Is that what we said, blow it up?

Let’s BLOW IT UP!!

Well, another day, another shooting in quiet city Knoxville.  This time it was at East Town Mall, specifically at the Reno Menswear (I would’ve pegged Pass Pets as the most potentially dangerous store in the mall, but it seems the only real danger there is adorableness).  It’s getting awfully dangerous around here of late.  I guess it might have to do with the economy’s eerie resemblance to a spirited game of Hungry Hungry Hippos, but it still seems odd.  I mean, if people are stressed about their finances, shouldn’t they be robbing banks?  I mean, First Tennessee deserves to be robbed.  Seriously, to hell with those guys.  Still, like in a spirited game of Barrel of Monkeys, there really are no winners.

Speaking of a spirited games of Cooties and nobody winning, we didn’t win.  Really, we lost on a lot of fronts.  It started off when we were forced to change our name.  We were originally gonna be Nailin’ Palin, but someone beat us to that topical punch.  In retrospect, we really should’ve been Nailin’ Palin 2: Electric Veepaloo or Nailin’ Palin 2: The Search for Cheney’s Gold, but we decided to go with a “spoiling golden opportunities” theme tonight.  So, instead, we went with a much less topical (but still not terrible) team name: What the Duck?!.  And, yes, the ?! is an integral part of the name.  Do make sure you get that part right.

As far as the actual question answer rigmarole, we actually rocked harder than a marathon game of Connect Four rocks boredom.  We only missed one question in the first four rounds (#12, and we really had no idea what it was).  But, we missed the all-important bonus.  What truly sucks is that it was a category that we really knew, and it came down to one right choice and one wrong choice and we went the wrong way.  We were alone in 2nd place at the time and we would’ve only ended up in 2nd, but it still sucks to have done as well as we did and have nothing to show for it at the end.  Ah, alas.  Such is the role of the tragically brilliant and the brilliantly tragic.

Dad and I are the tragically brilliant.  I know that you probably just scoffed at the idea, but nuts to you.  We’re Sonic fucking Death Monkey.  I mean, Tragically Brilliant.  Also Clairvoyantly Amazing.  Anyway, on with this pathetic hoe-down.  HERE BE QUESTIONS!

1.  To whom is Roger Rabbit married?  (That’d be Jessica Rabbit.  I misheard the question and thought he said Roger Braddock.  Apparently Roger Braddock is a marine biology professor at Griffith University in Australia.  Fascinating work on phytoplankton.  But, since he’s an Aussie marine bioligist, he’s probably married to an aquatic species of Wallaby or to some shrimp named Barbie or something.  I don’t know from crazy backwards countries.  But, still, it’s safe to say that he wears hats on his feet.)

2.  At what Tennessee university was Tuesday night’s presidential debate held?  (That’d be Belmont.  Apparently the best way to keep it real during an economic crisis is to go to a rich kid’s university in Nashville.  Fun fact: Belmont is a dry campus, but they made an exception and allowed alcohol on campus for the debates.  Typical Baptist flip-floppers.  Another fun-fact: Fuck Belmont.)

3.  Which body systemis made up of the brain and spinal cord?  (The Nervous system.  You see, sis, there’s a telegraph line.  You’ve got yours, I’ve got mine.  It’s called the nervous system.  And everybody understands those telegram commands and don’t ya know that everybody’s gonna listen?  Seriously, wasn’t that song out of date when it came out?  Telegraphs?  Do we really want to compare our bodies to a system of communication that hasn’t been popular since wild William Howard Tafts were roaming the countryside, looking to feed ravenously upon the spareribs of progress and the mashed potatoes of freedom?  Out of touch.  By the way, that part about Taft would make a kick-ass editorial cartoon.  Where have you gone Thomas Nast?!)

4.  According the the U.S. Dept. of Energy, aside from the U.S., which country is the world’s biggest consumer of energy?  (China.  Or, as I have taken to calling them, China.  I suppose all of that energy is going to finding the real ages of the Chinese Olympic Gymnastics team, so I’ll give them a pass.  However, I sould be remiss if I didn’t mention that twice while I was trying to type Thomas Nast’s name up there I typed out Thomas Nasty.  Again, great stuff for an editorial cartoon.)

5.  Does a bull market denote that stocks are rising or falling?  (Rising.  If you’re bullish, then you buy something.  If you’re bearish, then you only really buy honey and salmon.  You see, sis, occasionally bears get a rumbly in their tumbly.  And, while they are inclined to be civil and purchase certain goods, sometimes the rumbly can only be sated by devouring the greatest prey: Tigers.  You though I was gonna say humans, didn’t you?  Well, neener-neener.  Tigers are true, unerring killing machines.  Humans enjoy killing and taste undeniably delicious, but it’s really more about the hunt, ya know?)

6.  On this day in 2004, what celebrity began their prison sentence at Alderson Federal Prison Camp?  (Martha!  Stewart, that is.  By the way, have you seen the ads for the new series “Whatever, Martha” yet?  It bills itself as a sort of MST3K but one that spoofs on old Martha Stewart shows instead of cheesy movies [the worst / they can find / sha la la] and starring Martha’s daughter as the Joel/Tom Servo/Host.  But the only commercial that they show has her talking about how good a segment was!  And the whole thing is produced by Martha!  I mean, if there’s a real crime here, than it’s probably all of that stuff.  I guess justice is blind.  And not awesome blind like Daredevil.  More like Mr. Magoo blind, which is considerably less awesome.)

7.  What does the vaccine MMR stand for?  (Measles, Mumps, and Rubella.  Really, the question should have asked what the MMR shot inoculates against.  Awkward wording.  I’m pretty sure that I’ve had my MMR.  I mean, I have yet to catch measles, mumps, or rubella, so I just assume.  Then again, I’ve had my awesomeness vaccine and I do suffer to this day with almost constant outbreaks of being awesome, so I guess there’s no foolproof cure.)

8.  Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers attended what college?  (That’s right!  Cal!  OR, the University of California, Berkeley if you’re a dirty hippy.  I figured you’d know that since he’s kicking so much ass for your fantasy team.  What’s that?  He’s actually kicking ass for my fantasy team?  That is true.  But, really, when I win, don’t we all win?  The answer, of course, is no.  I’m Leonard Nimoy; keep watching the skis!!  I mean skies.)

9.  Who was the first femal Prime Minister of England?  (Margaret “The Iron Lady” Thatcher.  She was also know as Old Blood and Guts, The Fordham Flash, and Serpico.  Fun Fact: the song “Sowing the Seeds of Love” by Tears for Fears mentions Thatcher as a politician granny.  Another fun fact: “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” kicked so much ass that Tears for Fears had to subtract that amount of ass-kicking from the song “Shout”, which is why “Shout” has such a noticeable negative ass-kicking quotient.  Yet another fun fact: Margaret Thatcher wants those damn kids to get off her lawn.)

10.  What month’s name is derived from the Latin word for eight?  (October.  This seemed a little easy for a round 3 question, but who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth?  I’m more one who would punch it in the mouth.  Another acceptable answer would be French Toast Month at IHOP.  French is Latin for delicious and Toast is Latin for yummers and Month is Latin for 8.)

11.  In which decade were the first Grammy awards held?  (The 1950s, specifically in 1959.  Dad gets credit for this one, although he was unsure about whether it was the 50s or the 60s.  But we held it together to get the right answer.  I don’t know anything hilarious about the Grammys, except that the little record in the award can actually be played.  Turns out that it plays the song “Tiptoe Through the Tulips” by Tiny Tim, the ultimate standard by which all music is judged.  This was the question where we finally gained some ground on our opponents.)

12.  What movie has a Tyrannosaurus Rex, Theodore Roosevelt, and Charlie Murphy?  (And thus we fail.  Turns out the right answer is “Night at the Museum”, a film which neither dad nor myself have seen.  We struggled and eventually failed to come up with anything even remotely plausible.  We ended up going with “Black to the Future”, the fictional blaxploitation film from Family Guy.  I figured that there would be some sort of time-travelly gimmick, what with T-Rex and TR, but, alas, the only time-travelly bit was the brief memory of a time when Robin Williams was funny.)

13.  Which toy was introduced first: the E-Z Bake Oven or the game of Twister?  (It’s the E-Z Bake Oven!  Some might argue that it’s not a toy.  That it makes real cakes and treats with a 30 watt bulb.  That the secret ingredient is love, damn it.  Some might say that if you want something yummy, then you should put a happycake in your tummy.  To those people, I say: “Hey!  Shut your fryhole!”  This is yet another toss-up 20-pointer, but, since we got it right, I can’t muster the energy to really get mad at the question.)

14.  What country has the Gulf of Lyon, the city of Le Mans, and a border with Italy?  (This question is another one that seems to easy to be a 20-pointer.  It’s France, of course.  I guess you could argue that it was a little bit harder when it was live, since Andy kept pronouncing Lyon as Lion, and, since there are very few lions in France, it could have led some people astray.  Mais je ne sais pas.  Besides, we all know that there’s only one animal that hangs out in the water: tigers.  Thank god for bears, right?)

15.  Who has been in the following films:  “Copycat”, “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?”, and “Little Black Book”?  (That’d be the radiant Holly Hunter.  This was a stroke of luck.  Neither dad nor I have seen “Copycat” or “Little Black Book”, so we were working strictly off of our knowledge of OBWAT actors and actresses.  In the end, we narrowed it down to Holly Hunter and John Turturro.  We figured that “Little Black Book” sounded fairly chick-flick-ish and that John Turturro was too fuckin’ harsh to star in anything with the even the slightest whiff of chick-flick around it.  Stuff like Monkeybone.  You know, GOOD films.  So we went with that chick from “The Piano”.)

16.  According to the Wildlife Conservation Society, what is another name for a full-grown female elephant?  (Cow.  Another one for Dad.  He remembered that males were called bulls and babies were called calfs, so it was just simple logic after that.  Also, elephant is undeniably delicious.  Many times, wild elephants are hunted down by ravenous bears with a gourmand bent, and IHOP has been known to slide in a side of delicious elephant sausage during French Toast Month, to great effect.  So, all signs pointed to cow.  By the way, that’s some good closure, innit?)

BONUS!!  Category: Those darn United Nations
Q.  There are 5 permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.  Name them.  (The correct answers: US of A, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China.  We swapped out China for Germany.  Unfortunately, I had a list of the 6 countries I knew were on the security council, and it included both China and Germany.  But it seemed to me like China had been added to the Council recently and controversially.  Like in my lifetime.  Apparently, I’m wrong though, because China was an original member dating from the end of WW the Deuce.  Also, in our defense, there was already a China question tonight, so it was pretty misleading.  But, what I really want to say, is that this one hurt.  No dumping of Gatorade, no champagne, no sweet bran muffins.  Maybe next week.)

So, them’s the breaks.  It was a real drag, but at least we’re trending up as far as performance.  So maybe we’ve turned the corner and we’re back on our feet again.  Anyway, I’m going to bed.  Hopefully my dreams will be filled with the sweet deliciousness of IHOP’s French Toast Month.

We have a love-eight relationship…

Hey!  Do you remember trivia?  The thrill of the question, the agony of the answer?  Throwing shakers full of red pepper flakes at the waitstaff just for laughs, and then ordering them to clean it up like the filthy street people that they are?  Do you remember that?!  DO YOU?!  WELL GOOD!!

