Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

Even with the pandemic removing so many responsibilities from my day-to-day life, my weekly schedule feels like a top-heavy and unsteady game of Jenga. 

Tomorrow, for example, I start MCing the 2021 Information Security Symposium, with over 700 attendees. As my UC Davis colleague Ahna Heller says, “Next week a record 700+ attendees will attend the virtual Information Security Symposium. The event will present talks, labs, and discussions on topics involving cybersecurity and privacy for UC and other higher education security and compliance professionals. The theme is ‘Adapt’ – a continuing priority as campuses adjust to changes caused by COVID-19.”

As you may know, I usually work smaller crowds than 700 (at de Vere’s Irish Pub, we have maxed out at about 200 participants), and information security was not one of my majors in graduate school. Nevertheless, I jump at opportunities to stand before a microphone, an audience, or even a Zoom camera, for I like to challenge my public speaking skills, and because I always learn something when I do. I think people hire me for such gigs because, like myself, they never know what I might say.

Last Thursday, I got to MC a more somber affair: A Celebration of Life of Mark Rivera, the great ceramic artist and top-notch human being who should have turned 50 on June 10^th. About 150 of Mark’s friends and family (mostly here from Colorado) gathered in Central Park to tell stories and admire his handiwork. One can see a half-dozen of Mark’s pieces downtown, and perhaps 50 others in and around Davis on which he assisted.

When I finally saw the program Thursday morning, next to my name was written “Opening Remarks and Poem.” I had one hour to write a poem that afternoon, but as I had grown used to writing on demand for you fine people, and as I had been thinking about Mark and his artistic contributions to our city since hearing of his passing, I had something to say that was sonnet-sized:

The Work, The Art

A Poem for Mark Rivera (1971-2021)

“He who works with his hands is a laborer. He who works with his hands and his head is a craftsman. He who works with his hands and his head and his heart is an artist.” Saint Francis of Assisi

We walk past them, the grandiloquent creations 

That appear as fantastical polychromatic sentinels, 

Modern gargoyles standing guard on Davis street corners,

Artworks that fill our strolls and perhaps our dreams with color.

The creations guard against complacency, against tedium,

Daring even the hurried traveler to imagine something wild.

Reminiscent of an artistic renaissance, the intricacy astounds. 

Each stone, each tile, each precisely chipped luminescent pebble 

Has been imagined, formulated, and then perfectly placed

By a laborer, by a craftsman, by an artist who crafted

By heart and with heart, assembling collections 

That reach towards transcendence, that coalesce into wonder.

A child tries to name what he feels as he gazes upon the work:

A spirit soaring towards sublimity, and then resting upon gratitude.

I was happy to re-connect with close friends whom I have met or seen often at Pub Quiz at that event. As a participant and MC, I was reminded that the extra obligations that our communities ask of us may interrupt and strain the comfortable flow of weekly responsibilities that fill our lives, but when we look back on a lifetime of connections and accomplishments, we will realize that some of our strongest and fondest memories will result from our aspiring and stretching for others, as Mark Rivera did so heroically and artistically throughout his short life.

May he rest in peace, and may compassion and connection fill all of our days.

In addition to topics raised above, tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on blindfolds, audible mysteries, hotels, fish, long gliders, Katharine Hepburn, solving problems online, imperatives from companies, numbers that are divisible by four, eternal lines, Nantucket, fallen princes, bonus holidays, voodoo slang, 20^th century wars, long retirements, lead singers, home addresses, unlikely winners, complainers, authors named Paul, crusts, vacuums, residues, shrinking organizations, documentaries, big books, houseguests, elderly competitors, musical subgenres, Republicans who know how to govern, peninsulas, current events, and Shakespeare.

Poetry Night this Thursday will take place via Zoom (because of the heat) and will feature the poets Lucille Lang Day and Brian Dempster. Look them up to be impressed, and then plan to join us at 8 PM.

Thanks for reading.

Dr. Andy

https://www.yourquizmaster.com

P.S. A bit of trivia from last week: 

1. Countries of the World.  The reservoir of Three Gorges Dam can retain an amount of water voluminous enough to slow and change the rotation of the Earth. That’s a big dam. Where is it found?  

2. Disasters. What living actor and comedian, the winner of three acting Emmys, all but ended his career on the evening of November 17, 2006?  

3. Science. What do we call the branch of molecular biology concerned with the structure, function, evolution, and mapping of genomes?  

P.P.S. “A true artist is not one who is inspired, but one who inspires others.” Salvador Dali

This week’s newsletter is devoted to the memory of Davis artist Mark Rivera.

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

Nothing was normal last Thursday as we tried to return to normal at the poetry series I run twice a month. 

First of all, Governor Newsom has not yet opened up California for business – that happens a week from tomorrow. As a result, John Natsoulas proposed that Poetry Night return to the roof of his gallery on June 3^rd. I agreed, even though I had grown used to the Zoom poetry readings, appreciating the opportunity virtually to gather far-flung audiences, including especially a number of Sacramento-area poets who prefer not to make the Causeway drive after dark. The increasing number of regulars joining us from New Orleans, Chicago, and New York City brought their own drinks, and I didn’t have to unfold a single folding chair.

The best poetry audiences are local, though, for even in the socially-distanced Zoom age, poets need live audiences, and they depend upon in-person events to sell books. The poet is almost a playwright who performs her own soliloquys, leading us to wonder if the more authentic experience is provided by the author who reveals her own confessional nuggets or the actor who can best embody the breadth and depth of human emotion. Either way, whether embodied by author or actor, a live performance in a shared physical space gives us access to performed artistry, and invites us to be present in our own heads and hearts.

