We welcomed another new host to the Pour House family on Tuesday, as Geraden kicked off our tenure at The Block in Annandale.  You can read all about that game and more than a dozen other exciting contests in our nightly recaps, as we begin the countdown to World Series XV in 33 days:

TUESDAY’S STATS AND FACTS (103 teams across 14 venues):

–> Highest Overall Score: Uncle Jack (Quincy’s South) with 168

–> Highest Score after Round 4: Uncle Jack and Comfortably Dum (Champion Billiards) with 163

–> Highest First Half Score: Uncle Jack with 92

–> Perfect 21 (correct on all wagers and final): Give Us Your Beer Money (Primanti Brothers)

–> Our halftime page featuring tiny film characters ans cocktail ingredients played to an average of 17.4, with 23% of our teams scoring a perfect 20 points.

–> While most teams scored four points, NO TEAM scored six points on the 6-4-2, which asked about the pilot episode of “The Muppet Show”.

TUESDAY’S FINAL QUESTION (44.4% success rate):

–> Which establishment sells almost four million of its signature product every day, nearly all of which comes with its own “zarf”?  (you’ll find the answer later in this blog)

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Capitol City Brewing in Arlington, VA

Another Tuesday night, another great crowd at Capitol City Brewing Company in Shirlington!  A little shake-up of our regular teams last night: the Valley Girls and Menace 2 Sobriety both came with somewhat depleted rosters, so they merged tables to form Comey Comey Comey Chameleon, a super-topical team name based on some late breaking news.  Could they put past rivalries aside and challenge the returning champs?  Or would the Capitol City Goofballs take home an astonishing fourth win in a row?

In Round One, the winner’s choice on famous Minnesotans was a chance for the sports-trivia buffs to shine, with a nod to Hall of Famer Dave Winfield.  This one threw most teams for a loop, but the rest of the round was pretty smooth sailing: classic animated films, U.S. geography, and super-affordable cuisine got us all off to a strong start.  The Goofballs and Comey Chameleon both posted perfect scores of 36 points in the first round, which pretty well foretold how the rest of the night would go for both these teams.

In the second round, another tough baseball question gave the jocks a leg up – this time about 13-time Gold Glove winner Ozzie Smith (also a former San Diego Padre).  We also remembered a legendary, flamboyantly wealthy drug lord, and looked forward to the upcoming revival of a trippy paranormal-mystery series from the 1990s.

Welcome Back: The Urban Achievers were once Cap City mainstays, but had been absent for some time.  They made a strong return last night, playing under a new name: Nudists on Strike!  They distinguished themselves early by being the only team to pick up the 2-point bonus on our “dreamy” audio clue – Tip of the Hat!

Halftime was a piece of cake for our movie buffs and/or alcoholics in the crowd – Comey Chameleon, God Complex Particles, and newcomers Ides of Mark all scored a perfect 20!  In Round 3, we were joined by a really sharp pair of newcomers that would certainly have contended for a top spot if they had played the whole game – Team First Try!  Hope to see y’all at 7:00 next week!

You Miss 100% of the Shots You Don’t Take: One of my few (minor) peeves as a host is when a team just shakes their heads at me from across the restaurant, instead of handing in a guess.  You should always at least try!  Case in point: last night I had to go over and ask one newcomer team if they had a guess for our (pretty darn tough) question on Mary Wollstonecraft and her famous daughter.  After a bit of sighing and shrugging, she sheepishly wrote down: Mary Shelley.  And she was right!

Throughout the second half, the big story was the Goofballs and Comey Chameleon battling at the top of the scoreboard.  The Goofballs had a one-point lead after halftime, but the Chameleons came up big on the 6-4-2 and grabbed the lead!  They went on to pick up two-point bonuses on Vocabulary and Jon Hamm in the fourth round, putting them at a five-point advantage going into the Final question.

