Pockets of Sanity

End of an Era

Last night was essentially The End of Trivia Night.

The weekly chore of having a meal, some drinks, and answering trivia questions had taken its toll on almost all of our team members, and over the summer the whole thing essentially fizzled out.  I still wanted to go, but mainly because I had nothing better to do.  Everyone else has lives, or something.

But we were able to pull the whole team together one last time to say goodbye to quizmasters Tim and Jen, who'd been hosting the game at our location.  They are moving to Boston, and so it was their final show.  We had to see them off.  I guess we needed closure.

And to bookend the whole sordid affair, we went back to our original team name: the Mind Bullets.  We'd changed names a few times over the last year or so, including stints as Fine Corinthian Leather and Zombie ABBA.  One night when it was just the dudes of the group, we came up with SatisfactionGuaranteed.com.  You know, to impress the single ladies in the place.  I don't think it worked.

It turned out to be a solid night of prizes though for team Mind Bullets as we scored the first prize house cash, two tickets for this weekend's Jacksonville Jaguars game, two passes to the local casino cruise (with buffet!), some Chicklets, and a container of McDonalds-branded Play Doh.  The Play Doh was made in China, so we'll try not to lick it.

And, well... that's that.  It was a helluva run.  But I still hope that I can get everyone together every couple of months or so.

Friday Words of Wisdom

Just remember, the average person does not consume 400 pounds of chicken in a year.  That's an absurd figure and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Pulp Trivia

The way I look at it, these trivia answers are your birthright.  I'll be damned if any of the other teams are gonna get their greasy little hands on your birthright.  So I hid them in the one place I knew I could hide something: my ass. Two long days, I hid these answers up my ass. Then right before I died of dysentery, I typed them up. And now, little man, I give the answers to you.

* There are 9 faceoff spots on a hockey rink. Most faceoffs take place at these spots. There are two spots in each end zone, two at each end of the neutral zone, and one in the center of the rink.

* Some dude sang some song that you might vaguely recall, but you won't guess this dude's name in a million years so really just bite the bullet when you're asked this question and take the points deduction like a man.  Quite frankly I can't even remember dude's name or the song or anything, so let's just move on.

* The ancient Greeks believed that the zebra was a cross between a tiger and a horse.  They called it hippotigris, or “horse tiger.”  Early Romans who tamed these animals for their circuses called them “the horses of the sun that resemble tigers.”

* France is the only European country with two elements on the Periodic Table named for it: Lutetium Gallium and Francium.

* On a side note, the Antonio Banderas-Angelina Jolie sex movie is called Original Sin.  Calling it the Antonio Banderas-Angelina Jolie sex movie will not help anyone remember the name of the film.

"Not so wounded as we were led to believe. So much the better."

If your back is ever up against the wall and dark, sinister forces conspire against you and make you play a deadly game of trivia, please for the love of God, NEVER forget these nuggets of knowledge.  They just might save your life.

* Ricardo Montalban is older than Clint Eastwood, Lily Tomlin and Lesley Stahl.

* After his infamous 1997 ear-biting attack on Evander Holyfield, the Hollywood Wax Museum moved boxer Mike Tyson's figure to the Chamber of Horrors - next to the figure of Dr. Hannibal Lecter (from The Silence of the Lambs).

* G.I. Joe is an American cartoon soldier. The character was created by David Breger when he was asked to create a comic strip for United States military magazines during World War II. Breger came up with the title "G.I. Joe" from the military reference "Government issue". His strip debuted June 17, 1942 in the military's YANK magazine and Stars and Stripes newspaper.

Skinny Dipping in a Sea of Me-diocrity

Things everyone should know (from Wikipedia):

* The fanciful design and manufacturer's logo commonly displayed on the Ace of Spades began under the reign of James I of England, who passed a law requiring an insignia on that card as proof of payment of a tax on local manufacture of cards. Until August 4, 1960, decks of playing cards printed and sold in the United Kingdom were liable for taxable duty and the Ace of Spades carried an indication of the name of the printer and the fact that taxation had been paid on the cards. The packs were also sealed with a government duty wrapper.