When I proposed that we move the time from 8 PM to 7 PM to give the poets more light to work with (a concern at past rooftop events), I hadn’t anticipated that June 3^rd would be one of the hottest days of 2021. That afternoon, Natsoulas texted me a screenshot of the weather report (91 degrees at 7 PM!), and recommended that we mask up and move the event inside, where he would provide the art-covered walls (some of the paintings mounted by Mark Rivera), the sound system, and the air conditioning. I called one of the poets to propose the change, and she went for it.

That same poet also showed up at 6:20 that evening with enough cupcakes for a classroom full of graduating first graders. The other poet brought beverages. So from the moment I arrived, I was on the job: fetching bottle openers, helping to find napkins, and testing the microphone. John and his staff had already set up the chairs, dispersed at six-foot intervals, as if we were adhering to an earlier round of CDC regulations.

As we approached 7 PM, a steady stream of attendees appeared, marveling like time travelers at the wonder of standing inside a public space with other humans from outside their pods. Everyone was vaccinated, everyone was masked, and everyone had access to all the cupcakes they could eat.

But could the rusty host, Dr. Andy, the poet laureate emeritus of Davis, recapture the magic of 2019 and before, amusing the audience, hyping the poets, and catching his breath while taking in the moment?

The answer to this trivia question is perhaps expected: Yes. Magic was present and presented. The featured poets both astounded us with new poems from their new books, and the open mic featured an Indian dancer (who brought her own music), a couple of the regulars, and an extended and full-throated introduction of venerable poetry scene mainstay Allegra Silberstein that benefitted from my years of my blowhardy Pub Quiz braggadocio. Allegra said that she had left her hearing aids at home, but she could still hear me.

Let’s hope the microphone still works at de Vere’s Irish Pub when I return to Pub Quiz duties there, perhaps at the end of this month. As soon as Gavin Newsom gives us the go-ahead, I plan to let loose with as loud and breathy an 18-month-delayed welcome back as I can muster. Even if you are not there to see it (though I hope you will be), I bet that you will be able to hear it from wherever you spend your evenings in Yolo County. But really, you shouldn’t miss any more of our events ever again. You only live once. 

Tonight’s Pub Quiz will be virtual, with questions written about expected topics (the craziness in the news), as well as unexpected topics, such as San Juan Capistrano, people who bear cups, and people who bathe garishly. Other questions will address the following: soliloquys, corn, Spanish translations, independent contractors, California counties, pop singers, the employment picture, lazy machines, molecular biology, Emmys, the rotation of the earth, Mexican culture, dystopias, pogs, singer / songwriters, royals, gross domestic products, people named George Washington, far-flung countries, and Shakespeare.

Thanks to all my regular supporters on Patreon. I’m able to continue this work because of your support. As a special treat, I have tucked a shout-out to one of you in two contiguous pub quiz questions on tonight’s quiz. I will let you see if you can figure out the implied meta-question.

This Thursday afternoon I will be participating in a celebration of the life and the (very public) work of the local ceramic artist Mark Rivera, who died unexpectedly last month at age 49. If you are a Davisite and you check out the Facebook invitation, you will likely recognize a number of pieces of public art that you didn’t know all came from the same artist. Rest in Peace, Mark.

Be well.

Dr. Andy

http://www.yourquizmaster

https://www.patreon.com/yourquizmaster

yourquizmaster@gmail.com

P.S. Here are three questions from last week’s Pub Quiz:

1. Mottos and Slogans. What beverage allegedly “gives you wings”?  

2. Internet Culture. What cross-platform web browser developed by Microsoft was first released for Windows 10 and Xbox One in 2015?  

3. Newspaper Headlines. According to CNN, “A century ago this week, the wealthiest U.S. Black community was burned to the ground.” In what city did this take place?

P.P.S. “Every one of us is losing something precious to us. Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That’s part of what it means to be alive.” Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

Because my father was a stage director, and my brother and I had seen so many of his productions, we knew how to talk to actors after a show.

On this occasion, the show was not a play, but a movie. And ironically, we had not yet even seen the film, even though the event we were attending was a children’s charity event on the day of the film’s world premiere.

The first order of business was to find Billy Dee Williams. My father had directed Williams in William Hanley’s play, Slow Dance On the Killing Ground. Because of the actor’s dyslexia, someone was needed to run his lines with him on a regular basis, and that person was my mom, coincidentally another dyslexic person. My mom described laughing at the ridiculousness of the assignment, and then also laughing with the charismatic Billy Dee as they tried to get the lines right, lodging in Williams’ memory what could not be easily read on the page. 

It was not because of his stage prowess and theatrical connections, but because of his job as the film reviewer for WUSA in Washington DC, that we were invited to the world premiere of Empire Strikes Back, which premiered 41 years ago this month. You can imagine my excitement when my dad told us that we would get to go to the Kennedy Center on May 17, 1980 to meet most of the cast. 

I was a big fan of Star Wars, as was every American boy born in the late 60s. By the time I met the actors from the Empire Strikes Back, I had seen the first film 15 times in the theater. Maybe that was a little excessive, but my mom knew that I would enjoy both the show and the air conditioning during that May and June and July and August of 1977 while she attended to other responsibilities. 

Once we arrived at DC’s equivalent of The Mondavi Center, my brother Oliver and I each grabbed a paper plate that was festooned with Star Wars iconography, got a felt pen from our dad, and then started swarming the cast members with all of the other children. We resolved to meet and get autographs from everyone from the cast.

As you might guess, not everyone was there. Anthony Daniels was ill, which was a shame, for I would have liked to see him interact with Kenny Baker at the event. Sir Alec Guinness did not do press for these films, thinking them rather silly (once calling his lines “mumbo jumbo”), but recognizing all the talk of magic and the Force earned him another Academy Award nomination, and made him a multimillionaire (about $50 million total from the three films).