Things Nobody Knows: Styx album titles, Mia Farrow TV appearances from the 1970s, 19th-century Secretaries of State

In the Final, we all puzzled over what a “zarf” could be.  Something that accompanies over 4 million products every day?  About half the teams figured out that it refers to the cardboard sleeve on your piping hot Starbucks!  Here’s your final top three:

First Place: Comey Comey Comey Chameleon (Menace 2 Sobriety feat. one Valley Girl)

Second Place:  Capitol City Goofballs

Third Place:  God Complex Particles

Next week’s first category: Neil Gaiman Characters

~ Austin

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Champion Billiards in Frederick, MD

With a house full of regular teams at Champion Billiards, the only new face was me, Sam’s trainee Megan.  Veteran teams were kind enough to show her the ropes with healthy amount of banter with Sam.  With 15 teams in tonight’s field, the eventual winner was going to have to be nearly flawless with tonight’s set.  In the first half, it was Comfortably Dum that blazed the trial, missing only oine possible point en route to a stunning 91 points at the break.  Our teams showed their strength on the halftime puzzle page, when their knowledge of cocktails was put to the test.  Several teams scored a perfect 20 points here.

Tonight’s crowd needs to brush up on their Sony PlayStation 4 gaming, as our most difficult question dealt with the recent video game “Bloodborne”.  While nearly every team knew that Beast Mode (Marshawn Lynch) is back in action with the Oakland Raiders, only three teams recalled the team with which he began his career: the Buffalo Bills.  Comfortably Dum continued its torrid pace, reaching an amazing 163 points by the end of the final round, which included an eight-point lead over Wiseacres.  But alas, it was not in the cards tonight for Comfortably Dum, as the team missed the final question, dropping back to third.  Here are your top finishers tonight:

First Place:  Wiseacres

Second Place:  Crystal Methodists

Third Place: Comfortably Dum

Next week’s first category: Eponymous Diseases and Disorders

~ Megan

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Cugini’s Restaurant in Poolesville, MD

Hello my fine Pour House Trivia players!  It was a packed house down here at Cugini’s in Poolesville with ten teams and near capacity seating for one wild game.  We had a lot of Pittsburgh Penguins hate in the crowd tonight as reflected in our winner’s choice category of Stanley Cup Playoffs without the Penguins.  We had to go back to 2006 for that one and it was the Carolina Hurricanes that stumped a number of teams.  The first round went pretty much back to normal at that point with questions about animated films from 1989, Rumer Willis, and the only state to legislate themselves out of drinking water, California.  We also visited this college food staple, keeping young minds alive and ready to be triggered or micro-aggressed:

Round two’s audio clue had a “dreamy” theme, with artists such as Tom Petty, Bobby Darin, and Katy Perry.  Teams also did well identifying bad boy Pablo Escobar, MLB legend Ozzie Smith’s “wonderful” nickname, and where on your body you would find the trapezius muscle.  The toughest question of the round was this 1990’s TV noir drama that is coming back to us on Showtime later this month:

For the third round we found ourselves in some countries with a lot of room for their citizens, and identified ozone, which apparently is great up high, but bad down here.  Folks answered quickly for the return from retiring Marshawn Lynch, but it took a little time to translate the Japanese phrase “domo arigato”.  Finally, we found out that the author of this popular movie monster had a mother that was equally prolific when it came to writing.

 

The final round moved right along, and teams scored quickly with U.S. Presidents that first held the position of Secretary of State, but you have to go way back for that one.  We mashed up Kanye West with the Palestinians which would probably get you shot in some places of the world, and followed that one up with some of Jon Hamm’s most recognized work.  Our “jovial” crossword clue jumbled a couple of teams, as well as this video game series from 2015:

About half of our teams answered correctly on the final question, and I for one learned was exactly a “zarf” is.  Here are the results:

First Place:  MoMo

Second Place:  Lightfoot

Third Place:  Never Mind

Next week’s first category:  “Grace & Frankie: Season 3”

~ Ronnie

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Orioles Nest in Frederick, MD

Tonight at the Orioles Nest in Frederick, we opened our game with a question about “The Flintstones”, where just about everyone knew that The Flintstones kept a baby wooly mammoth as their vacuum cleaner.  However the question of the day was definitely this: What the heck is a zarf??  That was essentially the final question of the night, and that proved to shift some teams around.

