The Hound Who Stole Christmas

Festive greetings from what proves to be the last quiz of the year at the PA of which more later. Making up tonights's team were a Namibian and a Romanian, as defined by drinking nationalities in a BBC thing. Personally, I'm not sure its actually possible to be anything else. By way of clue, here's one of the team:

Christmas justifies a lot of things but....

Once the interlopers in the pub were dispatched we could take up positions and the quiz began. Now, Siobhan gave us a heads up on the theme of Round 1, its not cheating, its taking advantage of available information. So with a quick google and photographic memory these were dispatched:

To be fair, we knew most anyway.

Current Affairs was trickier, the most attended Sporting Event of 2016? Answer given was the Wimbledon Championships, 494,000 over 14 days. Well if we're counting "a championship" why not the Premier League, approx. 300,000 * 38 or single event, London Marathon? Hurrumph.

Food and Drink was Christmas themed but not 100% so. Which type of cheese comes solely from La Mancha? That struck me as very much a filler of a question. Carp for Christmas dinner though? No wonder all those Poles come over here.

On the connections, we were on for the first letter of all the answers spelling "CHRISTMAS" but Kenny Everett swung it back to Xmas birthdays, the way he always seems to. So those crucial 10 pointers, we'd located the labyrinth and who sang "It's Christmas time, there's no need to be afraid.." Who did Sue Nicholls play in Corrie though? Anyone?

Refreshed by a combination of Siobhan's poppy sord shortbread, hot nuts and beer, the second half. The alternate name of the Moluccas Islands detained it for far longer than it really should, otherwise we made relatively short work of them all.

Onto jeopardy and a few vexed us. Was it Curry or Cousins at Lake Placid and who played Lofty Holloway in Arsenders? We were almost resigned to taking an eight when out of somewhere, Tom Watt appeared. A couple of other measured risks and we were going for it! Music, more Christmas themed stuff, we failed to get Cruz Beckham, oh well. So how did we do? Well chicken Marengo proved our undoing, concocted to celebrate a victory in the Napoleonic wars. Tell you what though, it looks good! As was the pub, at its festive best.

Ok, so we didn't win and were third. Those items of business

Next week - The Sun at 12.30 - bring pieces des resistances, plus Steve, please bring some cash
The PA will have a buffet for Thursday regulars, an option?
Or maybe a quiz around Carshalton/Sutton? Kevster, any thoughts

To follow maybe an Inbetweener somewhere, bring ideas and knowledge of suitable days. Sayonara.

Hydroponic Hound

There are those amongst you who probably wouldn't put it past me to claim that we only lost because I forgot my specs. Not so. I never forgot them, they were in my coat pocket all of the time. Anyway, my assistance wasn't really required for the pictures, manually altered film posters. 

A near maximum in the current affairs round, just missing John Key as the new NZ PM. Similarly on the British sitcoms round, we missed only Tyler as Boycey and Marlene's kid in Only Fools and Horses. As expected, Mrs O got one this before I had even finished asking the question.

Connections were airports as follows;

James Stewart - Indiana County, Pennysylvania
Yuri Gagarin - Namibe, Angola.
John Wayne - Santa Ana, California
Cristiano Ronaldo - Santa Cruz, Madeira
Pope John Paul II - Krakow-Belice
Louis Armstrong - New Orleans
Ronald Reagan - Washington
Alexander the Great - Skopje, Macedonia
Frederic Chopin - Warsaw

How did we not get that connection? First 8 answers correct anyway. No further drama with the ten-pointers.

Half-time report: Cameo from Kevster around the mid-quiz break. Daren is keeping himself busy, mostly baking cakes to help pass the time. Our sloe gin has become slow gin and won't be ready until well into the New Year. Steve mysteriously disappeared for quite a while, could it be love? I still bemoaned my "missing" spectacles. Someone hilariously hid D's phone in a Quavers packet, and one of the opposition looked like a house-elf in seasonal knitwear.

                  

Quite a lot of backfilling in the chain letters round but we got there. Hearts, Eclipse, Offenbach and High Chaparral proving to be the trickier ones.

Busters "did" the Jeopardy round to win. We left two out but got the other eight correct, including Joe 90 as the Gerry Anderson creation that worked for WIN, which put paid to the Anoraks hopes (they went for Captain Scarlett). We didn't know that Suzuki make the Gran Vitara, and myositis is also known as 'forget-me-not'. Missed two in the music round, a score of 154 out of 170 (excluding Jeopardy bonus) represents a good night's work, but not good enough. I leave you with an artist's impression of what Daren's cakes might look like;

 

   
The Hound gathering on the 22nd will now be closer to home than originally anticipated, Carshalton seems popular. Apparently Christmas jumpers are suggested for next week's quiz. Up to the individual I guess.

G-Force









The Big Hound 0

It's that time of life, retirement parties and 50th birthday bashes are becoming way more prevalent than stag parties and head-wetting. But who would have thought the former would precede the latter.

Cast - In Order of Appearance

Steve showed up first, business is good at JRP and thankfully its good that one of us still has his shoulder to Industry's wheel. They're even selling a product called "Guaranteed Income For Life" but I don't think it'll catch on.

Myself next - hotfooting it from nowhere in particular. The most productive thing I'd done in the day was empty the vacuum cleaner of fluff.

Graham was third in, full from his diet of cricket, golf and tennis. Not as full as Leeds' old and Mansfield's new manager, approx. 20 stone in a grass skirt. He'll get along fine.

Next up, the main man, briefly accompanied by Tina. House move and back operations both imminent. Lots going on.

Then there was Kevster, fingers in more pies than a blind butcher. Lets hope the business of the day was satisfactorily concluded.

Next man in, Bruce (works best here in a high voice, I can't do it). Easily the most travelled of the group and an internet sensation. Going off him already.

And bringing up the rear, oh stop it, we had Pete. Looking remarkably svelte actually but that's what a bout of beaver fever does for.

With a common interest in beer, pub quizzes and at sometime in their lives worked at Umbrella Towers, they are the Hound.

We kicked off with one of those Word Ladder things, the final answer was either THREW or THREE. I don't think it mattered.

In the news were Sting, Carrie Fisher and Danny Baker. For once, Brexit wasn't.

Of geographical interest were Mexico, Kazakhstan and Birmingham. We spent a while trying to work out which of Dorset and Devon had more Regis's. Other than continually offering Cyrille I was no help at this point.

What linked Terry Venables, McLaren and Slade? Porridge of course with Daren having the insight to spot it first, it says here.

I'd say something about the 10 pointers but I can't read Graham's writing. Time for a toast.

We got stuck on the Linkup Round until a Hiro came to our rescue.

Onto Jeopardy and what colour is the Ferrari horse? And which is the longest tube line? Time for another picture.

