Thanksgiving Eve Trivia!

With an abbreviated schedule this Wednesday, we saw a light field as we welcomed 36 teams across four venues heading into the holiday break:

ROUND 1:

Wednesday’s opening round began with a three-part question on Thanksgiving word play, as each of the answers to these clues would be derived from the letters in the word Thanksgiving:

1)  This History Channel drama is not set in Minnesota, but rather medieval Scandinavia.

2)  This Honda model was the first hybrid vehicle to hit the mass market in the United States.

3)  It’s the stage name of rock star Gordon Sumner.

Only six teams came away with bonus points with the three correct answers of “Vikings”, Insight, and this British singer:

We saved the most difficult bonus question for the end of the round.  While most teams were able to identify Japan as the home to the world’s longest tunnel (the Seikan Tunnel), only two teams knew that it connected these islands:

The first round did not yield any perfect scores on Wednesday.

ROUND 2:

Wednesday’s audio question dealt with the work of singer Kesha, as our teams tried to identify the other halves of her most notable duets, specifically Flo Rida, Pitbull, and Macklemore.  We continued with a look at this crunchy snack:

The most difficult bonus question of the second round was asked on the subject of TV Cartoons.  On a question regarding the “Animaniacs” spinoff “Pinky and the Brain”, we offered two bonus points to any team that could tell us which other character’s name was added to the title of the show after it was re-tooled  in 1998.  Only three teams earned bonus points with this answer:

Once again, none of our teams were able to sweep the second round with a perfect score.

HALFTIME:

Wednesday’s halftime page had our teams identifying “NIGHT” movies, while the bottom half offered a 50-50 round on world capitals.  With an overall average of just 13.9 points, we did not see any perfect halftime rounds.  Here are Wednesday’s top scores after the first half:

• Tokyo Sex Robot (Belles’):  85
• Brainy Yaks (Clover Theater):  82
• We R Out (Delirium Cafe):  80
• SIX TEAMS TIED WITH 78 POINTS

ROUND 3:

Wednesday’s second half began with a question on this long-running NBC series:

After a look at video game consoles and cottage cheese (those were two separate questions), we concluded the round with the topics of Celebrity Hobbies:

–> Referencing one of his most notable film roles, which Oscar-winning actor spends his spare time touring as a musician with a backup band called the Abiders?

Only about half our teams could recall the line “The Dude abides…” from “The Big Lebowski”, which coined the name of the backup band for this Oscar winner:

Only four teams tacked on an extra two bonus points by knowing that Jeff Bridges won his Academy Award for playing a musician in the film “Crazy Heart“.  Sorry folks, there were no perfect scores in the third round as well.

ROUND 4:

The final round began with a Sports Headlines question on the topic of the NBA:

–> What rookie recently became the youngest player in NBA history to record a triple-double, achieving the feat against the Milwaukee Bucks on November 11th, at the age of 20 years, 15 days?

Though his younger brother and his father have garnered even bigger headlines lately, 26% of our teams still knew that we were looking for Lonzo Ball:

The next question proved to be our most difficult bonus of the round:

–> Also known as the general gas equation, the scientific formula PV = nRT is associated with which gas law?

Since this question was asked with a potential crossword-style clue, the bonus points were offered to any team who could recognize this equation before that hint was revealed.  Only five teams earned those points with the ideal gas law.  As was the theme on Wednesday, there were no perfect scores in the final round.  Here are Wednesday’s top overall scores heading into the final question:

• Brainy Yaks (Clover Theater):  149
• Tokyo Sex Robot (Belles’):  143
• Puppy Kickers (Belles’):  142
• We R Out (Delirium Cafe):  140
• Hollywood Jerks (Delirium Cafe):  140

FINAL QUESTION (55.5% success rate):

–> Which sitcom featured guest appearances by politicians Tip O’ Neill, John Kerry, and Michael Dukakis?

Just over half of our teams were able to remember that those three men all served the state of Massachusetts in the late 1980s, leading them to the correct answer of “Cheers”.  None of our teams earned the Perfect 21 on Wednesday by answering all wagering questions correctly.  These were your top overall scores from Wednesday:

• We R Out (Delirium Cafe):  152
• Hollywood Jerks (Delirium Cafe):  152
• Obscure References (Delirium Cafe):  150
• Brainy Yaks (Clover Theater):  144
• See You Next Tuesday (Belles’):  144
• Flight Level Awesome (Belles’):  140
• Jerry Lewis Romperthon (Nido’s):  138
• Simple Minds (Nido’s):  130

TONIGHT’S WINNERS:

Valley Grill in Middletown, MD:  NO GAME THIS WEEK  (Next week’s first category: “MacGyver” – original TV series)