Calvin Coolidge. Apparently.
Posted by Moose on November 11th, 2009. Filed under: Friends, My Brain Needs a Drink.You’d think an unabashed nerd such as myself would rock the pub trivia, but alas, it is not so. That I would tank on current affairs was a given (apparently a woman in Brazil was expelled from school for wearing a pink mini-skirt, not for founding a brothel for poodles as I erroneously suggested) (also, two countries went to war on the open sea, and these two countries were not Denmark and Finland) (the naval power of Denmark and Finland being highly suspect, you understand.) It was also quite clear I wouldn’t be the one to correctly name our 30th president. (Nathan asked for pen and paper and merrily blew the rest of us away with his presidential algorithm. You could have given me all the paper in the world and a ballpoint pen full of magic and I still wouldn’t have gotten any further than “Washington was first, Obama is now, and Taft was the one who was overly-fond of shepherd’s pie.”) (Suffice it to say, my cohorts are far cleverer than I on virtually every subject and don’t think I didn’t spend some quality time with my head in my hands being very grateful I wasn’t in charge of the world or even a small township in the backwaters of Missouri.)
I even gave myself a pass on the etymology questions because, well, because I’d had a few pints by that time. But I fully expected to shine when ye olde Question Master got to the Sesame Street portion of the proceedings. I got rather smug, I admit. Cracked my knuckles and looked forward to sallying forth as the savior of our table in the genre of children’s entertainment that prominently features muppets. BUT NO. What’s Bert’s favorite TV show? Wait…seriously? (Yes. Pigeons in the News.) How tall is Big Bird? Well, let’s see, he’s on a tiny TV screen, so…6 inches? (8’2″) What was the name of Oscar the Grouch’s pet worm? Uh…Stinky? (Squirmy. Wait, no. Squiggly? Squealy? Shit. I still don’t know the answer, EVEN AFTER HEARING IT THREE SEPARATE TIMES.) It was humbling, I don’t mind telling you.
I’ve decided my strengths are better displayed by baking banana bread and doing Miss Piggy impressions.
In non-humiliating, non-trivia-related news: Thank you all so much for your kind comments about my site redesign! I honestly felt like I’d tunneled to Rome, arm-wrestled an ornery gorilla, and mastered Euclidean geometry. It feels incredible to conquer something that has scared you for years. Even if you could have emailed a friend and had the whole thing sorted in under an hour. MY FEELING OF SUPREME ACCOMPLISHMENT WAS WORTH IT.
I’m now clinging desperately to that sense of accomplishment, hoping the cupcakes will wipe away the haunting, fugue-like sense of despair that accompanies being asked 80 questions and HAVING NOT ONE SINGLE ANSWER. I mean, except when I correctly identified Tori Amos’s bee-stung lips from a grainy photocopy and hummed Little Earthquakes for a few blissful minutes.
November 11th, 2009 at 7:44 pm
Pigeons in the news….did anyone actually get that?!
And I gotta see this Miss Piggy impression!
November 11th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Argh, but I got it wrong, curses, I got it wrong!!
44 Obama
43 Bush
42 Clinton
41 Bush
40 Reagan
39 Carter
38 Ford
37 Nixon
36 Johnson
35 Kennedy
34 Ike
33 Truman
32 Roosevelt
31 Hoover
30 STUPID Calvin Coolidge, not Woodrow Wilson, who I erroneously thought was next.
I will lament it to the grave.
And we shall defeat the trivia nerds next time! We only lost by 20+ points. I think we’re on our way to victory next time.
November 11th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
Sensibly Sassy: Yes! One of us got it! Tangentially because of me, now that I think about it. I sent a Beaker singing Ode to Joy Youtube video and this sent her into a Sesame Street black hole that provided this answer. Oh good. I feel better.
Nathan: BUT YOU CAME SO CLOSE. When you’re 20 points behind, getting close counts. IT MUST.
November 11th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
OMG, we recently had the exact same presidential trivia question at pub trivia night aaalllllll the way over on the other side of the country, and the answer was Coolidge and weirdly enough I think we also said Wilson. Coolidge? Coolidge????