Ok, it isn't clear but that red one is pretty long. We didn't know it, we had 8 confidently with a good shout at the ninth. But we had to declare at that point.

Music, and a singalong to Antmusic and Country House ensued. We'd had a few at this point.

Results, would our effort be enough? No, the Anoraks had bagged the Jeopardy. Well played to them, but tonight wasn't about winning.

(Grey)Hound Round

News has reached Hound HQ that one of the team has recently been afflicted with "Beaver-Fever". I kid you not, and leave it you to surmise who. A speedy recovery is wished.

Thanks at least in part to Rolls-Royce/Vickers Umbrella shares are up to £2.34 today. It's almost like they are better off without us. As if.

Pozdrowienia z psami to all our polish readers who continue to hit the blog big style.  

Numbers are down again, just me and Robson. As a comparison here is the attendance for the other teams;

Lady & The Tramp - 8
Anoraks - 6
Young Ones - 2 + an old one
Unfamiliar Girls - 4 + 1 more later
Two new blokes behind us - 2 surprisingly
Busters - Not less than 50 at any one time.

Ok, it's Louie's quiz this week, we did have prior warning so no need to swot up on Current Affairs.

Oh good, makes of car to kick off. Robson and I reckon 4 was a good score here, but any one of you might disagree with this. We both got number 1., Robson knew no 6., and I got Fiat (which is on the back, it's Louie this week). My strategy of putting Ford where we didn't have a clue bore fruit on number 9, but you knew that didn't you. Despite it being Louie, I put Porsche and Lotus respectively for 3. and 7., knowing all of the time that they were probably Italian. Number 8. may look easy to you but apparently the answer is BMW. The wily old fox got the 'My answer is the correct one' in early, something he might come to rely on later.

 

 

 

Round 2 is numbers, surely an immediate chance to get some points back. Alas, no actual numerical ability required, being able to count was enough. Dots on a dice, Pearl wedding, carats in pure gold that kind of thing. We did surprisingly poorly here as well.

 

Another chance follows immediately, 'Name the Dog' a bone-a fide Hound Round. Dogs relating to the following;

 

Bill Sykes

Tin Tin

Rubeus Hagrid

HMV

Dorothy Gale

Famous Five

Mrs Humphreys in All Creatures Great and Small.

Bob Carolgees/Micky Quinn

Punch & Judy

Dr Who

 

        

 

Of course we got them all.

 

Two short connections round this week, 4 answers and then a connection. We got the second but not the first.

 

For the first, kicking myself for not remembering that 'Rodney Marsh' was sacked by Sky for a tasteless Tsunami joke. The other answers were 'Miners', 'Willow' and 'Azurri'. Answer at the foot of the page.

 

Second set of 4 answers were 'Pew', Barney Rubble', 'Officer Dibble' and 'Grub'.

 

We got the ten pointers, I pulled out 'Fenn Street' as the school in 'Please Sir', which I think brought us back in line, not many got it.

 

It's Louie this week, so anagrams of famous actresses at half time.

 

1. Joining Aleale

2. Fax Gnome

3. Twangler Wop Thy

4. Puzel Cornpe

5. Kittens Nurds

6. Hanked To Us

7. Blanketiet Cake

8. Zodiac Maner

9. Jointers Fine Ann

10.Woman Teams.

 

It's Louie this week, so watch out for the spelling mistakes in 4. and 7. We got them all, 3. taking the longest. Answers on application.

 

Onto the Jeopardy Round and it feels like we have to have a go. Not necessarily true as it transpired.

Did I mention that it's Louie this week, so everything is from 2009, not sure that the Jeopardy round needs a theme. Microsoft bought/launched which search engine in 2009. We weren't sure but arrived at Bing by process of elimination. It's stretching us to remember Mel Brooks controversial touring play from 2009, but we settle unsurely on 'Springtime for Hitler'. Two other obvious stumbling blocks, "What iconic mode of transport popular in the US was introduced to the UK in 2009?" and a Hillary Benn multiple choice question with 4 possible answers. The 4 answers were 'Sell by', Use By', 'Best Before' and a comedy one to end. Not looking great at this stage but we reckon 'Best Before' is right.

 

I'm sorry to say that I now resorted to deviousness asking for the transport question again because I could tell that Louie was uncomfortable that it might be a bit hard. A bit of subtle probing and he eventually gave away that it was a Greyhound bus, game on. We go full tilt.

 

 

 

Louie gave the answer to the Hillary Benn question as 'Use By' but subsequent googling suggested that it was actually 'Use Before', which wasn't one of the 4 possible answers. Not much point in complaining as Louie's answer is correct we already know that, and besides 'Springtime for Hitler' is just one of the songs in 'The Producers'. Nil points it is. In a simple twist of fate it transpires following the scores that we would have won by leaving the doubtful ones out. Having said that, The Anoraks were probably the rightful winners, blowing their Jeopardy round because they weren't listening when I pumped Louie on the Greyhound question, and answered 'Segway'. They didn't see the funny side of that at all. Easy full marks on the music for us, and a second win in  a row for the Busters. By my calculations they made about £1 each.  

 

Connections answers, 'Tits' and 'Camberwick Green/Trumpton'.

 

G-Force.

 

 

 



 

 

 

 

Halloween Fun

So Robson's not having Halloween. Fortunately not all of us are such killjoys. Take this pig for instance...

Terence Trent Hound

Let it not be said that us hounds are creatures of habit. Several unusual events to report on last night's goings on.

1. Meeting at the Hatch.

Why? Well Graham and myself had another hard day's marking (the work's ok but I'm struggling with the commute) and were just too tired to cook. Steve had managed to swing a WFH as well and made the happy band.

2. No poppadoms.

It's curry night, what do you need lots of? In place I had a bhaji, Graham had a samosa. Reminds me of the time The Pembroke ran out of peas, not as it there's not a Tesco next door.

3. Hound Table Occupied By An Amorous Couple

Well I ask you? Pending their departure, which Graham hastened by standing very close, we had to occupy the Anoraks' usual spot.

4. The Hound's Plus One

One of TLATT found himself without a lady (or tramp) quite literally. A potted version of his life history revealed that his wife of 43 years died early last year, he's since taken up with another woman who he was very keen on, however on Monday she dumped him. It'll surprise no-one that he wasn't the most sparkling company, and that from me.

So the quiz, we start with some badly taken pictures.

Steve managed to recognise David Van Day just from his forehead. Almost spooky. Onto the rounds:

Current Affairs - Cheryl (she seems to have given up with surnames) is to be the face of Childline and the Spanish are striking about having too much homework.

