Your Quizmaster — Home of the Quizmaster of Sudwerk Brewing Company in Davis

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Internet Culture. Instagram was founded in the same year that the first iPad was released. With a one-year margin of error, tell me the year. My son Truman just submitted a report on his favorite invention: The iPad

David Letterman. The name of what living 83-year old has appeared most often in the last 29 years of Top Ten lists written by the writing staff of David Letterman? You should expect another Letterman question on tonight’s quiz.

Roman Numerals. Since the beginning of the common era, August 28th of what year is the longest date thus far in Roman Numerals? Hint available. The birth year of T.S. Eliot. I often try to sneak Eliot into conversations.

Pop Culture – Music. There’s a red-headed singer-songwriter who has been the opening act for Taylor Swift’s Red tour, and who has three E’s in the nine letters in his first and last name. Who is he? By the way, my favorite redheads are named Kate and Jukie.

Sports. Jerry Rice, lifetime leader in this category, caught how many touchdown passes? 108, 208, 308, or 408? I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know this.

P.S. Poetry Night returns on January 15^th.

Hundertwasser on the QE2 Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on December 15, 2014

Hundertwasser-Paintings-1959-singender-dampfer-in-ultramarin-III-detail-1

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

When most people are asked to name their favorite Austrian artists, they inevitably bring up Gustav Klimt and Egon Schiele, and I can see why, for they were both supremely talented, and their works are widely shared, especially on Tumblr. I myself much prefer the third most-famous Austrian painter, someone who died in 2000 and whose birthday we celebrate today, December 15th: Friedensreich Hundertwasser.

My family owned a beautiful Hundertwasser reproduction when I was a child. It contained wild and curvy lines and small mirror tiles that would reflect the afternoon sun shining into my home on Tunlaw Road. A delightfully radical architect as well as a painter, Hundertwasser might not have approved of my north Georgetown row house, for he was not a fan of straight lines, once writing that “Because of the straight line, the products of design, drawing board, and modeling have become sickeningly sterile and truly senseless. The straight line is godless and immoral. The straight line is not a creative line, but simply a reproductive lie. In it there live not God and human spirit, but a mass created, brainless and addicted to comfort.”

Hundertwasser himself was not addicted to comfort, once living in a New Zealand home made of bottles, and refusing to spend money even on haircuts. Hundertwasser focused on invention, rather than convention, believing that “No restraint should be imposed upon the individual’s desire to construct. Each person should be allowed to build (and ought to build), and would thus be truly responsible for the four walls within which he lives.” He confronted homegrown authoritarianism and totalitarianism with his art, and all of us who know his work have benefited.

So happy birthday, Friedensreich! We can only assume that no other pub quiz newsletter is celebrating you today, so I have stepped into the curvy breach, for all of us. Thank you for your artistic leadership, and for your swirls and your spirals. Thank you for helping the Dalai Lama escape Tibet. Thank you for your environmental activism. Thank you for telling the story of how you fooled Hitler as a youth. I’m glad you could die at sea, aboard the RMS Queen Elizabeth 2, rather than amidst the sterile right angles of a hospital. I hope someday to visit one of your buildings!

Regrettably, tonight’s Pub Quiz will offer no questions on Friedensreich Hundertwasser. Instead expect to reflect on your knowledge of toys and playthings, online photographs, newspaper headlines, Taylor Swift (for the youngsters), Robert Downey Jr. (for my wife Kate), David Letterman, holiday traditions for those who watch TV, Roman numerals, unwilling dog accomplices, handicrafts, unusual adjectives that start with the letter M, salt, mumps and bumps, world leaders who almost share a name, pictures, monosaccharaides, film musicals, income gaps, Irish music, funny actors, wars that matter, V words from “Santa,” Davis businesses, women who did a job more famously than any man, reds and redheads, hooks, lying liars, speeches from heroes, glands, the meaning of a touchdown, YouTube, and the scandals of Shakespeare.

I look forward to seeing you this evening. I shall wear black.

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Internet Culture. The names of the fastest growing social networks (over the last six months) are an anagram for the common phrase REBEL MUTT PRINTS, which is, coincidentally, what I have requested for holiday presents from all my family. Name the social networks.