After Billy Dee Williams. We approach some of the larger (in this case, taller) actors. At seven feet two inches, Peter Mayhew was as tall as a Washington Bullet, but without all the grace of the players on our local basketball team. Back then, almost everyone was tall to me. The man behind (inside?) Chewbacca was friendly, and I enjoyed hearing him speak in his Yorkshire accent. 

Mayhew had been recruited for his elongated and wiry stature, while Dave Prowse, also a towering figure at six feet six inches, was recruited for his athletic physique. Of all the actors that day, Prowse gave me the most time and attention, saying that he would prefer to sign a photograph of himself rather than my paper plate. In block letters, the head shot of himself side by side with the Sith lord said DAVE PROWSE IS DARTH VADER. I did not argue with him, even though in my family we knew all about James Earl Jones, another (Actors Equity Theatre) buddy of my dad from two decades earlier. 

By contrast to those hulking figures, Kenny Baker and I could almost look each other in the eye, in that I was only a foot taller than his three feet, eight inches. I could tell that the diminutive actor relished the opportunity to talk to all the children. I remember feeling bad for him that his shoulders seemed hunched. He did not look particularly comfortable in his own body, and I wondered if he had had enough air while operating R2D2.

You’d think I would have spent much more time with Frank Oz, for he not only voiced Yoda, but also, Bert, Grover, and Cookie Monster, my constant Children’s Television Workshop companions of earlier in that same decade. Because people did not recognize his face, Frank Oz did not have as much of a crowd, assembled around him. He and I had a leisurely conversation, as much as my young self was qualified to do so. I did not request that he “do his Yoda voice.”

Harrison Ford was personable, but he also didn’t look like he was comfortable. He signed the autographs rather quickly, and then looked away. After I finished with him, I knew that there were just two actors left whom I had to summon the courage to approach: Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher.

When I walked up to Luke and Leia, they were deep in conversation, smiling and laughing with each other, obviously enjoying each other’s company, connecting authentically while a constant stream of children came up to visit with them. Mark Hamill signed the paper plate rather carefully while Carrie Fisher had a sloppier autograph. She might have been surprised by my expression of thanks, and that I kept making eye contact instead of moving along as I was supposed to. The Princess took just a moment to bend down to my level, quietly saying “you’re welcome” as if she were sharing a secret message. I will never forget her smile.

Thanks for subscribing to this newsletter. I host a print and video pub quiz every Monday night, and this makes me eager for Mondays. Please subscribe on Patreon if you would like to receive something substantive from me every week (in addition to newsletters like this one). For example, tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on topics raised above, as well as the following: That which is “under,” tears, Kamala Harris, baseball, extra soldiers in the audience, French royalty, oxygen consumption, wings, people who have an edge, pressures, promised lands, rickety alpha dogs in Congress, Wall Street, Indian food, unpleasant armies, seed production, Canadian diamonds, silent Ls, evangelicals, tropical Waldens, law firms, coaches with biscuits, collaborative rivals, rope tricks, membranous wings, singles, salsa, Trojans, securities that come in baskets, current events, and Shakespeare.

Of all the folks who support the Pub Quiz on Patreon, I am especially grateful to those who make significant investments in the Quiz. They get audio, video, and even Dr. Andy’s Book Club books mailed directly to their doors. This month’s book is Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson, and at least one team will receive it tomorrow! Please join me on Patreon if you would like to upgrade your Pub Quiz fun.

Poetry Night is Thursday at 7 at the Natsoulas Gallery. Despite the heat, we will meet on the roof!

Be well.

Dr. Andy

P.S. Here are three questions from last week’s Pub Quiz:

1. Cinematic Umbrellas. What does Gene Kelly do with his umbrella at the end of the famous titular Singing in the Rain scene?  

2. Pop Culture – Music. What South-Korean boy band has recently seen its  video for the song “Butter” set a new record for most YouTube views within 24 hours of release?  

3. Science. Recently scientists have discovered the brain connection responsible for misophonia, or super-sensitivity to what? Noise

P.P.S. “Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

When my daughter’s hamsters died, we buried them along a path in a public park just on the outside of our fence, so that we might return to their gravesites even after we sold the house. The grave markers – little signs made by Geneva herself – were positioned on our side of the fence. People visiting our home back then would conclude (correctly) that we were not accomplished gardeners, for no herbs grew under the tiny placards named for “Parsley” and “Sage.”

No such placards mark the back yard graves of two of my childhood animals: “Hubcap” and “Boxhead.” Hubcap was wounded juvenile squirrel that lived briefly in an open box in my basement bedroom. Boxhead was a box turtle that we “rescued” from the middle of Reservoir Road in Beavertown, Pennsylvania. My proficiency raising unusual pets in the 1970s was about equal to my gardening prowess.

That said, when back in DC, I return to 2454 Tunlaw Road to gaze upon the house where I lived from age 1 to 22. I also venture to the back alley to pay my respects to the final resting place of Boxhead and Hubcap, knowing that I was the only person who was present for both their funerals. I loved that house, for, quoting Philip Larkin, I found it was a home “proper to grow wise in, / If only that so many dead lie round.”

I knew the turtle and the squirrel for such a short time that my repeated remembrances of them can be attributed to a poet’s sentimentality. By contrast, today I am thinking of the back yard of a friend of mine who has suffered an incalculable loss, one that likely shades her every interaction and reflection. 

Because of my wife’s board position with the Smith-Lemli-Opitz Foundation, we have become friends with many parents of children with the rare syndrome that challenges the life of our son Jukie. While Jukie is physically healthy, we know from the shared stories of our friends that the Syndrome has taken the lives of many in our SLO community.

Our friends Bonny and Shane once had a beautiful son named Zopher. Born with developmental and metabolic challenges and a silly sense of humor, Zopher smiled, and laughed, and loved his parents like crazy. Shane and his father built a beautiful garden in their large back yard for Zopher to explore, to delight in, and to enjoy the company of his parents and their visitors.

