Sports-themed quizzes begin the week

Tuesday, October 12, 7ish pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Rounds: ALL FIVE ROUNDS ARE SPORTS

This quiz will immediately follow a Philadelphia Eagles-sponsored charity water pong event at the bar. The quiz is sports-related in conjunction with that.

Tuesday, October 12, 9ish pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: GUESS WHAT ... SPORTS

Wednesday, October 13, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: ASIA

Thursday, October 14, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: THE 1970s

No Draught Horse Tuesday night quiz this week; remaining schedule as normal

Owing to my minor elective post I have to have a good 13 hours of argument with the other officials at a polling place on Tuesday.

This means the early Tuesday quiz is off for this week but I'll still be doing the late quiz at El Camino Real. Not sure yet what the subject round will be for that, but hopefully I'll be updating this post on Wednesday with the info for the following two nights' quizzes, which will be held as normal.

Tuesday, October 19, CANCELLED, GO HOLD YOUR NOSE AND VOTE... OR NOT, WHATEVER
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.

Tuesday, October 19, beginning roughly 9-9:15pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: TBA

Only Tuesday night quizzes this week owing to Phillies' playoff run

Tuesday, October 19, AFTER BASEBALL GAME ENDS
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Rounds: TBA

Tuesday, October 19, POSSIBLY BUMPED BACK A BIT OWING TO BASEBALL
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: TBA

Because the Phillies made quick work of the Reds, the quiz schedule is unaffected

Tuesday, October 12, 7pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Rounds: CHEMICAL ELEMENTS, US STATES, OSCARS, DAIRY PRODUCTS, SCANDINAVIA

Tuesday, October 12, 9:10pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: CHEMICAL ELEMENTS

Wednesday, October 13, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: US STATES

Thursday, October 14, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: MAGIC

Quiz schedule not too disrupted by Phils' playoff schedule... yet

Tuesday, October 5, 7pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Rounds: SIT-COMS, TREES, FAMOUS AUTHORS & BOOKS, MONEY, WORLD RELIGIONS

Tuesday, October 5, 9:10pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: FAMOUS AUTHORS & BOOKS

Wednesday, October 6, ?pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: BASEBALL

UPDATE: The quiz is going to happen immediately following the Phillies game, likely in the 8pm range. Go Phils!

Thursday, October 7, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: WORLD RELIGIONS

What to do with your evenings

FYI, with the Phillies making the playoffs for the fourth consecutive year, any evening of a Phils' game will be a likely be a night without a quiz at any given venue. More detail as details emerge.

Tuesday, September 28, 7pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Rounds: POPULAR WEBSITES, SERIAL KILLERS, PENNSYLVANIA, GAME SHOWS, COLLEGES & UNIVERSITIES

I promise this time 'round to stick to that menu!

Tuesday, September 28, 9:15pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: POPULAR WEBSITES

Wednesday, September 29, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: GAME SHOWS

Thursday, September 30, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: MEXICO

Upcoming quiz rounds

Tuesday, September 21, 7pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Rounds: BASEBALL, POPULAR WEBSITES, ROMANTIC COMEDIES, SOUTH AMERICA, REALITY TV

Tuesday, September 21, 9:15pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: POPULAR WEBSITES

Wednesday, September 22, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: ROMANTIC COMEDIES

Thursday, September 23, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: NAME THAT ACTRESS

Your Subject rounds for this week

Tuesday, September 7, 7pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject: There will be 5 subjects, different ones for each round - let's try that. No one in the room cared about Cartoon Network programming last week, a true shock to me. I thought that's all college age kids did these days...

Tuesday, September 7, 9:15pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: ASTRONOMY

Wednesday, September 8, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: ???

Note: I will be doing a corporate event 9/15/10 so Quizmaster John will have the reins for this evening. He is writing his own quiz in the usual format.

Thursday, September 9, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: PRIMATES

Twice-weekly Draught Horse quizzes begin now!

"Double your pleasure, double your fun." September begins the 7pm Tuesday quiz at the Draught Horse up at Temple U.'s campus. What's the same, what changes?

Nothing changes Wednesday and Thursday nights at 12 Steps Down and the Draught Horse. Same Bat-time, same Bat-channel, same Bat-format. The Thursday night quiz will be in the standard format and will have a completely different set of questions than Tuesday, thus you can play there twice/week if you like. Please do.

Tuesday night at El Camino Real does not really change except for the fact that I might get there a tad after 9pm these first couple of weeks doing the 7pm as we hack out the format and I work my way down to Northern Liberties.