Art and Art History. Salvador Dali was born and died in the same city. Name the country.

Next Year. What awakens on Dec. 18th, 2015?

Pop Culture – Music. Actress and Grammy winning musician Kelly Rowland rose to fame in the 1990s as a member of what girl group?

Sports. EPL is the acronym for the UK’s primary football competition. What do the letters EPL stand for?

P.S. Have you considered giving a book of poetry as a holiday gift this year?

The Alan Ternes Crackling Blows of Axes Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on December 8, 2014

Alan Ternes

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

During one of my most recent trips to visit my mom (and the NIH) in Washington DC, we were treated to a visit from my mom’s brother, Alan Ternes. The Editor Emeritus at Natural History Magazine, and former Director of the Natural History Museum on the upper west side of Manhattan, Alan was an author and editor of books, and the guide and inspiration to the authors of many others, most notably the paleontologist and nature writer Stephen Jay Gould, one of Alan’s closest friends. In the early 1960s he was also friends with a penurious actor and director, Davey Marlin-Jones (my father), whom he introduced to his sister (my mother).

I am grateful for that introduction, and that gratitude extends throughout my relationship with Alan and his family. Alan and his wife Barbara invited me to live with them for a few weeks in their apartment overlooking Central Park (333 Central Park West). While still a high school student, I worked an internship with Barbara at the Children’s Aid Society in Greenwich Village, and explored Manhattan during my extensive lunch breaks. Over family meals in their large but Spartan apartment, Alan and Barbara’s essentialist practices taught me lessons that wouldn’t sink in for decades later: those people are richest who require the fewest things, who have shed the needless ballast of our lives.

Running New York’s most famous museum (thanks to Ben Stiller), and working with the authors whose books we teach at UC Davis, Alan did so much with his life, including after he left New York, when he became a Justice of the Peace and environmental education enthusiast in Bellows Falls, VT, and a sailor of the Atlantic, voyaging solo from a port in New England to a port in Morocco. As impressed as we all were with Alan Ternes, I most appreciated his generosity with me during our many casual conversations, and for the way that he cared for his nuclear and extended family.

About 35 years ago, I was hiking back down Shade Mountain to my grandmother’s cabin in Beavertown, Pennsylvania. During the last leg of the hike, and starting what seemed like a mile or so as we wended our way back to our Snyder County home, I had heard the slow and methodical sound of someone chopping wood. It grew louder as we approached the cabin, and then I found the source of all this industry. Wielding the longest-handled axe I had ever seen, Uncle Alan had been splitting logs for more than an hour. Imposingly tall, bearded, and shirtless, Alan stacked log after log upon the chopping stump, and then fragmented them powerfully and precisely, like a 19^th century woodsman.

Bearded, portly, manly, strong, generous, and intellectually and geographically curious, Alan Ternes has always made me think of another hero of mine, Walt Whitman, whom he resembled. Recently I have been thinking again of Alan chopping all that wood, and the way that he provided for the family as men like him have done for thousands of years. The image reminded me of a section of one of Whitman’s rare California poems: “Song of the Redwood-Tree.”

Part 2 of this section of Leaves of Grass begins this way:

Along the northern coast,

Just back from the rock-bound shore, and the caves,

In the saline air from the sea, in the Mendocino country,

With the surge for bass and accompaniment low and hoarse,

With crackling blows of axes, sounding musically, driven by strong arms,

Riven deep b the sharp tongues of the axes—there in the Redwood forest dense,

I heard the mighty tree its death-chanting.

I use these words from our great American poet to commend the life and mourn the death this past weekend of another great American. Rest in peace, Alan Ternes.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on natural history, bonded words, rebel mutt prints (seems like an anagram), social media, specious celebrities, presidents in San Francisco (where I spent all day yesterday), people who were born and who died in the same, anticipated dates, multi-Grammy winners, UK acronyms, Santa’s little helpers, Africa, words that start with the letter O, obsessive tweeters, celestial hierarchies, IKEA, enlightened fools, full sweep of the South, crime novelists, islands with rich histories, big companies, biotic diversity, villains that can’t spell their own names, karate masters, missing persons, Basil, world capitals, banana crabs, the heart, words that follow happy, New Jersey, exchanges, and Shakespeare.

