The past two Saturdays were “trivia Saturdays,” with me and my team playing in a semifinal game, winning a finals spot and playing in finals. Well, that chapter is officially done – we won a bit of cash, and are free to move about the “trivia cabin.” And get some shopping done (including buying a new laptop).
We did very little work to qualify for semis, only playing four games. Winning the tourney cash did take a bit of work and involved a bit of nail biting and finger crossing, so it all balanced out. Scores were tight among the top teams, with only three points dividing my third place team and the first place team.
We borrowed our fourth player from a rival team. It’s pretty standard for me to have to borrow players for every trivia tournament, either because I don’t have enough players – or in this case, I didn’t have enough available players old enough for a MTL tourney. MTL questions skew older for the most part, so your best bet is to have an older roster (no players younger than say..38). I really, really didn’t want to have to sub out my younger player, but I wanted to hedge our bets. Considering how well we did, I’d say my strategy paid off!
On a sad note, another reason we had to borrow a player is because a guy who played with us previously in many, many trivia tournaments passed away in August. I’ve dedicated the most recent trivia finals to his memory for a couple of reasons – one, the last time we played a tournament in that bar (February 2018) he was on our team, and two, our tiebreaker question allowing us to win $ was about Harley Davidson (one of his favorite topics). We did this for you, Archie! ☺
Now a player from the team we borrowed from is starting to make noises about try to qualify his own team for MTL tourneys. He’s squawked about this before, so it’s probably just talk – but I would love nothing more than for this to happen. I’ve even offered sincere advice for him in making this happen. We’ll see!
Next week’s plans…
With the last two Wednesdays falling on holidays, we’re pretty much just playing for fun until January. We’re playing this coming Monday at Sticks, and will have FOUR players for this game (a rarity for a Monday game). Evan usually can’t play Mondays, but will be joining us for this game.
I’ll also be joining Kim for a music trivia game Thursday, December 26. I’ve been itching to play a music themed game, and since she will be on holiday break from her teaching job, I’m sure she’ll enjoy getting out, too. I can use a night away from “the boys!”
As for 2019? The weekly trivia games will continue at Tower Inn as long as the place offers trivia. It’s a good night to get a decent team together, and isn’t too far from home. We’ll also play Sporcle Live games from time to time, but won’t be committing to those on a weekly basis. Twenty-one week seasons just didn’t work for us! Also I think us getting to state championship games is pretty impossible. Know your strengths, hedge your bets, yada yada…
The Pods, like The Dude, will abide in 2020!