QuizList

Happy New Year, all. I know a few people still recovering from the night of the 31st…

Time for QL’s review of the year, and for once I am at a loss. I think the main story was pub closures, and though I have tried as far as I can to keep the site up to date, I’ll repeat my plea that if you know of a pub closure or quiz which is no longer running, please take a minute to let me know. You don’t go on any mailing list and your e-mail address isn’t used in any other way, but you will have done all users of the site a favour. People are generally keen to tell me when something new starts; when it finishes it’s kind of ‘out of mind’ but not necessarily out of site (sic) as you haven’t let me know to remove it…

Anyway, pub closures, recessions, big jackpots… I think we have come nearly full circle to the position of 10-15 years ago, with a small number of people targeting big money and big jackpot quizzes, and barrings and bannings happening. On the other hand, small quizzes with no big cash atttractions are being held onto by pubs as they draw the punters in during these difficult times. I think predictions of the end of quizzing as we know it are premature, and we’ve heard it all before…

Low points were easier to identify than high points. There was that ill-advised return to a quiz where we were sure we’d been shafted twice and being almost certainly shafted again (the QM didn’t recognise us) – three losses by one point to drunk teams of the QM’s friends is too much, and besides I took the answer sheets so am aware of the winning team being marked right for wrong answers… enough said. Then there was being presented with a round of Suduko counting for ten points. Then there was going to a quiz organised from work and my colleague picking ‘Music’ for our joker round (turned out to be national anthems…).

High points – what? The continuation of some good local quizzes, like the Three Compasses in Hornsey and the Five Bells in East Finchley, some good quizzes outside London like the Rendezvous in Weymouth and the perennial Mermaid in Porth, and the usual good company and good times at quizzes when people don’t take things too seriously.

So the usual thanks to Carl, who created the site and does all technical things; some of the better pub landlords and QMs (you know who you are); everyone who has sent me information during the year; and Quizzers Extraordinaire NC, PH and MF; and here’s to a prosperous 2010.