Also, wasn’t the worm named Smelly?
November 11th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
Andrew and I love pub quiz, but always walk away completely humiliated. It’s sad to think yourself remotely intelligent and find out HOW WRONG YOU ARE.
November 11th, 2009 at 8:12 pm
Calvin Coolidge was from (originally? see that I don’t know…Wiki says no, Vermont) but was definitely Mayor of Northampton, Massachusetts before going on to become President.
I love the new site design.
November 11th, 2009 at 8:31 pm
SLIMEY. The worm is Slimey. Right?
I am also terrible at trivia. I considered going to my college’s alumni trivia night in Boston a couple weeks ago, but I would only have been going to keep the boyfriend company, not because I would have been able to answer anything. I am such a dead weight at these things.
November 11th, 2009 at 9:00 pm
Yes, Amanda, the worm was Slimey — we got it in the end! And Moose, your identification of Tori Amos was brilliant. At least you didn’t point at one man and shout UNCLE DARIUS! IT’S UNCLE DARIUS! for the entire picture round.
(It wasn’t Uncle Darius. Because who the hell is Uncle Darius?)
We’ll go again and get better and better and better!
November 12th, 2009 at 9:28 am
Hmm…I’m hoping that the pub trivia YOU attend is somehow connected to the pub trivia I attend, but given the themes for this week’s quiz (yes, I signed up for the pub quiz e-mail in an effort to improve our rankings) I don’t think Tori Amos has ANYTHING to do with tonight’s offerings. Shame, as I own almost her entire repertoire.
It’s humbling when a person is lauded in their group of friends as the random knowledge know-it-all–and then said friends form a team with the intent of storming the local pub quiz night. Considering that we’ve NEVER come within 20 points of first (although we DID get 3rd a few weeks ago) my status as repository of all that is random and useless is crumbling. Crumbling!!
(I did, however, win a free pint on the “Alanis Morrisette Song or Self Help Book Title” round by being the first to get the bonus question: who ditched Alanis to marry Scarlett? While my scribbled answer looked more like RYeh Reynhhlllll——–!!! the quizmaster graciously awarded me with the beer. So, yea!)
November 12th, 2009 at 9:31 am
Can you believe I know people–plural–who have ALL of the presidents memorized, in order, from 0-45, or whatever number we’re at now? Sadly I have never been able to put their talent to use at trivia night. The only thing I can contribute is, um, worthless Friends knowledge and unabashed enthusiasm. I hope that makes up for my dearth of knowledge.
November 12th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
Slimey. That’s the only answer I knew. I MIGHT be able to figure out the President one after much writing on scrap paper.
I was on a pub trivia team and we won, like $1000 between the group and I think I only helped with ONE question. In like 8 weeks. And it was a guess. And the answer was Lupe Fiasco.
November 12th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
You guys are awesome. I am vastly entertained that everyone knows the name of the worm. SLIMEY! SO APPROPRIATE. I was always quite fond of Oscar the Grouch. You’d think I’d remember the name of his beloved pet.
November 12th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Er, did you happen to go to the Edinburgh Castle trivia night? Because that shit is hard.
Regardless, who knows how tall Big Bird is??? What kind of question is that? It’s just mean. I should know more of the presidents though. Before Kennedy it’s just a random mish-mash in my mind.
November 12th, 2009 at 11:55 pm
I haven’t done pub quizzes since everyone got the internet on their phones. I’m suspicious of how this might change things…
November 14th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
My goodness, all you people sure do make a man want to try one of these pub quizzes sometime! I’ve heard that there are some in my area but until I read this I never really thought it sounded like fun. One of my favorite pass times is watching Jeopardy and doing my best to match wits with those brainy bastards from the comfort of my living room. It’s too bad that, as this post has shown me, knowing the names of famous WWII battles or forgotten details from some famous literary work won’t help me during a pub quiz. But if I’m enjoying a cold Guinness I don’t think I’ll care too much about my inability to identify Coolidge, Slimey, or anything else that would get us a point.