VFW: What-a-world

There was no way out for people who do not like Kevin Costner movies, as that was one of our themes for the evening. The Chicks and Dicks were going for a fourfer, but they were stopped by the We're No Biscuits team. (See Kirk for the amusing origin of their name). Room Two settled for third and we had a tie between the badly-named Three Minus Bill and Shitz and Giggles teams. Bill's team chose domestic beer and the Gigglers chose U2. We welcomed back Tom and Nick, who promptly cornered the Oreo market and also said "Howdy, stranger!" to the newly toasted Paul (toasted meaning by the Florida sun.)

Bube's: Oh, So Close

The Chubby Stubbies are getting closer and closer to that elusive first place. Tonight they placed second, only 4 points behind the always challenging Flaming Mo-rons. The Toxic Ovaries (see below) came in third. Right behind them was the baby carrot-munching Lady Mondegreen, who chose constellations as their theme. Team Discovery Channel managed fifth place and chose the band Phish.

We welcomed back Wanda and Erica of the Stone Cutters and Nathan and Marie of the Pair of Lonely Nutsacks. Joining them in despair was Lonesome Bob. Also despairing were the Wise Men, who had an off night. Team MHA did really well on the last round and vowed to bring some teammates two weeks from now. The Incredible Edible Eggs, AKA the Undisputed Lords of the Universe, quit while the going was good.

Andy left the kids at home with Missy and put in a rare appearance with his teammates Seth and Tom. Once again, TDC got a strange book from the Trashbag of Deelite: The Big Book of International Insults.

Meredith and Lisa of the Exploding Ovaries joined Becky, Laura and Nate of the Toxic Olives to become the Toxic Ovaries (which has an edgier appeal than the Exploding Olives).

Chuckles: Ice, Ice Baby!

The weather was iffy all day Sunday, but we decided to go on with the show. Good thing, too, since nine teams braved the ice to compete. It must have been all those die-hard embalming trivia addicts. I could have used some of that formaldehyde, since I've been fighting a nasty cold the last couple of days.

The Talent Scouts, returning from a fruitless trip to Atlantic City, reversed their luck and took first place, beating the We Don't Need No Stinking Deric Ubersmack team by four points. There was a tie for third, which forced a Captain Jack-off between Ben of Skirtland and Jeff of Poor Charlie. Neither had faced the gator before, so it took some 'splainin' before they got the hang of it. Ben got bit twice, so Poor Charlie once again was in the winners' circle. Skirtland chose Broadway as their consolation theme. The Lethal Amoebas absorbed one of the Price Is Righters to transform themselves into the Symbiotic Microbes and took fifth. Jay was dee-lited to pick car rally racing as his theme.

The best prize of the night was a Japanese ink-painting kit, won by 8 Paws. And the new vocabulary word of the evening was aspirate, which Lee quickly made his own.

Some of you might recognize the Milmar crew, veteran trivia players from Curtis' days back at Lancaster Malt Brewery. They enjoyed the new-to-them picture round, but did not enjoy the final round.

VFW: Getting Freakie With It

It was cereal character night at the VFW, although a couple teams were confused and studied up on serial killers, which is a totally different topic altogether (There was that time when Sonny from Cocoa Puffs got off with the insanity defense, however...). No one except me seemed to remember the sugary goodness of Freakies cereal, so I've included a pic of the box. I think I even might still have that free magnet somewhere!

Chicks and Dicks must have eaten their Wheaties, since they won their third show in a row! Next was Room 2, followed by Shitz and Giggles and Friends (even though they were Shitzless in the last round). We're Here for the Beer placed fourth and chose United States natural disasters as their theme (I think the Beer team gets the prize for mosunique theme choices). The Picture Round's biggest fans, D&M, placed fifth and chose Kevin Costner movies.

Sheila of The B52s, meanwhile, is still filling out her answers.

Three Simple Rules, Amended

We need to amend our Earth Trivia rules, since a loophole has been discovered. Billy Warmth reworded his rules a while ago, so I'm going to paraphrase him:

1. No using your cell phone to find answers.
2. No blurting.
3. No reference sources. This includes laptops, PDAs, Internet-enabled devices, books, magazines, crib notes etc. (and that etc. covers a lot) Just use the knowledge in your head.

Officer Friendly now returns you to your regularly scheduled blog.

At Last: The Founding of M.H.A.

One of my life goals came one step closer to completion last night. I have always wanted to start a group called The Mike Horns of America (or MHA, for short). The only qualification would be that you have the name Mike Horn and be American (although I'm not ruling out international chapters at some later date.) With such a generic name, I figured there must be hundreds of us out there. My initial plan was to pluck some Horn, Mikes out of phonebooks and call them to invite them to join my group. But that sounded a little too creepy and stalkerish.

So the dream became a reality last night when Mike Horn of Williamsport came to Bube's. He had heard that Mike Horn hosted trivia there Tuesday nights and wanted to check out his doppelganger (which is still legal in the state of Pennsylvania). As you can see from the picture, we are practically identical twins! He heartily agreed to join the group, so we are now two members strong! Don't laugh, this is how the Masons got started!

Bube's: What's a Mondegreen?

Pat and Jen from Lady Mondegreen proudly display their can of Savory Vegetables from the Trashbag of Deelite. They had another cause for pride, since they placed second, right behind Britney Is Now Balder Than the Fool Monkey's Bum. One point behind them were the Pogue's biggest fans, The Chubby Stubbies. In fourth, due to a disastrous last round were the Jelly Roll Mortons. They chose Jethro Tull as their theme. In fifth was a scaled down version of Team Discovery Channel, as Tom and Seth chose Futurama as their theme.

