Scroll to the bottom for the answers.

If the most recent post-game recap I’ve received from Sporcle Events is accurate, we played our 95th game at Original Gravity on a recent sultry (and buggy) July evening! This was the first time we’d played here since August, 2024. In the days leading up to the pandemic, we did play here a bit more often, even playing some weekly games in 2016-2017 (back when I was more of a trvia junkie). Not that I’ve stopped being a trivia junkie, but I do try to rein it in a bit more!

I didn’t realize how buggy it was until after I’d turned off my Thermacell!

Within five minutes of turning off my “Bugbot” to let it cool down so I could pack it up,  I was nailed by at least 2-3 skeeters! Too bad they don’t make a similar device that works on flies and especially deer flies. Those little vampires are nasty – I got a couple of bites from them on a recent visit to my mother-in-law’s house – they leave a couple of tiny bloody holes…just like vampires.

I cleaned the bites up with alcohol and witch hazel right away (witch hazel helps with the itch).

As for the game? Meh, no prizes for our third trivia game in a row! Are we in a “slump?” We are far too familiar with those!

Thanks to Kim and Brent S. for joining us at this game…

We wagered zero on the first final question, and bet it all on the second final – and got it right. But the two teams tied for first ahead of us got  it too!

The two game MVPs were Kim S. for helping with one of the tough anagram Emmy questions, the music mystery round and the final question in game two! Our second MVP of the game was my trusty “Bugbot” for making sure that the heat and lack of a breeze (and really tough questions) were the only things “bugging” me in this game!

Honorable mention MVP goes out to my little solar fan and my necklace fan, which made me slightly less cranky about the heat!

Here were our questions:

Game One/Round One

1 Debuts – What English silent film icon created and portrayed “The Tramp,” a mischievous yet good-natured vagrant who would become one of cinema’s most enduring figures?

2 Disasters – What company owned the oil tanker partially named Valdez that ran aground in Prince William Sound in 1989?

3 Cocktails – The Sazerac cocktail was created in what city that is also home to the Southern Food and Beverage Museum in the Sazerac House?

4 What Italian River shares its name with a Teletubby? It was helpful here to be playing with a couple of parents! No, there isn’t a Tinky Winky River in Italy! 😂

Mystery Round One – July Hits

Name the artist of each Billboard top ten hit in July.

M1 “Come & Get It,” 2013

M2 “Unwell,” 2003

M3 “Whoomp! (There it Is),” 1993

M4 “Every Breath You Take,” 1983

Only missed #1. But without Kim’s help, we would have only gotten one of these correct! Also, she was the only one in the bar knowing the correct artist for Whoomp! (There it Is). She really is the musical savant!

Round Two

5 Olympics – Simone Biles, the most decorated gymnast of all time, made her Olympic debut at the Olympic Games held in what city? Miss.

6 2000s Movies – What 2003 movie, based on a Laura Hillenbrand book, stars Tobey Maguire as a jockey?

7 U.S. History – Who became the second U.S. vice president to resign when he did so in 1973?

NERD POINT: Who succeeded him as vice president?

Got both parts of these correct.

8 Languages – What Indo-European language is the classical language of Hinduism? Miss.

Mystery Round Two – Visual

Missed #s 3 and 4. Number four really threw me because the elephant wearing green in the picture really looks like Babar! Was this just an homage?

Scores heading into the final:

drinks4work, 21; we’re gonna need a bigger boat, 36; Duckado, 37; DCFC, 39; Pods and Milan Metalloid Maniac, 43; Solo, 44; Thirsty Mornings and TTPD, 46.

Final Question Category: Mergers

Name two of the four current NBA franchises that joined as a result of the 1976 ABA/NBA merger.

I thought this category was a bit misleading. I certainly didn’t think of sports, but of company mergers. Had it been labeled as “NBA History” or something like that – and we had the right player in this mix (in our case, that player would have been Brad). Was he playing with us at this game? Of course not! That would make things too easy for us!