I liked the audio question we had today, all about songs with the word ‘Dream’ in the title.  Just about everyone got Tom Petty (“Running Down a Dream”) and Katy Perry (“Teenage Dream”), but nobody got Bobby Darin with “Dream Lover”!  Halftime asked about films with tiny characters, as well as matching the alcoholic drink to its unique ingredient.  The tough pictures on this list included the chameleon from “Tangled”, as well as identifying the ingredient in a Cuba Libre versus a Harvey Wallbanger, as those two were the most frequently swapped answers.

Suck It Trebek jumped out to the lead at the break, notching 87 points.  The team was nearly flawless in the second half, missing only one wagering question (the video game “Bloodborne”) to increase its lead to nine points heading into the final question.  The final question of the night asked about American Companies, and it definitely had some heat to it, going back to what a zarf is.  It turns out a zarf is that little cardboard sleeve you put coffee cups into, with the answer being Starbucks.  Only a few teams got this right, which meant the final standings ended up as such:

First Place:  Suck It Trebek

Second Place:  Fill Stick

Third Place: We Are Number Two

Next week’s first category:  “Hamilton”

Until next time…

~ Chad

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Senor Tequila’s in Germantown, MD

Tuesday night has come and gone, and so has another game of Pour House Trivia here at Senor Tequila’s!

Highlights of the Night:

In “No-I-Didn’t-Sing-Nirvana”: The Winner’s Choice category was Let’s All Laugh at Ian… sorry, Ian Sings 1990s Grunge.  While I was fully prepared to come out singing “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, it occurred to me that Pearl Jam was grunge too and I could easily not do that song. I chose “Even Flow” instead.  The one with the rapid fire lyrics at the beginning where you can’t understand Eddie Vedder half the time.  Tee hee.

In “Forget-Color…”: I don’t know if it was the pictures on the word file, or if there was an issue when the printing happened, but the Puzzle Page tonight needed an inordinate amount of staring at my computer screen.  Sorry about that one guys! Thankfully it proved not to be a huge factor, with an average score of 19 on the halftime page tonight!

In “Can-We-All-Agree…”: That zarf is a stupid word?  Like…who the hell came up with that?  Who the hell agreed to it??  No one took a moment to stop and go “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.  It sounds like to just randomly chose four letters and threw them together.  Change it.”  No one stopped this from happening? No one??

That said, knowing (or at least guessing) what a zarf was was critical tonight.

In third place, Cheeks!

In second place, Beer Pressure!

In first place, the Fan Club!

Good game tonight guys; next week we’ll kick things off with the Showtime TV show “The Affair“. Study up, and we’ll see you next time!

Until then,

~ Ian

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FireFlies in Alexandria, VA

Yay, I love seeing a full house!  Thanks to everyone for coming out to FireFlies in Alexandria tonight.  It sure was a JOVIAL bunch!  Best team name of the night, as always goes to our current event champions (Bad Hombres) who played as “Easy Comey Easy Go”.  However, the first question of the night did not come easily to half of our teams.  Finkel is Einhorn was determined to redeem themselves with a New York Islanders question and redeem they did! They and three other teams were able to name the Florida Panthers as the team that the Islanders defeated last season to break their playoff drought.