Sorry, I had to get ya pumped.  Hey!  Do you remember Reebok’s Pump Sneakers?  DO YOU?!  Oh.  Sorry.  So trivia today was a litany of disappointment and despair.  It’s like when you successfully rob a bank, and you and your co-thieves are cooling off in your discreet hideout, and there’s that one crazy guy who keeps shaking and rocking back and forth and babbling about how its so hot in here and how he really can’t wait to just get out there ya know and just be done with the whole thing and looking at him now you kinda wish you hadn’t given him that gun since he seems loathe to give it back and he keeps cocking and uncocking the thing and you’ve suddenly noticed that it has gotten kinda hot in here and that fan doesn’t seem to be doing anything but moving stagnant air around and you didn’t even realize that you’ve started cocking and uncocking your gun and that damn fan is so loud that you can barely hear yourself think and you think you might just go off at any second and you just wanna get out of here before you snap and unload on every one of these mutha uckas!!!!!1!!1!!!1!1

That’s never actually happened.  But it was still so intense that you had to wipe the sweat off of your brow, no?  Still, the point is we all started shooting at each other.  Which is to say that we lost.  And we lost by missing one freaking answer on the bonus.  The real drag was that it was a bonus that I had anticipated once upon a time and tried to memorize.  Apparently I was Overdrawn at the Memory Bank starring Raul Julia.  And so our team, “Alaskans for Better Book Burning” (which Andy kept calling Alaska’s Better for Book Burning…at least he more or less got all of the words in there…), was all for naught.  Which is a shame because we did pretty well for most of trivia, although we screwed the pooch in round 4.  I think there was a lot of pooch-screwing going on, though, because Andy added an extra round 4 question (that was actually just a warm-up for the bonus…read on!).  We ended up missing questions 8, 12, 13, 14, 16 and 17.  I know that looks bad, but keep in mind that you’re an asshole for pointing out our trivia shortcomings.  (Besides which, Dad was of virtually no help this week, so there was a lot of stalling and flying leaps going on.)  By the way, if you’re wondering about the “Love-Eight” relationship thing, the team that ended up winning was called Eight is Enough.  So, there’s that.

At any rate…HERE BE QUESTIONS!

1.  Who is UT’s starting quarterback?  (There are actually several correct answers to this question.  One of them is Jonathan Crompton.  Another is Lame-athon Crap-ton.  Yet another would be Jonath-ass Cromp-ass.  And still another is Sir Buttface Sucks-a-lot III.  By the way, did you watch that game?  That Tennessee quarterback is some kind of something…)

2.  Which sea separates Turkey and Libya?  (The Mediterranean.  Dad was sure that the countries were Turkey and Lebanon, which are only separated by the Sea of Imagination.  Did you know that on the Sea of Imagination you can cast your nets and catch little fishes…of inspiration?!  Seriously though, if you flash fry those suckers and take em with a tall, cool Caybrew than there actually still pretty terrible tasting.  I usually just catch the fishes of inspiration and the otters of wonderment and club them to death.  With a club.  Of metal.)

3.  Which amendment protects you from unreasonable search and seizure?  (While some doctors of jurisprudence and lameness might say that it’s technically the 4th Amendment, which is what we put, in your bitter, jealous heart you know it’s the 2nd Amendment.  You see, if anyone tries to unreasonably search and seizure all up in your business you just pleasantly remind them that you’re packing your “anti search and seizure spray” that’s actually a gun.  And then you shoot them.  Again with that killing, right?)

4.  Who is John McCain’s running mate?  (That’d be the book-bannin’, moose-huntin’, oil-drinkin’, daughters-underage-sex-out-of-wedlock-havin’ VPilf Sarah Palin.  We would have looked less than serious about our mission of burning books in Alaska if we got this wrong.  Apparently she’s giving a speech about the finer points of snow shoveling vs. snow blowing right now on some channel, but I’ll be damned if I’m gonna change it from Dinner: Impossible.)

5.  On this day in 1939, what 2 countries declared war on Germany?  (That’d be Great France and Britain.  Or something like that.  Fun fact: most people assume that France was the first country to have their pooch screwed and surrender in the European theater, outside of Poland and Czech O’ Slovakia of course.  That honor actually belongs to those pussies in Denmark.  Apparently putting Hamlet in charge of your army and throwing the bones of Yorick at the German tanks before retiring for some tasty breakfast pastries was not a successful defense.  On a related note, I really want a tasty breakfast pastry…)

6.  What is the most-visited government websites.  (No, not federallyhotasses.gov.  Although that is a very valid site, apparently the most visited site is irs.gov.  Or, if you like the style employed by fantastically splendiferous late 90s horror films, IRS Dot Com.  Or The Faculty, I guess.  I really don’t watch a lot of horror films.  I did see that one where that guy said that “Showgirls” was scary.  OK, I actually didn’t see that one, but I did see “Showgirls.”  And I’m almost certain that I saw a “Saved By The Bell” made-for-TV-movie where they went to Hawaii.  I guess what I’m saying is that I have a rich cinematic heritage, and that Slater and Jessie are gonna be aaaaaaaaaaalright after all.)

7.  At which altitude can Mach 1 be reached at a lower speed: 20,000 feet or 40,000 feet?  (This question seemed kinda confusing.  The right answer is, of course, 40k ft.  You see, as you get higher up, you get closer to the Earth’s yellow sun, giving you powers equivalent to Superman or Birdman.  Which is to say the power to control the rotation of the Earth itself.  As such, you can threaten to make the world stop spinning in a everyone-dies kind of way [and not in a lame-70's-crap-rock-song-cliche way] if they don’t do as you say.  And you’re first demand, obviously, would be to make it so that you can break the sound barrier at a slower speed at a higher altitude.)

8.  What actor’s mom wrote the book I Amaze Myself?  (Apparently it’s Matthew McConaugh-augh-asdfhasd=-asgdn’s mother.  Sorry, got something stuck in the keyboard there.  We said Brad Pitt.  Apparently Brad Pitt’s mom is not as easily amazed by herself.  Which is surprising, because the Pitts from Iowa, and I imagine that a particularly shiny tractor hitch or a picture of Calvin pissing on a Chevrolet logo would be enough to thoroughly amaze an Iowan.  I mean, they still use Windows 98 there right?  Wacky!)

9.  A cytologist specializes in the study of what?  (Cells.  I really had no good idea, but apparently I had a right idea, so fair enough.  Seriously, I know I studied Greek and Latin roots in 10th grade with Mrs. Doak, but I really don’t remember much of it.  What I do remember is that Mrs. Doak was apparently fooling around [shudder] on the down low with the ROTC guy who was married to Mrs. Willis.  That and listening to a record of James Earl Jones performing the play “The Emperor Jones” on an antiquated piece of equipment that I assume we smuggled in from Iowa.)

10.  What movie was set during Christmas, featured 3 important rules, and starred Phoebe Cates?  (That’d be “Gremlins.”  We’ll call this one serendipity, since we more or less pulled this out of thin air thanks mostly to the “3 rules” part.  I’ve never actually seen Gremlins, but I have seen “feardotcom.”  Or maybe it was “Showgirls.”  Point is, Kelly and Zach’s bonds of love are stronger than any Tiki-curse hokum, am I right?)

11.  What sport was developed by Native Americans as a war training and spiritual exercise and was originally called baaga`adowe?  (That’d be the affordable luxury that is the Buick Lacrosse.  Or just Lacrosse.  As you know, Native Americans were very concerned with high performance and a comfortable ride, but they didn’t want to lose all of their wampum.  Hence, they all got together and decided to create a dream come true, a marriage of form and function, of beauty and brains, or luxury and affordability, of gold paint and old people.  That commercial with the Native American on the side of the road shedding a single tear?  It’s because he’s so damned happy that the car throwing crap on the side of the highway is the same car that keeps American runnin’ strong.)

12.  Globophobia is the fear of what?  (You said globes didn’t you?  WRONG!!  Apparently it’s balloons.  Also apparently this juicy psychological tidbit came from the New England Journal of Health.  PSYCH!!  It actually came from and article People magazine or something.  At any rate, we said “spheres” in a vain attempt to try and say that the answer was globes without actually saying the word globe.)

13.  What Prince song has the following lyrics: “The sky was all purple / There were people running everywhere / Tryin 2 run from the destruction / U know I didn’t even care”?  (The correct answer is “1999″ but we said “7.”  I think we should’ve gotten at least partial credit for choosing a Prince song with a number as a name that deals with slight apocalyptic themes to a groovy Minneapolis beat.  I mean, I can see getting nothing for “Raspberry Beret,” but c’mon!  We said 7!!  It’s only 1,992 off!!  This is the biggest outrage since I called Native American currency as wampum.  Sreiously though, we really should’ve gotten this one and I feel like a freaking idiot for screwing this question’s proverbial pooch.  But, on the other hand, Prince isn’t that cool.)

14.  Who would take over as President AFTER the Secretary of State?  (Apparently it’s the Secretary of the Treasury.  We said the Attorney General, which is actually two notches below Secretary of the Treasury [it goes Treasury, Defense, and then Attorney General].  Interestingly enough, when Andy read out the answer the table across from us seemed genuinely offended that there’s an infinitely tiny chance that through a series of improbable but surely hilarious catastrophes we might end up with the Secretary of Treasury as our leader.  The real outrage in my mind is that the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development technically outranks the Secretary of Energy!  What a liberty!!)

15.  Who directed the following films: “Thief,” “Ali,” and “The Last of the Mohicans?”  (The right answer is Michael Mann, which, coincidentally, is the answer that we put down.  But not because we thought it was the right answer.  I misheard the question and thought that instead of “Thief” he said “Heat.”  Honestly, I was wracking my brain to come up with the name Wolfgang Peterson, which I never did come up with.  We’ll call it serendipity.  Or fate getting up all our hopes before it smashes all our dreams to pieces.  Fate is an inhuman monster.)

16.  In which decade was Velcro patented by George de Mestral of Switzerland?  (It was the swinging fifties, but we said the hard-partying thirties.  In actuality, Velcro was invented in the roaring forties, but it wasn’t officially patented until the girls-gone-wild fifties.  So, really, we didn’t screw the pooch all that much on this question.  I guess it would be like screwing a little pooch, but not a toy dog.  Like a dachshund or something.  But definitely nothing as large as a Labrador retriever or anything like that.  Just so we have the pooch-screwing metaphor properly defined.)

17.  According to Forbes magazine, which fictional character is wealthier: playboy millionaire Tony Stark or millionaire playboy Bruce Wayne?  (We said Stark, Forbes said Wayne.  Honestly I would have expected Bruce Wayne to be more philanthropic with his wealth with Tony Stark to be more miserly, but alas.  The idea behind this absurd number 17 was that the other round 4 questions were too hard, so we were given a superfluous multiple choice 20-pointer to level the playing field on behalf of stupid people.  At least this is the last we need speak of Forbes magazine though.)

BONUS!
Category: Forbes.  Damn it!
Q.  According to Forbes magazine, name 8 of the 10 wealthiest fictional characters.  (I could see this freaking question coming.  The worst part about it was the inevitablity of the whole affair.  And that I had read the list at some point, and it had occurred to me that it might come up as a trivia bonus.  Unfortunately, I didn’t commit the list to memory as fully as I had thought.  Still, we ended up getting 7 of the requried 8.  7!  That crappy number again!  Quit laughing at me, fate!!  Anyway, we were allowed to put Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark on our list, meaning that we really needed 6 of 8, not 8 of 10.  The answers that we got right: Daddy Warbucks, Scrooge McDuck, C. Montgomery “Monty” Burns, Richie Rich, and Jed Clampett.  The other correct answers: Mr. Monopoly, the Nigerian Prince of internet-scam fame, and Thurston Howell III.  In case you’re wondering, the incorrect trio that we offered up consisted of Charles Foster “Citizen” Kane, Lex Luthor, and Santa Claus.  Santa used to top the list, but he was taken off this year because Forbes is a big asshead.  And while we’re on the subject of assheads: Mr. Freaking Monopoly?!  Seriously, what the effing hell?!  He had to pay the fucking poor tax!!  YOU ONLY PAY THE POOR TAX IF YOU’RE POOR.  WHICH HE IS.  EXCEEDINGLY.  I mean, if winning second prize in a beauty pageant is a huge financial boon for you, than there is no way, NO FREAKING WAY, that you could keep up financially with Lex Luthor.  I mean, honestly.  HE GETS AROUND IN A FREAKING THIMBLE!!  Load of crap.)