Halloween - I'm sorry but I just don't buy it as a major event. Still, we hit the crossbar a couple of times here, witches brooms are generally made from birch, not that I know any witches and apple bobbing apparently determines who's going to get married. Maybe we've moved on from that, maybe we have't.

Connections - Lots of seemingly unconnected things but we subsequently found it, all pumpkins. David Dickinson included. Is it the colour?

Ten Pointers - Bagged.

Link Ups - Sticky start, about three in before we actually wrote anything down but then it started to come together. We tried to fit a close fitting item of jewellery between "Ramekin" and "Taffeta", gave up and put bracelet. Necklet apparently. Wouldn't "Inuit Territory in NW Canada" just be a whole lot better?

Jeopardy - Not the easiest. We swerved a mild bear trap knowing the 50k walk is the longest Olympic athletic event but had no idea what a dish "Veronique" was. We thought Daren would probably have known it though. Also what did Jack Horner have his thumb in? Probably his ass.

Something Veronique.

Music - Needed to go to second listen on a few, being stumped by something Irish sounding. We fancied our chances though, no-one looked like they'd nailed the Jeopardy and we were confident on 10 pointers. Not to be, second again.

Checked access for the 17th and fine, great if we could all make it there though we have a quiz to win before then.

Theo & the Moonhounds

Daren legless (or can't walk or something). Others unsure, just me and Robson on the day again. It's catching, only two of Johnny & the Moondogs and a few Busters around the bar join us. With no Kronenberg sales likely to offset the prize money, and one team that is at least 50% teetotal, Management calls off the quiz. With hindsight we probably should have offered to play for no reward. 

But no, I have a much better idea (sic). Would the Moondogs (Terry and Steve) like to join us and make up a team at the Jolly Farmers for their quiz. So, quick bus trip and we are back on familiar old territory, more familiar to Robson as he was here on Saturday night watching Bowie etc. cover band The Diamond Dogs/Hounds. The quiz has started and we have missed the first round. But Theo, for it is still he, has a perfect solution, he will default us to the lowest score for the round and don't worry there are only 3 points covering all teams. He suggested we just put a couple of quid in the glass instead of the usual £1.50 per head, the first of many indicators that we weren't likely to win the quiz tonight or I suspect anytime soon.

Which wouldn't haven't been that galling, except that we got nearly everything correct and finished 4 points behind the winners. A page of celebrity pictures (all died in 2014, largely film/TV), long and pretty easy music round and more film/1981 history/entertainment q's. The Moontwins know their stuff and Theo is playing to all of their many strengths, I overheard one of them saying earlier that he had competed in a quiz event at the weekend where his team came up against Chasers and Eggheads. It was slightly disturbing that all 4 of us seems to get Sinita - So Macho on the first couple of bars. though McFly did elude all of us.

Some things never change, Theo spoilt his best questions by offering two possible answers where one could be eliminated by anyone who has the capacity to reason. Don't use your mobile phones "The teams don't like it". No chance of a table after 8.30, standing room only. A namecheck from Theo for old friends returning (like a sick dog to it's own vomit if you ask me). Everybody gets points for the league table. 2 customers get the chance to "Play their cards right" for £800/400. The first draws the Jack of Clubs, goes lower and gets a Queen. The second one draws the Jack of Spades, goes lower and gets a King. Will be worth £1,000+ next week!

A few other teams were familiar, including Gugnuncs and Fivers I think. Her that had a plaster cast on her foot for about 2 years was there. The Guinness is better than the Purley Arms but not much else.

My biggest regret of the evening? We didn't get the damn anagram. See what you can do with BANALITIES, give yourself no longer than 5 minutes.

12 Hounds Of Christmas

As promised I've researched a possible London/Croydon pub crawl that would feature the 12 Days of Christmas "theme". I've planned it broadly West to East with a train back to Croydon then finishing up at Purley. Half these pubs are probably closed so just feasibility at this stage:

The Dove - Hammersmith
The Swan - Hammersmith
The Blackbird - Earls Court
The Cock & Hen - Fulham
The Crusting Pipe - Covent Garden
Lady Offaline - Holburn
The Ring - Southwark
Lord Clyde - Borough
Blue Eyed Maid - Borough

Then a train from London Bridge

Drum and Monkey - Croydon (Shut?) Or some adjacent spelling
Goose On The Market - Croydon
The Pear Tree - Purley

Requires some mobility but that's largely front loaded. Around a pub an hour of achievable logistically I'd say. D2, appreciate depends on your walking ability by then, Graham and myself are available for bicycle rickshaw.

Any thoughts team?

World turned upside down Hound.

Had to get up early to take the kids to school this morning. They usually walk, but clowns in the vicinity and the possibility of a police presence today. Didn't see diddley squat in the end, but the school is taking the clown threat very seriously.

Lifts to our doorsteps from Kevster much appreciated, though I think that Robson thought he was being kidnapped. Newsnight depicts outpourings of grief in Thailand, and novelist Margaret Atwood claims that Bob Dylan's nobel prize for literatureis a political decision intended to give a message to the US electorate. I know, that's what I thought.

A win by 11 points, comfortable considering we missed a ten pointer. Importantly, we all got solo answers, the numbers made a difference. Easy full marks for the music round, all nailed on first listen.

Jeopardy round successfully negotiated. We left out four. A couple of theme tune questions. Robson correctly thought Tina Turner for 'Goldeneye', but could have been Bassey. Daren correctly thought Coronation Street for Eric Spier, but not 100%. Maklamore & Edgerton started up Burger King in 1954, and Who's Sorry Now? was the autobiography of Connie Francis, not Helen Shapiro or Cilla. Kevster on his game here with Hussein as Obama's middle name.



Full marks on the link-ups, Robson pulling out Shirley Heights as the 1978 derby winner ridden by Greville Starkey, but unable to cap it with a prediction of Kapil Dev for question ten despite looking very good at one stage. Another US president middle name question, it's James Earl Carter.

QVC = Quality, Value, Convenience. Didn't know it, but we got the other two ten pointers, sapper and Captain Cook.

A good connections round only fully solved as Gin at Question 8. A bit of licence spelling wise e.g. Hendrix/Hendricks but no matter. James Watt and Michael Boulton are on the back of the £50 note, all that stopped a clean sweep.



Round 3 was an extra music round, questions rather than tunes. We only missed the musical that 'I Could Have Danced All Night' came from, My Fair Lady not The King and I. Lulu played Adrian Mole's mum on TV, and the Sheffield 80's scene featured somewhat coincidentally as we had discussed this at length earlier. A timely arrival by Kevster around this point, to back fill 'Woman's Hour' for the current affairs round (Radio 4 show celebrating 70th anniversary).

Creditable 14 for the current affairs round, not overly obscure this week.