Tuesday evening at the Draught Horse, however, will be riding the psychedelic pserpent through Crazyville at first for many of you who are accustomed to the normal Quizmasterchris format. The quiz will be a bridge between Happy Hour and other, later-night events and is designed to hook some new folks and add a new twist for people stuck up at campus who might want to play twice/week. (You're welcome!)

For one thing, the weekly annoucement of a Subject, as per below, applies to the entire quiz, not just one round. All of the 4-5 rounds of the quiz will be on the same subject. We will likely be giving prizes for the highest score per round, as well as perhaps a cumulative prize as normal for the whole evening. Let's see how this works.

Most radically... are you seated? You'll want to be seated for this. This is seismic in this little quiz world.

We're going to try a bit of a wagering system for points. None of this random jokering you get at some quizzes however. The answer sheet for each round of ten questions will have a space for a Primary Answer and a Secondary Answer. If your Primary Answer to a question is correct, and you write no Secondary Answer, you get 3 points for that answer. If you write both and the Primary Answer is correct, you get 2 points. If your Secondary Answer is correct, one point. Zero points for two wrong answers.

Let the games begin!

Tuesday, September 7, 7pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject: ADULT SWIM CARTOONS

Tuesday, September 7, 9:15pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: FURNITURE

Wednesday, September 8, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: '70s KIDS' SHOWS

Thursday, September 9, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: CANADA

This week marks the return to Temple U. quizzing; You could have chosen any quiz, you chose QuizmasterChris

Tuesday, August 31, 9pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: ALL THINGS JAPANESE

Wednesday, September 1, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: HATS

Thursday, September 2, 9pm
The Draught Horse
Broad St. & Cecil B. Moore Ave.
Subject Round: THE SIMPSONS

Your Subject rounds for this week

Tuesday, August 24, 9pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: BIOLOGY

Wednesday, August 25, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: FAMOUS CATS

Get ready for the next term with a quiz

Tuesday, August 17, 9pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: WORLD WAR II

Wednesday, August 18, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE

September 2 will bring return of Thursday night quiz to the Draught Horse

Keep 9pm Thursday nights open as my quiz officially returns to Temple U.'s own Draught Horse for the third consecutive year this September 2nd.

If and when I have Earth-shattering news about further quizzing in that time-space continuum vicinity you, dear readers, will be the first to know.

Cool stuff given away once again at this week's quizzes

One of the fabulous first prizes up for grabs this week at one of the quizzes - haven't decided which yet - in addition to a gift certificate will be an ultra-cool copy of this The Lady Is Afraid 1950 Dell "Mapback" mystery paperback by George Harmon Coxe. Why would I give such wonders away? As is the case with much of the stuff I give to winners, I already own a copy.

Tuesday, August 10, 9pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: SO YOU THINK YOU CAN ANSWER QUESTIONS ABOUT DANCING

Wednesday, August 11, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: MAGAZINES

This week's upcoming fourth round subjects

Tuesday, August 3, 9pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: FAST FOOD

Wednesday, August 4, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: BONES

This week's upcoming fourth round subjects

Tuesday, July 27, 9:00pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: FAMOUS PEOPLE WHO'VE DIED RECENTLY

Wednesday, July 28, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: BONES

Back home, this week's quiz schedule

Tuesday, July 20, 9:00pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: PORTUGAL

Wednesday, July 21, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: MOROCCO

Hello all, good to be back and hosting quizzes after a belated honeymoon to Portugal and Morocco. There will be plenty of photos etc. to share over the coming weeks. In the meantime just know that I will be asking you about both countries this week in the Subject rounds, seeing as this is my quiz world and you're competing in it.

Hopefully all went well in my absence. Hopefully not too well; I prefer to think of myself as indispensible regardless of reality.

Full coverage for all quizzes while I'm away - all quizzes will be held sticking to the normal schedule!

Just a quick note to let you all know that while I'm overseas for the next three quiz cycles, all six normally scheduled quizzes will take place as usual, save for my presence.

Quizmaster Fox from the Kensington Hookers Against Cockfighting team, frequent El Camino Real winners, will take both quizzes week one. Quizmaster John from all-time-high score holders and frequent 12 Steps Down champs Lil' Roy will do the other four over the second and third weeks.

Both fellows are brighter than they look and I expect youse to treat them with the same casual derision you would treat me. They're writing their own material, some was run by me and it has my Seal of Approval. Times, prizes etc. are all as normal.

Have fun and have a great early summer - I'll see you again past the mid-point of July.

Talking back to the local Fox propaganda branch

Weekday evenings I pretty regularly catch the Fox 29 local news before the nightly airing of The Simpsons. I watch not so much to learn anything about the world - a person who doesn't view at all is more likely to have some idea of what's going on, their head not filled with distortion and lies - but to keep tabs on what a lot of the public is being fed about what's going on.