So, we lost.  It was disheartening.  But, to end on a good note, Andy did give me a gift of a sweet Mellow Mushroom magnet featuring a naked lady whose nudity is obscured by a mellow mushroom pizza box about to devour a slice of pizza.  It says “Get a piece.”  Of pizza, I presume.  Honestly, for a pizza magnet, the pizza bit seems overshadowed by the naked lady bit.  I mean, what are they trying to sell you anyway?  But it’s a nice enough magnet so I think I’ll keep it.

Waaaaaaaaaaait.  I get it.  She’s naked!  Ha!  Brilliant!  You know who’d like that magnet?  Men.

A Very Muppet Rosh Hoshanah

Have you ever stopped to wonder how large of a debt “The Dark Knight” owes to “The Muppet Show?”  It’s not a topic that’s getting the credit it deserves, thank you very much anti-Muppet media.  Seriously, though.  You’ve got millionaire playboy by day (Scooter) who masquerades as a fierce and just vigilante by night (Rolf), a woman (Miss Piggy), a justice-minded fatalistic DA (Dr. Teeth) who turns into a hideous vengeance-minded enforcer (Kermit), a good but overly-loyal cop (Ernie), and a sadistic murderous clown intent on raining chaos down upon the whole of Gotham City (Snuffleupagus…you wanted Elmo, didn’t you?  Well too freaking bad.).  As far as I can tell, the whole thing is just an elaborate remake of “The Great Muppet Caper” with a few dashes of early “Sesame Street” and the Alice Cooper episode of “The Muppet Show” thrown in just for laughs.  Christopher Nolan is a freaking thief.

You see, Muppets are a fitting allegory for trivia this week: it’s not quite a mop, and it’s not quite a puppet, but MAN!  So to answer your question it sucked.  We didn’t win, and we didn’t have a particularly successful time of it otherwise.  We missed 4 regular round questions(5, 12, 14, 15) AND the Bonus.  Dr. Bunsen Honeydew would be so ashamed…But, then again, nobody got the bonus so I guess we can’t feel too down on ourselves.  So, in the end, it was the weiners who were winners (Weiners=those who did not have the fortitude to BET IT ALL!!).  And, as countless arcade games from the early 90s have taught us, Weiners aren’t reall Winners.

In case you’re wondering, our team was named Bi-Polar Express.  I was hesitant to name ourselves after a seasonal pun when that pun is clearly out of season, but we forged bravely and foolishly ahead with it anyhow.  We were thinking about naming ourselves “Scrantonicity 2″ but Dad and I decided that Andy probably wouldn’t be able to pronounce that correctly.  Good thing though, because anotherteam actually did name themselves Scrantonicity.  And Andy didn’t flub it!  What are the odds?  ANSWER ME: WHAT ARE THE ODDS?!  Sorry, but those thieves just make me so damn mad.  They’re just like Christopher Nolan…

HERE BE QUESTIONS!!  Deal with them swiftly and mercilessly.

1.  Who is UT’s first football opponent this year?  (That’d be UCLA.  Never heard of it.  I’ve heard of Pepperdine.  Why aren’t we playing Pepperdine?  Apparently the first-string QB for the Bruisin’ Bruins went down, providing a golden opportunity for the second-string QB to come in…and subsequently also go down.  So the Vols are playing against a scrappy young walk-on who makes up for his obvious physical deficiencies with an over-abundance of “heart.”  Playing the part of the well-funded bad guy team is Tennessee.  Er…rah rah?)

2.  What famous American structure has five sides and five floors?  (The Pentagon, doubtless built by masons to carry out their Satanic keggers. Technically the Pentagon has 10 sides, with five outer walls and five inner walls surrounding the courtyard.  Fascinating, no?  Hey!  WAKE UP!  Fun Fact: The Pentagon is built to honor Satan.  I know I already mentioned that, but I felt that it was important enough to mention twice.)

3.  What is frequency modulation also known as?  (FM.  I’m pretty sure that this question was supposed to be “What does FM stand for?”  But that opens all sorts of other possibilities: Freaking Marvelous, Fistfighting Martians, French Martians, Fangorious…Martians.  Anyway, you get the idea.  Still, you know what’d sound really “groovy” on the FM?  Rock and roll music.  I’ll get the boys in the Pentagon to stop messing with that Necronomicon and get right on it.)

4.  In the movie “My Girl,” what is Vada’s father’s occupation? (Funeral Director.  Or Mortician.  Or Undertaker, although I’m pretty sure that you have to do some wrestling in addition to funeral work to merit the title of Undertaker.  We went with Funeral Director, although I wish we’d have gone with college-professor-by-day/wild-fearsome-pimp-by-night.  That’s right kids!  It’s a Dr. Detroit reference!!  Fun Fact:  Did you know that the girl who played Vada’s great-grandfather once owned a trained bear that appeared in a Three Stooges film?  Well you do now.  And I am not making that last bit up even a little bit.  Seriously.)

5.  What decade saw the popularity of fake pearl necklaces, penny loafers, and Levi 501s?  (Popularity is such a smelly word…apparently it was the 1980s.  I remember the 80s, and not just through charming and informative infomercials about the decade on VH1, and I’m having trouble remembering fake pearl necklaces or penny loafers being “popular.”  I remember them existing, but I also remember slap bracelets and swatch watches existing; that doesn’t mean they were popular.  Really, I’m having trouble remembering 501s, although my memory has perfect clarity concerning Levi’s Big Jeans.  “Living Large,” the commercials would say.  And truly you were.  Anyway, we said the 1950s.  I think we were probably right enough.)

6.  What is the largest non-polar desert in the world?  (The Sahara.  I really wish that he hadn’t been so thorough, because I totally could’ve nailed him on Antarctica actually being the world’s largest desert, but alas, my attempts to be a condescending ass were foiled.  Curses!  Fun fact: people living in the harsh arid climate of the Sahara desert are often forced to make a meager living as a moisture farmer with their uptight aunts and uncles, utilizing groovy robots purchased from robed midgets for the job.  Truly a brave people, moisture farmers are constantly overcoming obstacles like having to travel for, like, 12 parsecs just to get some freaking power converters or having to deal with a veritable wamprat infestation in Beggar’s Canyon.  Also Star Wars.  Sorry, I just really wanted my awesome Star Wars allusions to be recognized…)

7.  What “Looney Tuner” voiced Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and Porky Pig?  (Mel Blanc.  He also voiced Private Snafu in the great WWII military cartoons of same name.  You might remember that his hilarious bumbling eventually cost 45,000 brave GIs their lives and nearly single-handedly won the war for zee Germans.  And yet today he’s seen as a hero while true heros like Sam the Eagle, who risked his freaking life for us, go sadly unrepresented in today’s history books.  OK, technically Snafu goes unrepresented in modern history books too.  But it just begs the question: what else are they leaving out?  The Berlin Wall?  The Banana Splits?  Waldorf and Astoria?  We should all be outraged!)

8.  On this day in 1977, what space probe was launched? (That’d be Voyager the Deuce.  Or Voyager 2 if you’re not “groovy.”  We were actually torn between answering Voyager or Viking until Andy informed us that we needed a number firmly affixed to the probe.  So we went with the one with the number and bang-a-dang-a-doodle, we got us a right answer.  By the way, if you have any good probe jokes to insert here than you’re obviously a depraved individual, the sort that they welcome with open arms over at the Pentagon.)

9.  Who is married to Ben Affleck?  (Jennifer Garner, who is apparently preggers again.  What is it with all the ladies and the getting pregnant all the time?  If it were me, I’d be all “Nuh-uh!” and that pregnancy would be all like “Ok…” and try to walk away with its lower lip trembling but I wouldn’t let it and I’d be all like “Where do you think you’re going pregnancy?  You’d better get back here and mow my lawn!”  And the pregnancy would say, “But you don’t have a lawnmower!” to which I would reply “Then use a freaking laser!”  My point is that you have to show that pregnancy who’s the boss.)

10.  Which MLB team was the first to win a televised World Series?  (It was the New York Yankees, which we unfortunately answered correctly.  Not so much unfortunate in that it meant that we got the right answer, but unfortunate because it meant acknowledging the Yankees success.  It was also unfortunate because I was having trouble coming up with a fitting joke name for the Yankees.  I think that’s because most of my sports-related indignation was being focused on the Chinese Olympic dive team, using up my resources and leaving precious little for Yankee-hatred.  Hopefully I can work on expanding my faculties so that I can capably loathe several teams at the same time with equal fervor.  Someday…)

11.  Where will the Republican National Convention be held?  (The CORRECT answer is Minneapolis, MN.  Andy said St. Paul, setting off a playful tete-a-tete between him and me for the rest of the evening, what with him screaming “ST. PAUL YOU LOUSY NINCOMPOOP!” and me returning with “IT’S AT THE METRODOME IN DOWNTOWN MINNEAPOLIS, LAMEBRAIN!”  For you see, I have decided that all fights need to be resolved with the appropriate manner and level of name-calling.  Furthermore, I have ascertained that the only vocabulary robust enough for proper name calling is that which is present in 1980s cartoons.  I’m submitting my findings to the “New England Journal of Science and Medicine” and to the creators of “The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!” for approval, but, in the meantime, feel free to go ahead and amend your vocabulary accordingly.)

12.  What film is set in Chicago and has a tour business and Jason Bateman? (The answer is “The Break Up.”  Guess who has two thumbs and has never actually seen “The Break Up?”  If you now find yourself with two thumbs pointing proudly back at yourself, than congratulations!  You may join me and my dad [both still possessing our opposable digits] in having the good sense not to encourage Vince Vaughn in his delusion that he should make movies.  As for our answer, we went with “The Confabulous Fabtraption of Prof. Horation Hufnagel” which actually starred Troy McClure.)

13.  What was the name of the trial held in Dayton, TN in 1925 concerning evolution?  (The Scopes Monkey trial!  Hooray!  Or, just The Scopes Trial if you’re into the whole being sensitive to monkeys thing.  I mostly only new this from the film adaptation “The Muppets Inherit the Wind,” with Fozzie as Clarence Darrow, Gonzo as William Jennings Bryan, and Oscar the Grouch as the monster who lived in the garbage can outside the courthouse.  A moving and visceral work of cinematic art, and one that I highly reccomend.)

14.  A study from the University of North Carolina’s “National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injuries” says that which high school and college sport is responsible for the most injuries?  (This is a stupid question that has a stupid answer.  That answer, of course, is cheerleading.  Yes, apparently students are overextending their “spirit” all across this great land of ours, and that’s not to mention all of the pom-poms forcifully lodged in bleached-blonde foreheads that are awaiting removal.  Seriously, what the effing shit?  Cheerleading?  FREAKING CHEERLEADING?!  We misunderstood the question and actually put a sport, football, and we’re suddenly the ones who are wrong.  These damned kids these days.)

15.  Which happened first: the Battle of the Little Bighorn or Jesse James committing the first train robbery west of the Mississippi?  (Another week, another multiple choice 20 pointer.  The correct answer is apparently Jesse James’s robbery, which apparently occurred in 1873, compared to the apparent Battle of Little Big Horn which, apparently, happened in 1876.  Apparently.  I was really trying to guess based on my knowledge of the film “The Muppets Conquer the Red Men” with Animal as Gen. Custer and Rizzo the Rat as Sitting Bull, which made the whole thing seem like it happened in a land before the West had railroads.  CURSE THE HISTORICAL INACCURACIES OF THE MUPPET UNIVERSE!!)

16.  Who has been in the following films: “Animal House,” “Cold Mountain,” and “The Dirty Dozen?”  (Of course, the answer is Donald Sutherland.  Sorry, Flounder, but you don’t get to be in any other movies.  Seriously, there were really only two options here, Sutherland and John Vernon, and so we just had to put our foot down and choose.  And that foot was Sutherland.  Fun fact: Karen Allen did not want to “flash” the audience in Animal House.  It was only after Donald Sutherland eagerly agreed to do so himself that she relented.  Thus, I think we can safely call Donald Sutherland the greatest thing to happen to modern film.  Period.)

