Don't You Guys Worry About Spoiling The Pub Games?

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

Just found this group last night. Wow, do I wish I been reading this
before I went to a pub quiz in Rhode Island a week ago.

I don't see that particular quiz here but I see many of the same
questions. (Congratulations to any of you who have all of this stuff
in your head.)

As much trivia as there is to quibble over, I would think that anyone
spending a day reading this group would pick up 10 or 20 points in the
next pub quiz.

Aren't they supposed to test how much information you've picked up
randomly, rather than how much you can memorize by reading the last 10
years' quizzes?

Well, enough preaching. I love the enthusiasm and knowledge I see on
this board.

There was one question in the pub quiz which I thought had a wrong
answer. I'll leave it up to you guys.

What was the Tin Man after in "The Wizard of Oz"?

Of course you know the answer-- A heart.

But someone at the table brought up, "What about an oil can?", which I
thought was a perfectly correct answer.

What do you think?

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

"John Bescherer" <notmtwain@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:2e026f7c.0410060517.4f8ecca3@posting.google.com...
> Just found this group last night. Wow, do I wish I been reading this
> before I went to a pub quiz in Rhode Island a week ago.

Someday soon, I hope to see a post beginning with, "Assume a Rhode Island
pub ...."

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

Steve Grant wrote:

> "John Bescherer" <notmtwain@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:2e026f7c.0410060517.4f8ecca3@posting.google.com...
>> Just found this group last night. Wow, do I wish I been reading this
>> before I went to a pub quiz in Rhode Island a week ago.
>
> Someday soon, I hope to see a post beginning with, "Assume a Rhode Island
> pub ...."

<giggle>

--
Keith Willoughby http://flat222.org/keith/
When the legend becomes fact, print the legend

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

John Bescherer wrote:

> As much trivia as there is to quibble over, I would think that anyone
> spending a day reading this group would pick up 10 or 20 points in the
> next pub quiz.

Well, you'd have picked up just as many questions by going to pub
quizzes, too. (And there are more contestants at my quizzes than answer
questions here, although I guess there are plenty more lurkers)

> Aren't they supposed to test how much information you've picked up
> randomly, rather than how much you can memorize by reading the last 10
> years' quizzes?

If you go to as many quizzes as I do, you can't help but pick up
knowledge that will be helpful for future quizzes. I had a question on
Monday that I've been asked at least 3 times in the last 4 years. I'd
like to think I'm just providing fun, rather than spoiling it.

> There was one question in the pub quiz which I thought had a wrong
> answer. I'll leave it up to you guys.
>
> What was the Tin Man after in "The Wizard of Oz"?
>
> Of course you know the answer-- A heart.
>
> But someone at the table brought up, "What about an oil can?", which I
> thought was a perfectly correct answer.
>
> What do you think?

Well, this comes under what I call "playing the quiz master, not the
quiz". Although the question doesn't specify, the Wizard of Oz is famous
for the three companions looking for specific things. If you know "oil
can", you probably also know "heart", and you should answer the obvious
one if you'd rather have the quiz point than the pedant point

--
Keith Willoughby http://flat222.org/keith/
"Too lazy to work, too nervous to steal"

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

Keith Willoughby <keith@flat222.org> writes:

> If you know "oil can", you probably also know "heart", and you should answer
> the obvious one if you'd rather have the quiz point than the pedant point

Damn right. I've had experience of teams giving an answer the know to be
wrong, in the assumption that the wrong answer is so commonly held to be true
that it is, in all likelihood, the answer the quiz master is after.
--
Gareth Owen
101-ism : The tendency to pick apart, often in minute detail, all aspects
of life using half-understood pop psychology as a tool.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

Gareth Owen wrote:

> Keith Willoughby <keith@flat222.org> writes:
>
>> If you know "oil can", you probably also know "heart", and you should answer
>> the obvious one if you'd rather have the quiz point than the pedant point
>
> Damn right. I've had experience of teams giving an answer the know to
> be wrong, in the assumption that the wrong answer is so commonly held
> to be true that it is, in all likelihood, the answer the quiz master
> is after.

Absolutely. I've done it myself, many times.

--
Keith Willoughby http://flat222.org/keith/
We all blamed the committee, but no-one there blamed Dai

 

[Simon]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

"Gareth Owen" <usenet@gwowen.freeserve.co.uk> wrote in message
news:r5ik6u4gd8p.fsf@gill.maths.keele.ac.uk...
> Keith Willoughby <keith@flat222.org> writes:
>
> > If you know "oil can", you probably also know "heart", and you should
answer
> > the obvious one if you'd rather have the quiz point than the pedant
point
>
> Damn right. I've had experience of teams giving an answer the know to be
> wrong, in the assumption that the wrong answer is so commonly held to be
true
> that it is, in all likelihood, the answer the quiz master is after.

I try to avoid quizzes run by a landlord who just gets questions from
whatever quiz book they had in the library that day. If you have a
"professional" quizmaster you at least have a chance of your alternative
(but equally correct) answer being accepted.

When I was a student the landlord/quizmaster flatly refused to accept
"micrometre" as the answer to "What is the name give to a millionth of a
metre?". His book said "micron" so thats all he accepted.