Tonight will be busy at the Irish Pub. Vacation is approaching for may, and here for some. I invite you to come early to claim a table.

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Mottos and Slogans. In the 1980s, which of the big three American car companies used the slogan “Everything we do is driven by you”?

Internet Culture. According to Mashable, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the company’s Connectivity Lab in March, unveiling plans to use BLANKS and lasers to “beam” Internet to the world in an effort to get the last 15% of the population, who aren’t connected, online. Fill in the blank with a monosyllabic word.

Newspaper Headlines. On Saturday, a judge threw out all charges against a deposed president of what country?

Disney Productions. What 2014 American musical comedy caper film produced by Walt Disney Pictures features Ricky Gervais, Tina Fey and others?

Pop Culture – Music. Musicologist Mickey Hart played what instrument for the Grateful Dead?

The Checker Marathon as Status Symbol Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on December 1, 2014

The Checker Marathon

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

I read recently that a paid-off mortgage has replaced the BMW as the status symbol of choice (a few of you will catch that reference). Some people invest significant time and energy in their cars as status symbols, which is odd to me because of how quickly new cars lose their value. We bought a new Toyota Prius last year in part because we felt it was our duty as ecologically responsible citizens of Davis, and in part because it was my wife’s dream car. Kate also pointed out to me that it would be difficult to purchase a year-old Prius that does everything she’d want hers to do.

When I was a youth, my family purchased two cars total: each one of them was a Checker Marathon. The 1967 Checker Marathon was powder blue, while our 1978 Checker was a more sensible tan color. As you can imagine, our Checker chariot attracted stares, in part because it could seat more people than most family minivans. During those decades, New York City was awash with Checker cabs, while today they can be found only on film sets, with the last New York Checker turning off its meter for good, as the headline said, in 1999. I loved those cars, and if I were to own one today, I would absolutely consider it a status symbol. Of course, even my talented mechanic Bob Redfield (whose Davis Wiki reviews offer a sampling of the sort of referrals honesty can garner you) would have trouble finding parts for a Checker Marathon.

My current car, a 1998 Saturn sedan, gets scant use because of my preference to bike rather than to drive. It has been enjoying this past rainy weekend in the garage, for its osmotic roof is only a semi-permeable membrane. If Bob Redfield helps me stay with that car for another 17 years, we may just be able to pay off our mortgage – what a status symbol! – in time for retirement. I will let you know what happens.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on topics that appear only rarely on the Pub Quiz: cars, astronomy, Amsterdam, and ruminants. Take some time to ruminate on those. Consider also that tonight we’ll be discussing “beaming” the internet (star Trek style), depositions, Atlanta, Disney productions, other Mickeys, single votes, the Football Writers Association of America, bookworthy sojourns, an antiquated expression of wrath, unpopular leaders, yarn made of the hair of yaks, cubing, abandonment, sequels, wavelengths, debatable centers, the circulation of magazines, France, one-word titles, Oscar nominees who have never won, weather events, the equivalent of Cecil B DeMille, aspiration, the effect of power when it doesn’t corrupt, leaf-shaped items, unemployment, the Pacific Northwest, famous speechifiers, surprising statistics, Ireland, poetry, and Shakespeare.

Welcome to December. November at the Pub Quiz has been busy, as you probably have noticed, and I’m sure the trend will continue. Arrive with your team by 6 to claim the best tables!

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Mottos and Slogans. What company founded in 1928 has used the commercial slogan “Hello Moto”?

Fashion. What fashion designer who died this month at the age of 82 was famous for his evening gowns, one or more of which he made for every US First Lady from Jackie Kennedy to Michelle Obama?

Pop Culture – Music. What LA-based band founded in 1981 is considered one of the founding “big four” bands of thrash metal, alongside Anthrax, Megadeth, and Slayer?

Science. Aside from humans, what genus of old-world monkeys are the most widespread primate genus, ranging from Japan to Afghanistan and to North Africa and Southern Europe?

Mathematics. A billion seconds is closest to how many years?

P.S. Poetry Night is Thursday here in Davis. Please join us at 8 PM this Thursday, December 4th, at the John Natsoulas Gallery (521 First Street, Davis) for Poetry Night featuring Jennifer O’Neill Pickering and company from the Quill and Sable Writers from Sacramento.

