In a break from tradition, here's a mini-quiz written by one of our regular quiz attendees (the programmer). Designed for the statistician and the doctor, questions (all of which are included below) alternate between those we were expected to know, and those we weren't. After each one the letters S and D in red or green indicate which of the statistician and doctor got the answer incorrect or correct.
The attendees
1) The statistician
2) The doctor
The ones that got away
1) Where in the body is the malleolus? S D
2) With 49 tries, who is the England rugby team's all-time highest try-scorer? S D
3) The highest-scoring opening move in Scrabble is MUZJIKS for how many points? S D
4) Before decimalisation, how many shillings made a half crown? S D
5) Who was the British monarch immediately before Victoria? S D
6) Which film starring Gene Hackman and Roy Schnieder as NYPD narcotics officers won the Best Picture Oscar in 1971? S D
7) What word is spelled Tungsten Indium Darmstadtium Uranium Rutherfordium Erbium? S D
7a) Bonus Question: Of the elements whose symbol does not begin with the same letter as their element name, which has the highest atomic number?
8) In Eastenders, who killed Archie Mitchell on Christmas Day 2009? S D
9) What does QED stand for? S D
10) Which county neighbours Cheshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, Worcestershire, Shropshire, and West Midlands? S D
The answers
The excuses
1) A neat fake-out of sorts, with the ear's malleus bone an easy distraction.
2) The doctor's rugby knowledge was sufficient to guess Jonny Wilkinson, while I knew enough to know that was definitely wrong, but nothing more.
3) Quite a few bits to remember on this one. First up are the letter values, with MUZJIKS converting to 3+1+10+8+1+5+1=29 points. Next up is knowing your Scrabble board enough to remember that there's a double letter score four squares either side of the centre star. You need to stick the Z on the one to the left to maximize your score, taking the raw tile values up to 39. The centre square is also a double word score, so this takes you up to 78. This was as far as I got, but after all that I forgot to add the 50 point bonus for using all your tiles. Oops.
4) Pre-decimalisation currency is classic quiz fare, and something I've tried to learn at various points, without much success (I generally get stuck beyond remembering 12 pence in a shilling and 20 shillings in a pound). The guinea is at least a slightly fun one: it was originally equal to a nice round pound but, being made of gold, its value fluctuated until eventually it was fixed at 21 shillings.
5) Another area I've made a point of learning. William IV is a particularly important one to remember for the somewhat classic quiz question of "Assuming he doesn't choose a new name, what will Prince William's regnal number be when he ascends the throne?"
6) The doctor somewhat confounds expectations here, for once getting a film question correct because he's actually seen it, rather than a poster of it on the Tube.
7) I'm not sure if the bonus question that this inspired is particularly fair for a 'general' quiz, but I think it's gettable if you're catering to a slightly scientifically-minded group.
8) We're planning on emigrating soon, and the thought of never being expected to know anything about Eastenders is certainly part of the appeal.
9) The doctor is furious with me for writing this one up.
10) Despite making a concerted attempt in recent weeks to learn some British geography lately, we are still terrible at it. The only thing I know about Staffordshire is that its largest city was formed from six separate towns, thanks to an episode of Songs of Praise filmed there. In the introduction, the presenter asked us if we could explain how he had visited six different towns in just one morning. The answer? "No, I'm not Superman, I'm in Stoke-on-Trent!".
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