Boston quiz recap: Monday, Sept 23

First of all, Oberon continues to be a radically superlative Big Quiz Thing venue, easily among the best ever. Inside info: Preshow Monday night, we filmed some action at the bar for one of next month's video four-parters, "The Mixology Mindbender." Be prepared, October 14.

 

If you can tell what that drink is just from this picture, I take my hat off to you, my friend—you are indeed an alcoholic.

Whoa there, getting ahead of ourselves. Monday was another successful night in Harvard Square, as the Cambridgians did even better on our viral-video puzzle, "Meme-O-Rama," then those NYC folk. You were inspired…so much so, that a lady in the front row felt to shout out the answer to the first follow-up question.

His name is "Chris!," we're told.

Despite that, that question gave us one of the evening's best Smart-Ass Points. He was asking us to leave who alone? Britney. And what's his first name? Britney. Other SAPs of the evening: the outdoor activity indicated by "buildings, antennas, spans, and earth" is "sticking things up your ass"; two of People magazine's Most Beautiful Women, depicted with blank faces except for their eyes were Ed Asner and Voldemort; and the best of the evening by popular acclaim, Alan Alda's famous quote from Crimes and Misdemeanors was "If it bends, it's Beckham; if it breaks, it's not Beckham."

And Monday we featured a audio round especially suited to you Harvard/MIT/whatever eggheads: "There Will Be Math." Can't name the song title? Solve the equation onscreen and tell me the number in the song title for half a point. See, the Big Quiz Thing rewards education.

And the finale! Our old friends the erstwhile Quips team—this time known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Est—was looking to return to the top for the first time since they abandoned the Quippy theme. Joining them were perpetual gamers but seldom winners the Myriad Second Quiz (as they were called this evening) and frequent champs the Monstrous Humanoids. In other words, the familiar bunch of nerds. As in NYC, no finalist knew that at the peak of her Hollywood power, Bette Davis was known as the Fifth Warner Brother. (One player guess "the Fifth Beverly Brother." Um, okay.) The Ents and the Humanoids split a pair of points on knowledge about the celebrity with the forthcoming The NAME Show and the late-'80s toy named for the sound it made when you catch it. But Ent-er Michael climbed the mountain once again when he named the mammal that's the namesake of both a Midwest NFL team and a far west CFL squad.

The standings:
1. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Ents: Not the Mormons
2. The Monstrous Humanoids
3. Myriad Second Quiz
4. Grover Cleveland and the Non-Consecutive Terms/Ken Norton Kicks Ass!! (tie): The latter was going for their fourth consecutive win, but sadly, no dice (or maybe not sadly to everyone else in the world)
6. Demonic Stolen Cakes
7. Ice Cream Anti-Social
8. Butter Bumper
9. Kissed by Seacrest
10. Something Something Heisenberg

NEXT:  October 14. Then November 4. Then December 16. Mondays all, then beginning in January, we're starting on a first-Mondays schedule (1/6, 2/3, 3/3). We're also working on some possible special events for the MA area worth getting excited about, so get excited. Details, as ever, in this crazy new social media world the kids keep talking about, here and here.