Pizza? Are you effing kidding me?!

You may remember a rather intemperate post I made some time ago about the league in the Gwyn Hall monthly film quiz. Basically we built up our expectations through the year, religiously checking how each result might affect the overall table. Then, come the December quiz and the grand finale of the league, we were fobbed off with the news that no announcement about the league would be made on the night, but it would be put on Facebook before the next quiz in January. It wasn’t. Still, we turned up to January’s quiz, maybe not full of expectation, only to be told that the grand prize for each of the winning team was going to be a T shirt.

Yes, I was underwhelmed. The stupid thing was, if they had announced that there would be no prize for the league when it started, then I wouldn’t have been disappointed. T-shirt? Meh. Then I was told earlier in the week that we are not in fact going to be given T Shirts. No. Instead the grand prize for winning the league will be . . . a pizza.

My reaction when I heard this was more – are you effing kidding me? – than – oh, well, that makes the League all worthwhile, then.

So, last night was the February quiz. Now, on 19^th February I returned to work after half term which had been preceded by three weeks off with stress, anxiety and depression, which, incidentally, is also the name of the legal firm I used when I took out my mortgage. On my first day back I was told to pi** off, to f**k off and shoved out of the way by a pupil trying to invade my classroom. Those are just the most serious incidents. So I’ve been coming home knackered. That’s not the problem. I’ve been going into work knackered as well, dreading what some of these kids might put me through.

So come last night I just could not shake myself to attend. Just couldn’t. This despite the fact that it was about one of my better categories – Sci fi. I’ll find out how the guys got on when I see them tonight. It was just as well I didn’t go, because the way I was feeling I might have told the organisers to shove their pizza right where the sun don’t shine.

University Challenge 2024 - Quarter final qualification match: Trinity, Cambridge v. UCL

The Teams

Trinity. Cambridge

Sarah Henderson

Agnijo Banerjee

Ryan Joonsuk Kang (Capt)

Jeremi Jaksina

UCL

James Hall

Ali Izzatdust

Tayana Sawh (Capt.)

Jacob Finlay

How are we, then? So, last night we saw another quarter final qualification match, this time between Trinity and UCL who both won their first quarter final matches.

Normally I never get any questi9ons about Greek letters in Science and Maths, but after a number of given uses for it were given, I knew that the letter Mu is used for the SI prefix micro. Dunno how I knew it, but it was good enough for me and I set off on my ap of honour. James Hall came in too early with lambda and lost five which left the Trinity skipper to snap up that unconsidered trifle. The government’s tentative list of proposed new UK UNESCO World Heritage Sites brought two out of three bonuses. A very quick buzz from Jeremi Jaksina identified assassinated poet and playwright Lorca. Films whose titles contain the full name of a character brought the disarming comment from Mr. Kang – pffft – we’re not going to get this right – but we did both get Casper Hauser, the last one right. None of us knew the Growing Block Theory about time for the next starter, but Trinity lost five for an early incorrect buzz. Nucleophilic substitution sounds completely disgusting, but it was the answer to the chemistry starter that followed and Ryan Joonsuk Kang, playing a captain’s innings, supplied it. One bonus on genetics followed. So to the picture round, showing a relief map of China with an arrow pointing to a city’s location. I took a bit of a punt with Nanjing, and was right to do so. That man Kang had it. Three other treaty ports from the Treaty of Nanking brought a single bonus. As we approached the ten minute mark, Trinity led by 60 to -5 and UCL could give thanks that Trinity weren’t quite firing on all cylinders with the bonuses yet.