The second round audio question earned everyone their wager, but only two teams could identify Bobby Darin as the singer of “Dream Lover”, thus earning them bonus points.  The most missed wager question was in the literary character category which correlated to sports. Our non-sporty teams seemed to give up and just name random characters like Huck or Porky Pig.  But the majority figured out that the name Ozzie related to a very famous literary character and shortstop Ozzie Smith’s nickname as “The Wizard of Oz”.  Teams did quite well on the halftime puzzle page.  Except for one mishap where a team wrote a number instead of a letter, ALL teams correctly identified the ingredients in various alcoholic beverages. You lushes, you! 😉

The second half featured our two most difficult questions.  It seems that few teams were familiar with the author Mary Wollstonecraft and could therefore not name her also famous author daughter – Mary Shelley.  Only two teams earned their wager on that one.  The toughest question of the final round surprisingly came in the Modern Video Games category, as only two teams correctly identified “Bloodborne”, and one team admitted it was a guess.  In the end, first place seemed locked in, so it was a challenge of who would end up in second and third place.  In the end, it came down to wagers, and when only two teams could correctly name the company that uses a “zarf” (something I would simply call a sleeve) ranks changed drastically.  Your winners were:

First Place:  Einhorn is Finkel, Finkel is Einhorn

Second place:  Neighbor Troubles

Third place:  ALL CAPS

Next week’s first category:  Weezer’s Blue Album

See you next Tuesday!

~ Kate

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Shuckin’ Shack in Frederick, MD

Coming soon…

 

 

 

 

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Top Golf in Ashburn, VA

It felt great to be back at Top Golf in Ashburn!  We hosted eight teams who came to duke it out on this slightly chilly May night.  After I had two Shirley Temples (don’t judge, they are awesome), we got into the game.  It was a close game early on with teams such as Taco Tuesday, Kelly’s Heroes, and Team Pi neck and neck for first place.  Everyone seemed to dominate the halftime puzzle page – several 20s were abound, including a perfect score from Taco Tuesday, who snuck into the lead at 88 points at the break.

That lead would not last, as Taco Tuesday missed the Ozone question in the third round.  Although the team wagered one point, this was their bonus category, effectively costing them six point against the field, as only two teams missed that question.  Team Pi took advantage of the mistake, and even extended their lead as we began the final round, as they were the only team to earn a two-point bonus on our Presidents question.  How did they know that James Buchanan was the last U.S. Secretary of State to become President?  I consider myself a presidential trivia geek and I didn’t even know that!

With those two points, as well as a correct response on the final question, Pi finished in first place tonight!  The final question also pulled other teams unexpectedly ahead in the standings, and here are your final results:

First Place:  Pi

Second Place:  Talk Nerdy To Me

Third Place:  Mind Benders

Next week’s first category:  Disney Films!

~ Zach

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Primanti Brothers in Hagerstown, MD

Primanti Brothers is the hot place to be in Hagerstown on a Tuesday night.  We hosted seven teams who came out to rumble for a shot at trivia glory.  It’s good to see some teams from other venues and a few old friends who haven’t been out in a while.  If you’re looking for some fun on a warm spring night with some friends, get yourself to Primanti Brothers and join us.  Our opening winner’s choice category tonight was The Death Star: an incredibly difficult trivia category.  Only two of our teams could correctly guess that it held over a million stormtroopers, all killed by that terrorist Luke Skywalker.  Never forget their fictional deaths.

Congrats to We Don’t Even Know for scoring the only perfect score of 20 points on the halftime puzzle page!  The scores at the end of the first half were quite close.  The spread was just nine points between first and seventh, but the Arrondissements of Ouagadougou managed to sneak into first with 85 points.

I do want to say a special thank you to Shea’s little daughter who helped me read out the answer to the 6-4-2.  She got to tell everyone that “The Muppet Show” was the program that featured Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem.  The second half turned up the heat.  The Shot Takers ended Round 3 in fourth place, but managed to climb into second place by the end of the fourth round.  Alternative Answers and We Don’t Even Know where battling for fourth place. Give me your Beer Money had steadily risen from seventh to fifth to third place by the end of the fourth round!  Who would take home gold?