I don't have the pictures to upload, but they turned out to be celebrities starting with the letter F. Knowing this inspired some great guesswork, especially Nigel's call of Frankie Valli, and whoever first said Flo-Rida for number 10. Only missed Frances Farmer Cobain, no doubt Seattle will suffer for this at some point.

Pre match banter topics included Human League et al., a whistle-stop guided tour of the Periodic table, and whale watching/hunting in the Faroes. Daren now knows a little more about both Chemistry and Bridge than he previously did. Cue bad jokes about Ah! the element of surprise, and dummies.

To round off, an extra curricular quizzing event is planned for this Sunday, 16 October at the Wattenden Arms, soon to become Big D's local. All are welcome. Subject to D getting the required passout, the plan is to gather at his current gaff and take a taxi from there. Not sure re starting time, anybody know?

7D9CAF928C (all upper case) Hounds

In the week that Melvin Odoom was knocked out of Strictly, there was some great quizzing to be had.

Pre fight talk was sporadic but a couple of points of interest were;
> Possible driving bans
> Venues for the 'Hound 12 days of Christmas' pub crawl

Also, one in three hounds were presented with a Tom Odell t-shirt in a Barcelona FC club shop bag. You couldn't make it up and quite frankly, why would you want to?

Ding ding- Round One
There should be a picture of the 10 caricatures that constituted the picture round but I can't upload it for some reason so I'll have to describe it,
Number 1 vexed us the most, a side on view of someone with a potato for a head, wearing a monocle and a black, leather, military coat and brandishing a Kalashnikov. Our first answer was Goebels, which was changed to Samuel L Jackson and turned out to be Lawrence Fishburne. Number 4 could have been Bono but, thankfully Robin had a revelation that it was actually Carrie Ann Moss and Nigel Farage turned out to be Colin Powell, who knew?
We all agreed that the problem here was down to quality of the caricature as much as it was our ability to identify the subject. 7/10

Round 2 - current affairs - although the answers are a pretty rum bunch;
Article 50,  Hurricane Matthew, Gordon Ramsey, Diane James, Scouse Cod, Rob Bradley, Rodrigo Duterte etc.

Round 3 - TV and films (accompanied with Graham's constant mantra of "if only Steve was here") As it turned out,it was a pretty straightforward round with the only question requiring any serious discourse being 'who won the Oscar for Godfather II'? We all knew it was RdN but nevertheless we felt it worthwhile to argue about for a while (Graham claiming not to have heard the 2 bit).

Connections - this pretty much came down the fact that I knew the old saying 'half a pint of peas and half a pint more'. We had the answers Alaska, snowfall, Lincoln etc suggesting it was some sort of fruit or vegetable so the answer to 'what imperial measurement is equal to 232 mils proved to be the key.

10 pointers we got them all, Kirsty Young, Hamlet and Status Quo being this week'"s unlikely combination.

So, we felt we were sitting fairly pretty going into the second round (insert majestic, crescendo building music here)

Link up - Genesis, Smallville, Erwin, Napa, Abel, Lesotho, Osaka, Apricot, Tetras, Spelunking
A clean sweep for hound and we could hear that other teams had struggled at the Napa Valley question. Great knowledge from G-Force on his spelunking.

Jeopardy
Who won the boxing gold medal at the '68 olympics was to prove to be the knock out blow for Hound. Having managed to get Gerrymandering from our collective Blakadder knowledge we were confident with 9 answers. Was it Frazier or Foreman?

Music round was pretty straightforward so it was just a wait for the answers and scores.
If we had got the full jeopardy round we would finish in first place with 174 points. If the'68 Gold medal had been won by Foreman, we would finish 4th on 134 points and King Kong Balls would win with 168.

The End

Despicable Hound

For the first time in what seems like months, my blogging notes haven't been left on the train, eaten by the dog or other such flimsy excuse. So here we go for a blow by blow account.

In a curious twist of fate, both quizzers arrived from a hard day at work, eager for a foaming pint to slake the thirst created by a hard day's graft. Yes, Graham and myself have both started on the actuarial marking, so maybe taking some liberties with "hard day" there but work nonetheless. Given both of our complete ignorance in the subject, we thoroughly expected the pictures to be Disney films of the like. So

came as quite a pleasant surprise. Four vexed us for a while, both of us convinced that it was somewhere in London, nope. Of all the buildings I've been inside one of them, any takers?

Should also point out that Hound Towers is now equipped with a fully functioning "all-in-one" computer now so may be experimenting along the way. A slightly disappointing turn out to the quiz with just the four core teams, but on we went with current affairs. Comments like "Steve/Kevster/Daren would have known this" were banned from the start so on we struggled, getting that Olly Murs pulled out of the Olympics parade, not before dallying with Bruno mind, but failing to estimate the size of this baby.

9 stone 10lbs on a good day. The mushroom was nearly two stones though.

Next round was the 00's. One of those that makes you think about how long ago things actually were. Wierdly when thinking about which MP claimed for adult entertainment for her husband, this lady came to mind for both of us.

Wrong though. Am I overdoing the photos? We also mistook Slobodan Milosevic for Radavan Karadzic. Doubt if we'll be the first or the last there. Neither played for Villa though.

Onto connections and though I say it myself, I'm on a bit of a hot streak here. Failing to be distracted by Graham's insistence that he had invented the telephone, I dragged out that the likes of Holly Willoughby, Tom Cruise, Lewis Carroll and Steven Spielberg were/are all dyslexic. Ten pointers and despite getting Jack L, we couldn't dredge up Jack Lord playing Steve McGarrett. Siobhan gave us some credit though.

Link ups and the only one that really stumped us was the connection between Kerch, Georgia and Messina. This may help.

Yep, all straits.

Jeopardy and which is the longest bone in the forearm. We had radius and ulna and maybe 60/40 ulna?

Ok, so which Formula One racing driver was the first one to be twice been Sports Personality of the Year. Now there's been some undeserving winners of this over the years, but taking the cake.

Just looking at him prompts a yawn. If we'd had an idea we might have plumped for ulna but frankly we were guessing between 3 or 4. Damon Hill won it twice for God's sake.

Music and we were only undone by Toni Braxton, Graham steaming in with Toxic from Britney.

Ok, wrong video but working from home has to have its advantages.

How old was QEII when Charlie popped out, 22 and the Minstrels were ours! Sadly though, the £50 wasn't, the Anoraks had nailed the jeopardy. If only....

Sound As A Hound

Just Graham and myself this week. Southampton were playing Hapoel Bethsheba or the like with Man U vs someone unprounounceable to follow. Early observations:

- A gift of wedding cake, baked by Siobhan from Debbie of TLATT for us before we started. Absolutely no soggy bottoms, until later in the evening in any case.

- Siobhan would be making Graham a bottle of sloe gin, maybe to be shared between the team, who knows?