The Customer Service for Supinators Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on November 24, 2014

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

My wife Kate spent about an hour this weekend comparison shoe-shopping online. In my family we have runners, hikers, pronators, supinators, and, no offense to us, shoe losers. In fact, once we bought an expensive pair of Keen sandals for Jukie, and then walked over to our favorite eatery / Irish Pub for dinner. After eating, Jukie absented himself from dinner by lying back on the padded seat along our favorite booth and then, without our knowing it, dropped to the ground to retrieve his shoes.

When we were leaving, we couldn’t locate Jukie’s second shoe, and quickly realized that he had somehow secreted the shoe inside the bench. The de Vere’s manager (Josey) and a few servers tried in vain to extricate the brand new hiking sandal, but to no avail. It is still there today, and probably will be for decades. Although many restaurants have come and gone from 217 E Street since I moved to Davis in 1990, I expect de Vere’s Irish Pub to have a long tenure in that location.

Yesterday morning Kate opted to buy Jukie’s new pair of boots locally. When one of our favorite local stores, Outdoor Davis, didn’t have anything that would fit our boy’s high arches, Kate ventured over to Big 5 Sporting Goods, one of the local chain stores that sends a multi-page full-color insert to every Sunday subscriber of the Davis Enterprise. There she found Jukie a pair of boots and six pairs of socks. Jukie’s in-store antics must have distracted her while she was signing for the purchase, for she didn’t notice that Big 5 had charged her twice for the boots.

When I called yesterday evening to point out the overcharge, and ask that the store refund us the money for the second pair of boots, I was told by Steve the manager that they would refund the money only if their inventory reflected that they had sold us one pair of boots instead of two, and that we would have to come in today for our refund. How did Steve feel about over-charging us? How did he feel about our having to drive back to Big 5 during Thanksgiving vacation? We don’t know, for we heard no apology for the overcharge. We will see if Kate is treated with that same assumption of guilt when she returns to Big 5 today.

During our extended phone conversation, I didn’t tell Steve the manager that I consult with companies on customer service and media relations. I guess he didn’t know that he was speaking to a member of the media. But I do know that anyone working with the public should know that we are all members of the micro-media, and that anyone with a blog, or a Facebook or Twitter account, can tell a story. Excellent customer service makes it much more likely that the customer will share the narrative that a business owner would like to hear.

I guess my family and I keep returning to de Vere’s Irish Pub not only because of the friends we have made here, and because of the tasty food and cocktails, but because of the consistently excellent customer service that we’ve enjoyed at our favorite Davis restaurant. If you feel the same way, feel free to share your story. If you share it with me, you may find yourself quoted in next week’s post-Thanksgiving edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter. Until then, Jukie and I will give thanks for our comfortable shoes.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on superheroes, the telecom industry, splitting checks, poets laureate, avoiding interceptions, rising fees, Jackie Kennedy, basketball, that which thrashes, heroes born in Pennsylvania, fishmongers, gowns, understanding billions, the song of a city, widespread genera, Longfellow, mantles, Scottish dangers, app addicts, Elizabeth Bishop, nosy oxen greens, impending glaciers, Pinocchio, sexy blonds, Gwendolyn Brooks, pumpkins, axes, Irish beauties, Asian-American women, favorite colors, crusts, Robert Frost, white flowers, Aggies, and Shakespeare. Have you read Hamlet recently? I try to reread it or re-view on stage or screen it at least a few times a decade.

The schoolchildren of Davis seem to have the rest of this week off from school, so I’m sure that tonight’s Pub Quiz will be overrun with teachers. For them, I have included a mathematics questions that perhaps any of us could solve if we had enough time. Because of the time factor, I moved that question from the second half of the Quiz, to the first. I wonder who will come in first tonight? Come by to find out, and bring some friends!

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Mottos and Slogans. What company whose name starts with S has used this slogan since 2005? “Ingredients for Life.” Hint: An earlier slogan was “Everything You Want from a Store and a Little Bit More.”

Internet Culture. On November 10^th of this year, President Obama recommended the FCC reclassify broadband Internet service as a telecommunications service in order to preserve WHAT? I am looking for a two-word phrase.