Amol encouraged UCL, reminding them that they had plenty of time to get going.Well, no. They had plenty of time to come back, but they needed to get going very, very soon in order to do so. Jeremi Jaksina came in too early for the next starter and lost 5, but none of us knew mise en abyme so that shot at an open goal went wide of the posts. Jeremi Jaksina knew about the Unification Day of Bulgaria for the next starter. Works in the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum’s Gallery of Honour brought one correct answer. Ali Izzatdust did the right thing by buzzing early for the next starter, but sadly could not quite summon the correct answer. Given the whole question Agnijo Banerjee buzzed in with the correct answer of Sir Francis Bacon. A full house on anarchists took them to 95 points, 105 ahead of UCL. Finally Ali Izzatdust found his buzzer range to come in early with the British social anthropologist Evans-Pritchard. Who was also a character in Under Milk Wood, surely? Two bonuses on garden biodiversity narrowed the gap further. This brought us to the music starter. Jacob Finlay recognised the vocal talents of Kendrick Lamar. The bonuses were three jazz artists who played on one of his albums. None of us had any of them. Well, at least UCL were moving now as James Hall buzzed in on the next starter to identify the Uralic Mountain range. We both took a full house on Boccaccio’s Il Filostrato. Right – a question beginning Sir Stamford Rffles founded which – is fraught with danger. Ali Izzatdust zigged with Singapore. Nope. Which meant it had to be London Zoo. Ah, but the question asked for the organisation with the initials ZSL. Sarah Henderson tried London Zoo, but it was the Zoological Society of London that was required. A bit of a let off for UCL. Ali Izzatdust buzzed in on the Superbike world championship with Marquez, to earn bonuses on Chinese mythology. 2 correct answers followed. James Hall came in too early without an answer to the next starter. Given the whole question Jeremi Jaksina recognised a description of surrealism. Or do I mean a fish? A full house on Japanese culinary terms undermined a lot of the good work that UCL had been doing. However James Hall took the next starter with osprey. Holidays and celtic festivals brought two correct answers. So just after the 20 minute mark Trinity still held a useful lead of 120 to 75. But UCL were starting to come back. . .

James Hall knew that Wordsworth wrote the Prelude. Some stuff about saccharides meant nowt to me, but kept the UCL bandwagon rolling. So to the picture starter. Now, if it’s a Shakespeare play with a young woman with bandaged hands and blood all round her mush, a pound to a penny it will be Titus Andronicus, the play that proves that even a genius could write a turkey. James Hall took that one. Photos of productions of Shakespeare’s Roman plays brought a timely full house, and voila! The scores were tied. However it was UCL who had the momentum. Mind you they weren’t anything like home and dry. Asked about the post held by Eamonn de Valera and others, Jacob Finlay offered the Taoiseach. Close but no cigar. It allowed Jeremi Jaksina in with the President of the Republic of Ireland – not the Taoiseach. Trinity only managed the one on Japanese and British Monarchs whose reigns coincided. Jacob Finlay made up for losing five on the previous starter by taking the next with the film Triangle of Sadness. I thought that was a 1980s BBC soap opera but there you go. Two bonuses on Mountain ranges levelled the scores again. Another good buzz from Jacob Finlay took the next starter on iron. Any old iron? Gawd knows. Christopher Wheeldon provided just the one bonus, but the collective UCL nose was in front now for the first time in the match. Ali Izzatdust almost jumped out of his seat buzzing for the next starter, but it fell to James Hall, who knew the islands of Estonia (which country’s capital is close to the top of my bucket list now). Place names in Roman Britain brought just one bonus, but crucially it gave UCL a 30 point lead which meant that Trinity would need at least two visits to the table. Well, Agnijo Banerjee won them one with the term genus.They took the first two bonuses on ancient civilisations, but the contest was gonged before the third. UCL won by 165 – 150.

Amol hit the nail on the head when he called this a great contest. I don’t know what the biggest comeback in UC history was, but this has to be one of the best. For the record, Trinity had a BCR of 54%, while UCL’s was 60%. I certainly won’t be betting against Trinity taking their own place in the semis in their next match.

Amol Watch

Fair play to Amol, he took mateyness to new heights in this show. Dear old Bamber , if I recall correctly, was always on second name terms with the team members. JP was often not even on that, but certainly never first name terms. When Ali Izzatdust buzzed too early on the Bacon question, Amol went on to commiserate, “Bad luck, I’m sure you knew the answer, Ali.” Well, this is the 21^st century after all. Will we eventually see nicknames being used to address the students? I look forward to Roger Tilling announcing “Keble – Jimbo “ in the future.

Interesting Fact That I Didn’t Already Know Of The Week

This was one of those rare occasions when none of the many things I didn’t already know particularly grabbed me.

Baby Elephant Walk Moment

First a disaccharide consisting of two glucose molecules connected by an alpha linkage. It is a product of starch breakdown by amylases.

By normal standards that’s short, but it’s still pretty deadly. Dum de dumdum dum dum dum dum dumdum.

Mastermind 2024: Semi Final 2

The Tale of the Tape

Stephen Dodding	12	0	17	0	29	0	-
Rob Jones	12	0	12	0	24	0	-
George Twigg	13	0	10	0	23	0	-
Sharon Reading	7	0	12	0	19	0	-

Hello, and welcome. Last night saw the second of our Mastermind 2024 semi finals. All of our contenders managed double figure GK scores in the heats, and 3 of them managed at least a dozen in their specialists, so the result was not by any means a foregone conclusion.