Pictures this week were of an insurance theme, ADMIRAL Nelson, Winston CHURCHILL, that sort of thing. Right out of our comfort zone obviously but all the clues in the world wouldn't help us get Abbie Clancey, though £60,000 a week from Stoke City might have a good chance. I took a picture but its on another "device" so you'll just have to imagine them.

Current Affairs would be mainly in Graham's court this week. I'd spent the previous week in Cornwall where the words "current" and "affairs" have very different meanings to the ones we're used to. So do most things actually. We muddled through, failing to identify that it was an upwardly directed thumb on the 4th plinth at Trafalgar Square.

Some Cornish Folk

Next Up Ding Dong, generally bell-flavoured answers, Martyn Bell, Ian Bell, Tubular Bells, that sort of thing. We did ok.

Connections was one of those where I think we actually got all 9 answers but for the life of us couldn't link them up. What connects Rebecca Adlington, Glenda Jackson, Hamlet? Oscars apparently, they've all won one, well not Mansfield's finest but she ain't too old to start an acting career.

Ten pointers were fairly easily dispatched. We didn't think it would be the Busters' night when Julie revealed they'd gone for The Coors as the Irish band the Lynch sisters were in. While we're there:

B*Witched - like you didn't know

Link Ups round and Gerry is really starting to express himself with this round. So we had Topaz linking to Zager and Evans and Gravadlax joining up with Xenophobia. An educated punt from Graham filled in two of our missing answers but we couldn't quite square the circle and make it ten.

Jeopardy and one of the more straightforward, in a decision sense. Award yourself a metaphorical pat on the head if you know which country first introduced all plastic banknotes and where Phileas Fogg first sailed to after he left London, was it the Reform Club? We weren't really close but had 8 other decent ones.

Music and no good Hound music round is complete without a mix up and so "Troublemaker" by Olly became "Heart Attack" by Bruno. One day we'll crack this, but by then maybe they'll both become so hideously unfashionable, nobody will play their music in public. We can dream. Other than some Disney nonsense, I think we got the rest.

So onto the scores, no-one had aced the Jeopardy and with 3 ten pointers tucked away, Hound had to be in the running. And the final two read TLATT 143, Hound 144! We were outnumbered 3:1 but we've seen before, more bodies doesn't always mean clearer thinking, particularly in the Jeopardy. Disappointing after all the fun that when we got there, Ozzie's kebabs had closed for the night. Can't have it all.

SlaughteredHound Five

Rule 1 of quiz blogging, look after your notes and they will look after you. Unfortunately bits of paper were passed around when trying to get the last few anagrams and not all of them made their way back to me.

A strong line-up, boosted by an all too rare appearance from K. No S (apologies received) but debutant N deputising ably. Furious banterage pre match from memory covered Brad and Angelina's post nuptial shenanigans, D boarding a plane with high denomination currency notes secreted in various places about his person, sympathy for those whose academic futures may lie partially in the hands of G and R, and CJ from eggheads and Jeremy Corbyn may possibly have been in some way responsible for 1 death each.

Louis running the quiz this week, so the usual structure can't be wholly relied upon. A Disney round however can be relied upon, honestly how many more Disney villains are there? At least we got it out of the way up front.

5 max scored and only then if we got away with King John for Prince John. The ones we didn't get were;

1.  Jafar from Aladdin.
3.  Stromboli from Pinnochio
4.  Hercules from Hades.
9.  Ratigan from Basil the Great Mouse Detective
10.Ursula from The Little Mermaid (on reverse of sheet so not shown above).

Second round related to games. Sam is the name of the patient in Operation, think we got most of the rest covering Monopoly, Cluedo, Trivial Pursuit, Twister etc.

Connections round brought forward to Round 3, full marks scored with R being the first to get the San/St connection. K's early suggestion that none of the people featured show even the most basic level of likeability also turned out to be uncannily close to the truth. Round 4 was nominally entitled General Knowledge, but turned out to be largely geography based, fine by us. 3 ten pointers bagged to complete a good first half comeback.

For the record sizes of European countries (sq mi) as follows;

Germany - 137,847
Ukraine - 223,013 (without Crimea)
France - 210,026

A bit confusing, can't remember the exact wording of Louis' question, but he gave France as the answer.

Louis likes to mark during the half time break so gave us the first second half round to work on. Twenty anagrams of famous male actors. We made 19 pretty evenly split between the five of us, not all easily. Only CEASING COAL defeated us.     

The Anoraks went gung-ho on the Jeopardy Round and got their reward as we had to settle for second place. We left three out, all of which we did guess correct, but not with enough confidence/back-up to write them down. Hit and Miss was the Juke Box Jury theme, Vodka, Galliano & Orange Juice is a Harvey Wallbanger, and there are 9 gallons in a Firkin. Personally, I have recently blamed my lack of sobriety for underperformance in this round, querying whether or not it could feature a bit earler. Not on this occasion though, I think that that point was reached during the Picture Round.



Music described as 'Eighties Rock'. Way too easy.

CEASING COAL - NICOLAS CAGE. It seemed to be the lack of an H in his Christian name that made this one so hard.

That's about it. An invite to Robson Towers is extended to all for the last day of the Ryder Cup on Sunday, 2 October. RSVP by email or text.

G-Force

  

 
 
 

 

 

 

 

The Curious Incident Of The Hound In The Night Time

Well that was a rum one. Started off with frankly sweltering temperatures, all were commenting on arms sticking to the table etc. By the time I got back on the train, raining cats and dogs as it were, with absolutely no protection from the elements, it was a dash from the station back to Hound Towers.

Now due to this, and not at all down to the previous drinking, blogging notes were lost. Frankly they'd have been ruined anyway. So:

Starting with a picture, bring back any memories for anyone, eh Kevster?

It all started in the Pear Tree. Someone mentioned maybe an early start today, Man U were on the box at 6 so it all made sense. Steve had some good news about his immediate employment prospects, frankly good news for all of us as workers are getting thin on the ground in our collective, while Graham and I discussed ST8, all within the terms of the Confidentiality Agreement naturally. Bar snacks were had, then Kevster turned up to transport us to the PA.

More inane chit chat followed. Trips to Germany, a £1,200 balancing payment, Bilbao and Hermione Granger all got a well deserved mention. The Anoraks asked us to road test a quiz they were running at a school in Sutton. Probably harder than the one we did on the night. Who's up for dressing up in school uniform and crashing it?

By now Man U had lost, Kevster was on his way to Heathrow and Southampton were playing. Teams gathered, the quiz:

Round 1 - One of those linky things, SLANT, SLANG, SLING etc. Easy enough

Round 2 - Current Affairs - Which retailer had its Market Cap slashed? Primark apparently.

