New Scaratings

Showdown Recap for 11 Oct 2016 at BWW Gibson in ABQ

The team was ready for another rough and tumble edition of Bust-Your-Brainbox, but then our moderator, CHILL, reminded us that it wasn’t important. The group just needed to worry about Showdown, said he. Well hell replied we, tonight’s Showdown isn’t included in the Sandbagger Tourney, so we can do some light lifting.

This was to prove fortunate, because we received an unexpected visit from FUZZY, a long-time team mate who moved away to Tyler, Texas over a year ago. She’s in town while on the way to El Paso to see her youngest son’s Change of Command ceremony at Fort Bliss. He’s an Army aviator tapped to take command of a helicopter squadron. All of that was very nice, but she is a bit of a chatty Cathy and disrupted some of the game play, throwing off our rhythm for Showdown.

Worn-up Round

1. The property which makes gold so easy to shape is called: MALLEABILITY.
2. Which of these would you most likely see at an Olympic diving competition? GAINER.
3. The 737 Max 200 is a product made at: BOEING.
4. What is a conspectus? OUTLINE OR SUMMARY. {Only about 1/3 got points.}
5. Founded in Chicago in 1905, the Wobblies are a ___ organization: LABOR.
6. Utah’s Cathedral Valley is a part of ___ National Park: CAPITOL REEF. {We got stabbed by the ZIONists.}
7. This shoe company is known for its international ‘One foe One’ concept: TOMS SHOES.
8. In the field of astronomy, what is Corona Borealis? CONSTELLATION. {We blew this one off by going Solar Flare.}
9. In the Pop Music world, George martin was known as the: FIFTH BEATLE.
10. This animal’s scientific name is Gulo Gulo: WOLVERINE. {This was a clean miss.}

That round was below expectations for the team. A guess-fest on WU4 was followed by gaffes on WUs 6, 8 and 10. Although we got 6 of 10 without problems, the missed answers provoked a lot of “WHAT?” reactions.

Ground-down Round

1. Which form of poetry usually consists of 14 lines? SONNET.
2. Mucilage, parchment, and silver skin are parts of a: COFFEE BEAN. {Chef KURGAN called it, but his response was met with incredulity, to our later dismay.}
3. Which of these would you most likely find on a cowboy’s spur: ROWEL.
4. It has an Atomic Number of 53 and was discovered by a French chemist in 1811: IODINE.
5. Ellen Douglas is known to literature lovers as: THE LADY OF THE LAKE. {Another guess-fest.}
6. If someone says they’re from ‘down East,’ they’re most likely from: MAINE.
7. Once a staple of military clothing, ___ are known for their large pockets: CARGO PANTS.
8. What is the definition of a pejoration? A LESSENING IN VALUE.
9. The Rock Ptarmigan is a bird belonging to the ___ family: GROUSE.
10. The most common forms of treacle are golden syrup and: MOLASSES.
11. J’Ouvert is a popular form of celebration in ___ cultures around the world: CARIBBEAN.
12. Which of these is a type of cigar? CHEROOT.

This round was also a bit challenging to the team. This time a team member kept calling out guesses without qualifying his confidence factor, and led many astray. The lost points fell on GDs 2, 5, 8 and 11. There was also some trepidation, but no lost points, on GDs 4, 7 and 10.

Scatology Round

S1. ADVANCED MATH v Dickens characters
In mathematics, what does a lower case ‘E’ represent? IRRATIONAL NUMBER.
{BLZBUB’s incredulity at this Q/A combination was enormous. The symbol ‘e’ specifically represents the BASE OF NATURAL LOGARITHMS. Yes it is an irrational number, but far from the only important irrational. The way this question was phrased implies that ‘e’ represents ALL irrational numbers. UNBELIEVABLE frak-up, BUZZIE.}

S2. Musical plays v FASHION DESIGNERS
This Belgian-born fashion designer was known for her colorful sportswear: LIZ CLAIBORNE. {The ‘colorful sportswear’ part of the question threw us off the correct answer.}

S3. WINE TASTING v Manitoba
Montepulciano, Sangiovese, and ___ are three Italian red wine grapes: BARBERA. {BLZBUB made this call after negating several calls for grapes that are traditionally considered French.}

S4. Fashion designers v ADVANCED MATH
In mathematics, a Klein Bottle is an example of: NON-ORIENTABLE SURFACE. {BLZBUB, once again, is proud to say he doesn’t need to mail his diploma in Math back to Nicholls State University on the grounds that it did not take.}

S5. MANITOBA v musical plays
What is the official motto of the Province of Manitoba? GLORIOUS AND FREE. {Another bobble costing half of the team points…people couldn’t restrain themselves from offering unwarranted guesses.}

S6. Dickens characters v WINE TASTING
Blanc de Blancs is a valued French: CHAMPAGNE. {JAX made this call, and also pointed out that Albuquerque’s Gruet Winery makes an award-winning Blanc de Blanc.}

This round was a difficult one from us due to unrestrained wild-assed-guesses from the peanut gallery. The only two queries with an unambiguous call were on S4 and S6. The call on S1 came while at least 90% of its points were still available to the team. There was a sloppy rolling 5-way split on S2. Then S3 saw delays while calling off bad answers. Finally S5 was a 2-way split, only fully resolved by the third clue.

