Bear-Faced Hound

Three of us this week. Graham probably in the air though if Kevster's experience of recent flights was continued, loitering around Malta airport. Steve had a strategy meeting, whatever that is.

Anyway, we arrived in the pub, looked like one of LATT had made it in early.

Why the big paws?

We never really got a decent explanation for his presence, but we could have used him on our side. By way of pre quiz fun, I produced a wrist ball which were all the rage back in the day, gosh must have been around 1999 or the like. The hours of fun we had back then, simpler times.

So first up in the quiz, pictures of UK celebs back in their younger days. These were pretty A list and I think we got most of them, only mixing up Emma Watson with Helena Bonham-Carter, Gryffindor rather than Slytherin I guess.

Next up, the usual current affairs nonsense. The Scrabble World Champion won £7,000. Decent but probably not a cue to give up the day job and a crossbow bolt shot into the ground disrupted Surrey v Middlesex.


Third round was trains and the like. Sadly not focussing on the Tattenham Corner line but a more global challenge if you will. A few missed punts here, Beijing, Tokyo and New York all featuring but we probably got them in the wrong order.

Mumbai station, if it didn't feature, it should have done.

Onto connections, Jerry Lee Lewis, Henry VIII, Richard Pryor and Elton John pushed us onto the tracks of multiple marriages/divorces though Henry generally didn't bother with such formalities. Did we get the ten pointers? I'm going to say we did. Fine sandwiches as well with a good proportion of egg.

Link ups went awry towards the end, we lost it on Hajj and Jollof, citizens of the world that we are. Eyes down and time to focus on the jeopardy.

Or something.

So which England manager preceded Capello? The first name to jump up was Sven. But what about Stevie Mac? And didn't Pearce have a few games as caretaker? And then Howard Wilkinson has a game or two in charge every now and then? So we won't forget again (likely).

Graham Taylor - 1990–1993

Terry Venables - 1994–1996

Glenn Hoddle - 1996–1999

Howard Wilkinson 1999, 2000

Kevin Keegan 1999–2000

Peter Taylor 2000

Sven-Göran Eriksson 2001–2006

Steve McClaren 2006–2007

Fabio Capello 2008–2012

Stuart Pearce 2012

Roy Hodgson 2012–2016

Sam Allardyce 2016

Gareth Southgate

At least now we've accepted it doesn't really matter, we're not going to win anything and I'd say we have Roy to thank for that. We swerved it, plus maybe another. Music we got nearly all on and drum roll, joint second, beaten by a narrow three points by the Busters. So no win and close enough to think about what might have been but good to share the love, another fairly thin week in terms of team entries so no harm in the wins being shared around.

Phew, left my blogging notes in the pub but I think I got away with it.

Touch and Go Hound

First up, apologies for the delay. Had one of those weekends with nary any time to myself to do what really matters.

So, pre quiz, well, would there be a quiz and all? Only us and TLATT at about 8.30 and was it all going to be worthwhile? We were at the point of supping up and heading elsewhere until Gerry unpacked the microphone and we were on. Just to confirm, we were Daren, Steve and myself, trips to Malta and Luton Airport claiming other likely contenders.

But we now had four teams and a quiz could form. So, first up, the not unfriendly theme of beer can brands. Been a while since I've used my printer so lets's see....



Not bad. So a reasonable stab on the current affairs, Bradley Walsh and not Vinnie Jones is rumoured to be the new Dr Who sidekick and it was bras being searched at the Grimsby Town match.

Next round, flying. So we had everything from Buttresses and Circuses to Pickets and Without Wings. Think there was a Scotsman in there as well.

Connections featured John Steinbeck and Mark Twain novels, poor Oscars and some woman with a long complicated name. The answer was fruit so fill in those blanks. This guy made it in.

Ten pointers, Bouncing Bombs, Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe and Christ the Redeemer may have featured, can't remember as such but that's what I have written down.

No Siobhan so no link ups but a TV and film themed round. 2nd Bond film - Steve bagged From Russia With Love, would have gone later for that and we probably got the wrong city for Grays Anatomy. Been there before with all those pesky hospital dramas.

Jeopardy was a safe six in Countdown terminology. There's a few best guesses we got right but Xanthophobia is a fear of?

Music was a fairly routine nine, not a Bruno/Olly mix up but a Katy Perry miss I think.

Won't bother with trying to build up tension here, we all know we won. But take note, need to keep getting out there as, well maybe its the summer recess, but we all need the quiz to keep going. Here's a leopard.

Pinking Heck Hound

Is this the start of a Daily Mail smear campaign against Hound? Good old British press, build em up knock em down. First picture successfully inserted whilst blogging on my iPad. Thank You.



Fizzy drinks in the picture round. If you can read the written answers, 5 is wrong. Actually Tizer.

Decent current affairs round. Businessman flew to Vegas rather than Stansted. Ryanair want booze restriction prior to flying, did anyone else think that this might increase their inflight sales?