Round 3 - Science type stuff. Hurrah!

Round 4 - Connections. Not only England rugby but the 2003 World Cup winning side, Johnson, Dallaglio etc.

Round 5 - Linkups. Included a very clever link back to something beginning with J with Nicky Minaj. Kudos.

Round 6 - Jeopardy. Went all in. The Anoraks did the same. Tension mounts.

Round 7 - Music. Less this week than our usual 17 or 18.

Result, I'm on a deadline so no suspense, Hound win, both us and the Anoraks landed the Jeopardy but we got one more pointer. Way to go and roll on Plumpton.

In other news I was nearly run over today as a driver chose to go the wrong side of the road, speed over a zebra crossing and jump a red light in Coulsdon. At least here to tell the tale.

Gotta hop!

HoundsLow

 

 

 

Pre match banter was no more enlightened than usual. 3 Hounds, let's call them D,R & G, attested to differing degrees of fondness for those parts of an animal usually described as offal (which doubles as awful if you are aware of the frequently quoted Scottish joke). Marginally more enthusiasm was expressed for various pea-derived products. The least well-known, to me at any rate, being a Black Country dish called Grey Peas (pronounced something loike grey pays) often eaten with bacon. 











Poor on the Film Studios (see above) and Current Affairs, and not sure we ever really made it up on Lady & The Tramp, though they also scored more heavily than us on the Jeopardy round. Normal service resumed for the rest of the first half. Couldn't remember who plays The Penguin in the sixties Batman TV series, but got most of the rest. Pretty sure Steve would have known Burgess Meredith. R's turn to have a eureka moment in the connections round, recognising Christian names of prime ministers' spouses. This was despite my garden path pointing to Coronation Street legends (well we had a Liz, an Audrey and a possible Jack). Redeemed myself by being the first to remember Beats International for a ten pointer.





Yes, that is Norman Cook/Fatboy Slim!

Chain letters round successfully negotiated. None of us knew that Jane Lynch played Sue Silvester in "Glee", but we backfilled successfully. A poor Jeopardy round with only 5 answered, all correctly at least. Could have got more, even turning down a World Cup Finals question. Could have played and got the Greenpeace question wrong as well (originated in Canada not New Zealand), but didn't.

The Music round can be best described by the single word irony. Despite having exhausted the many ways that peas can be made delicious earlier on, we failed to spot a Black-eyed peas number. And having also discussed the 'Mandella effect' where things are collectively remembered wrong, and frankly poo-pooing it slightly, R & G both managed to remember Jean-Michel Jarre's Oxygene IV as Space's Magic Fly, D's protestations being repelled by a firmly parked bus with the handbrake on.

Winning margin for L&T was convincing, second place for Hound. Quick reminder that Plumpton is on Sunday 18th September.   

G-Force

Forgotten Hound

Before the quiz and rather unusually, we were scanning the skies. Not literally but via an app. Kevster was waiting on his arrival to take somewhere and we were considering whether G-Force would make it back to the quiz in time. For one crazy moment, we thought they may be one and the same and had visions of Kevster and Graham settling down for the quiz while the remaining O'Neills were lugging suitcases back to Purley.

Sadly though, Kevster's arrival was from Edinburgh and Graham was still over France so it would be Daren, Steve and myself forming the quiz team.

Even sadder, I can't find any of the copious notes I made so the rest of the blog will be brief. I couldn't remember the precise piece of tack a martingale is, thinking it was a bit rather than a strap. That cost us. We were second. That's all folks.

A Few Good Hounds

Relatively thin on the ground this week but then we were bolstered by Pete's second in a row and with Daren and myself, officially quorate. Pre quiz yap included a bit of a prolonged rant about the BBC. Shooting fish I know but no reason not to do it. High time I think to abolish the licence fee and fund the thing from taxation. A vote winner before the next election and enraging the luvvies at the same time? Come on Theresa, that one's for free.

Onto the quiz and in a change from the norm, we kicked off with a "word ladder". Change one letter to fit the clue, e.g. LATCH LARCH PARCH etc. After a bit of head scratching it came together.

Current Affairs seemed even more weird than normal. Apparently a five stone pearl has been found and noodles are the new standard currency in US prisons? Maybe it's the time of year.

Next up, a weather theme, Toby Flood, Hurricane Higgins, that sort of thing. Only tripped up by the film where Nicole Kidman plays a brain surgeon.

Connections and four in I postulated "I'm too sexy". Not for the quiz but to link answers like car, Milan, catwalk. Fun then to see the penny drop with other teams around the pub. The last answer was Bernard Cribbins which foxed me at the time but is of course from where RSF got their name.

Ten pointers were comfortably despatched and it was a good first half. This was to come undone, I think for the first time, on the link ups round. It went wrong on question 3, Daren tried to get us back on track but I think I took us away again. It did circle back, but we'd long lost where we were by then.

Onto Jeopardy. What is a Purple Heart awarded for? This had more than a whiff of Bear Trap, turns out it's for being killed or wounded in action. The decade Mahatma Ghandi was assassinated and rows of stars in the US flag were also too tricksy, lacking our normal flag and Asia expert.

Music and it was Pete's time to shine picking out these fellas.

The rest were fairly standard stuff, all that remained was the number of flavours of Ice cream Baskin & Robbins have produced. Around 1,100 for the record.

Onto the scores, most of the field scrunched up close but runaway winners by 15, Hound! Flattered maybe by a couple of Jeopardy fails but that's the name of the game. £50 to kick things off in Dorking next week. Sayonara.

Of Hounds and Hamsters

 

 

 

 

We were regaled early doors by a very loud young Alf Garnett, though nowhere near as funny. 3 Hounds in situ, no make that 4 as Kevster turns up with 2 hamsters and 1 honorary Hound in tow. The latter having duly passed her 'A' levels and with an exciting new job starting next Monday. Congratulations were due and given. Too many for one team, so two teams created. 7 out of ten for Hound in the picture round, need I say more.

Only half marks for the current affairs round, shoddy airport knowledge, lockdown for suspected terrorist action was at JFK, and Gatwick is the worst British airport for delays. 37 new vineyards opened in UK during 2015, not really one that you can guess. Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper are in a remake of 'A Star is Born' and we couldn't remember the name of the multi-medallist US gymnast. Are you having this though, half way through the round in swans Peterkins, a near full pack of Hounds, albeit one in another team. Great to see the Petemeister, and an end to the who's turn is it to pay for the taxi home debate for another week.

Only one slip in the women in films round, Dakota Johnson stars in '50 Shades of Grey'. Big-up for Daren getting the two times 'Thomas Crown Affair' actress, Faye Dunaway. The rest pretty straightforward.

