In the Question Master's Chair again? Ho hum.

Yes, I am aware I haven’t posted in the last few days. TBH, I don’t really have a great deal to say. If I don’t talk about the quiz in the club, then I’m not really talking about quizzing. Come back UC and Mastermind – all would be forgiven if there was anything which needed forgiving.

OK, so the quiz at the club it is, then. As it worked out Dai Norwich had asked me if I would do the quiz, and so it was my turn. I don’t volunteer to do the quiz anymore. The fact is, as I shall shortly explain, I’m ambivalent as to whether I take a turn as question master or not. Which never used to be the case. The first time that I ever played in the quiz was in 1995, and that evening Brian, the organiser, announced that there was no one to do the quiz for the next week. I immediately volunteered. I’d never composed a quiz before, but I’d been playing in quizzes – pub quizzes and quiz league quizzes - for about 8 years by that time so I wasn’t a total novice. I thoroughly enjoyed putting the quiz together, and I thoroughly enjoyed being QM on the Thursday. From then on Brian and I were the two ever-present QMs, regularly taking our turns and filling in when nobody else was available, and I’d say I kept it up for over 20 years, right until about 2018/19.

I used to put a lot of effort into it as well. I didn’t have the benefit of access to the web for my first few years of quizmastery either. I gathered a library of useful quiz reference works, and I’d always use between half a dozen and a dozen different sources of questions. First I’d gather the questions. Then I’d write them as individual questions. Then I’d write them out again as I put them into rounds. Then I’d roadtest the questions at work and re-write any that needed work on them. It wasn’t even hard work either. It was a labour of love, with the emphasis on love rather than labour. It wasn’t as if all I was getting out of it was the rush on the Thursday night, either. I am convinced that I made a great leap forward as a quizzer in the late 90s, and this was my first five years as a quiz master. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

What has all this got to do with Thursday night? Well, I’m ashamed to admit it, but I just couldn’t really be bothered to make a brand new quiz. So I downloaded a quiz I wrote about 5 or 6 years ago. I changed the news questions for current news questions, and bingo. The job was done. I’m not proud of it, but on the other hand I don’t feel extremely guilty about it either. At the end of the day it worked, people seemed to enjoy it, and nobody came to me afterwards and said words to the effect of “Villain! Thou art undone! Thou hast used this quiz and this handout before, yea verily.” I’d like to think I would have held my hands up and admitted it was a fair cop guv if they had.

Well, thankfully both Dan and Jess will be question mastering again before I do. I think – I hope – they’re at the stage of really enjoying the process of putting their quizzes together. Long my that continue for them.