36 Shades of Quizical

Last night was Expats quiz night down at Lulu, it was a hot and sticky evening (fortunately I made it home just before the thunderstorm hit) but it was fractionally cooler in the bar.

Chris promised us a 'bumper holiday' quiz and he then proceeded to torment us with 36 instead of the usual 25 questions.

Emma, our quiz queen, had been bagsied as a team partner* by KP, and as it was KP's first quiz we let it go.  Emma's sister, H, and brother in law D, are visiting this week and as D works for a proper, grown up newspaper** I thought I'd have a good chance of winning with him as a running partner.  No.  He is clearly only the tea boy at the Telegraph*** as I'm sure the only question he got right was:

- where did Napoleon meet his Waterloo?  Admittedly, if left to my own devices I'd have put either France or Sweden**** but D did confess that 'Belgium' was just a good guess.

Quite how we managed to get 28/36, the top score (along with two other teams) is still beyond me. 

We were rubbish on the music round getting only 2/6 right - Chris cheated and played Donna Summer singing the Gloria Gaynor hit 'I will survive', so when having to put the artist singing for the answer I think almost everyone wrote Gloria.  There was very nearly a riot when that answer was read out!

Then there were the six questions all about abbreviations used in the internet, these were clearly compiled with the help of a teen, that was another disastrous round for us:

- ROFL.  I think everyone knows that.
- LOL. Ditto.
- AFK.  Not a clue...we were truly clueless, 'Away From Keyboard'.
- BRB.  Ditto, we were told it's 'Be Right Back'.
- IMHO - honest or humble?  Maybe it's a north/south divide?
There was clearly one other question but I left the answer sheet in the bar (either that or D hid the incriminating evidence)

We had only one round of questions about the Olympics, hardly surprising seeing as the quizmaster is Australian (10th*****) and the quiz is held in Germany (6th) and they weren't 'serious' sport questions:

- what's the colour of the middle Olympic ring?  I was adamant the top left was black...but no, at least I don't actually live and work in London, haven't been going past the Olympic emblem 
10 times per day for the last month/year.
- what nationality was the diver who became an internet star due to his backflop off the 3m board?  I knew this, because diving is my favourite Olympic sport (nothing to do with the trim bodies and tight little speedos they sport!

Then there was the round all about holiday reading matter.  We had to finish the title to the books listed on some dodgy website as THE books to read by the pool this summer:

- Fifty Shades of ?  Which brought howls of laughter from all bookgroup members there, because that's what we read this summer.
- Captain Corelli's ?  Can't believe this made a summer reading list, I read this 11 years ago at least (it was definitely before Jasmine)
- The French Lieutenant's ?  Ditto (although I haven't actually read this, yet)
- Game of ?  Thrones, in case you haven't seen the TV mini series (very good adaptation, IMHO) and I've read all the books up to now, shan't be reading the next ones though, the story is being dragged out, new characters being added at the author's whim...
- The Hunger ?  Games, if you haven't read the books or seen the first of the trilogy of films, a good story, even if it's written for teens.


All in all it was an entertaining evening, I didn't even have to walk home after my normal chauffeur left to go home to bed (thanks KP for risking turning into a pumpkin and dropping me home) I came away with a dinner/bbq organised for Saturday and what looks like a girlie weekend in London in early December to see Naked Boys Singing... 

Congrats to Karen and Emma for winning the quiz, how many wins is that Emma?
Edit: oops, it wasn't Emma & Karen that won (although they did also get the 28/36 score) the congrats should go to Ve & Hannah.  Sorry guys, I blame the fizz.

* Chris only lets us have teams of two, because we're all so good at trivia (not).
** which prints world events and not just gossip.
*** I think it's the Telegraph that pays his wages, but that could just be a vicious rumour. 
**** think Eurovision.
***** position in the overall medal table, I seem to remember the host nation coming 3rd, squeezed between China and Russia