So Pub Quiz is pretty simple. The announcer asks ten trivia questions, and if your team answers the most questions correctly, you win a free round of beer. Generally, each round has a few easy questions, a few moderately difficult questions, and 2-3 challenging questions. Winning even one round is pretty good — the bar is packed with teams of four, so your odds are pretty bad to start with. To make matters worse, the perennial champion teams The Usual Suspects and Four Fat Indians usually win 2-3 rounds a piece, leaving the middling teams to fight over the scraps. Basically, it’s pretty hard work. TANSTAAFB and all that.
Anyway, last week we noticed a huge group of maybe 12-15 sitting next to us. A couple of them were wearing Google T-shirts, and a Google water bottle was sitting on the table. Hmmmm, we wondered… could they possibly be our good friends from Mountain View? Our suspicions were confirmed shortly thereafter when the announcer asked a question that went something like, “What is the technique by which bad guys steal your personal information by setting up fake websites?” The answer was “phishing”, but Team Google decided to be cheeky and call out, “Yahoo Mail!”
Outraged, we shouted out, “Gmail!” Team Google swiveled to look at us, blinking in surprise.
“Oooooooo,” said the rest of the bar.
Fortunately, our teammate Chris piped up with his soothing British accent, “People, people! Let’s just agree it’s AOL Mail and move on, shall we?” Crisis averted.[1]
And thus the evening progressed. Now, a better man than I would just leave it there. It’s unsportsmanlike to gloat.
But I haven’t signed any sort of “Do No Evil” agreement, so what the hell: at the end of the night, Team Yahoo! had won three rounds; Team Google, zero.
When we won the seventh and final round, we were clinking our glasses in triumph, and Team Google was busy getting their coats. We even heard the sweet sound of, “mumble Yahoo! mumble mumble…” At this point we had far too much free beer to drink (discounting Chris), and the gentlemanly thing to do would have been to give our largess to our worthy competitors to the northwest. So… we gave it to the nice young couple with the piercings sitting behind us. Yeah, that’s right. This is our house, baby! Well, okay, actually it’s the house of The Usual Suspects and Four Fat Indians, but Team Google doesn’t need to know that.
1. Look, they outnumbered us 3-1. Even at Eleanor’s best, she could never defeat so many.