Bonus!  Category: Expensive Divorces

Q.  According to Forbes Magazine, name 7 of the 10 celebrities who had to pay the MOST in a divorce settlement.  NOTE: This does NOT include Phil Collins since he is about to top the list with his impending divorce.  (The list IS: Mick Jagger, Lionel Richie, Michael Douglas, James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, Neil Diamond, Michael Jordan, Paul McCartney, Harrison Ford, and Kevin Costner.  Of those we got McCartney, Ford, and Costner.  We also technically got Phil Collins; he was on the list for his previous divorce, but, since he was outlawed wholesale, we didn’t get credit.  This was a killer of a question because, honestly, I didn’t even know that most of these people were divorced.  The high-profile divorces that you usually hear about happen between 2 famous people, not a famous person and their anonymous spouse.  But if both people are famous, both probably already have money, so you don’t get big settlements.  In case you’re wondering, our wrong answers were Donald Trump, Alec Baldwin, Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Roseanne Barr, James Brown, and our wrong/right answer Phil Collins.)

So there you have it.  Our downfall brilliantly documented for posterity, with liberal Muppetization employed for flavor.  And it was a pretty good wrap-up too.  I didn’t like seeing Donnie die, but I happen to know that there’s a little Lebowski on…um.  Yeah.

False advertising lawsuit against “The Neverending Story”

At the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, Roy Jones, Jr. was vying for the gold medal in the sport of boxing.  He knew that, in order to win the gold medal match against home country favorite son Park Si-Hun, he couldn’t just win the fight; instead he would have to destroy Park.  It seems that at the 1984 games in Los Angeles, there was talk that the boxing judges had favored Americans, including a controversial TKO in the first round of bouts, with eventual gold medal-winning American Paul Gonzales beating Korean hopeful Kim Kwang-Sun.  A Korean official intimated after the mtach in 1984 that the Americans would not be so “fortunate” in 1988.  Back at the 88 Olympics, Jones Jr. took on Park knowing full well what he had to do.  And by God, he didn’t just beat Park, he pummeled the hapless Korean pugilist.  For 3 rounds, Roy Jones, Jr. pounded his overwhelmed opponent, progressing from a cautious stance at the beginning of the fight to almost openly taunting Park by the end of the 3rd round.  At the end of the fight, Jones had landed 86 punches compared to only 32 for Park, had forced a standing 8 count (where the referee stops the fight and starts counting down, like a fighter had hit the mat even though he had not, since Jones was dismantling Park so fiercely), and nobody had any doubt that Jones had won the bout.  Nobody, that is, except for the judges from Uganda, Uruguay, and Morocco.  Surrounded by several thousand fiercely patriotic Korean fans, those three judges ruled in favor of Park, and Park won the gold medal in a split decision, 3-2.  One judge shortly thereafter admitted that they had made the wrong call, and all three were eventually barred from judging in the Olympics.

Long story short, we got third place this week.  And boy did we deserve it.  NOT!  (At this point, although I had offered up my hand for you to shake or to which you could give 5, I promptly pull my hand back and run it through my long luxurious hippie mane.  You stand with egg prominently affixed to your face.)  We actually didn’t do so well this week.  We missed two 10 point questions (5 & 8) and two 15 point questions (9 & 12) as well as booting the bonus.  So, although we mounted a good comeback attempt by sweeping the 20 pointers, we still ended up with a lofty 0 points.  At this point you might be asking “Pray tell, how did you end up in third place if you did not in fact finish the match with any points?”  More likely you’re throwing breakable things against the wall, banging your keyboard with your fists, and screaming “You cheating crap-asses!!  GIVE ME ALL OF YOUR MONEY, YOU CHEATING CRAP-ASSES!!!”  (Don’t lie sis.  I know you, and I know how you react to conundrums.)  Well I’ll tell you.  (He’s going to talk, he’s going to talk…)  Apparently, two things happened: 1) Andy thought that we got the question right (which we assuredly did not), and 2) Upon being told that we had answered incorrectly, Andy told us that the team that would have gotten third place were apparently and bunch of cheating crap-asses.  So, he gave it to us.  Go fig.  On a related note, I’m sure that Chris is furious because he kindly came by before the answer to the bonus was revealed and let us know that we were wrong.  So, he knew that we got the question wrong when we were announced as the third-placers.  No doubt he is throwing breakable things against his wall, banging his keyboard with his fists, and calling us a bunch of cheating crap-asses while intoning that we should give him all of our money.  What can I say?  I know the guy.

Two long paragraphs written, I’ll cut to the chase.  HERE BE QUESTIONS!  Oh, and if you’re wondering, the name we eventually went with was “Digital Chinese Fireworks.”  I wasn’t entirely satisfied with the name.  We were considering calling ourselves “12 Year Old Chinese Gymnast,” but it was a good thing we didn’t since another team totally porknined that idea.

Now, with that aside, HERE BE QUESTIONS.  No fibbin’, Mephibosheth.  Tip: to see the answers, highlight the area between the parentheses.

1.  How many stripes are on the American flag?  (13.  Nailed it.  In case you’re wondering, I don’t plan on doing any sort of Electric Slide-type theme nonsense this week.  No IHOPs, or Brendan Fraser films, or other such foolishness.  That would make me a real crap-ass.)

2.  What actress is the granddaughter of Ernest Hemingway and sister of Margo Hemingway?  (Obviously, it’s Mariel Hemingway.  I would have thought that was obvious, or maybe I just assumed that here sharp angular and fairly unattractive visage would be burned into everyone’s cortex the same way it’s burned unto mine.  I mean, honestly, if John Candy were constructing a fantasy world entirely in his head, are we really gonna believe that the hottest love interest he could conjure up would be Mariel Hemingway?  He wasn’t a crap-ass.  At any rate, one team ditched the whole Hemingway name altogether and went with Gwyneth Paltrow.  Crap-asses.)

3.  What is the capital of Colorado?  (Colorado City.  PSYCH!  [See above under "NOT" for the protocol which follows this declaration.]  It is, of course, Denver.  Fun fact!  Did you know that the song “Werewolves of London” by Warren Zevon, though a minor hit when it came out in the 1970s, really only became a musical mainstay after featuring in the movie “Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dead?”  Strange but true!  Like most music, it’s not really popular until it’s been in an Andy Garcia film.)

4.  Which American has won the most gold medals at the 2008 Olympics?  (Michael Phelps.  I assume that you don’t know that since you’re probably only concerned about how Canadian swimmers perform.  But what’s that?  They’re all barely-buoyant crap-asses?  Is it maybe because THEY ARE ALL WEIGHED DOWN BY MAPLE SYRUP, MOOSE REPELLENT AND UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE?!  I say, probably.)

5.  Which of the three Apollo 11 astronauts did NOT walk on the moon?  (We got this one wrong.  Apparently, it was Michael Collins.  Although the real answer was ALL OF THEM since we all know that the moon landing was fake.  Still, I would have thought that Dad, having lived through that whole ruse, would have gotten the answer right.  We said Lt. Commander Bea Arthur, hellcat of the Navy and First Lady of the Solar System.  Apparently, we were crap-asses.  Oh well.)

6.  What stadium houses the Green Monster?  (As you well know, it’s Fenway Park.  Originally Andy called it the “Big Green Monster,” but I corrected him.  I did feel a little like a crap-ass for it, though.  Even though I do it all the time, I always feel a little like an asshole when I do the whole know-it-all schtick and put someone down.  But the sanctity of the Monster must be maintained!  It’s not big, it’s just hormonal and loves chocolate.  At this point I should mention that I once again feel like a crap-ass for the bad joke.  But, again, it’s not enough to stop me.)

7.  What was Cameron Diaz’s first film?  (Somebody stop me!  It was “The Mask,” although I’m having trouble actually placing HER in the movie.  I remember a character that definitely had her cleavage, but I’m pretty sure the non-cleavage part of that character was a singer and I’m also pretty sure that the non-cleavage part of Cameron Diaz would put “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” and hit frappé.  Oh, and, umm…crap-ass?  Maybe?)

8.  What do you call a virgin cow?  (Uptight.  Hi-yo!  Seriously though, it is apparently Heifer.  We put Bossy.  You know, like you’d call a cow Bossy.  As in “Hey Bossy, you’re quite a cow.  And what’s that?  Saving yourself for cow-marriage?  That’s quaint and all, but don’t be a crap-ass.  Half of those things end in tasty, lethal, Black Angus cow-divorce you know.”  Andy laughed at our answer, but I got him back.  I poisoned him.  I grew up on a farm.  Sidenote: Andy originally asked us the name of the character running for president under the slogan “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter.”  Immediately thereafter he realized that the original question was stupid hard and gave us the second question.  If you must know the answer, apparently it was “Spraychel.”  I’m sure you’re appalled that he relented on something so obviously easy.)

9.  On this day in 1942, what Disney cartoon premiered at Radio City Music Hall?  (If you said Fantasia, then congratulations!  You’re a crap-ass!  That’s what we said, though, so apparently we’re crap-asses as well.  So don’t feel bad.  Fantasia apparently came out in 1940, a full two years BEFORE Bambi, which is the right answer.  Apparently it was the commercial failure and racist undercurrent in Fantasia that made Walt Disney a crazy, bitter old man who wanted as many children as possible to suffer by killing off Bambi’s mother.  The original film showed the death in all of it’s glory, stretching it out over 25 bloody,  grisly, profane and gloriously horrifying minutes.  That would have shown the little bastards!)

10.  What is the only monosyllabic U.S. state?  (Of course, he didn’t say monosyllabic.  He said “one syllable.”  Crap-ass…whoops, I’m doing that condescending know-it-all thing again, aren’t I?  I guess it is truly I who is the crap-ass.  Anyway, the answer is Maine.  I have no doubt you’d have gotten the right answer, but the question is whether or not you would have gotten the answer without the aid of the alphabetical state song.  I say, probably.)

11.  What Greek mathematician discovered buoyancy and was one of the first to calculate pi?  (It’s Archimedes!  Eureka!  Yeah.  Archimedes.  [cough]  It seems that there’s nothing funny to say about Archimedes.  You can’t tell, but I’ve been trying to think of something hilarious to put here for like fifteen minutes to no avail.  I guess, maybe, Dorkimedes?  Archicrap-ass?  I dunno…)

12.  What movie contains the Klopeks, a furnace, and Corey Feldman?  (It’s “The ‘burbs!”  Starring Tom Hanks!  You know, that one that EVERYONE has seen?  Oh, yeah, except that NOBODY has seen it.  Dad and I put “The Lost Boys” since i really didn’t feel comfortable putting “The Goonies.”  Although “The Goonies” definitely had a Feldman sighting, and I’m pretty sure that the basement where the Fratellis keep Sloth had a furnace.  And what’s a Klopek anyway?  Anyhow, Andy insisted to me that EVERYONE had seen this movie.  “Big” has nothing on “The ‘burbs” as far as he’s concerned.  Freakin’ crap-ass.)

13.  What is the name of the tunnel that connects France and England underneath the English Channel?  (That would be the Channel Tunnel, or, as the kids have taken to calling it, the Chunnel.  Those crazy kids and their crap-assey names for things.  This seems like a really easy twenty point question, especially considering that Andy was ready to subject us to Spraychel a few questions earlier.)

14.  What medicine did German chemist Felix Hoffman develop in 1897?  (That’d be aspirin.  I’m sure you knew that, since I’m sure that you remember the episode of “Pinky and the Brain” where they travel through time to try to take over the world and, failing to do that but succeeding at getting hit on the head with a hammer or something, decide to time travel to 1897 to score some sweet first-issue aspirins.  Or maybe you remember Pinky saying “Narf!”  Both aspirin and Narf! sufficed as answers.)

