Breakin' up

Last night's BQT's ended with a touch of controversy. I'll get to that in a moment, with some relevant news. First…

This was an all-around satisfying quiz, in my humble opinion. Thank you for indulging my autocratic impulse to censor books for our video round. I was surprised to see that no one in this crowd knew who wrote The Day of the Triffids, but to be fair, I would've had no idea who it was if it weren't written on the magic clipboard right in front of me. (I've never read most of the classics; currently, I'm busy with this story about Jesus running for President and this overlong autobiography by the greatest pro wrestler of the '90s. Make of that what you will.)

Also, I just discovered that in the Lightning Round, question No. 3 was problematic: Q: What fictional product featured in the movie Office Space was later manufactured in real life? Turns out, the most popular wrong answer was technically correct.

Slow night for Smart-Ass Points, but I don't care what anyone says, I like "Diaphragm" as the answer to Q: Fill in the blank in the title of this 1965 beach party movie: How to Stuff a Wild BLANK.

Now, the standings:
1. Fantastic Fournicators
2. Birds of Ill Omen
3. Incontinental Congress
4. Butter Balls
5. Strippers for Stephen Hawking

Yes, Fantastic Fournicators won again. And while the core members of this team are certainly trivia masters not to be trifled with (and quite generous, having given me a very thoughtful birthday present several years ago), some of their perpetual success must be attributed to the consistently high number of people on their team (I believe 97% of the crowd last night was on this one squad).

So I trotted out my long-considered plan to limit the BQT team sizes. Lots of loud, circular debate followed, but here's the deal… Next show: Maximum team size 8. Break yourselves up however you see fit.

And this is a trial measure; we'll see what happens and take it from there. And really, unless you're one of those teams that obnoxiously insists on continually paying me money, participating enthusiastically, and succeeding at the task I lay out for people, it probably won't be enforced very stringently.

December 8, folks, it will all happen…