer went down, every word every gesture would be finely tuned to distract the opposition. The club was sparse, at first glance deserted even. From out the back, Ron emerged to the bar, cleaning a glass, with the air of world weariness earned from a thousand quiz nights. The only sound was a muffled buzz from a nearly muted TV in the corner displaying the sad spectacle of an England Football team reduced to friendlies instead of tournaments.
We took up our usual usual positions, each team guarded their tables with the territorial instinct of feral cats. Just fleetingly I briefly toyed with the idea of claiming a different table, but knew this would unsettle Vicky as much as our opposition, so I settled down in my seat. I vainly attempted a relaxed, diffident, and confident pose, but only managed a nervous, forced looking slouch, which is in itself a feat. Vicky still looked distracted, but I wasn't worried she would come good once the quizzing started. I clicked my pen repeatedly, like a hit man locking and loading his rifle, in anticipation of the kill. The club started filling. Firstly another sixth sense Sue entered. With greetings exchanged she joined Gaynor at the SixthSense table. They both looked calm and relaxed contrasting with mine and Vicky’s nervous shuffling. We had both downed our first drinks before others arrived. One from the Muppets came in next armed with a folder of papers that indicated that she would be the night’s inquisitor. Soon she was joined by a phalanx of muppets. You could never tell how many muppets would appeared on a night. They seemed to vary in numbers with an unexplained randomness. I’m not even sure sometimes if they know each other, or just amass at a given time and place through some age old instinct passed down through generations of quizzers. Last to arrive entering the club with a confidence of seasoned gunslingers were the three Campanologists, clearly relishing the fight ahead. They always arrived together and their quiet dignified unity contrasted with the hubbub from the crowd of Muppets in the far corner.
As if from nowhere the Throwout sheets appeared on our tables. At first glance they appeared benign, Simple plain photocopies belying the complexity of the challenge contained within. There was no time to lose. There would only be an all to brief 10 minutes before the quiz in chief started. Every team knew that this was valuable gifted time to get to grips with the throwouts. The chatter and laughter petered out as the huddles formed. Two separate unconnected throwouts initially needed a division of labour, that later on would require the cooperation of brain storming. I looked at my throwout. 16 countries with 16 currencies to pair off. Hearts sank in all four teams as it was quickly obvious that there were no easy givens. It would be too much to hope for a US dollar, a French Franc or even an Indian Rupee. I even had a yen for a Yen, but to no avail. I spied one answer I knew, and with a self contained sigh chalked off Ireland and the Punt. Almost imperceptibly I could sense each of our foes concurrently Punting. As for the other 15 obscure nations with even more obscure, probably obsolete currencies, well they would need more than one mind. I turned to help Vicky with her throwout, hoping to see a sheet full of confident answers, but only seeing a furrowed brow between the hands clasping her head. “This is rock” came a sound from behind her arms. “Lets have a look” said I hoping to sound reassuringly confident, that may well have come across with a unintentional arrogance. Listed down her sheet were 16 inventions and milestones of the 20th Century to be paired with their corresponding year. For the youngest and sexiest team we were clearly going to be at a disadvantage, unless all the years were from the 80’s and 90’s. Again there were no givens, such examples being the inventions of Lego and Cans opened by ring pulls. Who could possibly know, well not us anyway. I looked at Vicky, hearts sinking in unison. Vicky stirred us from our trance of ignorance. “We should try and work backwards”, she suggested with a hope not born from experience. The latest date from the options was 1994. The only possible answer was The opening of the Channel Tunnel”. Well its at least a start I said to myself.
With the quiet, almost unnoticed cry of “Is everyone ready” the room suddenly hushed. All eyes turned to the small, insignificant table at the back of the room distinguished only by an unused microphone. “The first round will be maths questions”, so for the next few minutes answer sheets were filled with long division and multiplication, that used up any spare corner. The trickiest one was to find the square root of 1024, which inevitable meant a degree of trial and error. The quiz was soon in full stride. All four teams were locked in close huddles, murmured whispers of correct and incorrect answers filled the space creating a consistent background only pieced by sporadic laughter or shrieked bickering. The later was usually provided by Vicky and myself.. By half time food we were already half disheartened. Our sheet was peppered with missing answers and the throwouts remained mainly blank. While our opposition enjoyed some sustenance, we just had our heads down in frantic thought. I was wholly jealous of the other teams. The Campanologists and SixthSense appeared confident and relaxed with the knowledge of a successful first half. The Muppets were relaxed with a resignation gained from a lack of expectation. Only us, the ThreeNonBlondes trapped in the frustrated memories of past victories and recent failure. For a moment under a moment's delusion, I knew how those England players on the TV must have felt. With the hurried completion of missing answered so guessed, the papers were marked and we had the ritual of half time roll call. “SixthSense ?”,”41”.”Blondes ?””33”, I sighed in reply. “Campanologists”,”42” was the surefooted reply. “Muppets”,”34” came through. That meant we were plumb last. Vicky and me shared a knowing look of disappointment. We knew we were struggling on our throwouts, so we needed a good second half to avoid a repeat of The Blondes now legendary Halloween themed debacle.
The second half was simply hard core General Knowledge. Instead of the needed focus Vicky and me got involved in more self indulgent bickering. The disagreement was about the name of the ship that rescued the Titanic survivors, with Vicky rashly wagering £10 that it was The Lusitania. Not only was this incorrect, but it caused us to miss 2 more questions, and on top of the question was about the first liner sunk in the second world war. This pointless trivia one up-manship that we slide into is exactly the lack of focus that has plagued recent quizzes. A rookie mistake that we should now be beyond, but at least I earned myself a tenner. The second half was over almost as soon as it had started. The call went out for answers to be swapped for marking. We still had half the throwouts left to complete. My now weekly cry went out “Can we have five more minutes”, so the next few moments were filled with thowout guessing, in a desperate attempt to garner a few more precious points.
The marking was soon over, but the competition was not. From the half time scores there were 2 separate battles. The Camponologists were vieing neck and neck with SixthSense for outright victory. The Muppets and ourselves were battling for 3rd place, or more honestly who wouldn't come rock bottom.The second half scores were noted and the final results were read back to us. The Muppets 63, ThreeNonBlondes 64, The Campanologists 82 and SixthSense 85.
Well at least we had staved off last place, but this was more luck than judgement. The heavy tense atmosphere that pervaded through the quiz subsided, and as we bade our farewells into the cold dank night air, thoughts turned to simpler more practical matters, food. "Would the kebab shop still be open? What about McDonalds ? Now what was it the French called a Quaterpounder with Cheese?". There right then, I knew I should have made the most of half time sandwiches.....
If any of you have bothered reading all that, you A) Are a self indulgant Meakins Club quizzer. B) Really, really have too much time on your hands, but obviously not as much as this feckless author or C) My stalker
+ Rank the following inventions in Chronological Order - The Bikini , The Electric Washing Machine, Lego, Zip Fastener, Mars Bar, and The Lie Detector.
+ Which Countries have or had the following currencies ? Dukat, Zlotty, Lek, Lat, Lev and the Forint
+ What is the gas used in household lightbulbs ?
+ What is the most covered song in history ?
+ Which actor in his 30's has the middle name Willhelm?
+ Which branch of maths has the Latin name meaning stone ?
+ In Russian what does the word Soviet mean ?
+ In Hollywood, who were Harry, Albert, Sam and Jack ?
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