Newspaper Headlines. Recently Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency because of the “possibility of expanded unrest.” For what state is Nixon the Governor?

Know your US States. What is the exact number of states in which the letters NEW appear in any order, consecutively or not, in the states’ names?

Pop Culture – Music. “Hey, Soul Sister” was the top-selling song on iTunes Store in 2010, and the second overall best-selling song in the US in 2010. Tell me the monosyllabic name of the American rock band responsible for “Hey, Soul Sister.”

P.S. Happy Thanksgiving to you and your families.

The Magliozzi Laughter Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on November 18, 2014

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

My wife Kate got to see David Sedaris at the Mondavi Center last night. If I had gone, you could probably expect five questions on the author and his stories. I remember that in a short story survey class that I taught about five years ago, I asked students to write down a favorite book they had read for pleasure. More than 25% of the class had chosen a Sedaris book, making him more popular than even J.K. Rowling (though the choices might have been affected by the knowledge that they’d have to share their choice with Dr. Andy). Sedaris offers humor, wit, poignant reflections, and great stories, just the right recipe to fill all 1,800 seats at our premiere center for the arts.

Last week I interviewed the celebrated author Pam Houston on my radio show, and we talked about how, as with Sedaris, her career as an author and speaker was significantly boosted by public radio. For Houston, it was a radio show called “Selected Shorts,” where the recognizable voices of established authors performed short stories, usually by contemporary authors. Oscar-nominated actress Debra Winger performed “The Best Girlfriend You Never Had,” the first story in Pam’s collection Waltzing the Cat. America seemed to be listening to that performance, for it raised Pam’s visibility significantly, so much so that John Updike chose that story as the final selection of The Best American Short Stories of the Century.

Some voices make us think, while others make us laugh. The recent passing of Tom Magliozzi saddened even those who had not listened to his infectious laughter on the National Public Radio automotive advice show Car Talk for a number of years. I heard an early version of their show on WBUR when I was an undergraduate at Boston University, for Tom and Ray recorded their show in the same Communications building where I took a version of the fiction class that I ended up teaching 20 years later at UC Davis. Tom’s infectious laughter reminded me of all the laughing that can be heard during my conversations with my own brother, though almost never about cars.

Listening to Car Talk, I had the impression that Tom and Ray took that extended radio gig because of how much they enjoyed each other’s company, as well as the interactions with the callers and occasional celebrity guests (such as Geena Davis, who had also attended BU). I believed then that no one could make a living working on public radio, and over the last 14 years in the host’s chair, I’ve proven myself correct, just as you would expect from a Quizmaster who feigns infallibility for a couple hours a week.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on endless ingredients, the FCC, African American culture, cabbage and carrots, China, the algebraic formulae necessary to solve equations with two variables, new states, major league baseball, supervisory duties, heavy metal, four-syllable verbs, people born in Italy, snakes, people named Shelton, medieval tortures, lush generosity, mud bricks, architecture, American genesis, patents, overhangs, big weekends, the City of Davis, Russian plans, mnemonics, basketball, Othello and Macbeth (by comparison), Arkansas and (obviously) Shakespeare.

Thanks to everyone who joined us last week, including members of the Davis Shakespeare Ensemble; the prominent British actor, director, and scholar Fidelis Morgan; and Davis Enterprise columnist Bob Dunning. All told, we had about 45 teams participate last week. If you join us tonight, and make sure that you do, come a bit earlier than you usually do to secure a table. See you then!

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Mottos and Slogans. As of 1983, who calls itself “The world’s favourite airline”?

Internet Culture. With an Alexa rank of 46, what site is categorized into “subreddits”?

Newspaper Headlines. Dismantled sections of what structure can now be viewed in 30 countries?

Four for Four. Which of the following four US states, if any, have the word “commonwealth” in their official titles? Indiana, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia.

Veterans Day. Following the trench warfare which took place in the fields of Flanders during the 1st World War, what kind of P flower has become a symbol of remembrance of soldiers who have died during wartime?

P.S. Poetry Night is this coming Thursday night at the Natsoulas Gallery. Join us at 8 PM for traveling poet Betsy Rosenberg and Aggie alumni Judith Rose!