15.  Which animal is faster: the Mongolian wild ass or the wildebeest?  (Wildebeest.  I don’t like these crap-ass blind luck toss up questions in the 20 point range, but we still got it right, so…still, I’m not convinced that the Mongolian wild ass is real.  When Andy said he’d never seen one, I told him that I was unsurprised that he’d never actually caught a glimpse of an ass.  And I laughed, for contained therein was the sweet essence of humor.  An ass joke.)

16.  Who has been in the following films: “The Bird Cage,” “Mystery Alaska,” and “Heat?”  (Moe himself, Hank Azaria.  I’ve never seen the first two but I have seen “Heat.”  Dad had seen the other 2 but not “Heat.”  So, together, we came up with the least crap-ass answer.  Good for us.)

BONUS!  Category: the Solar System!  Fascinating!
Q.  List the 8 planets of the Solar System (Pluto don’t count, smart guy) in order from largest to smallest.  (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Earth, Venus, Mars, Mercury.  Dad and I switched Uranus and Neptune.  And Earth and Venus.  But they’re all essentially the same.  Anyway, I’m sure that you called upon your extensive knowledge of Sailor Moon to give you the right answer.  What’s that?  I was the Sailor Moon fan?  Now that doesn’t sound right…stop lying you crap-ass!  Anyway, you can see that we got the answer wrong.  And yet, I still feel good about getting all of the planets in there.  I’m sure that you tried to squeeze in Planet Hollywood or Marlon Brando.  Was that a fat joke about a dead actor of great renown?  Yes.  Was it in extremely poor taste?  I say, probably.)

So, there ya has it.  After a brutal drubbing at the hands of the trivia gods, we still managed an ill-gotten bit of sweet afterlife.  SUCK IT JOHN WESLEYAN!!!!!!!  Free will is for crap-asses anyhow.

18 and 99, time of the red man and the marshal.

That subject has absolutely nothing to do with trivia.  I was really trying hard to come up with something creative and apropos for the subject line, but my mind has been steadily deteriorating into a soft sludge thanks to Video Hits 1 and their damned I Love 4.8 seconds ago.  They’re doing 2005!  How can you be nostalgic about two thousand freaking five?!  Still, much to my horror, it’s one my TV even now, and, to compound the horror, I’m not even changing it.  Such are the depths of teledepression. 

Anywhooooo, trivia ended with a bang!  Well, not so much a bang, but certainly with a quiet throat clearing and a lot of awkward confusion.  We didn’t win.  But we did win.  Try and follow.  We answered the bonus question incorrectly and wagered all of our points, but somehow we still were declared the winner and it wasn’t a mistake on Andy’s part.  Apparently, the only team that answered the question correctly was being followed by a cloud of cheat-spicion (like those mini-goombas that the big flying goomba poops out at you in Super Mario 3).  It was a 6-answer question, requiring 5 correct answers.  We got 4 of them right, and that was apparently more than any other team except for the cheating team, so we were named the winners.  However, Andy’s brilliant plan of revenge was derailed by our unfailing honesty.  We spoiled it by going up and being honest as one of the other teams was there waiting for their moneys.  Still, he gave us the third prize for our honesty, probably fuming inside that we uncovered his ruse. 

After all of that, our waitress insisted that one of the cards that should have had $26 on it only had $2 on it, so we had a big rigmarole about that.  And she was slow.  But really, what all of this is leading up to is that I left the question sheet at the restaurant accidentally.  Sorry.  But I can still remember at least some of the questions we got wrong (there were 5 of them, 2 20 pointers and 1 each of the others; it was a brutal week, even with all of those misses, we were still tied for first going into the bonus).  So, here are our misses, as far as I can remember them:

1.  What insurance company’s ad slogan is “Life comes at you fast”?  (It’s Nationwide, whose real ad slogan is “Nationwide is on your side.”  We said All-State, who’s ad slogan is “Hats for bats.  Keep bats warm.”)

2.  What film contains the following lines: “Number fifty-four million six hundred and one… Ferndoch.” and “I’m a graduate of the Harvard business school…I lived through the Black Plague and had a pretty good time during that.”  (It’s Beetlejuice.  Unfortunately, the only line I really remember from the film is “Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice!”  I guess that might have been a bit easy.  At the very least, he could have thrown out the lyrics to “Shake, Senora”.)

3.  According to the World Tourism Organization, which European country averages 43 vacation days annually?  (There were really only two options: the decadent French and the layabout Italians.  We chose the layabout French.  Unfortunately, it was those decadent Italians.  Salami!!!!!!!!11!!!1!1!!!11)

4.  What company introduced Mr. Potato Head in 1952?  (We said Milton Bradley, completely forgetting the decadent layabouts at Hasbro.  We really should have remembered that.)

5.  What movie contained the following: wind chimes, a greenhouse, and Julianne Moore? (We said Hannibal, banking on Hannibal Lecter murdering that one guy in the greenhouse with the windchimes.  That’s make for some great Clue…anyway, it was actually The Hand That Rocks the Cradle.)

Bonus!
Category: Fortune 500 Companies
Q: Name 5 of the 6 top U.S. companies in terms of revenue in 2007 according the Forbes Magazine.  (We got the following right: G.E., General Motors, Wal-Mart, and Exxon-Mobil.  The other right answers were Conoco-Phillips and Chevron.  We incorrectly guessed Microsoft and Coca-Cola.  It seems like we’ve had this question before, and I remarked that I thought that the answer was oil-heavy, but we were coming up empty aside from Exxon.  C’est dommage ca, je pense. )

So, that’s how it goes.  Sorry about not having the full rundown for you, but we had a fairly surreal ending.   Anyway, until next time, I’m Leonard Nimoy.  Keep watching the skis!  I mean skies.

Velcome to ze joungle. Ve have fun unt games.

Efficient German fun.

Allow me to cut throught the treacle: VE VIN!!  Or rather, WE WIN!!  Like a sleek BMW crashing into a stylish Volkswagon, we are poetry in motion.  FRANZ KAFKA ROCK OPERA UBER ALLES!

By the way, our team name was Franz Kafka Rock Opera, which morphed into Franz Kafka (short “a” sound) Rock Band.  It was a thorough thrashing of those thankless thieves who thought to thwack our thrilling, ummm…thousands?  I’ll go with that.  We only missed two questions, although some of our answers were far from certain.  In the end, we were tied for 1st, but we took down the tiebreaker like a fat fraulein takes down sausages at Oktoberfest.  (OK, no more German stuff, but hopefully more alliteration to follow!)  We missed numbers 6 and 14, but got the rest.  Good, ja?  (When I said no more German stuff, I was lying, as the Germans are wont to do.)

Here be questions!

1.  Which restaurant’s ad slogan is “I’m Lovin’ It”?  (McDonald’s, silly, not McDowell’s!  That restaurant only existed in the fever dreams of Eddie Murphy, and the sugar-laden delirium of Louie Anderson.  BTW, Bryan wanted to know if they have McDonald’s “and stuff” in the Caymans.  I told him to mind his own damn business.)

2.  Which of the Great Lakes is due north of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula?  (Lake Superior.  There’s very little funny to say about Lake Superior, unless you find “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” to actually be darkly comic.  And really, who doesn’t?  You, that’s who.)

3.  Which 2 presidents died July 4, 1826?  (John Adams and Thomas Jefferson.  There was a table of girls sitting across from us who looked like Nobel Laureates waiting to happen knowwhati’msayin’.  Anyway, I overheard them as I walked by discussing Roosevelt as an option.  And not Teddy either…)

4.  Which car make has the following models: LaCrosse, Rendezvous, and Riviera?  (Buick.  Affordable luxury is also acceptable.  “Those cars that old folks think are so great” is unacceptable, as that only pertains to the versions of those cars that are painted gold.)

5.  What statue was modeled after Marie Bertholdi, the sculptor’s mother?  (That’d be the Statue of Liberty, or, as Andy insisted on calling it, Lady Liberty.  See, here in the U.S. of God Bless America, we have this thing called freedom.  You might have heard of it in whatever totalitarian police state that you live in now.  To commemorate our overwhelming freedom and to give the finger to the world, we designed this statue, built it ourselves out of the corpses of Injuns and Injun tears, and gave it laser beam eyeballs.  Sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing…)

6.  On this day in 1997, what movie star died in Beverly Hills at the ripe old age of 89?  (If you said Jimmy Stewart, you’d be wrong.  However, if you said Jimmy Stewart with a really bad Jimmy Stewart impression, you’d be right.  Actually, saying it normally is right too.  Anyhow, we said Walter Matthau.  Curse you “Hello Dolly!”!)

7.  What Madonna song contains the following lyric: “Boys may come and boys may go and that’s alright you see”?  (That’s right, Material Girl!  That song is irrevocably drilled in my head from when you and Mel listened to it incessantly.  Or, when you listened to it that once.  Point is, it’s not my fault I knew this one, it’s yours!  I’m more of a Borderline man myself anyhow.)

8.  Which event happened first: the opening of the Panama Canal or the Wright Bros. first flight?  (A man.  A plan.  A canal.  Panama.  See?  It’s a palindrome!  But it’s not the right answer.  The ACTUAL answer is the Wright Bros. flight, which was in 1903.  Panama Canalary was in 1914.)

9.  Who was the first woman to host the Oscars solo?  (Whoopi!  There’s an obvious joke about questioning in what way Whoopi Goldberg qualifies as a “woman” as opposed to “man” but I’m above such base observations.)

10.  Who socked 61 dingers (home runs) in 1961?  (Roger Maris.  And did you know that Whoopi Goldberg may actually be a man?  Shocking but true!  All that aside, I’m not sure why this was a 15 point question.  I guess the advent of McGwire and Bonds might have clouded the memory of Maris.)

11.  What movie has the following:  putt-putt, a carpenter, and Dean Profitt?  (Overboard.  Andy has a serious man-crush on Kurt Russell, apparently.  I asked him why, and he gave me Russell’s 1980s filmography.  I was not swayed.  The filmography did mark the first of 2 times that “Big Trouble in Little China” was referenced at trivia, however.  Foreshadowing ho!)

12.  What state’s quarter has a design that features a buffalo and sunflowers?  (Kansas.  Dad got this one, as he should have.  Fun Fact: Did you know that there are only 3 states with one lonesome state nickname?  They are New York [The Empire State], Vermont [The Green Mountain State] and Washington [The Evergreen State].  Tennessee, the Volunteer State, is also known as the Big Bend State, the Butternut State, the Hog and Hominy state [deliciousness ho!] and the Mother of Southwestern Statesmen [history ho!].)

13.  Located in the ear, what is the smallest bone in the human body?  (The stirrup.  Not the hammer.  Nailed it!)

14.  This one is a 2 parter!  Because Andy thought the original question was too hard, he asked a second question as the actual 20 point question.  If we could answer part 1 correctly, we were entitled to an extra 10 points.  We were correct on neither part.  Part 1: Who was the artist of the famous Uncle Sam portrait?  Part 2: What American war actually had a cook named Uncle Sam?  (Part 1: James Montgomery Flagg.  We said Thomas Nast.  Curse you, William Randolph Hearst!!!  Part 2: The War of 1812.  We said the Spanish-American War.  Curse you, William Randolph Hearst!!!)

15.  Is a full-grown blue whale’s heart the size of a basketball, a washing machine, or a VW Beetle?  (He must have listed this one from Trivial Pursuit.  The answer, of course, is a celebration of methodical German engineering.  Although that should set up a joke about German basketballs, the right answer actually is the VW Beetle.  Dad got this one as well.)

16.  Who has been in the following films: “Big Trouble in Little China”, “The Bonfire of the Vanities”, and “The Ice Princess”?  (I’ve never actually seen any of these.  At any rate, the right answer is Kim Cattrall for some reason.  Hot?  I guess so.  Certainly “Police Academy” era Kim Cattrall.  Dad got this one too.)

