Trivvies

A number of weeks ago, a friend of mine asked if I was interested in doing a trivia competition with him. I had been in past ones with him before. They were relatively casual ones at a local bar. I do fairly well at things like history, movies and sports (though with the last one, I do well only by comparison with the non-sports fans who are so numerous here in LA). This trivia night was a little different. Just getting a team in it was a competition in itself, I gather.

When the big night came, I'd already had a plenty long day encompassing a Toastmasters contest and matters of supreme domestic importance. I was tired and frazzled. Still, I dragged myself out to the place, where I'd been before for special screenings of movies on 16 millimeter film. I found myself waiting for my friend some thirty minutes. The rest of the team had already been there for much of that time if not more, but not knowing them by sight, I was at a loss (in spite of having their names, or at least one name and one apparent alias).

Finally the game got going. We struggled at the outset, but managed to improve round by round. At first I feared a devastating defeat, but soon felt we could hope to finish somewhere in the middle. Then it looked like a top five finish was possible. By the time we got to the final round, we were in fine shape mathematically, not that I had great faith of us closing the gap. I should have, because after the last regular round, we were tied for the lead. One quick question from my friend (our team captain, I think) put us over the top, and there we were: winners of the whole thing.

We came out of it with some reasonable prizes. For winning one particular round we got Anchorman 2 shirts, Star Trek-themed lego sets and copies of "Zoolander" on DVD. For winning the whole thing, we got a host of other movies on Blu-Ray. I personally walked away with John Carpenter's "Assault On Precinct 13" and "West Side Story". It was an exceptionally successful and happy evening, serving well to take the edge off an anxious day.