We were laid low by mystery rounds about drama series and Black authors in a trivia game Sunday night at the Ypsi Alehouse in Ypsilanti, MI. Other than that, our games were “OK!” No prizes for the eighth straight game since we’ve been playing in 2024.

We’re even starting to question whether we want to continue with the regular Sunday games at the YpsiAlehouse. We may want to just start going out to explore the “trivia seas” when our schedules allow rather than focusing on doing anything but sucking at a “regular” trivia spot. If something stops being fun, stop doing it, ya know?

I have a great love of trivia, so rest assured I’ll find a way to continue seeking out ways to go out for games, even if it’s not the “same place, every week.” Seriously, my trivia team did things like that for so long that it almost makes me feel like I’m in jail just talking about it! Can you, like, put some money in my canteen account?

Our most recent trivia game was not without at least a few bright spots and fun moments, read on to see the questions and how we did on them:

Round One/Game One

1 Video Games – In 2024, what video game publisher is scheduled to released College Football 25, its first game in the series since NCAA Football 14 more than a decade ago? Believe it or not, we lucky guessed our way to victory here. But here’s where our luck would run out…

2 China – As of 2020, what city has the most populous urban area in China, with over 24 million people, ranking it ahead of Beijing?

3 Cameras – What company, founded in 1892 by George Eastman and Henry Strong, has produced multiple lines of cameras, including the Brownie, one of the first mass-market snapshot cameras?

4 Movie Music – What rock band appears in the film Back to the Future Part III playing a hillbilly version of the song Doubleback?
Got all of these correct.

Mystery Round One – Private Schools

Name the private college or university based on the city where it is located and the athletic conference in which it competes.

M1 Winston-Salem, North Carolina (Atlantic Coast Conference)

M2 New Orleans, Louisiana (The American)

M3 Nashville, Tennessee (Southeastern Conference)

M4 Hanover, New Hampshire (Ivy League)

Missed #1, chose another school in same general area and the same conference 😦

Round Two

5 NHL Teams – Doing so in 1993, what was the last NHL team based in Canada to win a Stanley Cup?

NERD POINT: Which Canadian team won in 1990?

Miss and miss. You’d think with there being only so many Canadian NHL teams, we’d have shot on goal here, but nope…

6 Authors – What author won the Hugo Award for Best Novel three years in a row from 2016 to 2018 for the books in her Broken Earth trilogy? FB clue. This actually sounds like a book series my husband would like! We might not be getting 100 percent of the questions about Black History Month correct, but we’re actually learning stuff we didn’t know! I read about the Emmett Till case after last Sunday’s game, and wow…what a watershed moment that was in the Civil Rights Movement. Even though the killers were acquitted in a court of law, society turned their backs on them.

7 Chemistry – What type of first-generation subatomic particle is found in a valance shell? Brad with the correct guess here.

8 Pets – What mid-20th century US president from Texas had two beagles named Him and Her? So, so many clues for the right answers here – Texas, mid 20th century…will we ever get a question about which president had pet raccoons? JK, JK!

And now for the visual round that would utterly sink our game, which wasn’t going too badly by this point!

Mystery Round Two – Visual

Missed every…single…one of these.

Isla’s College Fund was in first with 52 points, Poor Memory was in second with 49. We were somewhere well below that with 42 points, would have been much higher had that visual round been something we knew even a LITTLE more about than that! Seriously, the mystery rounds have been really, really hurting us lately. I’m beginning to think that they have no purpose other than to ruin players’ games. Anyone else miss when we only had one mystery round per round?

Rant over…I know complaining about trivia game formats, visual rounds you flunk completely – and “put these in order” questions (important plot point) – is pointless! If ya don’t like it, don’t play!

Final Category – Plays

Name one of the three plays – all with one-word nautical themed titles – that make up The Coast of Utopia, a trilogy by John Stoppard that won the Tony Award for Best Play in 2007.

We wagered zero on this, glad we did – never heard of this. Our guesses of Pirates, Scurvy and Seasick would have been way off!