P.P.S. Thanks to John Iacovelli and Theatre and Dance at UC Davis for providing tickets to their new show, The Gambling Lady, as part of the swag prizes. Congratulations to The Moops, winners of last week’s swag.

The Lennon in a Cape Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on November 10, 2014

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

One of my favorite Beatles songs is the first track on their first album. Paul McCartney wrote most of “I Saw Her Standing There” when he was about the age of one of my college sophomores. There is actually a photograph of him working on the song that had been written in a high school exercise book, with John sitting next to him. Lennon helped to clean it up a little bit adding the second of the first two lines.

Well she was just 17

You know what I mean.

McCartney was dating a 17-year-old at the time and had originally rhymed the word “17” with beauty queen, as in she “had never been a beauty queen.” John made him change that to what we recognize today.

Now that my daughter Geneva has turned 17, I look at this favorite song differently. I want to say, “No, Mr. McCartney, I don’t know what you mean about my 17-year-old daughter. Could you please explain yourself, sir?”

Bill Mahr on his weekly TV show has recently complained about ageism and the extent to which youth culture dominates popular culture. Badly written pop songs with specious lyrics, insufficiently revised animated films, and the obsession with unaccomplished celebrities fill the pages of US Weekly and the website TMZ.

By definition, all of these topics are trivial, so you would expect them to be found as the correct answers to questions in a trivia contest. For me, as a quizmaster, I also see my role as educator, so I need to present that apt mix of substance, history, and the high points in world culture, and not just a faddish mix of video games and superheroes. That said, I do love superheroes. In my mind, when I was just 17, John Lennon wore a cape.

Today’s Pub Quiz will cover a number of topics, including Veterans Day, which we commemorate tomorrow. Expect also questions about high-ranking Alexa websites, disparate structures, the names of states, favorite flowers, Elizabeth Taylor, the Beatles, big cats, basketball, foreshadowing, ancient cities, comedians, platinum reflections, canes, turtles, superheroes, super villains, rainfall, South American animals, the absence of narrowness, Italy, Star Wars, tyrants, Geoffrey Chaucer, sports topics that I haven’t decided upon yet, the Harlem Renaissance, and Shakespeare.

I expect it to be really busy tonight, for we have a rare Tuesday holiday. Everyone is encouraged to stay out late tonight, and to sleep in tomorrow. But don’t sleep in too late, for you will be able to hear the Davis Madrigal Singers if you stop by the Davis Cemetery tomorrow starting at 11. This is what the Cemetery website says: “Our annual Veteran’s Day ceremony will begin at 11 AM on Tuesday November 11th and will last approximately one hour. Our keynote speakers will include Supervisor Jim Provenza, Supervisor Don Saylor and Supervisor Oscar Villegas. The Davis High Madrigal Singers will be on hand for a musical tribute to veterans and their families. This is a free event. Please join us!”

Also, join me this evening for an appropriate mix of the specious and the fabulous!

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Mottos and Slogans. Leo the Lion roared inside a frame in which was written “Ars Gratia Artis” (or Art For Art’s Sake) before the start of many old movies. Name the film studio.

Internet Culture. Academy Award-winning actor Kevin Spacey has been quoted saying “Call of Duty: Advance Warfare” is likely to become the first video game he ever plays. Why would he start with this game?

Newspaper Headlines. We learned this week that Channing Tatum will star in the title role of Marvel superhero movie about a onetime X-Man from Louisiana who is an expert at throwing cards. Name the X-Man.

Four for Four. Which of the following counties, if any, are among California’s three least-populous? Mariposa, Mendocino, Modoc, Mono.

German Festivals. What city of 1.4 million people is home to the largest Oktoberfest in the world, lasting for 16 days?

P.S. Thanks to Chuck Snipes from the Pub Quiz team Portraits for providing the swell swag last week. The gauntlet has been thrown – who shall provide future weeks’ swag (other than yours truly)?

The Nixon Applauding Politely Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on November 3, 2014

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

Last Friday I got to visit San Francisco for a conference. Sometimes I wonder if I have a skewed view of that city, for I’m usually there to attend a conference in one of the city’s swankier hotels, such as the Mark Hopkins (every February for the San Francisco Writers Conference), and the Palace Hotel (for a UC-wide conference called UC Engage). The entryways, ballrooms and dining rooms of these five-star hotels are breathtakingly large for someone who has grown used to biking from a modest home to a 25-person classroom or a familiar conference room. As a city boy, I am still taken aback at the majesty and affluence represented by The City’s great halls.