Despite the ice and the absence of a few of the regular crews, we still had 14 teams battling it out. The Complete and Utter Bastards thought they show started at 7, but still stayed for the whole shebang. Worthles vowed to come back and Mike Horn of Williamsport (see above) vowed to bring reinforcements. The Slick Willies were out of practice and Nadine and Wilay hated the picture round. Tom, however, loved his Action heroine's Handbook, while the Chubby Stubbies left their opened box of Apple Cinnamon Cheerios. Now, how am I supposed to re-gift that?

Kem and Vern vowed to come back, as long as I didn't ask any more "Saved by the Bell" questions.

Meanwhile, Back at Bube's

Last night I had a fantastic time judging a karaoke contest held by fellow trivia host J up at Bube's. Competition was fierce, with over 20 singers. At the end of the evening, it was a tie between good friends Skott (on the left) and Nathaniel (the one with the hair). They called themselves the Kirk and Spock of karaoke. Skott's high energy Loverboy song had put him in the final, as did Nat's spot-on "Strutter." To break the tie, J had them both sing the rock anthem known as "Piano Man." (which was a lot more entertaining than it sounds). Skott once again made the song his own, and won the top prize (a medieval feast for two). Rock on!

Chuckles: Yo!

It was a nice holiday-sized crowd at Chuckles tonight, as a bunch of folks braved the ice-choked streets of Lancaster. Paul of the APM team gathered his troops and drove in from King of Prussia. But the farthest travellers were the Michiganders (actually it was one Michigander and one Michigoose), who regretted that they had no trivia in their hometown.

It looked like The Price Is Right were going to make it two in a row, acing two of the four rounds (they were the only ones who remembered Adrian Zmed), but they flamed out in the last round and took fifth. Lori Jo's past musical crush Bon Jovi was chosen as their theme. Jay' past occupation came into play for the Lethal Amoeba's fourth-place theme choice: embalming.

The top three spots went to teams that steadily improved in each round. In fact, the big story of the night was the third-place finish of Poor Charlie. It's great to see some new faces in the winners' circle! Skirtland, led by "I'll Show You A..." Lee, beat Charlie by a point. And Ubersmack Now With Beth! leapt from fourth to first. Congrats to all! And congrats to the Tidy Bowlers, who brought along all their Bowlettes, forcing Chuckles to add a new wing to the building.

Afterwards, I had to bolt up to Mount Joy for more good times (see above post).

NO SHOW TONIGHT AT THE VFW!

Due to potentially hazardous driving conditions, there will be no show tonight at the VFW. (I'm starting to sound like a broken record!) Also: Happy V.D.!

NO SHOW TONIGHT AT BUBE'S!

Due to the winter travel advisory, there will be no show tonight (Feb. 13th) at Bube's. Stay warm and see you next week!

Chuckles: Playing by the Numbers

It was a controversial night at Chuckles, as odd numbers affected the scoring. First was the whole "how many Earth days does it take Mercury to make one orbit" brouhaha. Out of the Vortex and Ubersmack put down 88 days, whereas my source said 87.96. So I gave it to Laffy Taffy (who had 86). Deric threatened to call his sainted grandmother (pictured at right), who used to sing him to sleep with a planetary year lullaby. Apparently I was calling her a no-good lyin' ho (or something like that). I'm 97.82% sure I'll never hear the end of this.

The other number controversy was my aging of LeAnn Rimes by ten years. Luckily that question had no effect on the outcome. The Price Is Right were well rested, since we all had last week off. They ended up in first, followed by Skirtland and the hard-charging Amoebas. In fourth was the aforementioned Vortex, who picked an astronomical topic: the moons of the solar system. Uberbittersmack chose the Rocky series of films as their topic.

On the prize front, Allan said that he is giving his puppet kit to one of his well-deserving students. The Tidy Bowlers, meanwhile, are anxious to try out their harmonica.

Save the Date: Earth Day 2007!

What's Curtis been up to lately? We'll find out April 7th as he makes his annual excursion from sunny Florida to Mount Joy.

VFW: Duking It Out

I'm writing this blog entry on Sunday, so my memory is a little fuzzy about this week's show (and it's the day after my annual FeBREWary party, so that's not helping anything). I remember that Four Minus Bill had chosen Duke basketball as their theme, but they failed to crack the top five. (This just in: it was Sheila from Shitz and Giggles and not the Bill team that picked Duke. My bad, as they say) That honor went to Dennis and Melanie, who made up for lost time in the last round. They chose cereal characters as their theme. In fourth were Kirk and Bruce and the Lincoln Road Gang, who went with the Brady Bunch as their theme. Shitz and Giggles and Room Two failed to match Chicks and Dicks' impressive last round, as the Chicks made it to the top spot two weeks in a row. (I think Annie made it two in a row for the Ladies Auxiliary 50/50, too). And I do remember that there was a big difference of opinion on how great or horrible the kettle-cooked chips were.

Bube's: In Our Cups

Here's a team of trivia virgins known as the B, C, D Cups (I think they're in reverse order in the picture). They came very close to the top five, only missing it by one point. The fifth place spot went to the Chubby Stubbies, who chose the great band The Pogues as their theme for next week. It was a tie for third, with Brent of We're So Good, We Don't Need a Name falling to the Tesla Death Rays. They then chose "Saved by the Bell." The Fool Monkey on a Budget led the entire evening, but they were blindsided in the last round by the Hey Baby, Wanna Warm My Ovaries? team. The Os squeaked by the Monkey by a mere one point. Trashbag highlights included an unpopular bag of coleslaw and an extremely popular Sock Puppet kit.

Reminder: No Trivia Super Bowl Sunday!

See you Chuckles folks next Sunday, February 11th!