First to the chair was Rob Jones. Rob was sixth on my unofficial table of contenders based on the first round. Last night he was answering on the Cheltenham Gold Cup from 1960 until the present day. I never did a preview of this show for one reason and another, but if I had I would have said this was a subject where I might scrape 1 or 2. As it was I scored 1 on Norton’s Coin’s starting price. I actually met the horse once – Sirrel Griffiths, his trainer was based in Nantgaredig, and knew Mary’s 4^th stepfather (I think my mother in law has a thing about wedding cake). Rob did well and took his score into double figures which gave him at least a chance in the GK round.

Sharon Reading was, according to my unofficial trainer, the outsider in the field. She scored 7 points on specialist in her first round heat. That’s respectable, but the semi final can be a whole different ball game. So although she managed a respectable 7 again, this time on the films of Sir Ridley Scott, she must have known in her heart of hearts that she was out of the running to all intents and purposes as she returned to her chair.

Stephen Dodding, well, Stephen was the top of my unofficial table of first round performances. In the heats he had scored an excellent 12 on specialist and if he could get there or thereabouts he’d be in with an excellent shout in the GK, having scored 17 in the heats. He didn’t quite manage 12 but he scored an excellent 11 on the band Genesis from 1967 – 1977. I’d scored two on the films of Ridley Scott, and I added another three on this to take the aggregate to 6.

Which only left George Twigg, who was answering on the Prose Edda. George was 8^th on my unofficial first round table, where he’d scored a brilliant 13 on Specialist. Well, he didn’t quite match that, but he did the next best thing and scored 12 to take the lead. I’m not even sure if I would have made this my banker subject had I made a prediction. The fact if though that I studied Old Icelandic as part of my English degree, and I’ve always loved the work of Snorri Sturluson in general, and the Prose Edda in particular. So to cut a long story short I answered 9 of these, which I believe is my highest specialist score of the series, to give me a whopping 15 as aggregate.

So essentially there three runners left who were contending the win. Before any of them got the chance for a run at the tape, though, Sharon returned to the chair. I’m glad she gave it a good old lash, too. She scored 10, another double figure GK score, and could walk away knowing that she is a Mastermind semi finalist, and managed a respectable 17 .

Rob Jones was next to return to the chair. Rob must have known that he had to go hell for leather, set the highest score that he could and hope to hang on to the top slot until the end of the show. He did a pretty good job, too. He added 11 to his score, and importantly he did not incur any passes either, and this set the target at 21 and no passes.

Stephen had provided the finest GK round of the whole of the first round heats and I wouldn’t have been surprised to see him repeat this in his GK round last night. Right, you may have had this experience yourselves at some time. Occasionally, while you’re watching the show, you’ll see what you might think of as a rogue round. A round where two or three stinkers appear at intervals and stop you in your tracks. This is all in the eye of the beholder, but let me just put it this way. If I had been sitting in Stephen’s chair I wouldn’t have wanted to face this GK round. As I said, it's all relative. Any you don’t know are hard and any you do know are easy. Stephen’s chances dwindled as the round progressed and he finished with 9 for 20.

Which meant it was a two horse race between George Twigg and Rob. George needed 9 and no passes to tie with Rob. He got them. Then he added another 4 correct answers to completely seal the deal. It was the best GK round of the night and gave him a clear win with 25 and no passes. It really was a good round, and he deserved his place in the final. In his piece to camera he said that he thought he was capable of better then the GK round in his heat. He certainly proved that! Well done, sir, and the very best of luck in the Grand Final.

The Details

Rob Jones	The Cheltenham Gold Cup 1960 - Present	10	0	11	0	21	0
Sharon Reading	Films of Sir Ridley Scott	7	0	10	0	17	0
Stephen Dodding	Genesis 1967 - 1977	11	0	9	1	20	1
George Twigg	The Prose Edda	12	-	13	0	25	0

University Challenge 2024 Quarter Final Elimination Match : Sheffield v. Birkbeck, London

The Teams

Birkbeck, London

Danny McMillan

Olivia Mariner

Samir Chadha (Capt.)

Margherita Huntley

Sheffield

Safiyyah Rujack

Joseph McGough

Cameron Colclough (Capt.)

Matthew Nail

Only last week we saw Imperial beat Manchester to take the first rightful place in the semis. This week the two teams they had both defeated in their first quarter final match duelled it out to see which would remain in the competition for at least one more match.