The final question dealt with the zarf ,which was a rather interesting invention.  Now it certainly isn’t cheating, but a few teams looked around, and saw a Starbucks right across the parking lot at the Valley Mall.  That answer was given by each of the top three teams tonight.  Climbing no higher than third, Give Us Your Beer Money stayed there at the final.  In second place was The Shot Takers!  Maintaining their first place position throughout the game and into the final: Arrondissements of Ouagadougou!

Next week we are going back to video games with an opening category of Characters from StarCraft.

~ Sean

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The Block in Annandale, VA

It was a fantastic opening night for Pour House Trivia here at The Block in Annandale VA!  It was my first night being in almost total control as host, but luckily I had my fellow host Bill here with me to help me whenever I needed it.  This venue was fantastic!  Everyone was friendly and welcoming, and The Block itself was beautiful and featured a very cool layout.  Clearly, it’s a hip venue welcoming to all ages.

At first, some people were understandably a little confused about what was going on, but straight off the bat we had two teams ready to participate.  As we got into the swing of things, more and more people started tuning in and paying attention.  After the last round one question, a few people came up and began saying things like, “Hey, I know that one!  Where can I sign up?” It was great to see the sudden enthusiasm in the people who hopped in.  Soon it was a friendly and focused competition between groups of total strangers!  Even the staff of SnoCream joined in!

Our teams tonight included Schwifty, Team Awesome, The Three Musketeers, SnoCream, Salmon, The Californians, and (the aptly named) Second Half.  The first round questions were perfect and varied enough for everyone to feel accomplished and excited, little did they know what was to come.

As the rounds progressed and questions became more difficult, it was awesome to see the intent, focus, determination, and energy grow among our players.  A few groups were trivia newbies, but everyone was quite efficient at communicating when they were confused, and rolled with it!  It was very rewarding for me as a new host to see how much fun everyone had!  I also forgot to mention at the start of the game that there as going to be an opening night cash prize, but the look of elation and shock on Team Schwifty’s faces was priceless.

Overall it was a great night full of firsts for the teams involved as well as myself.  The Block is a wonderful venue with a very chill and hip atmosphere.  After talking to a few of the groups when we wrapped up, I’m sure they’ll be back. So if you want to get in on the action come down to The Block in Annandale on Tuesday nights!

~ Geraden

Next week’s first category:  K-Pop

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Blue Parrott in St. Petersburg, FL

Another fantastic, close, in-contention night at the Blue Parrott in St. Petersburg! We had our usual teams joining us, including The Quiz Knows, Parrotheads, Buds, Clavins, and Freebirds, but tonight, we also featured Walt and Company enjoying their first game of Pour House Trivia.

The first half was quite evenly matched, as the entire field was separated by just ten points.  The third round saw the first glimpse of separation, as the Quiz Knows and the Clavins were the only two teams to run the table, giving them a 15-point cushion on third place.  The Clavins started to pull away in the final round, while the Buds finished strongly after started falling behind early, giving them a chance to compete for the prizes at the end!

In the final round, lots of big bets to get that first place spot, but only two teams answered correctly: Freebirds and Parrotheads!  Apparently they knew what a zarf was?  That correct answer helped Freebirds jump up two spots into second place!  The Parrotheads, dropped from fifth to fourth, missing the third place prize by one point! Congratulations to the Clavins for maintaining their top three spot!  Quizknows, after a long dry spell, finally won that first place prize with a safe wager of four points!  Congrats to all who played!  See you next week!

Next week’s first category: 1960’s Classic Rock.

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Monkey La La in Frederick, MD

Ten teams raced to a photo finish at Monkey La La on Tuesday night.  Four rounds and one final question was not enough to determine the outcome, as we went into overtime between two of the top teams for another exciting Pour House Trivia finish! Let’s see how we got there.

