6th Croydon Scout Hut, South Croydon
If it's 6pm on the Saturday of the middle weekend in May then tradition dictates that The Hound can be found watching football in the Purley Arms and limbering up for the 6th Croydon Scouts fundraising quiz.
Once again The Hound was represented by Robson, G-Force and yours truly, the Notorious Kevster Smalls...
We gathered in the pub for the Anfield denouement of 'Stevie-La' - hilariously, and magnificently, their opponents on the day, Crystal Palace, hadn't read the script and instead of rolling over and allowing 40,000 grief stricken bin-dippers to spend 2 hours wallowing in relentless worship to their departing Deity the damn Eagles went and won it. The roars of appreciation emanating from Sky powered living rooms the length and breadth of England were only amplified by the fact that one of Palace's goals should've been flagged offside and their penalty was granted for a foul outside the box. Shame. Or hilarious...
Nevertheless, The Hound wasn't on manoeuvres for the purposes of gratuitous Gerrard gloating - we had serious quizzing business to attend to. And if that's going to be taking place in a Scout Hut - and it was - then we also have to impressively raid an off-license en-route. G-Force sorted some beers and the Frazzles. Robson went with some Guinness, a couple of canned spirit/mixers and the Doritos. I covered off some strong Polish lager, a bottle of Merlot to split three ways and the Wotsits.
Once again following tradition we eschewed the chance to get to the venue in advance of the start time and slightly delayed proceedings with our tardy arrival. No matter. A table was found, seats were taken, wallets were emptied, cans were cracked open, small bowls from Ikea were filled with savoury snacks and before you could say, 'Robson do you fancy a Tyskie?' the quiz was off and running...
Nine rounds - ten questions per round - 2 points per answer - one Joker card to be played on the round of our choosing.
Keeping the specifics of the quiz itself brief...
Round 1 - Science & Nature - 14/20
Round 2 - History - 14/20
Round 3 - Geography - JOKER played - 18/20 x 2 = 36
Round 4 - Art & Literature - 20/20
At this point a temporary halt to proceedings was called and a queue formed for the generously provided chilli, jacket potatoes, baked-beans and cheese followed by some sort of fruit tart and custard. It was during the dispersal of these treats that the quote of the evening was recorded as one of the more elderly attendants shuffled away from the serving area having missed one of ingredients - 'Denise has forgot her cheese', echoed around the Scout Hut but fret not worried blog readers, it transpired that Denise had not so much forgotten the cheese as was allergic to it and had therefore not taken any deliberately. Relief all round...
Denise in the act of 'forgetting' her cheese...
Seconds were polished off, the decks were cleared, wine glasses were recharged and the news that we were second out of ten was absorbed. We cracked on...
Round 5 - Sport - 20/20
Round 6 - General Knowledge - 16/20
Round 7 - Food & Drink - 13/20
Round 8 - TV, Films & Entertainment - 12/20
Round 9 - Music - 36/40
All of that tallied up to 163 of your English points and was good enough for third place on the night - losing out by 14 points to the winners ('Quizzical').
No time for mourning though - we were swiftly into the raffle and, having bought nine strips of 5 tickets, we were hopeful of some consolation. Things were off to a bad start however when the preliminary draw was made for the £1-a-square, 49 squares, lottery draw - having arrived late we'd only been left with a choice of four un-chosen squares - we took three of them - the draw was made - 42 was the number, much to collective frustration and, in particular, G-Force's loud indignation - "we were 41 and 43 and that grey-haired bint's won it with 42...?!?". Oh, how we chuckled.
But we did come good on the raffle with a bottle of wine and, somewhat bizarrely, a box of After Eights.
Thereafter we were done and dusted - Robson was particularly keen that we should play no part whatsoever in the clean-up operation so we grabbed our stuff, bade our farewells and fled.
All the preceding however is beside the point - money was raised, the organisers were happy and the Hound played its part.
Saturday evening's Scout Hut episode now posted...
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