Frightening Round

1. ‘Pure and simple’ is the title of the latest release from this veteran songstress: DOLLY PARTON. {Running the eliminations worked here.}
2. 2016 witnessed the first commercial flight from the U.S. to ___ since 1961: CUBA. {Greek chorus.}
3. ‘Peace, land and ___’ is a slogan made popular by Vladimir Lennon: BREAD. {We choked on this slice.}
4. Of these five countries, which has the largest population? ARGENTINA. {BLZBUB muffed this one by putting the team on Malaysia.}
5. ‘Nobody’s Fool’ and ‘Everybody’s Fool’ are books by: RICHARD RUSSO. {DUFF with a pre-call.}
6. An ergograph is an instrument that measures: WORK DONE BY A MUSCLE. {DUFF with an assist from BLZBUB.}
7. ‘Graffiti Bridge’ is a sequel to this musical film: PURPLE RAIN. {Collaborations paid off.}

This round would have been acceptable, if not for the loss of points on F3 and F4. At least the misses were not on the high-value Frighteners. Now we need to rally on the…

Py-Ram-It Round

P1. Located in the Valley of Mexico, Teotihuacan is a former city best known for its:
PYRAMIDS. {KURGAN was first to climb on this one. Heh heh, very meta to have ‘pyramid’ as an answer to a question from this round.}

P2. The Leyden Jar is regarded as the first: CAPACITOR. {BLZBUB, who has been shocked more than a few times while demonstrating this beastie in Physics classes, made the “unshocking” call.}

P3. In July 1821, Jose de San Martin was named the:
PROTECTOR OF PERU. {We played it safe with a 5-way split here.}

P4. Which large city lies just south of the Hawkesbury River?
SYDNEY. {Oy, Oy, Oy. KURGAN made the call for “either Liverpool, Sydney or Pretoria,” and then recalled the Mersey = Liverpool, eliminating this choice. A few players managed to get their shit together in time to go to Sydney.}

P5. This writer, born in 1835, had an older brother named Orion:
MARK TWAIN. {DUFF got this one for us.}

This week was another average round of Pyramid for us. Again we finished with three correct, one 2-way and one 5-way split. Only one box made it to 5 of 5 correct. Then five more registered 4 of 5 correct, followed by eight on 3 of 5 correct. Not good.

FINAL TRAGEDY
Topic: PAINTINGS

“The Persistence of Memory” is a famous ___ painting completed in 1931.

1. Surrealist
2. Fauvist
3. Baroque
4. Renaissance
5. Impressionist

The order of the eliminations was 4, 3, 2, and 5, leaving #1, SURREALIST, as the correct answer. Fortunately this question was an easy one for several members of the team. The answer was a pre-call. Also fortunate was the answer was called in time for every player on the team to get the full 50% wagered. All of the top six boxes entering Final from Pyramid held their position in the final rankings.

The top six individual scores were 57066, 46902, 46858, 45358, 44569, and 44319 points. The team composite score was 47,512, a disappointing but not necessarily bad score. The team finished just out of the Top Ten at TWELFTH Place.

Many of the top Sandbagger Tourney teams had poor relatively scores on this game. Tonight’s winner was CKs Tavern in Phoenix with 54,506 points. Other notable teams in the rankings included the Grand Slammers @ BWW-Arlington, VA at 53,877; Big Guys of Winnipeg at 50,843; 809 Sports (Henry Hudsons) of Oklahoma City; and Old Barn of Portland, OR at 48,036 points.

Congratulations to all those teams who realize that trivia is supposed to be played with only their wetware for obtaining answers.

_________________
}}}--( (x) (x) )--->
Oh my gawd, they killed
Ken Z.
You bastards!

The first Dickens character Q was a gimme:
Who was the hypocrite in David Copperfield?
A. Uriah Heep
The second Dickens character Q was much harder
Who was the idealistic mill worker in Hard Times? [I'm paraphrasing]
A. Stephen Blackpool