In Round 1, the competition was tight.  Our top seven teams were within three points of each other going into the 1^st round break, with Sad & Demented but Social in the lead with 34, and Alternative Facts right behind at 33.  Round 2 saw the same with the teams spreading out a bit score wise.  Sad & Demented but Social took a slim lead at 87, Friends Without Benefits right behind at 86, and Sloppy Seconds at 82.  At the end of the puzzle page, six teams were at 80 or above.

Round 3 brought the first tough question of the evening in the category of Name That Author: “In addition to publishing numerous works of the own, 18th Century British author Mary Wollstonecraft is perhaps just as well-known for being the mother of which other author?”.  The answer: Mary Shelley.  Only Friends Without Benefits & Alternative Facts answered correctly.  The real moves of the game actually occurred at the 6-4-2 question.  Both Alternative Facts and Sad & Demented But Social (two of the top teams at Monkey La La) took their typical gutsy early guess to garner a lead and end up both missing the question.

This strategy would be decisive for both teams because the scores at the end of round 4 looked like this:

1^{st – tied}) Sloppy Seconds and Sad & Demented but Social – 148

3^rd) Alternative Facts – 146

4^th) Friends Without Benefits – 136

5^th) Stink Floyd – 123

Sloppy Seconds and Sad & Demented but Social both nailed the final and Sloppy Seconds guessed closer to: “In what year was James Buchanan born?” (Answer: 1791) to take the win of the night!

Stink Floyd playing as a single person was the next highest score to guess the final and ended up taking 3^rd!

~ Scott

Next week’s first category:  1980s Hair Bands

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Quincy’s South in Rockville, MD

Tonight I had the privilege of subbing for Bill for a GREAT group of teams at Quincy’s South!  It was a packed house here as we had two new teams join in the fun for the first time, so the crowd was really into tonight’s game, and it was really fun to watch.  This is a sharp bunch of teams too, as the first half was no match for our field.  The only questions that gave our teams trouble were the two-point bonuses, which helped separate the pack.  Only a few teams knew Ozzie Smith’s original MLB team or the name of the lead actor on “Twin Peaks”.  Our top team at the half was also the top dog at this bar when I FIRST substituted has host over two years ago, and apparently they are still crushing the competition now.  Yes, he team known as Uncle Jack played a perfect first half to lead the field with 92 points.

As the game progressed, slowly after each additional round, you could start to see who our top three teams were going to be…. well… actually not third place. That team made an INCREDIBLE fourth round comeback to climb into third place after sitting in seventh place following the 6-4-2 bonus question!  Most of our top teams nailed the final question, so there weren’t any crazy last minute changes to the top three spots.

With an amazing Round 4 to finish in third place was Wingardium Triviosa!  The played hard all game and took second place as a result: they are Sofa King Smart!  And leading wire-to-wire with an impressive 168 points, Uncle Jack was our champion tonight!  They decided to go with “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” for next weeks winner’s choice category, so study up and get back out to Quincy’s South this Tuesday!!

~ Jon J

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Black Eyed Suzie’s in Bel Air, MD

Tonight at Black Eyed Suzie’s in Bel Air, we saw some fresh faces at the spot for trivia.  In the first half, Honey Beez recorded the only perfect score on the halftime puzzle page, which gave them a very slight lead at the half with 82 points.  That lead was short-lived, as they missed their nine-point wager on the NFL question in the third round, which was also their BONUS category.  Ouch!  Backstreet’s Back ALRIGHT…  The Backstreet Boys took advantage of that mistake, and played a great second half to finish the fourth round at the top of the leaderboard!  Their small lead meant an aggressive wager on the final question, but unfortunately, it was not in the cards for the Boys tonight, as a missed response on the zarf question dropped them into third place.  That drop meant we needed a TIE-BREAKER to determine tonight’s winner!  Exciting!  In the end, Just Us knew how old James Buchanan was, and they took home the win over Honey Beez.

Next week’s first category: Broadway Musicals – it’s a MUSICAL, a MUSICAL!

~ Natalie