Poor Matthew Nail fell into the trap on the first question, knowing Michael Jackson’s Bad, but not waiting for the whole of the question. It was worth waiting for too since it combined il buono, il brutto e it cattivo – or the Good, the Bad and Eli Wallach in old money. Danny McMillan opened the Birkbeck account with that one. They took a full house with the names of Japanese dishes. Samir Chadha ed the charge on the next starter identifying that the things alluded to in the question all begin with Neo. I’d like to think that ‘fromthematrix’ was one of them. They took two out of a set on domes. The next was that articular type of UC starter where you have to hold your nerve, wait for it, wait for it, then as soon as it becomes blindingly obvious reach for your shooting irons. Matthew Nail was first in to identify the Island of Zanzibar after Tanganyika was mentioned. A full house on medicine saw me grab a sneaky lap of honour for knowing Endocrine glands.Shelagh Delaney and John Osbourne saw me shouting “Kitchen Sink Drama!” at the telly. Margherita Huntley didn’t shout, but gave the same answer. UNESCO world heritage sites in southeast asia brought just one answer. So to the picture round, and the titles of a writer’s work in the language in which they were originally published. La Peste said Camus to me, which was just as well since that was the answer, as Danny McMillan could confirm. Tow bonuses on more titles of works in the language in which they were published were taken. Eros and Eris, the celestial objects required for the next starter, were provided by Joseph McGough. The Parliament Act of 1911 only provided Sheffield with 1 bonus, which meant that Birkbeck led by 80 – 30 atfer the ten-minute mark.

Matthew Nail pulled ten points back through knowing the Copernican thingummybob. Composers of video game music provided a welcome full house and took a sizeable chunk from the lead. Safiyyah Rujak took another 10 points back, knowing William B. Hays, the first president of Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America. Bonuses on African countries brought two correct answers and Sheffield now had their collective nose in front. Nobody recognised a Shostakovitch string quartet for the music starter. A somewhat long-winded starter gave Joseph McGough another starter with Samoa. This earned Sheffield the music bonuses. It didn’t do them much good as none of us knew the composers of three post 1960 string quartets. My default answer for a Japanese film is The Seven Samurai and this paid off for me and for Danny McMillan with the next starter. Writers of the Harlem Renaissance brought the two bonuses that Birkbeck needed to take a five point lead. Margherita Huntley knew the Somerset Levels for the next starter. Terms in cell biology promised some baby elephant walk business, but none of them were quite long or convoluted enough. For the next starter, if you’re asked for a French Monarch you’ll be right often enough if you hit and hope and say Louis XIV. It was right this time. It added to Danny McMillan’s personal tally and brought up bonuses on Eastern towns and cities of the UK with teams in the Speedway Great Britain Premiership. Two correct answers meant that Birkbeck were pulling away just approaching the 20-minute mark.

Danny McMillan kept up his form on the buzzer knowing various definitions that all pointed the way towards norm. Fela Kuti provided two correct answers, and the Birkbeck lead of 65 points was starting to look decisive. For the second picture starter we were shown a rather startling photo of a keta salmon. Nobody knew it. The next starter was rather obviously looking for Maryland, but the buzzer race didn’t start for surprisingly long, when it was won by Cameron Colclough. The bonuses involved a game of name that fish.Good answers brought two bonuses. Various definitions of the word ‘sink’ fell to Safiyyah Rujak. Works from 1905 yielded little, and the clock was running down all the time. Especially considering that Samid Chadha came in early and took the next starter on Aaron Swartz. Two correct answers on  the mythological figures upon whom characters in American Gods were based. Again, the next starter saw nifty buzzer work from Danny McMillan who knew a reference to Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit when he heard one. Joost Van Den Vondel provided the kind of bonuses where you didn’t have to know about him, because a little general knowledge could bring you a full house as it did for Birkbeck. Joseph McGough knew that any book with Mycologia in the title is probably about fungi. They managed to correctly answer 2 bonuses, but it was looking as if this was going to be too little at this stage of the game. None of us knew Watch Night. Safiyyah Rujak knew polyester for the next to earn bonuses on  the periodic table. We both only managed the one on magnesium. And essentially, that was that. The gong sounded halfway through the next starter which was surely asking for cherries.

So farewell, then, Sheffield. No shame in going out in the quarter finals. They had a useful BCR of 56%. As for Birkbeck, well they’ll have another chance to qualify next time out, although I do think that if they have to face Manchester they may have their work cut out for them. If they can repeat this week’s BCR of 79% it really won’t do their chances any harm.

