A Trivial Pursuit
Some competitions leave audiences spellbound. The 1992 National League Championship series between the Pirates and Braves left Pittsburghers in tears in the bottom of Game Seven's ninth inning; The 1980 U.S. Hockey team made patriots out of every single American who drew breath that night.
But a good game of Trivial Pursuit? That stops time. A good Trivial Pursuit match separates the men from the boys, draws a line in the sand between experts and novices. And novices need not apply. Winning a Trivial Pursuit match can elevate you to a standard you've only dreamed possible; losing can destroy all hope. There's no second place, only one winner and a bunch of losers. Next time you play, look around the table. See those losers? Do you really want to be compared to them? This game is all about your Trivial reputation.
Right now, you think I'm nuts. No one takes the game this seriously, right? It is, after all, just that—a game. But the truth is that a large portion of humanity is dedicated to the proposition that all trivial intelligence is not created equal. And those who think they're all that and a bag of pie pieces will fight anyone who challenges them to a grudge match that would make even ear-biter Mike Tyson huddle alone in a corner, begging for mercy.
Last weekend, I participated in such a grudge match. Defying Gravity readers Bill and Tom (whose blogs I would link to if I could get the link function to work) decided to challenge the claim in my profile that I'm "phenomenal at Trivial Pursuit." When I reached Bill's house and saw the list of at least 20 editions of Trivial Pursuit in his possession, I thought I might have been out of my league. I also couldn't compete with the sports-type ego-boosting both engaged in about the vital roles they played on their high school Quiz Bowl teams. I was on Quiz Bowl, yeah, and I was good (MVP 1996). But even the question-asker noted that I excelled at questions about or related to Harrison Ford. And Harrison Ford can only take you so far in a good Trivial Pursuit match.
As luck would have it, my doubts were unfounded and I held my own against both boasting braggarts. They play by some contrived rules that deviate from the Trivial Norm, requiring the player with the filled pie to answer questions the whole way up the spoke toward the middle. Once arrived in the center (a feat that took me about 30 minutes), the player has to answer four of the six questions on the next card correctly to win the game. Insane, yes, but such were the house rules. FOUR times I answered three of six correctly. But that's just not enough. Nope. And Kerri Strubb wasn't close enough for the Olympic gymnast who sprained her ankle and still completed a perfect vault (Kerri Strugg). Almost four hours after the game began, I relinquished my lead to Tom, who knew all the answers to the questions I missed anyway. But I left Bill choking and sputtering in my dust, trying to pick himself up and brush away the web of yellow spaces he couldn't seem to escape from. And I did it without a single Harrison question.
I lost to Tom, yes, but I proved myself a worthy opponent. Susie isn’t stupid and she would have won had the regular rules applied. She can overcome obstacles like people talking while she's contemplating how far north Canada really extends or what whales travel a long distance each year. Sure, she might not know that Stan Lee created "Batman" (Stanley Who?), but at least she knows that Helen Fielding wrote "Bridget Jones' Diary."
And she's definitely not intimidated by Bill or Tom. She might not talk the trivial talk, but at least she's shown she can walk the trivial walk.
But a good game of Trivial Pursuit? That stops time. A good Trivial Pursuit match separates the men from the boys, draws a line in the sand between experts and novices. And novices need not apply. Winning a Trivial Pursuit match can elevate you to a standard you've only dreamed possible; losing can destroy all hope. There's no second place, only one winner and a bunch of losers. Next time you play, look around the table. See those losers? Do you really want to be compared to them? This game is all about your Trivial reputation.
Right now, you think I'm nuts. No one takes the game this seriously, right? It is, after all, just that—a game. But the truth is that a large portion of humanity is dedicated to the proposition that all trivial intelligence is not created equal. And those who think they're all that and a bag of pie pieces will fight anyone who challenges them to a grudge match that would make even ear-biter Mike Tyson huddle alone in a corner, begging for mercy.
Last weekend, I participated in such a grudge match. Defying Gravity readers Bill and Tom (whose blogs I would link to if I could get the link function to work) decided to challenge the claim in my profile that I'm "phenomenal at Trivial Pursuit." When I reached Bill's house and saw the list of at least 20 editions of Trivial Pursuit in his possession, I thought I might have been out of my league. I also couldn't compete with the sports-type ego-boosting both engaged in about the vital roles they played on their high school Quiz Bowl teams. I was on Quiz Bowl, yeah, and I was good (MVP 1996). But even the question-asker noted that I excelled at questions about or related to Harrison Ford. And Harrison Ford can only take you so far in a good Trivial Pursuit match.
As luck would have it, my doubts were unfounded and I held my own against both boasting braggarts. They play by some contrived rules that deviate from the Trivial Norm, requiring the player with the filled pie to answer questions the whole way up the spoke toward the middle. Once arrived in the center (a feat that took me about 30 minutes), the player has to answer four of the six questions on the next card correctly to win the game. Insane, yes, but such were the house rules. FOUR times I answered three of six correctly. But that's just not enough. Nope. And Kerri Strubb wasn't close enough for the Olympic gymnast who sprained her ankle and still completed a perfect vault (Kerri Strugg). Almost four hours after the game began, I relinquished my lead to Tom, who knew all the answers to the questions I missed anyway. But I left Bill choking and sputtering in my dust, trying to pick himself up and brush away the web of yellow spaces he couldn't seem to escape from. And I did it without a single Harrison question.
I lost to Tom, yes, but I proved myself a worthy opponent. Susie isn’t stupid and she would have won had the regular rules applied. She can overcome obstacles like people talking while she's contemplating how far north Canada really extends or what whales travel a long distance each year. Sure, she might not know that Stan Lee created "Batman" (Stanley Who?), but at least she knows that Helen Fielding wrote "Bridget Jones' Diary."
And she's definitely not intimidated by Bill or Tom. She might not talk the trivial talk, but at least she's shown she can walk the trivial walk.
6 Comments:
Don't you lame people have anything else to do?
don't you have anything better to do than read my blog? let's talk about lame.
Slow day.
God, I never even thought about breaking out the Trivial Pursuit.
I guess THAT's lame. For some reason, I thought I had better things to do.
Hmmm, choking and sputtering? I think not. The real truth can be found at http://wasambvca.blogspot.com
And it was Stan Lee who created Spiderman...Bob Kane created Batman.
Batman, Spiderman...whatever. They're both stories about mutant human-types who try to save the world. I had bats on the mind last week, though, since I was buzzed by one in my house. Yikes!
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