Simon

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

notmtwain@yahoo.com (John Bescherer) wrote in message news:<2e026f7c.0410060517.4f8ecca3@posting.google.com>...
> Just found this group last night. Wow, do I wish I been reading this
> before I went to a pub quiz in Rhode Island a week ago.
>
> I don't see that particular quiz here but I see many of the same
> questions. (Congratulations to any of you who have all of this stuff
> in your head.)
>
> As much trivia as there is to quibble over, I would think that anyone
> spending a day reading this group would pick up 10 or 20 points in the
> next pub quiz.
>
> Aren't they supposed to test how much information you've picked up
> randomly, rather than how much you can memorize by reading the last 10
> years' quizzes?

It's a murky ethical bog you're heading for if you start thinking too
long about pub quizzes Is it OK to memorize US state capitals? What
about the 'official' epithets? Or animals? What about UK county towns
(no one 'just knows' ALL of these)? The setting of the pub quiz
usually being a pub, there'll usually be 'that guy' who knows winner +
runner-up of the FA Cup for every year it's been run, along with the
grounds of all 92 clubs (and Conference, if you give him a minute). Is
he allowed to play? Is he allowed to team up with state-capitals-guy?
And if those two get together with
dates-of-European-monarchs-from-1000-till-present - well, we're all in
trouble.

What about ringers? Do you require obviously 'professional' quiz teams
to drink at least two pints each, prior to the quiz?

Too-substantial prizes can, over time, transform a friendly
opportunity for local-on-local joshing into a cut-throat arena of nit
pick and counter-nit pick. If you're really unlucky it comes to
lawyers at twenty paces. Save yourself the bother - no prize bigger
than a bottle of Scotch, and you should be OK.

One constant is that going to the bogs to text your mate is clearly
right out, of course.

--
Larry Lard
Replies to group please

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

larrylard@hotmail.com (LarryLard) writes:

> Is it OK to memorize US state capitals?

No, its not. Unless you're on my team, in which case its OK.

> Too-substantial prizes can,

Thats a problem I've never had to meet
--
Gareth Owen
Obscurism : The practice of peppering daily life with obscure references
as a subliminal means of showcasing both one's education and one's wish to
disassociate from the world of mass culture.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

Gareth Owen wrote:

> larrylard@hotmail.com (LarryLard) writes:
>> Too-substantial prizes can,
>
> Thats a problem I've never had to meet

We did, once. There was a rollover jackpot - you bought a ticket, if
your ticket was pulled out of the hat, you got the opportunity to answer
three questions. If you got all three, you won, if you didn't, it rolled
over.

The prize was up to 600 quid at the time that a friend of the organiser
was given, for the first time that anyone remembered, an error-bar for
one of the 'what year?' answers. We never went back there again.

--
Keith Willoughby http://flat222.org/keith/
"Often, they will even nick the essential crystal from their time machines, and
hide it"

 

[Jim]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

On Wed, 06 Oct 2004 15:15:21 +0100, Keith Willoughby
<keith@flat222.org> wrote:

>Gareth Owen wrote:
>
>> Keith Willoughby <keith@flat222.org> writes:
>>
>>> If you know "oil can", you probably also know "heart", and you should answer
>>> the obvious one if you'd rather have the quiz point than the pedant point
>>
>> Damn right. I've had experience of teams giving an answer the know to
>> be wrong, in the assumption that the wrong answer is so commonly held
>> to be true that it is, in all likelihood, the answer the quiz master
>> is after.
>
>Absolutely. I've done it myself, many times.

We had the question "What is the main constituent of the gas that you
breathe out?"
I answered Nitrogen, on the basis that 80% of what went in is
Nitrogen, the body doesn't use Nitrogen, so give or take, 80% of what
comes out must be Nitrogen.
But the answer given was Carbon Dioxide. Which is patently wrong.
I had people all night telling me, "Don't you remember from school?
You breathe in Oxygen and breathe out Carbon Dioxide."
Everyone else had answered Carbon Dioxide. Nul points for me. <Sigh!>

Jim

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

In article <g9nmm0d2v2d171b38rkru9gt1di7qe4doq@4ax.com>, Jim <spam@ihug.com.au> wrote:

: We had the question "What is the main constituent of the gas that you
: breathe out?"
: I answered Nitrogen, on the basis that 80% of what went in is
: Nitrogen, the body doesn't use Nitrogen, so give or take, 80% of what
: comes out must be Nitrogen.
: But the answer given was Carbon Dioxide. Which is patently wrong.
: I had people all night telling me, "Don't you remember from school?
: You breathe in Oxygen and breathe out Carbon Dioxide."

Did you think to ask them how, in their opinion, artificial respiration
can possibly work if the air you exhale has more CO2 in it than oxygen?

-----
Richard Schultz schultr@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"an optimist is a guy/ that has never had/ much experience"

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trivia (More info?)

In article <g9nmm0d2v2d171b38rkru9gt1di7qe4doq@4ax.com>,
Jim <spam@ihug.com.au> wrote:

>
> We had the question "What is the main constituent of the gas that you
> breathe out?"
> I answered Nitrogen, on the basis that 80% of what went in is
> Nitrogen, the body doesn't use Nitrogen, so give or take, 80% of what
> comes out must be Nitrogen.
> But the answer given was Carbon Dioxide. Which is patently wrong.
> I had people all night telling me, "Don't you remember from school?
> You breathe in Oxygen and breathe out Carbon Dioxide."
> Everyone else had answered Carbon Dioxide. Nul points for me. <Sigh!>
>


That's crazy. IIRC, air is around 20% O2 and you breathe out about 16%
O2 and 4% CO2. But doesn't everyone know air is mostly nitrogen?

--Harold Buck


"I used to rock and roll all night,
and party every day.
Then it was every other day. . . ."
-Homer J. Simpson