Children born after a miscarriage or death of a child are called “rainbow babies.” As I write this, I am reminded that each of our three children is a rainbow baby, and this makes Kate and me all the more thankful for them. From their earliest days all the way to this morning, we see each moment as a treasure. 

Years after Zopher’s death from Smith-Lemli-Opitz Syndrome, Bonny and Shane told stories to their own rainbow baby, an angelic curly-haired daughter named Wren, now age two. In their home, Wren has seen pictures and video of Zopher, and in response she smiles at the infectious smile of a brother she will never meet in person.

When it came time to sell their house, Bonny and Shane told the new owners about Zopher, about the difficulty of leaving a property that is home to all their favorite Zopher memories, and about the garden that had been built for him to enjoy for many more years than he got to experience. The deed for the property would pass from one family to another, and that would be a necessary loss, but the thought of losing the place of those precious few memories was almost too much to bear. When it comes to my favorite memories of places I have spent with friends, I am reminded of what the Confucian philosopher Mencius said: “The people are the most important element in a nation; the spirits of the land and grain are the next; the sovereign is the least.”

As they prepared to say goodbye to their home with Zopher, Bonny and Shane recognized the wisdom of these words about “the spirits of the land,” and, as they soon found out, so did the new owners. As you can see in the photograph above, a new bench was erected in the garden where Zopher used to play, and on it the new owners of the garden had placed a plaque.

It reads, “Rest and Enjoy Zopher’s Garden. You made them Brave.”

May Zopher’s memory be a blessing to his family and to all who knew him.

If you would like to make a donation to the Smith-Lemli-Opitz Foundation to support medical research into this rare syndrome, do so knowing that none of the leadership or board members are paid for their work on behalf of the affected children and families. I would be moved if you were to make your donation in honor of our son Jukie, or in memory of Zopher (10/06/2015—02/06/18).

Tonight’s Pub Quiz may touch upon topics raised above. Expect also questions on snacks, scooters, land masses, secular educations, masks, cozy mysteries, first scenes, coaches, adorable children, authors who died too young, constitutions, screenplays, nominees, art history, wasps, glorious water, U.S. states, mandibles, notes, great lakes, home improvements, honorary degrees, sensitivities, butter products, umbrellas, buildings, and Shakespeare.

Happy birthday to Eileen Rendahl, sustaining supporter of the Pub Quiz on Patreon, and author of books that captivate and delight. She is a member of The Original Vincibles, a Pub Quiz team to which I am deeply grateful. Others who support the Pub Quiz most generously include Quizimodo, The Outside Agitators, and Bono’s Pro Bono Oboe Bonobos. Won’t it be wonderful when you get to hear these amazing team names resounding in an actual pub again? Please ask your local friends to get vaccinated, if they haven’t already, so that one day we can again participate in crowd efforts. If you would like to support the Pub Quiz on Patreon, and see tonight’s Pub Quiz, please do so. Meanwhile, thanks to the 26 that fund this entire enterprise!

Perhaps I will see you in person next month!

Best,

Dr. Andy

http://www.Yourquizmaster.com

yourquizmaster@gmail.com

P.S. Here are three questions from a 2018 Pub Quiz:

1. Four for Four. Which two of the following four of the best-selling authors of all time was or is a parent to twins? Stephen King, J.K. Rowling, William Shakespeare, Harriet Beecher Stowe.  

2. Voting Trends in Yolo County, California. What was the last year in which the Republican candidate for U.S. President earned more votes than the Democrat candidate in Yolo County? Was it 2016, 1992, 1976, or 1952?  

3. Pop Culture – Music. Aretha Franklin’s first number one hit was originally an Otis Redding track. Name this song that won Aretha her first two Grammy Awards.   

P.P.S. “You forget that the fruits belong to all and that the land belongs to no one.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

During those few times when we are not overencumbered with responsibilities, we rarely look up or around to notice how light and spacious the world is. In such circumstanced, we don’t always realize how lucky we are. 

Last week I was discussing with a friend that people in their 40s and 50s often find themselves attending simultaneously to the needs of both their children and their parents. According to my small sample size, parents in their 40s prioritize the children while eyeing their parents, while parents in their 50s pivot to inevitable parental transitions while eyeing their children. Discussing these challenges, I enjoyed commiserating with my overwhelmed friend, quoting John Lennon: “Nobody told me there’d be days like these!”

Sometimes we turn to gurus and other sage and experienced people for the advice that will help us calm our minds or make better decisions. My wife Kate has been facilitating a new mom support group in downtown Davis for the last 22 years. You might know someone who has benefitted from the advice and fellowship that she has offered during that time. Even though she has three kids at home, one with challenging disabilities, she has been facilitating this group on an unpaid basis over the last two years, telling me recently that our other sources of income allow her to do so. (Finally, she has set up her own Patreon in case those who benefit would want to pitch in.) She learns so much from running “the group” (as we call it), and our friends and our children all benefit from the wisdom shared by my favorite complimentary life coach.

Speaking of advice, Google and the Apple News app both seem to know that I am editing a collection of writing advice, for they keep sending me to websites with advice on other topics. For example, yesterday Google News directed me to an “Ask Amy” advice column titled “Alcoholic wife wants husband’s support to regain sobriety.” In it, a wife discusses the trepidation she feels in approaching her husband for help kicking the secret drinking habit that started six months after he gave her an ultimatum: quit drinking or get divorced. She needed him to forgive her relapse so she could count on her support to make healthier choices. I hope the husband accepts his wife and supports her. As shame researcher Brené Brown says, “What we don’t need in the midst of struggle is shame for being human.”