I remember also being amazed at the size of the lobby of the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, where my parents attended opening night to see the 1971 premier performance of Leonard Bernstein’s Mass. Bernstein was there that night, as was Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, who commissioned the work to celebrate her late husband’s stewardship of the Arts as President. Although he was invited, then-president Richard Nixon did not attend. He said that he didn’t want to compete with Onassis for the attention of the press that night, but we have learned subsequently that Nixon’s paranoid advisors had other concerns. Bernstein’s FBI file revealed that he was a leftist and that he opposed the war in Vietnam. G. Gordon Liddy and others expected Bernstein to sneak progressive messages into the Latin sung during the performance, and that therefore Nixon, not known as a student of ancient languages, would not know what choruses to applaud politely, and which ones would warrant sitting on his hands, as some members of Congress do during the State of the Union Address. Imagine the embarrassment!

Tomorrow is Election Day (remember to vote), and I’m sure the pundits, who haven’t enough to talk about, will conduct some dimestore analyses of the current partisan deadlock, wondering if it started before, after, or during the time of Richard Nixon. Whatever the outcome, we can continue to smile at the composers and poets, such as myself, who sneak anti-authoritarian messages into their performed works, as I plan to do at the Davis City Council meeting Wednesday night. I plan also to sneak some such messages into the questions at tonight’s Pub Quiz, as I hope you will discover.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on lions, video games, Marvel superheroes, California counties, seasonal festivals, princes whose names start with F, Arizona, a mobilized White House, dead poets in London, cells with energy, Chinese exports, comedians, Asia, electricity, fiber, past colleges, bread, expired job titles, car slogans, the New York Stock Exchange, tennis vapors, Japan, animals, the last name of the fox, U.S. Presidents, representations of motion, mishaps in Toronto, beautiful women, film sequels, automobiles, and Shakespeare.

Speaking of beautiful women, tomorrow is my wife Kate’s birthday. What does such a bride deserve as a present? It’s too bad that the Pub Quiz doesn’t allow karaoke, or we might find out. Because it doesn’t, perhaps I will see you this evening!

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Mottos and Slogans and Logos. What rock & roll band’s logo with a “tongue and lips” motif in 1970 was inspired in part by the Hindu goddess Kali?

Internet Culture. According to CNET, what I-word is Google using as the name of its “new killer email app”?

Newspaper Headlines. Revealed last week, what five-letter word completes the name of the most profitable company in the world (with 2013 income of $42.7 billion)? Industrial and Commercial Bank of BLANK.

Four for Four. Subcategory: Flatworms. Which of the following, if any, are characteristic of flatworms? They are bilaterian, they are invertebrates, they are segmented, they are trophoblasts.

Ebola. The Ebola Virus was named after what? A country, a doctor, a people, a river.

P.S. Bill Gainer will be performing at the Natsoulas Gallery this coming Thursday night at 8. Bill Gainer contributes to the California literary scene as a writer, editor, promoter, publicist and poet. Gainer is a past winner of the San Francisco Beat Museum’s Poetry Contest and the Sacramento News and Review’s Flash Fiction Contest. He continues to edit for the PEN Award-winning R.L. Crow Publications, is a founding and current board member of the Nevada County Poetry Series, and serves as the longtime host of Sacramento’s popular Red Alice’s Poetry Emporium. Widely published, Bill Gainer remains a nationally sought-after reader. His latest book is Lipstick and Bullet Holes, from Epic Rites Press of Canada. Visit him at billgainer.com.

You should join us at that event, and / or at the after-party at 10 at de Vere’s Irish Pub!

