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Jessica was question master in the quiz I the rugby club on Thursday. In case you haven’t been with me for long, Jessica is my youngest daughter. She is part of my team in the quiz in the rugby club along with my son in law Dan, our friend Adam, his fiancée Fran, and new recruit, my mother-in-law Jen. Fran couldn’t play on Thursday, and Jen is back in Spain sorting out business. Okay – so, we’re the only team in the quiz where four members of the team set quizzes. And Thursday was Jess.

The little tinker blindsided us. I mean alright, I’m her Dad and that’s bad enough. But to do it to her own husband! She had told both of us that she couldn’t find enough connections so she wasn’t going to do any. Then she did this. We got to the last four questions of round one – they were

-        Whose last album ‘Blackstar’ was released posthumously in 2016, the year of his death?

-        Which electrical device was invented by John Logie Baird?

-        Who was the first footballer to be transferred for £1 million?

Then she said,

-        What is the connection between your last three answers?

Blindsided completely. Sometimes I can spot a connection as the questions are asked. This one I did not see coming and it hit me right between the eyes. Part of the problem was that we’d answered

-        David Bowie

-        Television

-        Trevor Francis

The key to it was answering TV to the second of them. When it finally occurred to me to try TV, then the lyric – ‘TV’s, deep freeze and David Bowie LPs’ gave me it. For some reason I didn’t recall Trevor Francis in the lyric, but of course it is – altogether now – “Trevor Francis tracksuits from a mush in Shepherd’s Bush”.

Nice connection, and to be fair Jess’ quiz seemed to go down really well on Thursday. I should bloody think so too. She’d gone out of her way to cater for the audience. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I turn fifty nine next week, and I’m still one of the young whippersnappers in the quiz. Even if they did shout at Jess at one point when she did a round of (largely) 70s and 80s catchphrases. Now, the traditional Welsh pronunciation of the surname Mainwaring is Main – Wearing, rather than Mannering. Jess has never watched Dad’s Army, so understandably when she gave the answers, she said that ‘You stupid boy’ was the catchphrase of Captain Main Wearing, several of them all shouted at once ‘MANNERING!” The irony of this is that in years gone by Aberavon RFC’s most famous supporter was called Mrs. Mainwaring (mother of Billy) pronounced Main Wearing.

Well, she didn’t let it put her off her stride, and I got the feeling that she was enjoying it as much as the teams were. I rather liked her handout – photographs of twenty five board games. We had 23. I couldn’t dredge up Articulate, and I’ve never actually played Sorry. (Sorry, Lawrence – and if you understand that reference you must be at least as old as me) I’ve never played the Game of Life either for that matter. Or Risk. I never knew I’d led such a sheltered life.