A couple of us ‘Pods joined forces with a couple (Kim and Brent) from the league team Sparty On on a recent Saturday evening for a bout of Sporcle Events trivia at Oscars Sports and Grill in Saline.

My only goal for the evening was to use up a prize we’d won there the week before! Honestly, those of you out there who might think we have some kind of grand trivia strategy? Nope, sometimes it’s best to not overthink the things that we do in our trivial pursuits 🤔

Speaking of thinking, we probably should have put just a little more thought into some of our answers before we submitted them!

We got both final questions correct, finished fourth in game one, finished second with a $10 prize in game two.

We had a good time at the game overall, though we did have the bad luck of having a server who apparently forgot all about us for over an hour! My husband had to go to the bar to order more drinks for us. Eventually our server did come around to help us after a manager intervened, but she was NOT in a good mood. Slamming drinks on a table for customers is never a good look 🙂‍↔️

For the record, the bar did not appear to be understaffed. But we don’t know if everyone showed up for their shifts.

We get it. It can get hectic in the food service business. People quit on the fly, people don’t show up for their shifts when they are supposed to, and maybe some people just don’t care about doing their jobs well.

We try to be very understanding about all of these things, but when you want another drink and someone isn’t coming around to let you order one after more than an hour, then you have to start asking questions!

Honestly, we’d rather answer questions when we go out for trivia, not ask where our server has wandered off to!

We don’t like doing these kinds of things or making people get chewed out by bosses, nope – not at all!

We were all behaving in a civil and polite manner. We were in no way, shape, or form –  rude to our server, or did any of us do anything that would warrant being snubbed for service like that.

Let’s move on, shall we? How about some game questions?

Game One/Round One

1 MLB Teams – Name one of the two current National League franchises – one beginning play in 1993 – that have been to the World Series exactly one time and lost.

NERD POINT: Name both franchises.

We got one, but not  both.

2 Actresses – Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides is the highest-grossing film starring what Spanish actress who has won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role on Vicky Cristina Barcelona? Directed by someone in “those” files 🤢🤮

3 Gaming – What five-letter slang term for money is found in the title of the highly ranked board game subtitled Birmingham? In modern times, it is more frequently used for a copper and zinc alloy. Mike for the points here.

4 Studies – What C word from the Greek for “the universe” and “study of” refers to the scientic study of the origin, evolution and eventual fate of the universe?

Mystery Round One – Pop Startup

Match the performer to the TV show they starree on before embarking on a successful music career. Options: Sabrina Carpenter, Sele Selena Gomez, Olivia Rodrigo, Ariana Grande.

TV Shows: Girl Meets World, Victorious, Bizaardvark, Wizards of Waverly Place

We missed #s 1 and 3.

Round Two

5 Countries – The smallest sovereign nation in the Western Hemisphere is what island country in the Caribbean, made up of two main islands that are separated by a narrow channel called “The Narrows?” Miss.

6 Politicians – Before holding office in the federal government, what politician served as district attorney of San Francisco from 2004-2011 and attorney general of California from 2011-2017?

7 Bands – This was an audio question, so here I go giving y’all a words question instead: Which band had a top ten hit with the song “Who’s Crying Now” in the early 1980s?

8 Books – What Pulitzer Prize winning 2006 novel by Cormac McCarthy follows a father and son who navigate a post-apocalyptic world that has experienced an unnamed extinction level event? Mike stepped up for the points here.

Mystery Round Two

Category: There’s a Monster in my Trivia

The correct answer to each clue includes the word “monster”

M1 Largest living lizard species native to North America north of the Mexican border

M2 Nickname of the left field wall at Fenway Park

M3 Fashion doll launched by Mattel in 2010

M4 2016 film starring Lucas Till, Jane Levy, Amy Ryan, and Rob Lowe

Scores heading into the game one final question:

Enter Team Name Here, 19; My Cure for Everything, 25; TNJ, 31; Mid-Life Crysis, 34; 5 Minute Therapist, 36; Big Brain Basil, 37; Team Birdman, 40; #TeamFun, 41; Silly Porch Geese, 42; Pods, 43; Last Place, 45; Joey Triviani, 46; Grizzle, 48.

Final Question Game One

Category: Animals

The genus Pan is made up of two living species, which are the closest living relatives to modern humans. One of those species is the comon chimpanzee, name the other.

Final Game Two Standings:

tnj, 6; Team Birdman, 25; #TeamFun, 26; Big Brain Basil, 30; Enter Name Here, 34; My Cure for Everuthing, 40; Mid-Life Crysis, 49; 5 Minute Therapist, 51; Silly Porch Geese, 57; Pods, 58; Last Place, 60; Joey Triviani, 61; Grizzle, 62.

Game Two/Round Three

9 Beer – What type of beer has a P name that is also a term for a monk who is appointed to interact with the public? Now I’m thinking of the Jampot business in Eagle Harbor, MI (that’s way up in the UP for any of you not already in the know) . They sell really, really good cookies that will make you want to immediately drive your car into Lake Superior because there really is nothing better you’ll ever eat (besides maybe my mom’s homemade cookies, but it’s a close race for sure). Since the place is run by monks, I wonder if they have a designated people person monk that has to give the tours, work the cookie/jam selling counter and other things that the other monks too busy making cookies and jams don’t have to do? 🤔

If you ever do make it up here, the thimbleberry jam is a must buy! But if you’d rather do online ordering, you may be able to get it that way, too!