Amol Watch

“Your say somebody German is no tactic at all!” joshed Amol as Birkbeck considered possibilities for the first picture bonuses. Well, actually, it kind of is. If you know the works were first published in German, then saying someone German is clearly a better tactic than saying someone who isn’t German, I would have thought.

Interesting Fact that I Didn’t Already Know of the Week

The word endorphin is partly derived from Morpheus, the Greek God of Dreams.

Baby Elephant Walk Moment

Which family of polymers are formed by the reaction of a dicarboxylic acid with a diol producing water as a by-product? They are widely used in synthetic rubbers, plastic bottles and clothing.

By no means the worst we’ve heard all series, but this was a dum dum -lite contest. Dum de dumdum dum dum dum dum dumdum.

Mastermind 2024 Semi Final 1

The Tale Of The Tape

Jane Hill	11	0	14	0	25	0	-
Sarah Thornton	12	0	11	1	23	1	-
Rashid Mumtaz	11	0	11	0	22	0	-
Richard Brooks	7	0	13	0	20	0	3

 

Yes, it’s semi-final time again, peeps. If we look at the table above we can see that Jane Hill put on the best performance in her first round heat with an excellent 14 on GK being especially worthy of note. All of last night’s contenders had scored at least 11 on GK first time out, so no duffers there. Worth noting was Richard Brooks’ 13 on GK – he’d come back after scoring 7 on Specialist. If he could improve on this, then he’d be in the reckoning.

First up was Rashid Mumtaz. A few weeks ago we saw him looking very dapper while giving us an excellent round on the Godfather trilogy of films. Last night he was answering on my banker subject, Charlie Chaplin. He didn’t do badly, either, with 6 points to my five. Not badly, but one sensed not well enough to give him a realistic shot at the win. For the record I had 4, but just couldn’t dredge up any more.

Richard Brooks had been marked down as one of the drak horses to watch after I saw him come back from 4^th to win last week’s last heat in a dramatic tie-break. Then he was answering on Winnie the Pooh and AA Milne, and he scored 7. This time he was answering on Sydney Harbour Bridge and did so really well. 11 points and no passes! I added two to my aggregate and I couldn’t realistically have scored any higher because I didn’t know any of the other answers.

Sarah Thornton scored an excellent 12 in her heat on Specialist. Then she was answering on the Chcolat Novels of Joanne Harris. Now she was answering on the TV Drama Series Happy Valley – and she scored 12 again. It’s a huge skill being able to maintain your performance in a second (and sometimes a third) specialist subject. No, I’ve never watched it and so I added nothing to my aggregate.

Billie Jean King has always struck me as an admirable human being and so she was a worthy choice for Jane Hill’s semi final subject. Jane was 5^th on our unofficial first round table with an especially noteworthy 14 on GK. Well, that round was a little way off yet. Instead Jane powered through to 11 on BJK. This put her just one point behind Sarah alongside Richard on 11.

With the best will in the world, It looked unlikely that Rachid could put in a good enough GK round to set the kind of high score needed to force the other three to traverse the corridor of doubt. In the heats he scored a good 11 and he came close to this again, finishing with 10 to set the target at 16.

Next into the chair was Richard Brooks. I hope I have made clear how good I felt his GK round was last time out. Well, he almost matched his score of 13 this time too, finishing just short on 12 for 23. As he walked back from the chair he must have had the satisfaction of knowing that an okay round would not be enough to beat him. The bank would only be paying out for 12s and over.

And 12, to be fair, is exactly what Jane Hill gave us. But oh, there was a pass in there. It looked from her face as Clive gave the score that she realised what this meant. On pass countback, Richard was the leader on the road, with only Sarah Thornton to go.

If she was feeling the pressure, Sarah didn’t show it. She had scored 11 in her heat on GK. If she could repeat this with no passes then we’d have a tiebreak. Well, she didn’t repeat it. She exceeded it, and exceeded it well with an excellent 14. This gave her a winning total of 26, through the highest score of the specialist round, and the highest score on the GK.Very well done, and I wish you the best of luck in the grand final.

The Details

Rashid Mumtaz	Charlie Chaplin	6	1	10	2	16	3
Richard Brooks	Sydney Harbour Bridge	11	0	12	0	23	0
Sarah Thornton	Happy Valley	12	0	14	1	26	1
Jane Hill	Billie Jean King	11	0	12	1	23	1