The venue for the 2008 annual SIAS pub quiz was the homely City Tavern and the atmosphere, drinks and pizzas provided during the evening were just what the teams needed to get their minds into gear.
A total of 22 teams entered to compete for the title, including the 2007 winners who didn’t quite cut the mustard this year. Despite there being no prize in 2008 for best-named team, two at least deserve special mention. The ‘Seriously Intellectual and Sexual’ team were in fact very intellectual and possibly a little too sexual, while ‘Pat Butcher’s Leotard Fanclub’ did provoke some speculation as to what lurked beneath their crisp white shirts and sensible ties.
The erudite quiz masters took the teams through five rounds of questions including a sports round, a pictures round and a culture round. The questions were far from easy and included “What is the furthest thing you can see from the London Eye on a clear day?” and “Complete 9SBLVB”. In the culture round nearly all teams mistook the Songs of Praise theme tune for The Antiques Road Show. It’s easy when you have the answers.
Fantastic winners this year were ‘Munich Re United’ who got an outstanding 91% of questions correct. Second place was a close-run thing, only decided by a tie-break question between ‘Smack Boy and the Fat Blokes’ and the aforementioned ‘Pat Butcher’s Leotard Fanclub’. They both scored a commendable 89.9%. Smack Boy (or perhaps one of the Fat Blokes) did the team proud, taking home second place.
The shame of last place fell on the shoulders of ‘Four Wierdies and a Beardie’ from Barnett Waddingham, but they didn’t seem to mind so much when they were given a few bottles of wine to take home. Many thanks to the quiz masters, the City Tavern, and to all those who came along. I’m looking forward to next year’s event already.