Now that my little plug for the seasonally open Jampot and UP tourism spiel is done, how about the next question?

Maybe all of that was just a distraction from me having to say that we missed this q, we picked the wrong “p” word (we did think about the right one).

10 License Plates – What U.S. state has featured as image of its trademarked Bucking Horse and Rider on license plates since 1936?

11 Architects – What Canadian-born architect, whose notable designs include the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, passed away in December, 2025 at the age of 96?

NERD POINT: This architech also designed a Guggenheim museum in what Spanish city?

I knew the nerd point because of the movie Hamlet 2. Really! 🥺 😂

12 Book to Movie – The 2025 film Frankenstein and the 2023 film Oppenheimer are based on books with full titles that reference what Greek mythological figure?

Mystery Round Three – Super Bowl Performers

Name the artist who has headlined (or co-headlined) a Super Bowl halftime show based on some of the songs they performed during the show.

M1 All For You, Rhythm Nation

M2 Love on Top, Baby Boy

M3 Get Right, On The Floor, Ain’t it Funny (remix)

M4 Won’t Get Fooled Again, Pinball Wizard

Missed #2, shoulda put an American performer instead of someone from the Caribbean (JK, JK – we really don’t care about any of the Super Bowl performer divisiveness that’s going on now). But if ya want to bicker about who’s American and who’s not, at least know what the American territories are! Or ask your phone’s AI bot to tell you! 🤖 📱

Round Four

13 Commercials – What telecommunications company ran ads featuring the phrase “It’s Not Complicated” in 2012 featuring actor Beck Bennett in a deadpan role where he was leading a focus group of all children? This ad was apparently not memorable enough for the four of us, miss.

14 TV Channels – What cable channel, which was founded by Robert and Sheila Johnson in 1980 and is commonly known by its initials, originally debuted as a programming block on USA Network until becoming a full-fledged channel in 1983?

15 Biology – The nucleobases found in DNA are adenine, cytosine, guanine and what fourth base with a T name? Yay I paid attention to the right scenes in “Jurassic Park!” And a boring one not involving rampaging dinosaurs at that!

16 World Leaders – In December, 2024, martial law was declared in what Asian country by its president, who accused the opposition of anti-state activities and who was later impeached and removed from office? Miss.

Wait WHAT? Other countries actually impeach their leaders? What a concept 🤔 😲😳

Mystery Round Four – Visual

We missed #4. Funny I actually thought of the right guy for this one, but I didn’t speak up about it, so totally my fault. Me – who can name maybe five current NFL quarterbacks on a good day who are not Dan Marino or Joe Namath! I guess I’ll speak up more on sportsball questions on the one in a million chance I may actually be right 😂

Reminds me of a quarterbacks mystery round we had years ago when I said “BLANK (guy’s name for #4) is a quarterback, right?” while we were brainstorming, and my trammate Dave gave me the most incredulous jaw-dropping look you could possibly imagine (you had to be there). Yes the name I said turned out to be correct!

Always lay your cards on the table in trivia games I guess? 🤔

Special thanks to host Dave for giving us credit for #3 even though we used the incorrect first letter in the guy’s first name (spelled the last name correct). We’re still kicking ourselves for misspelling the first name of the Dustin actor from Stranger Things in a My Trivia Live game back in December and not getting the points (we did spell the last name completely correct, even though the last name would be a more likely misspelling candidate than the first name).

Diff’rent strokes for different trivia leagues?

Also special thanks to Brent, this mystery round was pretty much all of his heavy lifting! And he wasn’t even at the gym! 😂

Scores heading into the game one final:

Enter team name here, 14; Ships and Sailors, 27; tnj/ Team Birdman, 31; #TeamFun, 32; Mid-Life Crysis, 33; Big Brain Basil/ and Joey Triviani, 40; Pods, 41; 5 Minute Therapist, 42; Grizzle, 51; Last Place, 51.

Final Question Game Two 

Category: Band Names

What punk rock band that was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002 got its name from the last name of an alias that Paul McCartney used when checking into hotels?

Kim the music trivia mistress came up with the correct band name fairly quickly. Most teams did manage to get this correct, too.

Final Standings Game Two:

TNJ, 16; Team Birdman, 16; #TeamFun, 17; 5 Minute Therapist, 27; Big Brain Basil, 29; Ships and Sailors, 42; Mid-Life Crysis, 48; Grizzle, 51; Joey Triviani, 55; Pods (Us), 56; and in first place the ironically named Last Place, 66.

This wraps up our trivial pursuits for the week. Next week, we’ll do TWO games at the Corner Brewery! Yes, you read that correctly! Monday, we’ll play our usual music quiz game, then we’ll bring a team for the very competitive Wednesday night trivia scene. This is not a spot that we usually play on Wednesdays anymore, but this is a “special” occasion, so limited time engagment, yada yada.

As always, Go Pods, Sparty On, and stay classy, Russell Wilson!

Answers:

r1 brewers/rockies, penelope cruz, brass, cosmology

r2 st. kitts and nevis, kamala harris, journey, the road

m1 girl meets world/ carpenter, victorious, grande, bizaardvark, rodirgo, waverly place, gomez

m2 gila monster, green monster, monster high, monster trucks

g1 final – bonobo

g2/r3, wyoming, gehry, prometheus

r4 at&t, hbo, thymine, south korea

g2 final: the ramones