Bills, Bills, Bills at Wednesday Trivia!

This Wednesday’s Pour House Trivia contest was held at 17 locations for a total of 171 teams.

FIRST ROUND:

We commemorated the anniversary of the moon landing with a question about astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, referenced the origins of the candy cane, and gave Three Clues about Popeye the Sailor Man to kick things off. The last question in the round was its most difficult:

• Currently airing its second season on Hulu, which streaming series follows characters named Charles Haden-Savage, Oliver Putnam, and Mabel Mora?

Only Murders in the Building was successfully named by 57% of the field for wagering points, while roughly half of Wednesday’s teams earned the bonus for naming all three of the show’s leading stars, Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez. A game-high 23 teams recorded perfect first-round scores.

SECOND ROUND:

The second round proved to be a tough go in general, with a pair of questions in particular tripping up our players. Teams had to name a trio of songs by genre-shifted cover renditions for Wednesday’s audio clue. The following question put the nasty in dynasty:

• Which modern-day nation has been ruled by dynasties such as the Carolingian, the Merovingian, and the Capetian, as well as its most notable dynasty with a drinkable name?

France and its Bourbon Dynasty was the correct answer, given by 35% of teams. Later on, things got a little…ruff:

• What is the more common name of the breed of working dog sometimes referred to as a German Mastiff?

Only a dozen teams gave the correct response, Great Dane, for what was the most difficult wagering chance of the game. A query about the two players with the most regular-season MVP awards in the Big Four North American pro sports leagues, Wayne Gretzky and Barry Bonds, saw only 11 teams name both athletes for bonus points to end the round. Unsurprisingly, a perfect score in this round was out of reach of Wednesday’s field.

HALFTIME:

Unlike the second round, Wednesday’s halftime page was very successful on topics like typically-English logos in foreign languages and matching artists to their songs with the word stop in the title. Teams averaged a fantastic 19.2 points on this page; in fact, 57% of them got all 20 points! We got to the halftime intermission with a trio of high scores and a logjam right behind:

• Scott Looks Different (Memories): 91
• Tokyo Sex Whale (Belles’): 89
• Ausfahrts (T. J. Stone’s): 88
• SEVEN TEAMS TIED WITH 87 POINTS

THIRD ROUND:

A three-parter on bodies of water threw our teams into the deep end to start the second half; a quarter of the field earned wagering points for getting at least two parts right, but just 11 teams knew all three answers for the bonus. We continued on to discuss poet W.B. Yeats, the corrupt bargain between John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay, and Perrier water. The round came to a close with the hardest wagering opportunity of the second half:

• Which 2021 live action/computer animated film used the tagline Best of Enemies. Worst of Friends.?

About 14% of the field knew that film was Tom & Jerry, while a game-low eight teams named Colin Jost as the man who portrayed Ben in the film. There were no perfect scores recorded in the third round.

FOURTH ROUND:

Wednesday’s 6-4-2 asked teams to name the band Queen within three clues; 17 did so from the first clue for the maximum six points. Round four started with a question about former Manchester United footballer Wayne Rooney‘s recent hire as the head coach of D.C. United, then a synopsis of TV series Killing Eve. A multiple-choice query about the element tungsten saw 28% of our teams name it before the choices were revealed for bonus points. The round’s toughest question came in hot:

• A collection of short stories entitled A Pleasure to Burn was published as a companion piece to a work written by which 20^th century author?

That would be Fahrenheit 451 author Ray Bradbury, correctly answered by just under half of our teams. We finally got some perfect rounds again here, as seven teams got all 36 points. These teams held top spots in the standings before the final question:

• Just For Fun (T. J. Stone’s): 161
• Scott Looks Different (Memories): 160
• Fresh Off the U-Haul (Mark’s): 157
• The Gang Plays Bar Trivia (Belles’): 156
• Knocking Puss and Boots (Hops N Shine): 154

FINAL QUESTION (46.2% success rate):

• Among the five U.S. buildings depicted on the back of current U.S. paper currency valued at $100 or less, which is the only one not located in Washington, D.C.?

Philadelphia’s Independence Hall is depicted on the $100 bill. There were no Perfect 21 teams on Wednesday, since none answered all 21 wagering questions correctly. These were the top-scoring eligible teams on the night:

• Just For Fun (T. J. Stone’s): 167
• The Gang Plays Bar Trivia (Belles’): 166
• Tokyo Sex Whale (Belles’): 165
• Knocking Puss and Boots (Hops N Shine): 165
• Scott Looks Different (Memories): 164
• Titanic Was an Inside Job (Hops N Shine): 164
• Stink Floyd (Belles’): 161
• Fresh Off the U-Haul (Mark’s): 158
• Ausfahrts (T. J. Stone’s): 155
• Saudi Arabian Fistbump (Memories): 155

Honorable mention goes out to Einsteins of Beer (Memories) and its 163-point effort, recorded while playing over the limit with more than seven total players!

WEDNESDAY’S WINNERS:

Moe’s Peyton Placein Springfield, VA: That’s What She Said  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Friends)

Valley Sports Grill in Middletown, MD: Fat Kids Are Hard to Kidnap  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Mercury Program Astronauts)

Belles’ Sports Bar in Frederick, MD: The Gang Plays Bar Trivia  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: The Expanse)

Memories Charcoal House in Mount Airy, MD: Scott Looks Different  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Triple 50/50: Tolkien Character or Pharmaceutical?)

GearHouse Brewing in Chambersburg, PA: Archived!  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Olympic Swimming)

TGI Fridays in Hagerstown, MD: Aaron and Drake are Besties  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Onomatopoeias)

Idiom Brewing in Frederick, MD: Kimchi Killers  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Texas History)

Axes and O’s in Sterling, VA: Flower Power  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Nintendo 64 Games)

Hops N Shine in Alexandria, VA: Knocking Puss and Boots  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Country Grammar (album))

Sully’s Pour House in Herndon, VA: Fireball Shots  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: The Lord of the Rings)

Falling Branch Brewery in Street, MD: Ladies  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Celebrity-Owned Alcohol Brands)

T. J. Stone’s in Alexandria, VA: Just for Fun  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Gilmore Girls)

Craftworx Taproom in Gainesville, VA: Who’s Eric?  (NO GAME NEXT WEEK – FIRST CATEGORY IN AUGUST 3: 1970s TV Sitcoms)

Barstool Sportsbook in Charles Town, WV: Jerk Cam  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: True Crime Podcasts)

Grape Escape in Gaithersburg, MD: All About That Bass  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: The Wild Wild West (TV series))

Shipgarten in McLean, VA: Marginal Revolutionaries  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Economics)

Mark’s Pub in Falls Church, VA: Fresh Off the U-Haul  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: 1996 Summer Olympics)