It was another packed house with 107 present. In spite of a lower than usual overall score of 51% (the usual being about 55%), the eventual winner, We Know Stuff, walked away with the honors with an overall score of what might be an all-time high mark of 58 (83%) and they showed they meant business by getting a 10/10 in Round 1.
Round 1 came in at 47% with only 6 teams knowing the approximate age of Diana Nyad as 64 when she swam from Havana to Key West in 2013. The youngest team (NeverGuess) also got the right answer here. Clearly her accomplishment was not so clear to the House as the guesses ranged from 14 to 80. Doing 103 straight miles at age 80 would have been truly astounding. This result was in direct contrast to the question about the actor who won 11 Tony awards for his performance in Hamilton. Lin-Manuel Miranda was answered correctly by all but 3 teams. Six teams got the bird with the highest brain/body weight ratio as the crow/raven although the hummingbird got the most votes. Maybe that they can hover and fly backwards was an influence in this choice. Ten teams knew Black Star as David Bowie’s last album although there were guesses as: Death Star, Grave Oddity, The End, Passages, Blue Mirror, Lazarus, Dark Star, Final Words, Purple Dreams, Life, Berlin and Black Lazarus- whew!
Round 2 was also low (40%) with We Know Stuff and the Ministry heading the list with 8/10 while the next highest teams were 6/10. Only Cheap Dates and the Trivia Trailblazers got the “light” behind paintings of religious figures as “nimbus”. Congratulations! Also, only two teams (Broken Record and the Blond Artifacts) knew Narragansett as the beer that Captain Quint crushed in the film Jaws. I was impressed that half the House knew the Southeast Asia geography question. It was not an easy question to ask but essentially relied on knowing where Singapore is.
Round 3 was the lowest in a long time with the score of 38%; here, We Know Stuff dominated with 8 and the next closest team with 6 was Cheap Dates. Over half of the teams knew the approximate date of the discovery of oxygen---there was a range of incorrect answers – 1450 to 1895! All but two teams knew the essential feature of the middle finger of Galileo- impressive! Rude to the end. Over half knew the marlin was the fish caught in Hemingway’s book. Only 6 teams knew that Shakespeare was the first non-royal to be celebrated on a British stamp- most of the incorrect answers were attributed to Churchill- a good guess. The six teams were We Know Stuff, Cashew, Trivia Trailblazers, Positive Vibrations and Wasted Synapses.
Round 4 saw a 49% score—it looked at this point like it was going to be a dark night. The definition of the word “eponymous” fooled only ONE team. I was very surprised as I had to look it up at least twice! Good for the House. The reverse took place when only two teams knew that a “paradiddle” refers to the use of drums- these were the Dewey Decibels and Green Eggs and Ham. It was surprising to me that most of the House knew the “Blobfish” but there were a few alternative answers posed: Dumbofish, Jimmy Durante fish (look him up for those unfamiliar) and the best of the night- Mitch McConnell (brilliant choice by the Van Buren Boys-almost worth the point). Finally, most knew the age (within a small error) of “The Boss” (70).
The 5th round perked up with a 60% score. Eleven teams knew the numbers (19 hanged in 1692) of the “witches” in Salem, Massachusetts. The second most chosen was zero. All but two teams knew that Jeff Bezos was tagged as the world’s richest person as of 2018- likely subject to change. Only 5 teams knew the quote by Anthony Bourdain with a host of alternative guesses including Super Dave Osborne and Pee Wee Herman. All but one knew old comic strip characters (Reggie vs Archie) and all but one knew Trafalgar Square in London. Four teams knew the lemur as having blue eyes and these were Boom Down, Who Knew, Four Horsemen and the Blonde Artifacts. Finally, all but two knew the music of Ed Sheeran.
The highest score of the night took place in Round 6 with 72%. Cashew rallied back with a 10/10 score, the second perfect score since Round 1. Inasmuch as the scores were high here, most teams were successful knowing The Bronx as not on an island in the boroughs of New York City. In addition, Ireland was identified as the last country in Europe to allow divorce. ALL teams knew the name of the leaf covering of a rain forest- namely the canopy. Finally, all but two teams knew the instrument of Phil Collins (drums). A great round.
The last round showed a more normal score of 53%, however, as mentioned above, the overall score for the night was the lowest in some time with 51%. Most teams (all but two or three) knew the impact of Coco Chanel in fashion and the US president’s Nobel Prize winners. Sadly, the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) determination that the most educated country (Canada) was chosen by only 4 teams; Ministry of Truth, British Bulldogs, Broken Records and the Van Buren Boys. All in all a good night with congratulations to We Know Stuff.
It should be pointed out that in the playoff for one of the ties- the question was how many cars are there in the world, (1 billion), Who Knew guessed 1,000,000,001!
I wish to thank again the careful scoring of Meaghan, Julia and Mercedes . I also want to thank, as always, our Greeter-in-Chief, Kim Stephenson, who coordinates book and other prizes from our Bookstore. Finally, thanks to Nicolas Zrihen, Manager of the Club, who provides not only the service for snacks but three vouchers for prizes.
OUR REMAINING SCHEDULE IS:
MAR 19 THURSDAY
APR 7 TUESDAY
MAY 7 WEDNESDAY
Results for January
Overall Results