Reading this column, I also thought of my students. Overwhelmed by what this pandemic hath wrought, they find it difficult (as I do) to find the physical and mental space to engage in the sort of deep work necessary to write a long feature or profile for my journalism class. What’s more, my students know that I evaluate their submissions fairly and dispassionately, meaning that I spend part of my time with them pointing out the inadequacies in their writing.

We can see why this process overwhelms some students. My classes (and most college classes) come with an unspoken ultimatum: Do the necessary work, or you will fail. I keep up my part of this agreement by judging students texts and administering the rules, but, like the husband of the alcoholic wife (we hope), I also focus on the person making the mistakes, and the steps that can be taken to encourage discovery and growth.

The very last quotation in my writing advice collection is by Book Thief author Markus Zusak. He says, “Failure has been my best friend as a writer. It tests you, to see if you have what it takes to see it through.” I agree! I impress upon my students that the mistakes in their essays can be what James Joyce calls “portals of discovery,” that is, if they can free themselves of the feelings of dread and shame that they usually attach to egregious errors. Our mistakes, relapses, and repeated blunders give my students and me topics to discuss in class and office hours: they make learning possible.

But so that I do not become a dour and captious carper who seems preoccupied only with mistakes, I remind myself daily that patience and compassion for my beleaguered students must balance, perhaps overbalance, the implied ultimatum of the classroom. This pandemic has hopefully taught us all lessons about people (and perhaps about writing) that Gautama Buddha shared 25 centuries ago: “As rain falls equally on the just and the unjust, do not burden your heart with judgments but rain your kindness equally on all.”

I send deep thanks to everyone who supports me on Patreon, and who therefore make our pandemic pub quiz possible. Is anyone taking bets on when a pub quiz might return to de Vere’s? Special praise goes to our new Patreon patrons, Michael and Catlyn, and to our sustaining members, represented by the teams Quizimodo, The Outside Agitators, The Original Vincibles, and Bono’s Pro Bono Obo Bonobos. Let me know If you would like me to add you or your team to this list.

In addition to the topics raised above, tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on May 17^th, the names of Kings, clutch play, windows, rangers, Peter Gabriel, jewelry, buzzing insects, Oscar-winners, famous books, onetime choices made by grandfathers, minor gods, baseball, California cities, the chase, chemical elements, the dotted nature of fun, pianos, people named after lemons, flicks, squints, trios, current events, and Shakespeare. 

Poetry Night is Thursday via Zoom. Be sure to join us. We return to the Natsoulas Gallery (rooftop) in June.

Dr. Andy

P.S. Here are three questions from last week’s Pub Quiz:

1. Countries of the World. Which of the following is the equivalent in Lichtenstein of an American president? Would that be a king, a prince, a regent, or a viscount? 
2. Popular Acronyms. Originating in the 19th century, what acronym is spoken more than any other? 
3. Science. What is the oldest of the natural sciences? 

P.P.S. One more piece of writing advice: “The perfect ending should take the reader slightly by surprise and yet seem exactly right to him. He didn’t expect the article to end so soon, or so abruptly, or to say what it did. But he knows it when he sees it. Like a good lead, it works.” William Zinsser

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

My wife Kate gets at least three poems a year on special occasions, but one occasion was so special that I surprised her with an entire book.

In 2017, to celebrate our 25^th wedding anniversary, I wrote and had privately printed a book of love poetry simply titled 25. During the (short) time that I wrote that book, I called upon our history together, assembling remembered fragments from bygone eras into poems with coherent patterns of imagery that supported the book’s theme of appreciation and love.

Since then, I’ve returned to our love story as a topic worth exploring in poems the same way that certain memoirists – one thinks of Frank McCourt, Mary Karr, or Maya Angelou – return to their life’s struggles to find content for multiple memoirs (McCourt and Karr wrote three each, while Angelou wrote seven!). Kate loves these poems, many of them about how we met in London in the 1980s, so for years now I have brazenly published my private adorations on Facebook, and sometimes in my newsletters. If George Harrison and Eric Clapton could write five or more famous love songs about the same woman (Patti Boyd), then I figure I can fill and share a book or two with poems about Kate.

If you are interested, find an example below.

The We That We Are – A Poem for Kate on Mother’s Day

When was the start of the “we” that we are?

I’d like to identify that moment 

and lock it in my heart, but is it mine alone to name? 

Is its identity social, like the hands of the new 

bride and groom that will not unclasp?

Or is it held still and singular, like a poet’s image?

Your bright eyes widened wider than wide 

when you first entered our shared room to find me there.

That London home, respite from a semester of perpetual storms,

was our crucible, our love lab full of experiments, 

glances, your beaming smiles, and my gentle questions 

standing in for microscopes and beakers. 

Cohabitating tourists fated at first sight, 

we sightsaw tenderness hesitatingly, 

like brickbound discoverers of a revealed garden, 

wondering how it could be so.

Did the we that we are start then?

Did our first parting prove us unpartable? 

Did the we that we are start the moment of our first phone call,

your doe-eyed enchantment proving even stronger stateside?

We addressed each other from our parents’ homes, 

like the teenagers that we never were together,

the unhurried song of your soft American voice 

just as hushed and melodic as I remembered it.

Would we find each other again? 

A spark seeks kindle, as I sought you.

Did the we that we are start then?

Did the we that we are start at our reunion, 

our first fierce American embrace?

Did we young lovers consolidate into one when

we crossed state lines in my Checker Marathon, 

or when I brought you to the cabin in the woods 

that my grandmother had bought in 1955 for $1,500? 

I promised you rustic, but you expected running water,

and pointedly pouted when I pointed out the outhouse.

Did we start in DC, in Pennsylvania, in New Jersey, or in Ohio?

Did we really start being us in a Snoqualmie pup tent? 

