Weekend Trivia is Nobody’s Fool!

April 3, 2023

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Another spring weekend with Pour House Trivia saw another venue return from a winter break: we’re back at Doc Waters Cidery in Germantown, MD on Friday evenings! We said goodbye to March and hello to April with a total of nine locations and 95 teams.

FIRST ROUND:

A question about a certain sitcom star proved to be the hardest of any wagering question in the weekend’s first rounds:

  • Which former Friends actor portrayed the title character of Adam Burns in the 2010s sitcom Man with a Plan?

About 62% of Friday’s teams knew Matt LeBlanc was the actor in question, while a night-low 7.4% also knew SNL alum Kevin Nealon played LeBlanc’s older brother on that show. Other topics discussed in the first round were the board game Trivial Pursuit, the mythical land of El Dorado, and fictional countries in literary works. In all, 11 teams notched a perfect score in their opening round.

SECOND ROUND:

For the weekend’s audio clues, teams were given songs that share its title with an unrelated film, song titles that feature timely words, and a trio of bands with colorful names (such as Deep Purple and White Town). As it turned out, the hardest question on all three days came in the second round! We asked about a certain scientist to end Friday’s round:

  • Born in 1571, which German astronomer is best known for his laws of planetary motion? He also consulted with Galileo after the latter’s discovery of Jupiter’s moons.

Johannes Kepler was named by 46% of teams, with 9.2% earning bonus points for knowing Kepler worked as an assistant to Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe. On Saturday, the second round concluded with a scientific query as well:

  • Which metalloid with an atomic number of 33 is used for strengthening alloys of lead in car batteries? Unfortunately, it is also quite poisonous and is one of the leading metals that affects groundwater contamination.

Exactly 30% of the field knew that element is arsenic. However, we saved the toughest for last, as Sunday’s second round featured a baseball question that struck almost everyone out:

  • From 2013 to 2016, the MLB regular season home run leader was a member of which American League team?

The Baltimore Orioles enjoyed a four-year streak with the MLB home run champ, as Nelson Cruz, Mark Trumbo, and Chris Davis (twice) mashed the most round-trippers in that time; only one squad on Sunday earned wagering points, but they weren’t able to name any of the aforementioned trio for bonus credit. In other second-round action, we asked about the Swiffer line of cleaning products, the various on-screen owners of Lassie, and finished with a piña colada cocktail. No teams earned a perfect score in this round.

HALFTIME:

Throughout the halftime pages this weekend, teams had to name various U.S. cities, identify cartoon characters by their silhouettes, and match chemical elements to their corresponding Latin names. The average team score across the puzzle pages was 17.2 points, while 12 squads went all the way to a full 20-point effort. These teams were ahead of the rest at the halftime intermission:

THIRD ROUND:

Saturday’s match featured the most difficult wagering question in any weekend third round:

  • With a slight spelling change and the addition of a hyphen, the name of which Australian state became the title of a 1990s animated TV show produced by Warner Brothers?

Exactly half of the teams correctly named Tasmania, which has a very close similarity to the 90s cartoon Taz-Mania. Sunday had another bonus chance that blanked the field:

  • Across three Smurfs feature films released in the 2010s, which two pop singers voiced the character of Smurfette?

More than three-quarters of the field named one of that pair, Katy Perry and Demi Lovato, but nobody was able to submit both correct answers for extra points. Other subjects talked about in this round were two-time singles Olympic tennis champ Andy Murray, the singing style of yodeling, and Pope Leo III’s crowning of Charlemagne as Roman Emperor. As with the previous round, a perfect score eluded our teams here.

FOURTH ROUND:

Author John Grisham, the finger, and the number 10 were our eclectic group of 6-4-2 topics over the weekend. For the final round of each game, teams experienced 2022 chart-toppers from Harry Styles and Taylor Swift, Three Clues about the word Studs, and some impressive structures designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. The most difficult wagering opportunity in any fourth round came on Saturday:

  • Released by Remedy Entertainment in 2001, which video game was inspired by the neo-noir crime novels of authors like Mickey Spillane? It later served as the basis for an action film of the same name starring Mark Wahlberg.

Max Payne was correctly named by 30% of teams. We were back to some perfect teams in this round, as seven squads earned all 36 points. Heading into the final question, there was a two-way tie for first:

FRIDAY’S FINAL QUESTION (16.67% success rate):

  • In the original version of the 1977 film Star Wars, which two words were the only words written in all capital letters in the film’s opening text crawl?

SATURDAY’S FINAL QUESTION (30% success rate):

  • James Darrell Edwards III and Kevin Brown are the two lead characters in which 1997 film?

SUNDAY’S FINAL QUESTION (80.95% success rate):

  • In the second literary work in which he appeared, what fictional character spoke the following line: when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?

When Star Wars was first released, the words DEATH STAR were in all caps. On Saturday, those characters are better known as Agents J and K from Men in Black. For Sunday’s final answer, Sherlock Holmes spoke that famous line. Among our weekend teams, none recorded a Perfect 21 for earning points on each wagering question in their game. With that, the weekend came to a close with these overall point champions:

WEEKEND WINNERS:

South Mountain Creamery in Frederick, MD: Hot Singles in Your Area  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Fallout: New Vegas)

Springfield Manor Winery in Thurmont, MD: Know It Alls  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: National Hockey League)

Dragon Distillery in Frederick, MD: Beer Pressure  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Drake (audio))

Doc Waters Cidery in Germantown, MD: Blue Banner Bombers  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Weird Al Yankovic)

Flying Ace Farm in Lovettsville, VA: Alley Cats  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Monty Python Sketches)

Belles’ Sports Bar in Frederick, MD: Demented and Sad but Social  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Elvis)

Pretzel and Pizza Creations in Hagerstown, MD: Special K  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Disney Princesses)

The Garage in Frederick, MD: Sexual Chocolate  (NO GAME NEXT WEEK – FIRST CATEGORY ON APRIL 16: Modernist Poetry)

Mason Social in Alexandria, VA: Supernovas  (NEXT WEEK’S FIRST CATEGORY: Cricket All-Stars)

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