On Course for a Victory? Not Quite

Hello again everybody, and welcome to the account of our very promising and then, tremendously disappointing performance at the Victory Curry and Quiz on Tuesday. As usual, my pain is your pleasure and there are 10 juicy quiz questions for you to get your teeth into. We only needed 2 out of these first 7 questions to win, so you could have made all the difference. I'm also introducing a new feature this week. I'm going to start noting down the best team names and announcing a winner for the best one. Well then, what are we waiting for?

16/09/2014
Venue: The Victory Colosseum                                        Team: Me + 4 others
Score: 87 (joint 2nd, lost on tiebreak) 1st place - 90         Snowball: Not chosen

The first half started off so well, but it all went downhill very swiftly after that. I also managed to ruin the tiebreaker for us by saying an answer that would have cemented us 2nd place and then insisting that I was almost definitely wrong. Just the way these things go I suppose.

Best Team Name: 3 team names stood out for me this week. I may start compiling a shortlist in future so that you can help decide the best one. Without further fanfare, here are my inaugural awards:

3rd Place - If Scotland votes yes, does that mean we can ban haggis?
2nd Place - Adrian Chiles
1st Place - If quizzes are quizzical, then what are tests?

There wasn't really much of a contest this week, 1st place romped home. Typically it's best to be topical with these, but all the best Scottish names were taken last week, and Scotland has really been dominating the news. I would tell you our name but 1) it was an in-joke and 2) it wasn't very funny.

So, on with the main quiz then:

Questions

1) A total of 5 points up for grabs here (we managed 4) -
Name all the 5 things that Solomon Grundy did on a weekday.

2) How many timeouts is each side allowed in a game of American Football?

3) What was the name of Kylie Minogue's debut album?

4) Who voiced Chef in South Park?

5) What would a plangonologist collect?

6) Which musicians duetted on the hit 'The Girl is Mine' in the 1980s?

7) Identify the song from the opening lyrics:
'I got my first real six-string, Bought it at the five-and-dime.'

Tiebreak) How many episodes of Neighbours did Harold Bishop appear in?


A lot of pop culture simply passed us by this week. My guess is you did much better. Why not find out by how much?

Answers

1) Born, Christened, Married, Took Ill, Grew Worse
2) 6
3) Kylie
4) Isaac Hayes
5) Dolls
6) Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney
7) Summer of '69 (by Bryan Adams)
TB) 1659 episodes


Post Match Analysis

NOT that Solomon Grundy

1) Not a household favourite. In reality we were riding our luck by getting 4 out of 5. We got everything from Monday to Thursday, but we assumed that he must have been divorced at some point. Not so. They didn't do divorce quite as much back in those days.
The Bare Necessities: This nursery rhyme was first published in England in 1842 and its Roud Folk Song Index number is 19299. The full rhyme is below:
'Solomon Grundy, Born on a Monday,
Christened on Tuesday, Married on Wednesday,
Took ill on Thursday, Grew worse on Friday,
Died on Saturday, Buried on Sunday,
That was the end of Solomon Grundy.'
How considerate of them to bury him on a day to fit in with the rest of his life!
Solomon Grundy should not be confused with the zombie enemy of the Green Lantern and member of the Injustice League who first appeared in All-American Comics in 1944 (however tempted you may be).

2) This seems like an awful lot to me, but there you go. We went with 3, knowing that each game is divided into 4 quarters and theorised that maybe you'd be allowed one each in the second, third and fourth quarters. Plus, we decided to go with the old Trivial Pursuit adage - if you don't know, the answer is either '3' or 'Adolf Hitler'.
The Bare Necessities: Timeouts are very common in all of the major American sports. The aim is generally to allow the coach to speak to and inspire the team to glory, and they are often employed strategically. In American Football, each team is allowed 3 per half, and they cannot be carried over, though more may be called if the game reaches overtime. Calling a timeout just before potentially crucial points are scored is known as 'icing the kicker'. They are usually called by the Quarterback or the Head Coach.

3) D'oh! Sometimes, it just doesn't pay to overthink things. Thinking of the single, we went for 'Lucky', but we were painfully aware that this one was going to give us the slip.
The Bare Necessities: 'Kylie' was first released in 1988 and was produced by Stock Aitken & Waterman. It is best known for the singles 'The Loco-motion' (UK No. 2) and 'I Should Be So Lucky' (No. 1). It has sold over 5 million copies worldwide, 2 million of which are in the UK, making Minogue the first solo female artist to achieve this feat.