Bonus!  Category: U.S. States
Q.  Name all of the states that begin with the letter W.  (Thank you Ms. Norton.  The 4 nifty United States are Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.  No word yet on Wode Island or Wawaii.)

Tiebreaker! 
In what year was Colorado organized as a territory?  (The right answer is 1861.  The pretenders to the crown said 1880, but we said 1860.  In your face history!!)

So, there you have it.  A powerful performance of patriotic prowess and persnickety plausibility.  Or something. 

OK, that last bit was a little forced, but I knew that you were waiting patiently for more alliteration, and I’m loathe to deny you any promised literary devices.

The Unbearable Deliciousness of Being.

Once upon a time, there was an old man who lived high in the highest mountains of India.  Each day was a constant struggle against the harsh, unforgiving environment of the Himalayas, man vs. nature ad infinitum.  Every time the man attempted to achieve some task, that stone-cold hosebag Mother Nature would be waiting to bitch-slap success away from the old man.  He grew tired and jaded from the perpetual struggle.  Then, for whatever reason, he lost at trivia.  The end.

That story has already been time-stamped and sent to Disney, so don’t even try to plagiarize it.  I’ll call you when the money starts rolling in so that you can start with the jealous.

Anyway, trivia.  We didn’t win or place, but we made a pretty good showing of it anyhow.  We were in a 4-way tie for 2nd place at bonus time (with Mr. Smith’s Class) but we booted the bonus.  A shame, too, because one of the answers that we missed came to me after we turned in our answers, but that’s immaterial.  It did end our winning streak, however, although one of those wins was fairly ill-gotten.  But we still got the cash, SO WHO’S LAUGHING NOW?!!???!  Us, that’s who. 

Here be questions.  I’ll try to remember to hide the answers.  Just for poops and giggles, we missed numbers 2, 5, and 14.  And, of course, the bonus.  You just had to bring that up.

1.  To whom is Madonna married?  (Guy Ritchie.  But for how long??!??!?!?  Seriously, Guy needs to dump that broad, amiright, and get back to the business of making movies in which she doesn’t appear.  With Jason Statham.  ‘Cuz he’s fucking harsh.)

2.  Mt. Katahdin is the highest point of which US state?  (Apparently, it’s Maine.  And not Kentucky.  Also, apparently, it’s the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail.  And, further apparently, the guys who knew that were all faux-outdoorsy douchebags with AT stickers on the X-Terras and Land Rovers that their collective parents bought for them and that they drive to “work” at dad’s contractor office for the rest of their pathetic meaningless lives.  Too harsh, or not nearly harsh enough?)

3.  Which instrument does not belong in the brass family: the bugle, the tuba, or the clarinet?  (The clarinet.  Also known as the loser instrument that losers used to play because they were losers and not nearly boss enough for sweet flute action.  Seriously, this was deceptively easy after that geographic sucker punch.)

4.  On this day in 1997, who bit Evander Holyfield?  (Correct answer, his dog.  PSYCH!  It was Mike Tyson.  You totally were fooled about the dog thing, weren’t you?  [Extend hand for high five, retract hand, run hand through hair, and cough awkwardly].)

5.  Who was the first non-injun person to discover North America?  (If you said Leif Ericsson, than Happy Leif Ericsson Day to you too!  But you’re still wrong.  The actual answer is Erik the Red.  We went the Leif route, as did most other teams who didn’t go “Golly, I don’t know, Christopher Columbus?”  This one’s a sucker punch too, though, because Erik the Red only discovered Greenland and Leif Ericsson, his murderous son, was the first to actually discover the mainland.  Technically, the right answer is Erik the Red, but c’mon! )

6.  What do you call the hybrid offspring of a tiger and a lion?  (There really has to be some perfect punchline for this, but the best I can come up with is “Deadly.”  Maybe “Joe Don Baker.”  Anyway, the real answer is the cuddly liger.)

7.  What 2 actors star in the new film “Step-Brothers?”  (Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly.  Strange, because its a Will Ferrell movie that neither A) takes place in the not-too-distant past or B) involves a delightfully tongue-in-cheek interpretation of an unpopular sport.  I might have lifted that criticism from Best Week Ever or Talk Soup or some other really lame pop-culture roundup.  Or maybe that was all me baby!)

8.  In what country can you find Bangalore, the Krishna River, and an Arabian Sea coastline?  (India.  By the way, did you know that in Rand McNally you where hats on your feet and hamburgers eat people?  That joke I didn’t steal, so whatever dude.)

9.  According to the USDA, what potato disease was the main cause of the Irish Potato Famine?  (Blight!  And we got it right!  Oh what a night!  Seriously, I didn’t actually know that “blight” was a disease.  I thought it was just the general term for “effed up crap” or “fucked up shit,” but we put it down anyway.  Good thing too.)

10.  Which event happened first: Michael Jackson’s Thriller video or Britney Spears’ debut on Star Search?  (Thriller, of course.  This seemed a little too easy for a 15-pointer so we were wary of a trick, something along the lines of “Oops, Michael Jackson never actually did a Thriller video!” but thankfully we went with head over heart.)

11.  Who was the first American to orbit the Earth in 1962?  ( John Glenn.  Dad thought it was Alan Shepherd, but I reminded him that  while Shepherd was the first American in space, Glenn was the first to orbit.  Dad also kept insisting that Shepherd was the first human in space, but I reminded him that although Russians are more closely related to the higher orders of apes, they are still technically human and they still technically beat us into space.)

12.  What movie has a portrait of Plymouth Harbour, Billy Zane, and ice?  (Titanic.  Apparently, Dad’s never seen Titanic.  Odd.  At any rate, I have to say that the parts where Billy Zane’s rich Boston aristocrat was sporting sweet 3-D glasses and taking orders from Biff kinda took me out of the movie.  The sequel was underrated though.)

13.  Who developed the Prairie School of architecture in Chicago?  (Frank Lloyd Wright.  Both Chris and Andy dared me to name another architect besides Wright.  Although I gave them both I.M. Pei, I’m pretty sure that there was an architect Smurf, probably named Architect Smurf, that would have made a better answer.  Or Jesus, who, being a carpenter, probably built houses.  Even if he didn’t, he has the whole dying for our sins thing and the whole water into wine thing.  The best Frank Lloyd Wright managed was dying for our sins, so he’s still an alcoholic miracle behind the King of Kings.)

14.  What are the 2 oldest AFC (football) teams?  (The correct answers are the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Baltimore Ravens/Cleveland Browns.  We said Baltimore and Indianapolis.  Andy said Pittsburgh and the Cleveland Browns, but Andy was wrong.  You see, although the Cleveland Browns were originally founded before the other AFC teams save Pittsburgh, when the team moved to Baltimore and became the Ravens they retained the history and records of the old Browns.  The CURRENT team located in Cleveland, confusingly also named the Browns, are in fact an expansion team that only came about in 1999.  Anyway, if you’re still awake, I’ll move along. )

15.  Who has been in the following films: Scent of a Woman, Twister, and Almost Famous?  (Philip Seymour Hoffman.  I’ve actually seen all of these movies, which is so rare for these questions.  I guess I’m just a fan of large pasty white guys, what with me being pasty white and larger than life.)

16.  In what decade was the jet engine invented?  (The 1930s.  Specifically, in 1939 by zee Nazis.  There’s enough Nazi humor out there, what with Hogan’s Heroes, so I won’t bore you with yet another labored Bavarian-cream-pie-in-the-face-murder-or-Jews-and-Gypsys joke.)

BONUS!!  Category:  Go Green!
Q:  According to the American Council for Energy Efficiency (or something), name 5 of the 6 vehicle manufacturers with cars among the top 10 most environmentally friendly autos.  (They are Honda, Toyota, Ford, Nissan, Smart, and Mini.  We got the first 4 right, but said Chevrolet and Saturn instead of Smart and Mini.  It seems to me that a Saturn hybrid would be more environmentally friendly than a Mini, since there are no Mini hybrids, so I’m still a little mystified.  But I digress.)

Anyway, those be the questions.  I think we did alright for ourselves, and we’ll be able to weather the blow to our finances, what with our Scrooge McDuck-esque stack of previous earnings.  Weep not for us sister!!

Baaaaaa ba ba ba baaaaa! BA! BA! BA! (funky sax solo)

If you couldn’t tell (and I know that you COULD tell), that’s what the theme song from Night Court looks like in post subject form.  The aesthetic pleasure rings true even in a different medium, don’t you think?  Night Court.  Man.  FORESHADOWING MUCH?!?!!!  Maybe.

Well, cutting to the chase, we didn’t win.  In fact, we really didn’t do very well.  We missed 6 questions (numbers 7, 9, 11, 13, 14 and 16) and only ended up with 100 points going into the bonus.  What really hurts was that 4 of the 6 misses were of the “we-have-2-options-so-for-a-

lark-let’s-go-with-the-wrong-answer” type.  And one of them we had a short list of possibilities and we chose…poorly then as well (since we had at least 3 choices it’s not quite as galling, but it still hurts).  HOWEVER, we did nail the bonus like a dimestore hooker during Fleet Week, whatever that means (I think it has something to do with an admiral’s hat, like Cap’n Crunch wears; I don’t know if it entails you and the Cap’n making it happen though). And it was a tricky one too!  So, despite our many failings,
we still ended up in the money, hitting 3rd place.  This of course makes our misses all the more painful because a couple of lucky breaks would have put us on top of the world (looking down on creation).  I guess it was not to be.  I’ll chalk it up to being rusty.

In case you’re wondering, our team name was Stately Wayne Manor (TM).  I thought it was appropriate, and, since we couldn’t seem to come up with another good Batman name, away we went.  (I realize now that “Batman’s a Scientist” might have worked, but it just doesn’t have the same ooomph, ya know?)  By the way, if you haven’t yet seen Batman than do it.  Fantastic.  Even if you have to fly to Miami to do it, do it.  Also, this was Dr. Smith’s last hurrah.  Everything appears to be set, and he’s leaving for the Commonwealth of Virginia directly.  He got to write some of the questions (swearing not to help his team with his questions), but they weren’t all his.  Apparently his questions were a bit too hard for the Red Bull and Jaegermeister crowd, so, after using Smith questions for questions 1 & 2, I think his contributions were tabled until the later rounds.  SEGUE!  Here be questions!

1.  Camden Yards is the home stadium of what MLB team?  (This one is actually a trick question, technically speaking.  The FIELD is called Camden Yards, but the park itself is known as Oriole Park.  At any rate, it’s the Orioles.   This was one of the questions that people thought was too hard, which was strange because for no apparent reason the Orioles-Blue Jays game from Baltimore on the Oriole channel was being aired on at least 2 TVs in the joint.  Anywho.)

2.  What series of books was penned under the pseudonym Franklin W. Dixon?  (The Hardy Boys!  We totally guessed on this one and got it right.  Callou callai!  Really there aren’t a lot of series of books from which to choose.)

3.  Who is Kurt Cobain’s widow?  (Courtney Love.  I wanted to make a tasteless joke about her being his murderer too, but I’m not really cool enough to pull it off.  So, instead, I’ll reference the Weird Al video for “Smells Like Nirvana.”  Remember that Weird Al video “Smells Like Nirvana?”  Totally cool enough to pull that yukfest off.)

4.  From what kingdom did Greece gain its independence in 1825?  (The Ottoman Empire.  Nailed it.  Those crazy Turkeys and their being stuffed with chicken and duck thing.  Cuh-razy.)

5.  Who are the 2 families fighting in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet?  (The Danes and the DiCaprios.  Hi-yo!  Actually the Capulets and Montagues.)