Full marks on connections round, Robson clicking that all are theme tune singers only after the 9th answer. Dennis Waterman clearly left to last for obvious reasons.



Missed 10 points for not knowing that Lancashire Spinners and Essex Leopards are basketball teams. Don't think that anyone got it though.

The best circular effort in the chain letters to date, as Amoco CadiZ links back to Zippo. We missed one despite having the end letters S____E. Andouille, Glamorgan and one other are all sausages. If nothing else, our answer of Swede will have given someone a chuckle.

Not feeling like our night, only answered 5 jeopardy questions, clueless on 2 and unsure on the other 3. Even with 2 or 3 of these we would still have been second behind a full strength and in form Anoraks. 14 points the final margin.

19 out of 20 on music round, Bay City Rollers song was 'Summerlove Sensation' not 'Shang-a-Lang'.

Did I ever mention that a mate of mine once had a fight at The Spotted Dog in Dorking, with a tiger in the car park? Anyway the statute of limitations, and what the intervening years has done to my hairstyle and general appearance, means that it is now deemed safe to return. Robson proposes that a jaunt round Dorking's pubs should take place on Friday, 2 September. Clearly if those in employment can't or don't want to take time off then this is fully understood. I get back from Malta the day before and hope to make it along. As a further reminder, Plumpton is Sunday, 18 September.

G-Force

Ladies, Tramps and Hound

Short one this week. I was left to my own devices and showed up about 8.15pm. Only team there was TLATT so joined them, thankfully 3 more teams showed up and we were off.

First up, a map of the USA and name 10 states. Around 5 were simple enough but large swathes of it looked pretty much the same. My main contribution was to suggest Montana for North Dakota and it was the usual 7 or 8.

Current Affairs and one Japanese gymnast has run up a £4,000 phone bill, but on what? Time was you actually got to talk to someone for that.

Next, food and drink and lots of drink, what tastes of almond, aniseed etc. The ladies came through here.

Connections started off cryptic enough, Kurt Cobain, rats? Answers like Major Tom and Manuel Pellegrini clarified things and just to make sure, Basil, Sybil and Polly all followed.

Two of three on 10 pointers, Greek god of war anyone? At halftime, I made a donation to Louis's "brave the shave" fund on behalf of the Hound. We don't like to talk about it though.

Onto link ups, we did well though not sure they circled back. Lots of Olympic stuff happening now.

Onto Jeopardy and the team have an expression of Jeopardy Confident. I went on my own with what RAM meant, other than male sheep and we had an uncontentious 7.

Got all the music other than an Eighties soul thing I've forgotten already and in a rare show of strength, we bagged the minstrels with nearest the pin on London to Rio distance.

Results, a win for the aforementioned with a LATT contribution to the charity fund! Let's hope for a full team next up. I disappeared into the night looking for somewhere to watch the sevens final. That was worth it.

Crooked Hound

Pre match talk centred on a proposed visit to Amberley on the 19th of some whenever. A beautiful idyll of typical English countryside with thatched cottages and Tudor pubs. They deserve a visit from the Hound but can they handle it?
There were photos of the hound tent shown and forwarded but due to the sick predilections of some of our readership, I'm not allowed to share. Suffice to say the vicar had done a sterling job of inscribing a name plate to ensure the Hound goes down (in posterity).

Now,  before we kick off - 9 or 10 teams, the Arms were literally kicking (!). The youngsters had arrived but were playing darts only. It was rammed.

Round 1 - Olympians. Only problem was some double barrelled boxer.
Round 2 - Current affairs. Some question about a Nigerian Pasta which I refused to answer on the basis that it was both racist and sexist.
Round 3 - more Olympian gonads; who wore golden shoes?, what colour are the bottom 2 Olympian rings? What do Waterford crystal and Ben Johnson have in common? (You'll have to look that one up).
Round 4 - connections took us from Beckham to Rowling. Apparently they are all Blue Peter Gold badge holders - a theme was developing here.

10 pointers - referring to my notes I only have 'Daren takes it up the a**e' and John Laurie.
We got all 3 so who knows what the questions were.

Half time interviews:
"Not too bad, 10 pointers ok, all comes down to jeopardy"
"No pussies - but I'm sober"
"good jeopardy needed but (the hound needs to) up its game in all departments - no badminton debacles"
"Daren is gay"

Second half was a bit crazy.... All I remember was discussing which symbol was the most redundant:
¥,},^ or ]

Final interviews timed at 22:37
"We had fun and it was up there"
"Let's just hope we got the f&&king jeopardy"

We'd actually been fairly confident on 8 out of 10 on the jeopardy and absolutely sure we didn't know the other 2 so we'd done all that we could.

Sooooooo- it's a long countdown from 10 to 1 but Ladies and the tramp, then Anoraks
and all of our other nemeses came out before Hound was named ebullient and triumphant.

I think a few tears were shed, either that or I had splash back from the toilets. Anyway folks, keep it frosty till next time.

Crooked Hound

Crooked Hound
Pre match talk centred on a proposed visit to Amberley on the 19th of some whenever. A beautiful idyll of typical English countryside with thatched cottages and Tudor pubs. They deserve a visit from the Hound but can they handle it?
There were photos of the hound tent shown and forwarded but due to the sick predilections of some of our readership, I'm not allowed to share. Suffice to say the vicar had done a sterling job of inscribing a name plate to ensure the Hound goes down (in posterity).
Now,  before we kick off - 9 or 10 teams, the Arms were literally kicking (!). The youngsters had arrived but were playing darts only. It was rammed.

Round 1 - Olympians. Only problem was some double barrelled boxer.
Round 2 - Current affairs. Some question about a Nigerian Pasta which I refused to answer on the basis that it was both racist and sexist.
Round 3 - more Olympian gonads; who wore golden shoes?, what colour are the bottom 2 Olympian rings? What do Waterford crystal and Ben Johnson have in common? (You'll have to look that one up).
Round 4 - connections took us from Beckham to Rowling. Apparently they are all Blue Peter Gold badge holders - a theme was developing here.

10 pointers - referring to my notes I only have 'Daren takes it up the a**e' and John Laurie.
We got all 3 so who knows what the questions were.

Half time interviews:
"Not too bad, 10 pointers ok, all comes down to jeopardy"
"No pussies - but I'm sober"
"good jeopardy but (the hound needs to) up its game in all departments - no badminton debacles"
"Daren is gay"

Second half was a bit crazy.... All I remember was discussing which symbol was the most redundant:
¥,},^ or ]

Final interviews timed at 22:37
"We had fun and it was up there"
"Let's just hope we got the f&&king jeopardy"

We'd actually been fairly confident on 8 out of 10 on the jeopardy and absolutely sure we didn't know the other 2 so we'd done all that we could.