In your Elmhurst bachelorette pad?

Everywhere I looked for you, I found you,

especially every time I closed my eyes.

You, you brought the same unalterable eyes, 

as deep as my dreams for us, to every rendezvous.

Those same eyes cried tears of joy 

in three maternity rooms, 

a mother working even harder than the midwives.

Today no Twitter feed distracts us

from the feasts you feed us.

Your face, this man’s joy and bliss, 

a private open book to my hungry gaze, 

is my preferred undistanced social medium.

I remember once on our rainy academic vacation, 

our genesis, asking if you would like to follow me 

into a Hampstead Haverstock Hill Road shop 

that sold clothes only for babies and infants.

We had been drawn to the window, 

for in our London, window shopping 

was the only shopping we could afford to do.

You demurred, saying that I could go in if I wanted, 

that you would wait for me outside.

You were not ready to enter that world 

of hopeful imagination, or not yet with me. 

Being so preliminary, the possibilities 

entertained there seemed almost cruel.

As is my wont, I smiled and stayed with you.

In my mind’s eye I return to that storefront, 

taking in the primary color wools and cottons 

that would be worn for so short a time.

I also take in your shop window reflection,

wondering then about a future together

that it has been my foremost joy to enact with you. 

The image travels with me still, 

(until now) private, and ever-present,

like a locked, heart-shaped locket. 

On Hampstead Heath, your reflected 

self shimmers like a visiting angel.

Our eyes meet (my favorite place to meet),

and 35 years later I ask myself again

if the we that we are started right then.

Thanks for reading. Tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on topics raised above, and on the following: TV addiction, hilarious friendships, famous glasses, carnivorous plants, basketball, diamonds, old acronyms, puppets, investors, biology, perennial losers, Kennedy examples, minority languages, stars and celebrities, heads of state, January releases, animals that talk in books, cautionary experiences, Peabody Awards, regular programming, singers’ sane minions, wolves, windy days, ocean heroes, and Shakespeare.

I so appreciate my new patrons on Patreon! Michael and Catlyn will both be receiving a weekly quiz from me. New subscribers get bonuses for their first month, such as the VIDEO version of the Pub Qui. If you would like to see what the video looks like, drop me a line so I can share the goods with you, as well. And thanks especially to the sustaining patrons: The Original Vincibles, Quizimodo, The Outside Agitators, and Bono’s Pro Bono Oboe Bonobos. If you enjoy these distractions, poetic or prosaic, you should also thank them. Or better yet, join them on Patreon!

Enjoy this blustery day. Kate and I are headed out to walk the UC Davis Arboretum.

Yours,

Dr. Andy

Yourquizmaster.com

yourquizmaster@gmail.com

P.S. Find here three Pub Quiz questions from last week’s quiz:

1. World Charities. What is the largest charity worldwide, with total yearly revenue of over $4 billion?   

2. Pop Culture – Music. What American musical duo from Columbus, Ohio produced the successful singles “Stressed Out” and “Ride” and thus produced the first album in history on which every track received at least a gold certification from the Recording Industry Association of America?  

3. Sports. Starting with the letter C, what Major League Baseball stadium gives up the most home runs?  

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

I once heard a comedian say, “Unless your name is Martin Luther King, Jr., I don’t want to hear about your dream.” Freud, astrologers, image-hungry poets, and new significant others are interested in a dream from the previous night, but most of us zone out, perhaps starting to check our mental “to do” lists, when someone insists on telling us their dream.

Ironically, I review my “to do” lists in my dreams, and then get to work solving absurd problems. Just last night, for example, I asked former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky to run to the deli to pick me up a sandwich, I enlisted my students to come up with pub quiz question topics in choir practice, and I was so late for a meeting that I didn’t realize that my bicycle had no brakes. So many apprehensions!

I suppose some people (maybe retired people?) have short, or even absent, lists of action items, and thus they don’t have what some productivity specialists, such as David Allen in his book Getting Things Done, call “open loops.” (The term “open loops” deserves disambiguation, for it has other meanings in other contexts.) But those of us who foolishly try to remember in our heads everything that has to get done, instead of depending upon an air-tight system, such as what David Allen espouses, will find ourselves haunted by symbolic representations of our various practical obligations in our dreams.

Perhaps this is why Wallace Stevens said, “A pension is the salary we earn for all the work we do in our dreams.” Of course, other poets resented Stevens for his insurance agency vice president salary and his pensions, for he was the most well-off of all American poets, meaning that he could afford to say that “Reality is a cliché from which we escape by metaphor.” As you would expect from an American, he also said, “The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream.”

So with a busy life and a busy dreamlife of errands and obligations, I find it such a relief to join a group of friends in Chestnut Park every Sunday morning at 9:00 for an hour of meditation. While walking the one and a half miles to the park, maskless, near no one, I seemed to inhale every known allergen that the stiff winds could blow my way. But when I sat down amidst (but at least six feet apart from) a group of meditators, the mask I wore protected my closed mouth not only from unlikely Covid 19 exposure, but also from whatever was making me sneeze so violently during my travels.

The feeling of relief, of sanctuary, was mental, as well as physical. Beneath the swaying trees, I heard the gong sound and then settled into myself, finally able to breathe easily, and to focus on my own sense of attentive belongingness. Noting and slowing my heartbeat, I began to count my breaths in cycles of 21. This may sound like an easy task, but in my first months (and perhaps years) of meditating, my mind would inevitably wander off before I got to ten or even 15 breaths, resulting in my having to start over. These days, I notice when my mind wants to go somewhere – to attach itself to some past or imagined moment of delight or anguish – and then I gently usher it back to the task at hand, observing the breath, and adding one more incremental eupneal step towards 21.