6.  Who starred in the following films: “The Goonies”, “Encino Man”, and “Memphis Belle”?  (Sean Astin.  This was also a guess.  I know “The Goonies” and I’m sure that I’ve seen “Encino Man,” but it was still pretty much just blind luck.  No love for Short Round/Data though?  WTF?! )

7.  In which amusement park will you find the 310 ft. tall roller coaster Millennium Force?  (And thus begins our descent into maddening failure.  The correct answer is Cedar Point, which Dad mentioned.  I half-heartedly suggested King’s Island in Cincinnati, but it was enough to sway Dad, so we put King’s Island.  Gwaaaargh!!)

8.  On this day in 1995, Alan Hale and Thomas Bopp discovered what?  (Hey!  Remember the 90s?  Crazy times man.  MTV and such.  Anyway, if you DO remember the 90s, than perhaps you remember the Hale-Bopp Comet, discovered by lunatic street preacher Alan Hale and Thomas Bopp, finest butcher in all of South Boston and the man pulling strings at Tammany Hall.  Seriously though, I think they were astrologists or something.)

9.  “Wham”, “Drowning Girl”, and “Look Mickey” were all paintings by what pop artist?  (Dad and I both assumed that pop artist=Andy Warhol, so we erroneously put Warhol.  Dad pondered whether there were any other pop artists of note, and I mentioned Roy Liechtenstein, but I dismissed him as too obscure.   I mean, really, Roy Liechtenstein? Apparently, yes, really Roy Liechtenstein.  Gwaaaargh!!)

10.  What movie has the Beach Boys, a frisbee-catching dog, and Sarah Jessica Parker?  (Right in my wheelhouse.  Flight of the Navigator.  There was a mad dash between me and Chris to get the answer in first, and I sadly lost.  Still, awesome stuff.  Compliance!)

11.What NFL legend is known as “The Blonde Bomber?”  (Terry Bradshaw.  We put Boomer Esiason.  We debated between the 2, but finally opted for the much Blonder Boomer.  In our defense, Bradshaw was bald, so he really should have been the Bald Bomber.  And Boomer still has that hair.  Sometimes I see Boomer Esiason and he’s put a blue streak in his hair and I’m all like “What’s with the hair?” and he’s all “Oh, I went to a Twisted Sister concert..” and I’m all “Never heard of HER.” and he’s all “It’s not a she, it’s a he.  Actually, it’s a them.”  Compliance! )

12.  Which amendment gives us the right to not have soldiers in our home?  (Very poorly worded question…anywhoo, the right answer is the 3rd Amendment, which is what we put!  Incidentally, I was walking back to the seat with Chris and he asked what we put.  Upon telling him that we put the 3rd Amendment, he flatly told me that we were wrong and that it was actually the 2nd Amendment.  Much like Howard Hesseman trying to keep David under lock and key, he was misguided.  Compliance!)

13.  The so-called “Football War” in 1969 took place between what 2 countries?  (The right answer: El Salvador and Honduras.  The hilarious answer: Budweiserstan and the BudLight Emirates.  Get it?  Like the Bud Bowl!  There were beers that were playing football!!  Anyway, we answered neither.  Not that it mattered but we put Brazil and the UK, assuming that the war actually took place on the soccer field.  But we honestly didn’t know this one, so no hard feelings.)

14.  Sentinel Falls, the 2nd highest waterfall in North America, is in what park?  (Tarnation!  It’s in Yosemite National Park, which we did not put.  We put Yellowstone, which I’m sure has at least one big famous kick-ass waterfall.  Maybe it was in Jellystone…like Booboo Falls or something.  Oh well.  Point is, this is another one we talked ourselves out of.  Gwaaargh!!)

15.  Who is the tiny green being from outer space who appeared in the later episodes of “The Flintstones”?  (The Great Gazoo!  I know, I know, you thought it was Ozmodiar, but he’s actually a little green alien that only Homer can see.  “Damn straight, Troy my man!”  Err…Compliance!)

16.  Who was the first woman to dunk a basketball in a professional game?  (There are really 2 WNBA players to trot out.  One of them, Lisa Leslie, was the first woman to dunk a basketball professionally, so we naturally stayed away from her.  The other, Cheryl Swoopes, is a well-rounded individual with an awesome last name for sports.  Isn’t that more important?  By the way, there was a fight in a WNBA game yesterday, and I saw at least 3 news outlets cover the story with the tagline “Womens Basket-Brawl.”  Fair, balanced, and priceless! )

BONUS!!  Category: TV Shows.  Right up our alley! 
Q:  6 characters are given.  Name the television shows in which they appeared.  The characters: Dr. Dick Solomon, Winnie Cooper, Carla Tortelli, Trixie Norton, Laura Winslow, and Dan Fielding.  (Dr. Dick Solomon is from “3rd Rock From The Sun”;  Winnie Cooper is from “The Wonder Years”;  Carla Tortelli is from “Cheers”;  Trixie Norton was from “The Honeymooners”;  Laura Winslow was from “Family Matters”; and Dan Fielding was from NIGHT COURT!!!!!!  Mel Torme!  I knew all of the except “The Honeymooners,” which Dad got.  Apparently that was the one that tripped everybody up, because only three teams got all of the questions right, us and the 2 teams that beat us.  But I think we earned our treat.  Compliance!)

So, there you have it.  Compliance!

First: There is a mountain. Then: There is no mountain.

Then, and this is the important part, THEN THERE IS?!  I HOPE YOU HAD SOME KLEENEX AT HAND, BECAUSE YOUR MIND HAS CERTAINLY BEEN BLOWN.  I’ll allow you a moment to clean up the phantasmagoric mess.  Done?  Okay then.

At this point, I’ll tell you that the subject of the post has nothing to do with our trivia experience this week.  But the words of Donovan echo through all things, so, in a roundabout way, his lyrics are inextricable from the very fabric of life itself, so deal with it.  Cut to the chase: we didn’t win.  It was quite the “drag,” as the kids say.  It turns out we weren’t “with it” enough, and we ended up “right off.”  I blame robots.  More than that, I blame the robot overlords of the SEC, because that was our downfall.  And by SEC, I mean the Southeastern Conference, a collegiate football confederation, and not the Securities and Exchange Commission.  I have no problem with the robot overlords at the other SEC. 

Our team this week was Dr. Beardface (That’s Beardfacé!!).  It induced many a chuckle, don’t you worry about that.  But winning it did not induce.  It really was lame though, because we actually did very well.  We only missed 2 questions in the first four rounds (#12 and #9, #9, #9, #9…).  But then there was the bonus.  Oy vey!  It was a deceptively fiendish question, couched in familiar cadences but with deadly poison bubbling just beneath the surface.  Oh the pain, the pain of it all!  Only 2 teams actually got the thing right, so I guess we can’t feel that bad about it.  It is a shame that a good game was otherwise wasted.  But, honestly, it wasn’t that good of a game.  After last week was “too hard,” Andy lightened things up and told us that the questions were gonna be a bit easier than last week.  And, by and large, they were.  So that was good.  But I was also hampered by the fact that Dad was no help at all.  Nary a question answered.  C’est dommage.

HERE BE QUESTIONS!  By the way, did you know that a stock phrase with certain parts that can be filled in with different words is called a snowclone?  Like “X is the new Y.”  Or “Here be X.”  or “When your Xing the Y, don’t W the Z or else A.”  I just thought you might like to know.

1.  Tim Tebow recently got on stage with what country music star?  (Kenny Chesney.  Andy asked me who, of the 2, I would rather punch in the giblets.  I responded that there are few people that I would rather effectively castrate than Tim Tebow.  And then I walked away.  Ok, that story really should have ended with somebody being punched in the balls, but I just couldn’t get the hate going tonight.)

2.  Australia, Indonesia, and Madagascar all have shores on which ocean?  (If you said the Pacific, then congratulations!  You’re a member of Mr. Smith’s Class!  You’re also very wrong.  The RIGHT answer is the Indian Ocean.  Is it wrong to gloat?  Probably.  But on the other hand we are the greatest of all time, so.  There’s that.)

3.  What’s the full name of Matthew Perry’s character on the hit Television show “Friends?”  (I think you know.  It’s Neurotico K. Wackypants.  Actually Chandler Bing, but I’m sure that you already knew that.  “But as wacky as those kids were, they were no match for Captain Wacky! [Later renamed Homer.]“)

4.  What Japanese mountain is considered sacred by Buddhists and Shintos?  (Mt. Foojee.  Or Fuji.  I kind of like the phonetic spelling though.  Foojee.  Foooooooooooooojeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.  As fun to say as it is to use as a tool of cultural insensitivity!)

5.  On this day in 1965, which president signed Medicare into law?  (That’d be LBJ.  Stands fer Lyndon Beatin’ Ass Johnson.  Seems he was known for Beatin’ Ass.  Whether or not names were taken is lost to the historical record.)

6.  How many quarts are in a gallon?  (Well, how many Einstein?  Is it 5?  6?  WRONG!!!  The answer is 4.  Again, I list it only for the sake of completion, not because I think you needed to know.  But, then again, you probably measure milk in “litres” down there, don’t you?  Why don’t you put the milk in the “boot” next to the “pram” then light up a “fag”?  We saved your ass in WW the Deuce, and don’t you forget it.  Beatin’ ass. )

7.  Who wrote the following: Dolores Claiborne, Running Man, and The Green Mile?  (Stephen King.  The last one kinda gave it away.  There’s nothing really funny about Stephen King, what with him being an American hero and all.  Did you know that he saved yer ass in WW the Deuce?  ‘Nuff said.)

8.  Who is Major League Baseball’s all-time strikeout leader?  (You said Steve Carlton, didn’t you?  Silly billy!  It’s actually Nolan Ryan.  Did you know that Ryan used his fastball to save yer ass in WW the Deuce?  Beatin’ ass.)

9.  What movie is set in Seattle and features a roller coaster and Alyssa Milano?  (It might have helped if he also mentioned a young pre-legitimate acting work “Marky” Mark Wahlberg.  Or maybe it wouldn’t have.  We said Commando, and we were quite wrong.  The answer was Fear, which I saw once a looooong time ago.  I don’t even remember Alyssa Milano being in it.  You know what I do remember Milano from?  Who’s The Boss!  All about a young housekeeper/plumber/whatever played by Tony Danza.  Fun fact: Tony Danza saved yer ass in WW the Deuce.  USA! USA!)

10.  What is Barry Gordy, Jr. famous for founding?  (Obviously, the answer is Rockwell’s career.  To a lesser extent, he’s known for founding Motown Records, but when put up against the sublime transcendence that is “Somebody’s Watching Me,” all things turn to pale ashen pablum.  And need I remind you of how Rockwell saved yer ass in WW the Deuce?  Of course, the answer is yes.)

11.  In what country can you find the following: Lake Eau Claire, the Queen Charlotte Islands, and Fort Vermilion?  (Our maple syrup-drinking neighbor to the north, Canada!  Our home and native land, true patriot blah blah blah.  Canada, as we know, is a stronghold of communism and hockey.  Sometimes I wonder why we even sent that elite squadron made up of LBJ, Nolan Ryan, Stephen King, Tony Danza and Rockwell to save their ass in WW the Deuce.  Why??!?! )

12.  What album by Michael Jackson contains the tracks “Remember the Time,” “Who is it?” and “Jam”?  (We put Black or White, but that does not appear to be an album.  But it is a kick-ass song.  Apparently, the album is Dangerous, which is not a kick-ass Michael Jackson song.  You know what other Michael Jackson songs kick ass?  I’ll tell you.  All of ‘em.  There was “Fat,” “Eat It,” and “Lasagna.”  Oh, and “Another One Rides the Bus.”  Artiste!)

13.  What early civilization is credited with inventing the catapult?  (Greece!  Ancient Greece that is.  Modern Greece is credited with the baklavapult and the gatling gyro.  As delicious as they are deadly.  Just like radishes!)