Sooooooo- it's a long countdown from 10 to 1 but Ladies and the tramp, then Anoraks
and all of our other nemeses came out before Hound was named ebullient and triumphant.

I think a few tears were shed, either that or I had splash back from the toilets. Anyway folks, keep it frosty till next time.

Wonderful Hound

Ok, another economical three ball, Daren, Graham and myself. Pre quiz focussed on:
- We would be no pussies in the Jeopardy round, would this make us or break us?
- You can get all the prescription drugs you need for £29.10 a quarter. Wonder what Elvis would have made of this, not that he needed the discount.

The actual quiz kicked off with dingbats. One better than the usual seven I think.

On current affairs I was personally disappointed that a story about Sammy the seal falling asleep in a ladies toilet in Tasmania didn't make the cut, being the only thing I'd really taken an interest in all week. What did vex us was the two countries moaning about their traditional Olympic costumes. One was Georgia.

Ok, not that flattering I guess.

Next, sport and leisure. Now can someone explain to me how you play hockey left handed? I get polo as a definite but surely hockey is always played right handed? Pokemon Go anyone?

The connections, well. Another of those we got nearly all of the answers but the link baffled us. Also we showed our collective ability to confuse Bruno and Olly wasn't linked to the music round. Frankly they should do the decent thing and merge. One was rear of the year, I'm sure that gives it away.

Ten pointers were hit out of the park, as were the cheesy snacks and on we went. The Link ups round is probably our favourite now and didn't disappoint. Onto Jeopardy and would we be true to our word?

Answer, no. But there were mitigating circumstances. Who knows what the 5th event in a heptathlon is as well as the plane that unloaded over Nagasaki? There were differing opinions on the Shakespeare play starting with a shipwreck as well. Maybe we left a couple out there.

Music, no notes here, no doubt we struggled with something Britpop and that infernal debate on Bruno etc. But guess what? Hound win! About 7 out on our guess of the score, but just as well.

Windmills & Dragons

Not an official Hound event. Just myself with Andrea & Brendan over from Sydney and visiting old haunts. Not that the Green Dragon is one of those, it was a bank or something back when they knew all of the Croydon pubs. A's presence did at least make the team two-thirds ex Umbrella Towers inmates.

£1.50 per person entry fee with £45 first prize and a raffle/pick a playing card at the end for a chance of a rollover jackpot. In  an interesting twist each team plays a joker for double points on one of Rounds 1,2,3 or 5, but which round is chosen by the quizmaster separately for each team.

Round 1 was our joker round, Geography & History. A good choice for us, but we could have done even better than 2x8 points if we knew the first British PM born in the 20th century. We mixed up the PLO and Hamas for the other wrong answer.

Round 2 was Business & Money, 8 points gained. A lot of mental anguish over the company named after a Bing Crosby & Fred Astaire film, with B eventually having a Eureka moment during a fag break (phone left on table). We missed the company named after the male founders secretary, and who knew that the purple Euro note is the 500 euros one.

Round 3 was People, and thankfully rightfully famous people rather than fluffy celebrities. We steamed in for 10 points, shame that it wasn't our random joker round.

Break at this stage, with Round 4 being a word based round to be completed during the 20 minute break. A whopping 30 points at stake. 15 cryptic clues are solved  giving two words each, with the second word being spelt the same as the first except for one additional letter. Their example was...

"Eat this at breakfast then light a fire on a hilltop." BACON/BEACON. I will bring the sheet along tonight if anyone wants to have a go.

We needed all of the time given getting about 9 or 10 without too much difficulty and then the rest only after much consternation. A came into her own getting a few of the stubborn ones. (This somewhat replicated her performance in the previous day's Crazy Golf major on Brighton seafront. 4 consecutive aces on the back 9 gave her a winning 18-hole score of 37, to my 39 and no-one else breaking 45). Looked like a full 30 points at this stage, however reduced to 29 as one of our answers differed slightly from the official one. Could probably have argued that our answer was equally acceptable if we needed the extra point.

The whole thing is marked at the end, but with hindsight based on the final scores, 64 out of 70 at this stage must have put us first or second of about 14 teams. Unfortunately Round 5 was Current Affairs (last two months). With 2 contestants who spent most of those two months on the other side of the world, and myself with a short term memory like one of those things with holes in it that is kept in the kitchen, can't remember it's name, we scored a feeble 3 points. Amongst the things that I couldn't remember were the lowly ranked British tennis player who had 15 minutes of fame at Wimbledon, the losing candidate in the London Mayoral election, the new Home Secretary and what fruit caused a crisis in New Zealand  (we had this the other way around at the PA).

A disappointing 12 out of 20 in the music intros round. We confused Whitney Houston with someone else equally awful, I confused a Donna Summer song with a Rod Stewart one, and we didn't get Fontella Bass/Rescue Me, a Northern Soul classic. Just as well I didn't mention that the last time that I had heard the latter was relatively recently in a bar in Brighton, where someone played it 4 times in a row on the jukebox.

78 points, 3rd equal. Second was only 79.5, but winners got 88. All completed within a couple of hours. A decent quiz, perhaps overweight in politics and people (though the round headings change each week I think). Perhaps underweight in Sport, and certainly not enough Films for B. Refreshingly bereft of meaningless celebrity titbits (though Noel Edmonds and Victoria Beckham did sneak through). Worth consideration for Hound if we ever need a Monday date.

The raffle winners missed the jackpot, but won I think two starters of their choice from the regular menu.

Answers where not given for questions mentioned in the above were...

Alec Douglas-Home
Holiday Inn
Ann Summers
Marcus Willis
Zac Goldsmith
Amber Rudd
Avocado

Graham

  

Ich bin ein hund

Brief one this week, my overseas visitors will be arriving any time soon. Early hopes of 5 hounds were ultimately dashed by a margin of two. Daren turned up already refreshed, and the call of the kebab and his own 4 walls was too tempting. Only 3 teams but still another defeat by two points.

We were pussies leaving out 4 correct answers in the jeopardy round, as well as 1 wrong one and 1 that still required further debate. Lots of missed opportunities, I failed to notice that all of the countries in the connections round had had coups even though I was present during the Cyprus one in 1974. Dandy Warhols were missed in the music round, and there was a Stevie Wonder/Bob Marley mix-up. Put that one down to the beer. A TV/film round was included, we forgot that Smurfs were 3 apples high.

See picture round below. We only got 5 correct. Didn't get 3,4,5,7 or 10. Can't remember who 3 and 4 were now but not messrs Spears and Drogba. We had 5 down as a butch politician, turned out to be Paula Radcliffe. 7 and 10 are Cher and Tarrant. Great to see Kevster back in the saddle, but otherwise a bit of a lame one this week.

G-Hound