The broadcasts are cartoonish distortions of the worst of modern American local news from which Kent Brockman himself would resign. Each evening there's a full 90 minutes of emptyheaded narcissist talking heads speeding through a confusing mix of edutaining half-factoids, garbled together in a dumbed-down stew of rightist elitism disguised as populism.

In between the daily jabs at government waste (the private sector is presumably efficient and honest) and a xenophobic tone against anything or anyone the slightest bit different, there is a clear and persistent attack on unionized workers, most regularly public sector workers. This regularly manifests itself in attacks on teachers, who are uniformly depicted as greedy, incompetent and criminal social deviants who bankrupt state and municipal government.

The obvious reason that public sector employees are targeted is that the vast majority of American private sector employees have had no real rights to organize since the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in the late 1940s, and almost all of the private sector union jobs have disappeared. I imagine Fox 29 would also attack local Leni Lenape for all of Philadelphia's problems if there were more than a handful of those people left. Fox lets no weakened social actor go unmolested, the consumate bully.

I am not exaggerating. Hardly a broadcast goes by in which unionized teachers especially are not villified in the manner of "commies" in the 1950s blacklisting days. This is the constant drumbeat of any of the many media outlets owned by Rupert Murdoch throughout the world, and has been on four continents for decades. If you want to work even in local news for Fox, you have to take cheap shots at honest working people every single day. In a just world these jackholes would be driving themselves to honor-salvaging suicides.

This evening they ran a piece titled "THE WORLD IS BROKE" with it's own big, scary red-bold-lettered graphic as the third of fourth "news story." Why is the world broke? Because Pennsylvania and New Jersey teachers won't take a pay cut below the wages guaranteed in their current contracts. Of course! This was stated as fact, with no opposing viewpoint, with no suggestion that cutting teachers' wages and benefits was anything other than the only way to balance state budgets.

I wrote an email to the two anchors of this travesty of a news show immediately following its broadcast, pasted below. I'll let everyone know if I hear anything back from these cowardly cheap shot artists. Fuck them.

----

I watched your commentary - certainly not a news piece but an opinion piece disguised as news - under the rubric of "The World Is Broke" this evening. It's difficult to say where to begin, but if you submitted that work in a freshman economics class I doubt you would pass the course. The piece did nothing to explain any actual budget troubles and solutions, but did much to continue your incessant biased drumbeat against union employees, particularly ones in the public sector.

This is to be expected from any Rupert Murdoch-related propaganda outlet. What amazes me is the lack of any attempt to disguise your hate for a living wage and decent benefits, and your advocacy of state governments breaking binding legal contracts with their employees. A more effective propaganda machine might even have some token opposition, preferrably an ugly individual with a poor speaking voice and foreign-sounding name. Astoundingly your "fair and balanced" coverage can't be bothered with even a token word of opposition, even taken out of context. Mr. Murdoch must be a demanding person for whom to work.

I'm left wondering both how you're allowed to continue to hold an FCC license and how you sleep at night.

Your collective ignorance of economic concepts and realities is immense, but I expect little from Communications majors. We don't have enough time to educate you fully, but consider a few bullet points:

- The statement "The World Is Broke" taken by itself has not even internal logic. If there are debtors there are also creditors. Perhaps you mean to state "The World's Wealth Is Inequitably Distributed" or something similar. I long for the day when daily news broadcasts point out that usury has bankrupted our ability to meet the needs of our citizens.

Some 2 billion people on the planet face food insecurity on a daily basis, in large part because of austerity measures imposed to collect on national debts and transfer public wealth to commercial banks, because of cheap food commodity dumping by the richer nations and because of a lack of fair compensation for work. Somehow "The World Is Broke" was not about them.

Some 10% of the able-bodied American workforce is idle (these are official figures; reality is worse) because of an ecomony wrecked by Wall Street casino losses, offshored jobs and low wages. Somehow "The World Is Broke" was not about them.

Tens of millions of Americans have one or more jobs but still live in poverty (low wages) and/or face bankruptcy (#1 cause: healthcare bills). Somehow "The World Is Broke" was not about them.

No, your piece focused on state budget battles. PA, NJ and DE state governments are "The World."

- Given that last point, we could see a number of ways to balancing state budgets. One way would be to collect taxes from corporations and richer citizens at the higher rates they were collected decades ago, when government deficits were not what they are now. Another method might be to cut corporate welfare spending. Another might be a small transactional tax on risky commodity trades of the sort that imperil most people's economic well-being. Another option would be for the federal government to fund its state mandates, which it could easily do by cutting the war budget (half of discretionary spending all by itself) and/or by collecting taxes from the 60% of domestic and 70% of foreign corporations who pay none, or even receive rebates.