The time is fleeting, but I appreciate these moments of equilibrium, and relief from the attention one pays to the world’s (or the self’s) woes, and to one’s increasingly complex duties. When one can’t realize true respite, even in sleep, the meditator’s cushion becomes a life preserver.

I hope you can join us for our asynchronous Pub Quiz this evening. I will send out 31 questions and 31 answers this evening to all my subscribers. Some will get to see the show on video! Tonight’s Quiz will feature questions on topics raised above, perhaps, as well as the following: cyborgs, belonging (see above), leaps and landers, Oscar-winners, great Scotts, timber, real-life doctors, slams, purported thefts, remorse, fast and slow pitches, seeds, European neighbors, carousels, people who disagree with themselves, college basketball, the opportunity to work with animals, candidates, short enterprises, running in spats, home insurance claims, old ladies, California locales, smarts, stadiums, aviators, Greeks, the Electoral College, and Shakespeare.

Thanks as always to our regular subscribers. People supporting this venture on Patreon sustain this entire enterprise. I would love to welcome more of you, if you would like to gain all the benefits of sponsorship. Thanks especially to The Outside Agitators, Quizimodo, The Original Vincibles, and Bono’s Pro Bono Oboe Bonobos.

Stay safe, stay curious, and, as Frank Lloyd Wright says, “stay close to nature. It will never fail you.”

Best,

Dr. Andy

Your Quizmaster

https://www.yourquizmaster.com

https://www.patreon.com/yourquizmaster

yourquizmaster@gmail.com

P.S. Here are three questions from last week’s quiz:

1. Unusual Words. What do we call a broad, flat, flexible blade used to mix, spread and lift material, including foods, drugs, plaster and paints? 

2. Pop Culture – Television. What James Spader crime thriller television series was recently renewed for a ninth season? 

3. Anagram. What famous naturalist has the word INTERVIEWS as an anagram of his name?  

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

I missed going to church on Christmas Eve last year, and I have missed most Super Bowls since moving away from Washington DC in 1989, but I can’t ever remember missing a showing of The Academy Awards.

I grew up in a family that celebrated film. My dad laughed so hard the first time he saw the cowardly lion in The Wizard of Oz that he chipped a tooth on the theatre seat in front of him. My parents watched Lawrence of Arabia, all three hours and 48 minutes, on their wedding day. My dad showed Citizen Kane at my 3^rd Grade birthday party, leading a discussion of the film after the first reel (yes, reel). I got a job in a movie theater not long after my 16^th birthday, and was rewarded with a minimum wage of $3.75 an hour and retired movie posters, such as that of The Bounty, a 1984 sea adventure film that starred Anthony Hopkins and three other eventual Oscar-winners. My father was a movie critic all through the 1970s and 1980s (I donated his press kits to Shields Library Special Collections at UC Davis), and my brother Oliver has been a film critic since the 1990s (Check out some of his recent reviews on Rotten Tomatoes).

During the commercials at last night’s Oscar party, my ninth grader Truman had his turn, asking us tricky questions about Oscar winners from the past. With my encyclopedic knowledge of trivial pop culture facts, I often knew the answers, but somehow could not remember the names of the actors. For Maggie Smith I could only come up with “Maggie.” For Joe Pesci I could only come up with “that guy from Goodfellas.” We make many jokes about the fading memories of our parents (though my dad’s memory never faded before he died), but how soon will I need to get my own memory evaluation? Whenever I try to recall the name of one of my wife Kate’s favorite actors, Owen Wilson, I inevitably come up instead with Wilfred Own, the British World War I poet who reminds us repeatedly that our lives are as ephemeral as the memory of an actor’s name, or a line of poetry: 

Red lips are not so red

As the stained stones kissed by the English dead.

Kindness of wooed and wooer

Seems shame to their love pure.

O Love, your eyes lose lure

When I behold eyes blinded in my stead!

Speaking of mixing acting with poetry, Sir Anthony Hopkins recently appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and he was mixing in lines of Shakespeare with his answers to questions, perhaps the way that a preacher can’t help but cite scripture when chatting with friends at a local coffee shop, or the way that my dad would quote plays or movies while teaching me how to play chess or basketball. Our foundational learning and artistic experiences keep us company and inform our thoughts for the rest of our lives.

As my friends have grown tired of hearing, Kate and I saw Anthony Hopkins perform the title role in my favorite Shakespeare play, King Lear, in London in 1987. That semester abroad I also saw Sir Anthony and Dame Judy Dench in Antony and Cleopatra years before either one of them had been “promoted” to their aristocratic titles. As mad Lear, Hopkins wore the sort of fingerless gloves that he had seen some worn by some of the homeless who could be seen frequenting the east London neighborhoods around the Barbican Theatre where we saw him perform.

It’s amazing to think that Hopkins won his first acting Oscar (“Hello, Clarice.”) just a few years after we saw him do Lear, and his likely last Oscar last night for The Father, about a man who can remember his favorite tunes, but otherwise loses his bearings and risks losing his flat. Everything will be lost, eventually, but the magic of movies lets us visit faraway times and places while we are here, follow the careers of talented actors and directors while we are here, and revisit the film gems of our earlier lives, reliving personal and cinematic memories whenever we have a dark room, welcome company, and two or more hours to spare for the familiar, flickering journey.

In addition to topics raised above, tonight’s Pub Quiz will feature questions on the history of difference, food insecurity, lactic acid, goblins, big pianos, naturalists, mask policies, wonders of the world, trumpets, ferrets, bluffs, beat joints, notable universities, pets, pompous stewards, summer meals, propaganda, Chicago triumphs, hosts, best-selling books, cow’s milk, the Department of Agriculture, triangles, places partially named after trees, Canada, inherent goodness, dead fathers, intermissions, cowboys, ponds, flexible blades, actors named Chadwick, bells, rap stars, US States, famous cups, Vermont, biodiversity, and Shakespeare.