The Just Hints Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on October 27, 2014

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

I got to introduce the bike-commuting advocate Paul Dorn to my Silicon Valley Journalism students this morning, and thus was unavailable to compose thoughtful insights on important topics by my regular due date of 10:30 on a Monday morning. As a result, today’s newsletter contains mostly hints. Next week I may talk more about transportation concerns.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will address the following topics: the ante-chambers of a queen, bad occupation choices, sports numbers that are divisible by three, industrial banks, realty stats, biopics and many other films, killer apps, Kali, invertebrates, light, African names, feeling free, spheres, moderately great Americans who appear in bad films, quickenings, sleep deprivation, characters named Julie, South America, Pacific rim films in which flowers are braided into the hair of lead actors, measurements, indirect Halloween, golden arrows, scary books, one-word titles, big films, October 27, food and “drink,” things mapped by Ptolemy, world capitals, the Cold War, Swedish culture, football, and Shakespeare.

Happy Halloween! Tonight, in celebration of the holiday, I shall wear black.

Your Quizmaster

Here are five questions from last week’s quiz:

Newspaper Headlines. Facebook and Apple have established new policies in which they will pay for female employees to freeze their WHAT?

World History. In what city was Archduke Ferdinand assassinated in 1914?

Pop Culture – Music. What Lorde song has recently been banned from radio play in San Francisco?

Four for Four. Which of the following A-List celebrities, if any, has ever been married? Johnny Depp, Cameron Diaz, Jack Nicholson, Oprah Winfrey.

Science. Up until the early part of what decade did most astronomers think that all of the stars in the universe were contained inside of the Milky Way? Was it the 1620s, 1720s, 1820s, or 1920s?

P.S. Thanks to all Pub Quiz participants who stay until the end of the evening’s entertainment to discover who has won. The winners and the staff appreciate your patience.

The Rilke on the Conveyor Belt Edition of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz Newsletter

by yourquizmaster on October 20, 2014

Dear Friends of the de Vere’s Irish Pub Pub Quiz,

We were lucky to have the internationally acclaimed poet and playwright James Ragan visit Davis this past week, performing at the John Natsoulas Gallery and on the UC Davis campus. Ragan impresses audiences with his stories, with the many movie-stars and heads of state with whom he has worked and performed, and the quality of his poetry, much of which he has memorized.

One of my favorites of the poems Ragan keeps in his head is titled “Rilke on the Conveyor Belt at Los Angeles International” (found at the website of the journal Rattapallax):

RILKE ON THE CONVEYOR BELT

AT LOS ANGELES INTERNATIONAL

A rick of pages, it falls hardly noticed

into motion, and down the track, unspined,

it cycles time between a rucksack and laundry.

A book no thicker than a wallet or a comb,

it is the unworthy carry-on, newly bought,

colliding with a carpetbag and steamer

on the unlikely navigation into being

where it’s not. Each passenger has watched it

circle more than once, a bold intrusion

into the archipelago of things familiar.

There is no fixed point of concentration,

no laughter, no elation when the eyes dissect

the slow descent of baggage into orbit

as if in taking up an armstrap, each handler

slews a body to the spars of his shoulder.

Had Rilke himself fallen, unbound,

lying in united state, he would have passed

unnoticed by the baggage check or porter

who fail to think it odd or such a pity

to tag him at the lost and found.

How many miles had his words trespassed,

how many cities, alive, unread

among so many ports of authority, a gold leaf

of art so grand in the pall of memory

it gives the mind encouragement to survive.

Unless, unsung like a soldier’s duffel, duty bound,

fear spreads its tarp along the spine of language.

Creation can end this way, abrupt and final,

like travel to the ends of the world

with no intent, or vision, but destination.

(from LUSIONS, Grove/Atlantic)

I hope you are making time in your life for great performances.

Tonight’s pub quiz will feature questions on U.S. Presidents, the Dalai Lama, football, early film pioneers, nearly defunct companies that start with the letter S, illuminated readings, California companies, A-List celebrities such as Johnny Depp, the cities where famous events took place, mountains, star-gazing though the centuries, meditation, sports that surround, Star Wars, people who have appeared on Seinfeld, British poets with whom you are familiar, political parties, prime numbers, Hamlet’s ethic, knights, big arrivals, the Boston Consulting Group, John Lescroart’s original fiction to be performed by a talented Sacramento actor Saturday night at the Pence Gallery, genetics, South American, and the topics of a few questions that I haven’t written yet, including the Shakespeare question.

If you bring a new person or a new team to the Pub Quiz tonight, which I encourage, make sure to introduce me to the newcomers. See you tonight!

Your Quizmaster