* The North Star is a title of the star best suited for navigation northwards. A candidate must be visible from Earth and circumpolar to the north celestial pole. The current one is Polaris. It is the star at the end of the "handle" of the Little Dipper asterism in the constellation Ursa Minor.

* Metal foil has been around for centuries. Foil is solid metal that has been reduced to a leaf-like thinness by beating or rolling. The first mass-produced and widely-used foil was made from tin. Tin was later replaced by aluminum in 1910, when the first aluminum foil rolling plant “Dr. Lauber, Neher & Cie., Emmishofen.” was opened in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland.

* Tic-Tac-Dough premiered on NBC daytime television July 30, 1956, hosted at first by co-creator and co-executive producer Jack Barry, who also hosted soon-to-be-popular (and scandal-ridden) Twenty-One.

* In western astrology the sun is in the sign of Virgo from August 23 to September 22, following the sign of Leo.

* (From Anheuser-Busch.com) Anheuser-Busch Recycling Corporation (A-BRC) provides a positive alternative to mandatory deposits and helps reduce container costs. As one of the world's largest recyclers of aluminum beverage containers, A-BRC recycles more than 100 percent of the beer cans Anheuser-Busch ships domestically.

Another Non-Video Post

Regarding trivia night last night... three words: redemption.

I leave you for the weekend with a discussion question.  Those of you who know me know that really, really nice, friendly, outgoing people annoy the hell out of me.  They make me cringe.  I don't like making small talk with strangers, and usually come up with ridiculous schemes to get out of that particular chore.

So are really outgoing people in the wrong?  Or am I?  Am I just a mean bastard for wanting to be left alone, or are they out of line for crowding my personal space with their meaningless babble?

Are you one of these people?  Or are you like me and want to curl up into the fetal positon when a total stranger starts telling you about every detail of their life?

The Third Place

From Wikipedia:

"The Third Place" is a term used in the concept of community building to refer to social surroundings separate from the two usual social environments of home and the workplace.

Sony's PlayStation 2 advertised itself as "the third place". The exact meaning of this phrase in this context was left unstated, to add to the air of mystery surrounding the product launch, which was accompanied by surreal, dream-like game visuals. The purpose was to create the idea of Playstation 2 creating a virtual world unlike any real location.

David Lynch directed the commericals for the PS2's "the third place" marketing campaign:

Official Watercooler Retraction

In a rare moment for me (so take note!), I'm going to reverse some things I said last week when talking about our extremely friendly waitress from trivia night.

Last night, our makeshift trivia team (LDC's Maine interests were elsewhere and Denirogator Buckshot had other commitments) was again treated like royalty by our new favorite waitress.  And I'm taking back some of the things I said about her, hinting that she was only being nice and flirty in order to get a good tip.

She's the real deal folks.  She's a genuinely nice person that for whatever reason loves doing what she's doing and loves it even more when she has good customers, treating them as best she can.  I can't imagine anyone saying that they love being a waitress, but if you're looking to create some sort of national campaign for that sort of thing, she's your poster gal.

I arrived a little early as always, and after securing a booth she came over to tell me that she was glad we were back and that she came in early just to make sure that she got to work the section that we like to sit in.  Let me repeat that: She came in early, hoping we'd be coming back, just so she could get our section.  Then she just sat down with me for a while, telling me all kinds of stories about customers both good and bad over the past week, and about how she was worried about having a slow weekend at work because Paris Hilton is opening some damn club in our formerly Paris Hilton-free city.

Then the conversation took an odd turn.  She started mentioning how she'd had to dress in other waitressing jobs but preferred how she was dressed now, because she wants her customers to like her for her personality and her waitressing instead of her body.  She doesn't want to be thought of as the type of girl you wish you could take home for the night, but the type of girl you can easily talk to.

Anyway, she got a little more detailed than that, and I'm not going to think of her as anything more than an extremely nice waitress and not put her into either of the two camps she mentioned, but she's definitely a class act as far as both people and waitresses go.  I just always worry about people like her though, because people that happy and friendly always seem to end up getting the worst from all the assholes out there.