4) We really didn't know. I've only seen a handful of South Park episodes. After many possibles put forward, we decided to go with O. J. Simpson, guessing that employing him after his controversial acquittal in 1995 would be something that the South Park team would be happy to do.
The Bare Necessities: Isaac Lee Hayes, Jr. was born in Covington, Tennessee in 1942. He made a name for himself as a producer and songwriter at Stax Records and is best known for writing the song 'Soul Man' which became a hit for Sam and Dave in 1967, and for writing the score to the 1971 Blaxploitation film 'Shaft', for which Hayes became only the 3rd African-American to win a competitive Oscar. Hayes finally achieved a UK No. 1 single in 1998, when in his role as Chef, he topped the chart with 'Chocolate Salty Balls'. Hayes is a scientologist and was made an honorary king of Ada in Ghana in 1992 (for his humanitarian work).

5) We had a inkling that this one wouldn't be anywhere near as obscure as it sounded. I don't think we really stood a chance with this though, despite ruling several things (stamps, coins, cigarette cards) out. I think we went with matchboxes...
The Bare Necessities: There's not really a lot that I can add here, other than the word has its origins in ancient Greek (surprise surprise). Apparently, because women were not allowed to be actors in ancient Greece, women were represented onstage by a large doll or 'plangon'.

6) We got Jackson, but not Paul McCartney, and sadly this one was all down to me, costing us outright second place. I assumed that the two musicians had only collaborated on 'Say, Say, Say', but I committed a cardinal quizzing error here by working on an assumption I had no good reason to make. I was however, very tired indeed, so I'll allow myself this slip up just this once.
The Bare Necessities: 'The Girl Is Mine' is a 1982 song written by Jackson and co-produced with Quincy Jones. It was the first single to be released from Jackson's piece de resistance, Thriller, which has the greatest claim to be the best selling album in the world. The single reached No. 8 in the UK. The pair had already recorded Say, Say, Say by this point, but it was not released until 1983.The only other song that Jackson and McCartney recorded together was 'The Man' and one of the reasons I had been keen to discount the likelihood of another Jackson/McCartney collaboration was because of McCartney's intense displeasure at being outbid by Jackson for the rights to many of his songs in 1985.

7) Another 80s music question evading us. This being the last question, we just went with our stock 'don't know' answer of Born To Run.
The Bare Necessities: 'Summer of '69' was released by Bryan Adams in 1985, from the 1984 album Reckless. Co-written with Jim Vallance, the song was originally intended to be called 'Best Days Of My Life'. Adams has confirmed that '69 is a reference to the sexual position, rather than the year. Though well known in the UK, it did not reach the top 40 on its release, peaking at 42.

Tiebreak) Once again, I threw our opportunity to come second away. I originally guessed 2000, which would have just clinched it for us, but revised it to 3000 when I considered how many Neighbours episodes there approximately were. I obviously hadn't allowed for the fact that he wouldn't have been in ALL of those episodes. Oh dear.
The Bare Necessities: Harold Wayne Bishop was played by Ian Smith, who appeared in the show from 1987 - 1991, 1996 - 2009 and briefly in 2011. When Smith departed the show in 1991, Bishop was written out by being swept out to sea, reappearing 5 years later with amnesia. He would later join the Salvation Army as a result of their help. Bishop is also well known for his friendship with Lou Carpenter. His 2011 return to the show was to marry Carolyn Johnstone, many years of the death of his previous wife Madge, played by Anne Charleston.

So there's the damage. I wasn't in the best of moods after this, but perhaps you would have been if you'd have been picked for the Snowball. There were two chances this week. Could you have won £100?

Questions

1) 'Telesphobia' is the fear of what?

2) What is the name of the small rubber-headed hammer used by doctors for testing reflexes?

Answers

1) Being last.
Quite appropriate that this was the first snowball then really...

2) A Plexor.


How did you find those then? Could you have won £100?
Let me know how you did and as always, don't hesitate to correct me if you think I've got anything wrong. Until next time then...