Rd 3 was Only Connect style sequences. Semi-quaver, quaver, crotchet should be followed by minim not semi-brief. Rest was straightforward.

Firsts, not Connections this week. Captain Webb, Benazir Bhutto, Judith Keppel etc. Got the ten pointers as well.

Good shout from D to get Mercantile, otherwise not too difficult chain letters.

Blew the Jeopardy round. A bit unfortunate, mistaking pinking shears for crimping scissors. Bit
mixed up on the Hurt Locker country (Afghanistan or Iraq), and savoury ducks are apparently faggots (yes you can still say that). Let the Anoraks in, 4th of 7 in fact, pinking shears would have meant second by a point.

Giovanni Vigliotto got a mention somewhere, can't remember why. Respect from Gerry for getting Thirld World in the music round.

Submissions are invited for songs where song or artist namechecks a chemical element or good pun thereof. Iron Maiden, Oxygene, Going for Gold, Now Those Days Are Gone (Argon) etc..

I'm in Malta for the next two, see you all in September.

G-Force

Giant Hogweed Hound

In the week that a jogger allegedly pushed someone into a bus lane and a bus crashed into a shop in Clapham it was business as usual on Thursday night with regards to quizzing.

Pre match discussions centred on invasive species (botanical) and the social experiment that is Eden.

Teams were thin on the ground again, to the point that there was some doubt about whether the quiz would actually happen. The Landlord gave the a-ok on the basis that he would join the 'fluid' Busters team.

In another twist, the new team of youngsters unveiled their secret weapon, someone who had appeared on TV's 'The Chase'. Graham didn't recognise him and i'm not entirely sure that appearing on The Chase qualifies someone as a 'weapon'. Oh, hang on, I think I get the joke now.

If it so pleases you, the first round was pictures of drug cheats or 'athletes' as some call them. Dispatched with aplomb.

The Current affairs round required us to state the number of infected Dutch eggs in the U.K. to within 100,000. Our answer of 700,000 was almost eggsactly right.

Next up was an X,Y,Z round; x-rays, zed bed, Zaire and so on and so forth. No problems here

Connections round; Bastille, pancake, Robin etcetera allowed us to back fill the 9th and 35th (?) fences as being Valentines and not Bechers Brook


So, going into the 10 pointers we were in fine fettle with plenty left in the tank. Unfortunately at this point things started to unravel. We were unable to identify the food type that Provolone belongs to and this was a sign of things to come.

The second half saw us grappling with the last 2  connections. Sabayon is the French version of Zagblione and I'm not sure to this day what a catholic minister, beginning with'N' and ending in 'O'is called.
Given that the Busters team contained Pete the chef and at least 2 Irish Catholics, we could sense which way the wind was blowing.

Struggled through the jeopardy round (what did an Irish m.p. Blame for the state of the roads in Kerry? Faeries! )

Music round was fine as usual but we knew we were too far behind and I was surprised that we actually managed a creditable second.

Unsurprisingly, the Landlord's  'Busters' team won having aced the jeopardy round. One way of keeping the cost of the quiz down I guess.

Kevster recommended that we all watch Icarus although Robson felt he knew the story arc already.

97% Hound

So this was is. The five top sportspeople of our generation, i.e. born after Graham, who transcended their sport to become global icons. So

#1 - Usain Bolt
#2 - Roger Federer

Honourable mentions, Mike Tyson, Tiger Woods and Michael Schumacher

Look, there's always going to be one or two we're not happy with but that's democracy for you. Not a bad representation of our generation all in all. Where are all the women though? Where are the "alternatively abled" athletes? Where indeed.

So, the quiz proper and we kicked off with a Dr Who themed round, plus assistants. Steve set off on a 70 yard run with this one before crossing for a marvellous finish from Daren with Karen Gillan.

Really don't know her at all but seems a charming sort.

Now, you know what, my notes get fairly sketchy from here but I can confirm:

- It was peanut butter used by inmates of an Alabama Jail to help them escape. Does anyone, outside of Alabama, still eat peanut butter? Let's just take the two least healthy foods we can find and mix them together shall we?

- Sarah Harding is the ex Girls Aloud member heading into the Celebrity Big Brother House. In typical ladette pose:

- A filibeg is indeed a kilt

- Euromillions numbers go up to 50 - Not hard to see our blind spots, kilts and lotteries.

- There was a nice Only Connect style round where we had to get the next in the sequences, Avon, Beds, Berks, Bucks..... or 18,4,13,6 .... Which reminds me of something.

- 99 Red Balloons and Kung Fu have something to do with ice creams/lollies

And that's about as far as my notes take me. Hopefully you've all received an invite from Pete by now and Daren was reviewing his house-warming date. Ok, he didn't make the top 5 but in honour of his storming win last night, and remembering the evening I was only 3 minutes behind him in a race in Nonsuch Park, I give you Sir Mo.