So good luck to you, waitress lady.  Keep smiling.

(Oh, and for the fourth week in a row, the team won.  We own June.  No one can defeat us in June.)

Everyone Here is Such a Loser

One of my favorite South Park episodes is one called "Raisins", where the boys take Stan to a Hooters-like establishment called Raisins (think about it...) to help him get over his breakup with Wendy.  During the course of the episode, Butters falls in love with one of the Raisins girls, mistaking her faux advances for genuine affection.

I usually have a great deal of trouble in the service industry distinguishing general niceness with blatant flirting.  Most times I'm out somewhere getting food or whatnot, the cashiers/drive thru people are just doing their job... handing me my food and giving me the company line.  But every so often I run into someone who confuses me. 

I get so used to people not paying me any mind in public that when someone really gleefully starts to talk to me, it seems weird.  If I'm in a Hardee's drive thru and while I'm waiting the nice lady turns to me, flutters her eyelashes and says "You know I love a man who can eat a whole Monster Burger... is that what you ordered?  Tee hee!" it throws me off a little.  Is this person just one of those overly nice types?  Is she flirting and I'm just too dumb to realize it?  Should I turn around and propose marriage to her?  Is she my soulmate?  Did she get my order right?

Now at places where the staff is working for tips, I have no such problems.  Anyone being touchy/flirty and over the top nice to you is not smitten with you.  They might be a friendly person, sure... but that's what places look for in waitresses.  And since they're working for tips, the nicer they are the bigger the tip.  I'm no Butters in these situations.  I get it and don't let it cloud my big dumb male mind.  But I also try to avoid it whenever possible, and even though the show might be nice, I rarely go to Hooters.

Here's where this rather directionless rant is going.  Last night at trivia we had an extremely friendly waitress, and all I could think about was Butters at Raisins.  She was almost quoting dialogue straight from that episode, saying things like she liked our table the best because everyone else was insulting her by complimenting her hot body (even though she was spending just as much time flirting with those so-called "pigs").

So here's my discussion topic for you.  In tipping situations, how does it sit with you when the waitress/waiter is way over the top in the nice department?  Do you still tip big?  Does it make you angry to the point where you don't tip as much as you might have?  After all, it is a bit of deception.  She didn't mess up our order or anything... nothing about her job was done wrong.  But would the flirty/touchy stuff bother you or entice you?

Cheaters Never Win. Oh Wait, Yes They Do.

I don't get to socialize as often as I'd like to.  Lately I've been able to spend one night a week with friends, having a meal and playing a trivia contest in a local restaurant for about two hours.  That's about all I have, socially.  And even that can't go right.

Friend and trivia teammate Denirogator pretty much summed everything up about last night's trivia contest.  Let me add a few things though.

Two questions into the thing I essentially stopped caring.  The team lead by Captain Jackass and his merry bunch of douchebags were blatantly cheating to get answers.  I saw and heard them on the phone, calling to get answers from someone else. 

This is the same asshole that three weeks ago was blowing his top because he thought WE cheated.  This is the same asshole who goes nuts every time someone in the crowd shouts out an answer or turns in their sheet at the last minute.  Yes, he's so worried about an even playing field.

Not that I'd understand the desire to cheat if there were real prizes involved, like cash or a car or something, but the grand prize of this thing is simply a gift certificate for a shitty restaurant.  No one knows your name, you don't get your picture in the paper... you get a gift certificate for some bad food.  That's it.  And people feel the need to cheat to win this marvelous prize.  It's pathetic.

I don't mean to sound ridiculous when I say that it ruins the integrity of the game, but that's exactly what it does.  If our team gets beat fair and square, then fine, that's how it goes.  I'd gladly lose to people smarter than me... I've been in that boat my entire life.  But why even bother competing when you know that other teams aren't even trying?  They're just calling their jackass friends at their jackass homes and having them Google the jackass answers.  Jackasses.

Anyway, we're out.  Our team won a moral victory last night, but we were also smart enough not to place in the money and so we won't feel obliged to return next week.  Instead we'll try a new location.  It can't be any worse at whatever new place we decide to go to.