Thanks to my regular super-supporters. People who choose one of the higher tiers on Patreon make it possible for me to keep sharing these newsletters, and to make pub quizzes for you during our many months apart. Any bets on when we will get to re-converge? Thanks especially to The Original Vincibles, Quizimodo, The Outside Agitators, and Bono’s Pro Bono Oboe Bonobos. Oboes actually come up on the quiz tonight, so that’s fun. I hope you get to enjoy it, and I hope all of us get to go see a film in a movie theatre, such as The Varsity, sometime soon. The Varsity is opening on April 30^th! Exciting!

Be well.

Dr. Andy

P.S. Here are three pub quiz questions from last week’s quiz:

1. Family Mysteries. What is a “pibling”?

2. Science. What chemical element has the symbol K (Neo-Latin kalium), an atomic number of 19, and an atomic mass 39.098? 

3. Books and Authors. The title of Stieg Larsson’s most famous novel features a tattoo of what sort of creature? 

Dear Friends of the Pub Quiz,

Here is the deepest question you are likely to be asked today: “What do you want written in your obituary?”

One of the productivity gurus I follow, Michael Hyatt, has a book coming out tomorrow titled Win at Work and Succeed at Life: 5 Principles to Free Yourself from the Cult of Overwork. I’ve preordered my copy. In his talks and books, Hyatt asks his readers to consider their legacies, the accomplishments that really matter, when he asks questions such as, “How do you want to be remembered?” and “What do you want written in your obituary?”

This morning at my son’s school, his principal told my wife Kate and me the story of a man whom I have never met, but whom I highly admire. George W. Hinkle died in 2016 at the age of 95 – this is the year his descendants can celebrate what would have been his 100^th birthday. According to the Woodland Daily Democrat obituary, “George [Hinkle] was a veteran of the U.S. Navy, a Medic and stationed with the Marines in North Africa during WWII. Earned his Masters Degree at San Jose State, and for 30 years was a High School Principal and Teacher.”

George Hinkle had a special relationship with Greengate School in Woodland, for in his 80s and 90s, he used to come tap dance for the children there with disabilities. You can imagine their delight and wonder. Whereas a significant population of dancers in Hinkle’s day knew how to tap, today it seems almost a lost art, seen primarily in the same MGM musicals that once would have inspired young George Hinkle to take up the joyful practice in the 1930s.

Obviously Hinkle was touched by the connections he made at this special school over the years, for when he died, this former high school principal and teacher bequeathed $150,000 to Greengate School to use as it saw fit. While my son Jukie and his classmates were learning at home over this last year, “Hinkle’s Musical Garden” was built on school grounds. Today Kate and I saw the plaque, festooned with the image of disembodied dancing tap shoes: “In memory of George Hinkle who loved music, tap dancing and our Greengate students. George’s generous donation brought this musical garden to life for many students and community members to enjoy.” 

Along with a beautiful mural and new planter boxes, the new garden includes giant weatherproof marimbas, xylophones, and drums. Jukie will be particularly excited. Every time we go into Watermelon Music, Jukie makes a beeline for the steel drums. Mallets gripped tightly in each hand, he starts sharing experimental Caribbean music that delights others almost as much as himself. Recess will provide even more incentives for escaping the classroom than usual!

But for today, finally fully vaccinated, our unmaskable son Jukie is excited to return to in-person learning with his community of teachers and peers. When we arrived this morning, the lucky boy reached across me to open my car door. As has been true for so many of us, Zoom school has been an uneven substitute for embodied instruction, especially for this boy who loves to run and yodel in the sunshine between lessons.

Any principal or teacher’s legacy is established at the end of a school day, or the end of a long career of teaching. John Steinbeck said, “Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.” For a select few, a second legacy of song and dance can complement all those years of service as an educator. Like me, Jukie will never meet his school’s benefactor, but every day for the rest of his time at Greengate School in Woodland, he will compose and perform unruly songs on instruments that will echo across the Sacramento Valley the sounds praise and gratitude for the legacy of George Hinkle.

Tonight’s Pub Quiz may review some of the topics raised above, but it will definitely address the following: pursuits, listening robots, weasels, choices, girl groups, Harry Belafonte, sailors, Keanu Reeves, jerseys, candidates, dragons, chemical elements, electrical engineering, Oceana, the City of Davis, Arkansas, super heroes, developed nations, the example of hammers, ABC, thin items in baseball, bad puns, composers, famous islands, strange players, windows, the deaths of sole survivors, Venezuela, influential ladies, Springsteen heroes, perfection, current events, and Shakespeare.

I really appreciate everyone who supports the Pub Quiz and these newsletters on Patreon. Thanks especially to new subscriber Charles, who joined at the silver tier. The regular sustaining subscribers are creating a legacy in my heart with their ongoing support. They include The Outside Agitators, The Original Vincibles, Quizimodo, and Bono’s Pro Bono Obo Bonobos. I would love to include you or your team in this list, so please subscribe or upgrade at https://www.patreon.com/yourquizmaster.

By the way, do you know anyone who would like to work in an Irish Pub? 

Be well, and I hope you get to read or even view tonight’s Pub Quiz!

Dr. Andy

https://www.yourquizmaster.com

https://www.patreon.com/yourquizmaster

P.S. Here are three questions about European Capitals from last week’s Pub Quiz:

1. What European capital starts with a W?      

2. According to a 2016 study, at the time there was only one major capital city in Europe that depresses its country’s per capita GDP.  Name the city.  

3.  Which European capital is built on eleven million wooden poles?    

P.P.S. Contact me if you want me to perform a Pub Quiz for your event. Today I was contacted about a gig to take place in February, 2022! Some people plan further ahead than I do.