14.  According to the American Museum of Natural History, which is faster: a grizzly bear or a rabbit?  (As we all know, deliciousness is directly linked to speed.  So, the deliciously dangerous grizzly bear can go 32 mph, but the dangerously delicious Wascally Wabbit can travel at speeds in excess of 45 deliciousness units per delicious.  We figured that this was a set up, where you say that the answer is obviously the rabbit, but since it’s a 20-point it can’t be the rabbit.  But that’s how they get ya.  So, we chose wabbit.  And we was right.)

15.  Who has been in the following films: “A Far Place,” “American Psycho,” and “Election?”  (I’ve never seen the first two, so we worked from “Election.”  And I figured that Matthew Broderick wouldn’t have been in “American Psycho,” so that left Chris Klein and Reese Witherspoon.  Luckily, I figured out that American Psycho and American Pie were totally unrelated, so we went with Reese Witherspoon.  We chose…wisely.)

16.  What decade saw the opening of Radio City Music Hall?  ( That’d be the 1930s, when men were men and dames were dames.  A rough and tumble decade of space pirates and vegemite, and a decade of us savin’ yer ass in WW the Deuce.  Bustin’ ass.)

BONUS!  Category: The SEC (if you’re confused as to whether this refers to the sporting designation or the financial designation, please see above)

Q.  Name the 5 highest paid coaches in the SEC.  (You want to say Phil Fulmer, don’t you?  Well too bad.  Fulmer is actually a poor vagabond who rides the rails from town to town searchin’ for the big rock candy mountain.  Or a free Chavis Donutburger.  As delicious as it is deadly.  No, the ACTUAL ANSWER is: Nick Saban (Alabama), Urban Meyer (Florida), Tommy Tuberville (Auburn), Les Miles (LSU), and Bobby Petrino (Arkansas).  We got the first 3, but we also put down Fulmer and Mark Richt at Georgia, who I was sure would be in there.  But, alas, it was not to be.  We were in sole possession of the lead going into the question but we were but a face in the crowd of also-rans at the end.  Such is the cruel hand of fate.)

So, there you have it.  A sordid tale of bustin’ asses and delicious danger.  My life in so many words.  I’m tired now, so I’m a stop typing.  Right.  Now.

Gotta get me some of that soup…

Out of the dark void, formless entities swirled through the faceless morass.  The spark of sentience falls like divine rain upon the raw forms, shattering into a brilliant flash of color.  Thought, primitive and unrestrained, flows forth like a cooling river over the hot desert sand.  Jarring at first, unconnected, primal, instinctive.  Slowly coming into focus, shaping into consciousness.  The beings begin to evaluate their situation, nay, their own existence.  Words come into the sphere of the temporal, small and unintelligible at first, but growing in sophistication.  Suddenly, like the bright flash of a star exploding into cosmic essence, the newly formed creatures can quantify the very meaning of life.  They fall to the ground and train their heads to the heavens and, in unison, cry out with urgent force:  “HALF PRICE TACOS?!  I’D BE CRAZY NOT TO BUY A DOZEN!!!”

This doesn’t have anything to do with anything.  Forgive me for indulging my own whimsy.  So.  Trivia?  Did we do that tonight?  You bet your sweet Aspercreme we did.  And, like the founding fathers before us, we destroyed all comers with our giant electrical death cannon!  Except the two teams that beat us.  They had, like, anti-electrical-death-cannon suits or something.  How should I know?  But don’t you worry, the damage was still catastrophic and delicious.  And, we still came in third despite booting some easier questions in the first two rounds. 

The name tonight was The Bourne Redundancy.  It was on the list, but it wasn’t very topical.  I suppose that if we had put more thought into it we could probably have come up with something Olympics-related, but we were le tired (Maybe the Gold Medals?  That’s funny, right?  Or Javelin?  Maybe?).  So we went with the tired out-of-date 2007 film reference.  Deal with it!  But we did ok, overall.  We missed one question each in the first two rounds (#s 3 and 8), aced round 3, and missed 2 in round 4 (13 and 15).  And we demolished the bonus like a German demolishes the all-you-can-eat pancake extravabreakfast at IHOP.  They loves them some boysenberry.  Or, as they call it, der boysenberry.  Or Eine Deelishus.  I think.  I don’t really speak German, so I’m mostly just gleaning what I can from TV shows that have lampooned Hogan’s Heroes.

HERE BE QUESTIONS!!  I promise not to mention the Electric Slide once in the question section.

1.  What does TVA stand for?  (Terrible Violent Apples.  Wait, I can do better than that.  Two Voluminous Apricots?  Twin Vienna Arf-arf?  I got nothing.  I think my funny’s broken.  I might have broken it doing the electric slide…anyway, it’s Tennessee Valley Authority.  Started by president Taft to provide opium to the natives, the TVA has since morphed into a secret organization bent on controlling the world’s supply of precious diamonds and being constantly thwarted by those meddlesome GoBots.  Choke on it Taft!)

2.  “CSI: Miami” and “The Price is Right” air on which network?  (CBS.  Best known as the channel that launched the great Electric Slide craze of 1909, CBS originally operated a chain of juice and smoothie bars catering largely to Portuguese immigrants along the eastern seaboard.  Later, they outfitted allied warships with giant electrical death cannons to fight against the TVA.)

3.  Which country’s Ministry of Health claims that it’s women are the longest-lived in the world?  (Man, that one is tough to phrase coherently.  I need a smoothie, so I guess I’ll have to fake a Portuguese accent again.  The country is Japan, but we said Sweden.  After we turned the answer in, it came to Dad that he had read about Japan’s boasting on teh internets today, but alas.  Fun fact!  In Japan, you can legally pay for any meal tab under 20000 Yen by doing the electric slide!  What a country!)

4.  What beer was endorsed by Spuds MacKenzie?  (If you said Caybrew, you’ve got another think coming.  You’ve also got your mind set to flavor and your phasers set to delicious, but that’s neither here nor there.  Spuds in fact endorsed Bud Light, which you might remember as the Bud Bowl runner-up from 1989 to 1997.  In 1996, in the penultimate Bud Bowl, Bud Light came close to upsetting Budweiser, but, with 12 seconds remaining in the final quarter, they were unable to electric slide their way into the end zone for the winning score. )

5.  What football team plays their home games in Bryant-Denny Stadium?  (If you said Bud Light, you’ve got your mind set to great taste and your phasers set to less filling.  But, you’re still close, as the real inhabitants of the stadium are a bunch of beer-filled losers: the University of Alabama!  Yee-haw!  The stadium is named after Paul “Bear” Bryant, the inventor of the electric slide, and a Denny’s that is, like, right down the road.  Germans stay away from Denny’s, preferring to get their boysenberry fix from the flavor country that is IHOP.)

6.  Which decade saw bellbottoms, miniskirts, and beehive hairdos become fashionable?  (If you said the 1960s, you were…um…right, i guess.  It was the 60s.  Dad did note that beehives were popular as early as the 1950s since it kept one’s hair out of one’s eyes when doing the electric slide.  There’s not a lot of funny in the 1960s, unlike the hilarious 1940s, so I can’t make a joke.  Oh well.)

7.  What color is associated with the Soviet army?  (If you said purple, then you’ve got you’re mind set to donuts and your phasers set to “is a fruit.”  And you’re wrong!  It’s red!  The Red Army!!  Remember?  You probably saw them in your history textbooks, doing the Electric Slide on the Berlin Wall before heading off to the nearest Denny’s for a Two Eggs Over My Hammy breakfastaganza.  It was the best of times, it was the delicious of times.)

8.  Which was inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame first: the Frisbee or the red wagon?  (This question is terrible.  There’s absolutely no way to divine the answer except to guess.  We guessed red wagon, and it was actually the Frisbee.  Seriously though, this is NOT the first time he’s thrown out a Toy Hall of Fame question, which begs the question: does Andy keep up with the Toy Hall of Fame the same way that non-German people might keep up with the Baseball Hall of Fame, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, or Electric Slide Hall of Fame?  I mean, honestly… )

9.  The Tennessee Smokies are a minor league affiliate of what Major League Baseball club?  (If you said the Sault Ste. Marie Electric Sliders, then you’ve just stumbled upon perhaps the greatest baseball team name ever!!  You’ve also got your mind set to Wrong and your phasers set to [muted trumpet].  It is, of course, those lovable rascals the Chicago Cubs.  Incidentally, the Cubbies last won a World Series in 1993, led by a rotation that included young fireballer Henry “the high stinky Limburger” Rowengartner and crafty veteran Chet “Deal From the Have-to” Steadman.)

10.  What movie has a ferris wheel, drag racing, and Stockard Channing?  (It’s Grease.  Blah blah Electric Slide blah.  Next!)

11.  On this day in 2003, Arnold Schwarzenegger announced his gubernatorial intentions on whose show?  (It was Jay Leno, three-time Nebraska State Fair Electric Slide champion!  Fun fact: while doing a tour of IHOPs in Germany, Leno made a Bob Evans joke and was nearly drowned in a giant vat full of boysenberry syrup.  Fun Fact, the deuce: the TVA frequently employs a giant vat full of blueberry syrup as an execution device, as it is more cost-effective than decadently delicious boysenberry.)

12.  What do you call a shockwave produced by an object moving through the air faster than the speed of sound?  (If you said Sonic Boom, referring to the shot of espresso that can be added to any blended coffee drink at Sonic, then you’ve got a serious case of delicious on your hands.  But you’re also technically not correct.  Like doing the electric boogie instead of the electric slide.  The real answer is a Sonic Boom, but in the less delicious supersonic speed version.)

13.  Who is the author of Where the Red Fern Grows?  ( If you said the TVA, then you just electric slid you’re way out of correctitude.  Now that that’s out of the way.  The answer is apparently Wilson Rawls, whom I’ve never heard of.  I’ve heard of Wilson Phillips and Lou Rawls, so I assume that it’s some kind of joint venture from the two.  Anywho, we said Frances Hodgson Burnett, which is in no way in the land of correctitude.)

14.  Who has played the following characters:  Doralee Rhodes, Mona Stangley, and Truvy Jones?  (If you said Dolly Parton, then, congratulations!  You answered correctly, which you should have since you’ve spent some time with at least one of those characters.  But, you didn’t answer hilariously.  For Hilarity, we would have accepted any of the following: boysenberry syrup, Germany, the TVA, giant electrical death cannons, IHOP, or Bob Evans.  But definitely NOT the electric slide.  That’s more serious than funny.)

15.  What country borders the Pacific, contains the large city of Villa Nueva, and has as its currency the quetzal?  (If you said Peru, you’ve got your mind set to our answer but, unfortunately, your phasers set to Incorrect.  As Peruvian as the question might sound, the CORRECT answer is Guatemala.  Fun fact: the electric slide is neat!  [That worked out better than I could have hoped.])

16.  Name the song and performer behind the following lyric: “Everybody sing, everybody dance.  Lose yourself in a wild romance.”  (As you are no doubt singing the lyrics to the ghosts and dust mites doing the electric slide invisibly in your bedroom right now, I’ll just affirm for you that the answer is, in fact, “All Night Long [All Night]” by Lionel “Chet Steadman” Richie.)

BONUS!  Category: Steel Production.  Hold onto your electric slidin’ bonnet, Nelly, things are about to get cuh-razy!
Q.  According to the International Iron and Steel Institute (not as awesome as it sounds), name 4 of the 5 top steel-producing countries of this our world.  ( The correct answers, in order from awesomest to least awesome, are Japan, the US of A, Russia, China, and India.  In case you’re wondering, Japan edges out the U of SA just slightly due to their overall lead in electric slide dancin’ robots with giant electrical death cannons embedded in their chests.  Anyway, we got the first for but missed India, saying Germany instead.  I think we figured that all of those IHOP forks and boysenberry syrup latches would require vast steel reserves, but we still got it right enough.  Hooray!)

So, that’s the way that it went down.  Notice that I didn’t mention the electric slide once, but many gloriously hilarious times.  It’s like my oeuvre.  And, now the post is oeuvre.  Which is to say over.