When you make your weekly “date night” a trivia night where you utterly fail on the questions – but still have a good time joking about animated movies marketed to furries, putting holes in your head on purpose and playing the celebrity deaths version of “charades,” you know you’ve probably been together a bit too long!

We managed to get to Arbor Brewing Co. aka “Corner Brewery” in Ypsilanti, MI about an hour before game time, and secured one of the last tables available near the women’s restroom. Yes, this place really fills up – no joke – you can’t expect to show up 10 minutes before game time and get a table – unless you have a teammate who has been babysitting a table for at least an hour.

We might have ended up with a measly 49 points for the night after getting roughed up a bit on the question set, but both of us still had a great time getting out of the house after Old Man Winter smacked us around last week! We just couldn’t bear yet another night at home watching TV!

As it turned out, the third player we invited out for trivia battle but could not join us – went to grad school in a state whose name we failed to put down as our final question answer in game two. We’re fairly certain he would not have forgotten about this oddly shaped western state! No comment on what the state is shaped like! He also might have helped us get at least another two points in a sportsball mystery round, though we were giddy about having come up with two correct answers by our sad selves.

Read on to see the very, very abbreviated questions:

Round One

1 Colors – The adjective “flaxen” is used to describe what color?

2 Maff – What type of curve is created by the equation Y = x2? Miss.

3 Soup – What type of French soup is made from well-flavored stock or bouillon that has been clarified? We joked about pouring this soup on a newly married spouse as a way to…confirm – the marriage. Puns are the lowest form of humor!

4 Treasury – T-notes have maturities of five different time periods, including two and three year. Name two of the other three years, all three for a bonus point. We got two, but not all three.

Mystery Round One – Visual

We missed #1 and #2.

Round Two

5 Elections – Senator Cynthia Lummis became the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate in what U.S. state in 2021?

6 TV Theme Songs – Which family drama series that aired from 1994 to 2000 used the Bodeans song “Closer to Free” as its theme song? We got this correct, but for a really odd reason having nothing to do with ever watching even one single episode of the show. A while back, I watched a ’90s documentary that talked about this show, in particular an episode where one of the characters has a drinking problem – and also decides to become a party clown for kids. Now who wouldn’t want to watch a clip of THAT episode? That poor birthday cake never had a chance!

7 Bridges – The Honeymoon Bridge, which collapsed in 1938, was replaced with the Rainbow Bridge in 1941 and connects what two cities with the same name? The word “honeymoon” should have been more of a clue for us, but alas, it wasn’t. Miss.

8 Pizza – According to pmq dot com’s PizzaPower report, what pizza chain had the most total sales in 2022, ahead of Pizza Hut and Little Caesar’s?

Mystery Two – Current Events (Yikes, these rounds are always deadly for us)!

M1 What type of balloon animal creatd by Jeff Koons was knocked off its pedestal recently at the Miami Art Fair?

M2 – What oldest sitting female U.S. Senator has said she will not run for re-election in 2024?

M3 Richard Belzer played what character in the Law and Order universe?

M4 Mattel relaunched what franchise complete with an updated look for its title dinosaur?

We only managed to get #4 correct. This round was even worse than the sportsball round!

Final One – World Leaders

Haile Selassie served as emperor of what African country from 1930 to 1974, five years of which was spent in exile in England?

We picked another African country that begins with the same letter as the correct answer, but nope…

Round Three/Game Two

9 Searches – What travel related search engine launched in 2004 and shares its name with a personal watercraft?

10 TV Titles – The competition series The Great British Bake Off is known as the Great British Baking Show in the U.S. because the word “bake off” is trademarked by what company? We hesitated a bit, but thankfully this tidbit was successfully dredged from my brain.

11 Bands – Brittany Howard is the lead singer of what blues band whose song ‘Don’t Wanna Fight” won two Grammy Awards in 2016? Never heard of ’em, miss.

12 Debates – Who is the most recent individual to be included in a presidential debate whom was note registered as a Democrat or Republican? We didn’t think back far enough, miss.

Mystery Three – All About Annie

Will we actually get a mystery round all correct? Maybe! You’ll have to read on to see!

Identify the person named “Annie” in the following clues. Or answer the question about people named Annie.

M1 – Annie Wilkes was the antagonist in what Stephen King novel?

M2 – What rapper sampled “Hard Knock Life” for his song Hard Knock Life Ghetto Anthem?

M3 – During the ’70s, Annie Liebowitz worked as a photographer for what magazine?

M4 – Annie Romano is the mostly silent character in what Netflix series?

Nope, no perfect mystery round for us, we missed #4.

Round Four

13 Animated Films – In what 206 film does actress Ginnifer Goodwin voice a character named Judy Hopps, who leaves her rural home to become a police officer in a big city? The two of us teamed up well on this, but when one of us said “Wasn’t this that movie they (supposedly) marketed to furries?” Bam.

14 Medicine – Trepanning is an ancient form of medicine involving making a hole in what part of the body? And of course I immediately thought of that song from the movie Under the Cherry Moon about needing another lover like you need a hole in your (blank). My husband was strangely excited about this question!

15 Playoffs (no, no NO, not more sportsball! (sob)!) – Name one of the two NFL teams that have lost at least 30 playoff games, which is more than the LA Rams or the Pittsburgh Steelers? Miss.

16 Books – What is the colorful title of the 1877 novel by Anna Sewell subtitled “His Grooms and Companions – the Autobiography of a Horse?” We zigged when we shoulda zagged, picked the wrong damn horse book. And is it really a book told from the horse’s point of view? “Today I stood around in a field all day, until this little girl wanted to ride me, then I ran really fast. After, she gave me an apple and some sugar cubes. Then I stood in my stall with the hay all night long” Wow, this must be really riveting stuff! Why haven’t I read this? Maybe I’ll have to get this from the library!

Mystery Four – will we FINALLY have a mystery round that we get all correct? Will we? Will we? Is the suspense killing you?

Which of the following long-running series aired 12 seasons or more?

Murder, She Wrote, ER, JAG, Seventh Heaven, Law and Order – Special Victims Unit, Dynasty, Dallas.

Yes we did! We guessed all four series correctly! No, this would not be enough to provide salvation in the game, but we’ll take the little victory!

We decided to bet all of the marbles on the final category of borders.

Name the four U.S. states that have borders with Canada of 100 miles or fewer.

We only came up with three states. Maybe other trivia spots only had to name three, or even two – but Tim would not play nice with a final question in a trivia spot where the trivia competition is as fierce for the competition for tables and chairs! And we can’t blame him, we’ll just blame that player who couldn’t make it out and would have known the correct fourth state (just kidding, Brad – you know we love you and your grad school stories about the University of (fourth state whose name we didn’t put down).

Ah well, can’t win ’em all. We may be back at this trivia spot next week, as long as we don’t get a snowstorm, hail storm, ice storm, hurricane, tornado, squall or other pesky weather event that forces us all to stay home. Go Pods, and stay classy, Mother Nature!