You suggest none of this.

No, your world is broke and the primary cause is that public sector union workers have the temerity to get paid a day's pay for a day's work, and expect to receive the pensions they've been paying into their entire working lives. Worse, these people expect to receive the pay and benefits they've already negotiated for and have received a contract to do. "Shame on them!"

I wouldn't write this as parody because it's not believable in fiction as a depth to which a "news" organization might stoop. I'll add I've never held a public sector position, union or otherwise. I just can't believe how vicious, how hamfisted and cartoonish your attacks on those people are. You don't even shill well.

- Deficit spending has always been considered a legitimate means of economic pump-priming by government. This is why FDR is generally lionized by historians and why the Hoover years are generally recalled like a bad case of acne. I would suggest looking up the name "John Maynard Keynes." He was the most influential 20th century economist, and you've basically turned everything he had to say on its head. In short, government can spend some cash in temporary deficit to employ people, create growth, and eventually make the money back through taxation. Do you think when the government spends money that it disappears down some hole, never to be circulated again? This has the side effect of keeping people from starving and rioting, which many of us regard as positive.

I assume some of you are actually aware of these ideas and reject them because of deeply held (if not in fact deeply thought-out) right wing beliefs. In the end it doesn't matter if you've arrived at this position through honest stupidity or willing ignorance, either way you are poisoning the public discussion and you need to stop.

- You have a fantastic ignorance of the wealth and health of societies with strong unionized labor in the public sector. Scandinavia as an obvious example has far more unionized workers as a % in both the public and private sectors than do we. Their public debts are lower compared to GDP than ours. They have healthy citizens, low crime rates and a longer life expectancy. They have higher wages and more benefits. Clearly paying a day's pay for a day's work bankrupts neither the individual nor the government.

The Third World has almost nothing in the way of public or private sector unionization. They have low wages and often no benefits... and high ratios of public debt. Clearly tearing union labor to shreds is not the path to economic recovery. It is, in fact, the road to ruin.

Forty years ago roughly 30% of the American labor force was unionized. Wages were higher, unemployment was lower, national debt was lower and state debts were not problematic. Certainly no austerity measures were imposed on public sector workforces.

Obviously these facts have no place in your fantasy broadcasts, which are unfair (as in "not fair") and imbalanced (as in "crazed.")

When, if ever, are you going to be running a one-sided screed in favor of state governments honoring current labor contracts, especially as a means of keeping our societies out of the toilet?

Yours,

[signed with contact info]

---

I'll let everyone know if I hear anything back. Fuckers.

Slade provides your World Cup soundtrack

Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge, Alabama coast

Toxicity + oxygen depletion = dead Gulf of Mexico. Why is an Alabama newspaper able to get this out there but the major networks "can't"?

Your pre-vacation quiz schedule

Tuesday, June 22, 9:00pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: SOCCER

Wednesday, June 23, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: FISH

Folks, note that I'll be taking a couple of weeks' vacation the first two weeks in July. I haven't otherwise missed a regularly scheduled quiz in more than two years and this is very necessary. At least one of those weeks will have an understudy to fill the gap, but there might be a week without a quiz. I'll be updating you in person and on this site as detail develops.

RIP Manute Bol

He was a big man in more ways than one. This ESPN video has embedding disabled, but I highly recommend clicking over to YouTube for a couple of minutes to see what one guy really trying to make a difference looks like. What a life!

Quiz schedule back to semi-normal this week

Tuesday, June 15, 9:00pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: SCI-FI

Wednesday, June 16, 7:30pm
12 Steps Down
9th & Christian Sts.
Subject Round: AFRICA

BP sweet light crude has the electrolytes shrimp crave

I continue to be transfixed, to the point of general distraction, by oil drilling professionals' discussion as to what's going on at TheOilDrum. And the the SkyTruth images. Between the two you'll be ten times better informed about all this than you could be by watching TV or reading the usual newspapers and their websites.

Your severely truncated quiz schedule for this week

I have trouble with small numbers and calendars it appears. Philly Beer Week is this week and your beer quiz is this week as well.

As noted below, this Tuesday's quiz will be beer-themed owing to Philly Beer Week. As of today we're looking at not holding a quiz Wednesday night at 12 Steps Down in order to facilitate people watching Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals, which is scheduled also for 7:30pm. If I speak with management in the meantime and we decide to hold the quiz regardless, I will notify people here ASAP.

Tuesday, June 8, 9:00pm
El Camino Real
1040 N. 2nd St.
(2nd St. below Girard Ave.)
Subject Round: REGIONAL BEER

One quiz in a week for two consecutive weeks - pathetic!