Round Two/Game Two

9 Candy – The classic “Five Flavor” roll of Life Savers candy was introduced in 1935 featuring cherry, lemon, and three other flavors. Name one of those three flavors.

NERD POINT – Name two of the three.

Missed the bonus, got the points.

10 Cars – The “Spirit of Ecstasy,” a woman leaning forward with outstretched arms, is a sculpture used as the hood ornament on vehicles made by what luxury automaker?

11 Artists – What artist produced the anti-war painting Guernica in response to a bombing of the town of the same name in the Basque region of northern Spain?

12 Streaming TV – Claire Foy, Olivia Colman and Imelda Staunton play the same character in different seasons of what Netflix series that debuted in 2016?

Mystery Round Three – Books in Order

Place the following novels written by Black authors in order according to when they were published, starting with the earliest

Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison

The Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead

Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston

Beloved, Toni Morrison

We got two points out of this round, only because I knew Toni Morrison was a contemporary author.

Round Four

13 Movie Singing – In what 1998 film does Ben Affleck’s character sing an off-key rendition of “Leaving on a Jet Plane?” Communication breakdown here, I had two possibilities written down for our answer guy Mike, and he picked the wrong one (totally my bad, not his fault whatsoever).

14 Bands – Boy George is the singer of what band, which reached the top two of the Billboard Hot 100 with “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me,” “Time (Clock of the Heart)” and “Karma Chameleon” in the 1980s?

15 Quarterbacks – What quarterback from the University of Oklahoma, who was the #1 overall draft pick in the 2010 NFL draft by the St. Louis Rams, went on to be named Offensive Rookie of the Year? Miss.

16 Flags – From 1961 to 2001, what African nation had its initial “R” printed on its flag? Miss, we mistakenly thought of a country that no longer exists. Not a great way to finish this game…

Mystery Round Four – Pro and Con

The following answers will all have either the letters PRO or CON in that order.

M1 Consumer goods company that owns the brands Pampers, Charmin and Bounce

M2 Song by Miami Sound Machine that includes the lyric, “I know you can’t control yourself any longer?” sung by Gloria Estefan

M3 Term in French cooking for a clear soup made from clarified stock or broth

M4 2020 film written and directed by Emerald Fennell and starring Carey Mulligan

Heading into the final, 24 Hour Brunch had 53 points and Poor Memory had 51 points going into the final and they were in first and second. We were…below that with 38. Clearly these teams know far more about Black authors than us!

Final Category – Citizens

Signed into law by Woodrow Wilson in 1917, the Jones-Shafroth Act granted U.S. citizenship to people who were born where? Anyone born in this location on or after April 25, 1898 was granted citizenship.

24 Hour Brunch held onto their first place spot and two other teams had to battle it out for a second place prize (we didn’t stick around to hear how that played out).

We wagered zero on this, which is good, because Mike and Brad’s guesses would not have been correct. We moved up a little bit, but not enough to count.

We kind of feel like we’re being pushed out of the door after trivia at this place on Sunday nights because of a comedy show that starts when the trivia show ends, and it’s not exactly a “sit around and chill with your friends” kind of atmosphere (you’ll be called out on the mic for talking too loud and not paying attention to the people on stage). So unless you move into the bar area after trivia is over, you’ll have to be quiet and listen to – or participate in the comedy show. I’m not even certain that the comedy brings in as many people as trivia does. But…just another pointless “If you don’t like it, don’t come out” complaint from me! About that…

I’m actually starting to re-think about how committed I am to continuing to make this a “regular” trivia spot. Sometimes it’s nice to not have to go anywhere on Sundays! But, we don’t have a lot of choices close to us that we can play with any real chance of at least occasionally winning a prize with the players we have!

I guess this will be a “game weekend decision” from here on out and not plan anything too far in advance. Go with the flow – if something stops being fun, stop doing it! If you take a break from it and start to miss it, go back to do it again!

Maybe we’ll come out again next Sunday, maybe we won’t. My husband has to get up early for jury selection the next day, so we may call off next Sunday’s game. As always, Go Pods, and stay classy, LBJ!