Game one standings disappeared from my phone before I could capture them with a screen shot, but Solo finished second with 59, and Thirsty Mornings finished first with 61.

Game Two/Round Three

9 Logos – What popular online bulletin board site has a logo that is an alien with red eyes and an antenna? This online bulletin board virtually helped break the story about the recent deaths at Isle Royale National Park. I can’t even imagine the number of hits the site received  during this time!

Social media has definitely helped play a big role in criminal investigations and news reporting for sure!

10 Founders – Dave Thomas founded what restaurant chain and appeared in more than 800 commercials for it before his death in 2022?

NERD POINT: The first of these restaurant chains was opened in what Midwestern state?

11 Grammys – Audio clue of woman who was the daughter of another famous singer who won the Best New Artist Grammy Award in 1976. Her single was “This Will Be (An Everlasting Love).” Miss.

12 MLB Homelands – What country was the birthplace of the MLB player with the most career home runs among those born outside of the United States? Yay for our combined general knowledge of baseball – and remembering things other players on our team have said during games!

Mystery Round – Emmy Anagrams

M1 Airfare Creamer, 2007

M2 A Heart Rub, 1977, 1988

M3 Literal Yikes, 1991

M4 Snub Ann or Quit

Kim managed to think of the right answer for #4, otherwise, all misses. We just…don’t…know…Emmy stuff! This game though! Asking about BOTH Emmy and Grammy winners (that will be game two) – and chemical elements (that’s also game two)!  Wow, we don’t play Sporcle Events games as much as we used to, and wouldn’t it be just our crappy luck to pick a night with a question set like this! OK, OK, I’ll stop whining now!

Round Four

13 Comic Books – What card-throwing member of the X-Men was born Remy LaBeau?

14 Elements – What are the two elements that are liquid at room temperature under standard  pressure?

15 Novels – What 1922 novel by Hermann Hesse shares its title with the first name of the religious teacher most commonly referred to as  the Buddha? FB host clue.

16 Games – What 1860 Milton Bradley board game was redesigned in 1960 with colorful cars, pegs for family members and a spinning wheel?  Now I’m curious about what the 1860 game was like! Were there little bitty covered wagons? Tiny outhouses? Even tinier bottles of morphine? Sick beds for victims of smallpox, cholery and every other disease afflicting people from this time period? Little horses and stables? 🤔    

Mystery Round Four – Renamed Cities

Give the current names of cities based on their previous names.

M1 Constantinople

M2 Saigon

M3 Lutetia

M4 Yerba Buena

Missed #3 and #4. The mystery rounds in this game were NOT kind to us! Judging from the low overall scores, they were probably not kind to the other teams, either…  

Scores heading into the final:

Philip K. Wigglebottom III, Esq., 29; Thirsty Mornings, 38; we’re gonna need a bigger boat, 39; TTPD, 40; Pods/Milan Metalloid Maniac; and Solo/ Quizteama Aguilera, 41.

What South American country is the only UN-recognized nation whose flag features a unique image on both sides: the national coat of arms on the front (obverse) and a golden lion with a red cap on the back (reverse)?

Got this (Kim came up with the correct guess pretty quickly here) but so did the teams ahead of us…so we finished third. Quizteama Aquilera and Solo had to battle a tiebreaker for first, which asked the current population of Paraguay.

This concludes our trivial pursuits for the week. As always, Go Pods, and stay classy, Spiro Agnew!

Answers:

r1

charlie chaplin, exxon, new orleans, po

r2

rio, seabiscuit, agnew/ford; sanskrit

m1

selena gomez, matchbox twenty, tag team, the police

m2

jungle book, george of the jungle, zootopia, sing

f: nets, nuggets, pacers, spurs

g2/

r3

reddit, wendy’s/ohio, natalie cole, dominican republic

r4

gambit, mercury/bromine, siddhartha, game of life

m3

america ferrara, bea arthur, kirstie alley, quinta brunson

m4

istanbul, ho chi minh city, paris, san francisco

f: paraguay