Category: Happenings

JGTSI Scores Are Up; New Physical Challenge Posted

Here are the scores after 6 weeks. Things are getting interesting. The top of the leaderboard is littered with teams who are taking this physical challenge stuff seriously. After that, we’ve got our usual suspects (Steak Em Up, the Jams, and Duane’s World). I think our Top 10 teams are all but settled. That leaves a lot of teams vying for our final 5 spots. You wanna get a leg up on earning one of those spots? There’s a new physical challenge on facebook. Extremely simple, and should be pretty funny to see photos of you guys as kids.

Now, before you decide whether to do a physical challenge and get your team out to quizzo the next few weeks in the hopes of earning a spot, keep this in mind: you are not only vying for fabulous cash and prizes, you are vying to be a part of history. The Top 15 teams not only get an invite to the JGTSI, they will be representing Philadelphia against Denver, Albuquerque, and Austin in a City vs. Smackdown at 7 p.m. on Sunday, August 7th at the National Mechanics. We’ll have live music, drink and food specials, and a lot of fun. And the city whose top 10 teams have the best average scores? They get to name the Cup that will be presented to the winning city at either Geek Bowl if it’s one of their cities or at Quizzo Bowl if it’s Philly. I really want Dicker, the head of Geeks Who Drink, to have to walk on stage and present me with that trophy.

There is some hope if you don’t finish in the Top 15 and want to be a part of this historic event. You can earn a wild card spot by winning first place at a quiz on the last week or performing a series of extremely difficult physical challenges. But you can make things a heck of a lot easier on yourself by getting your ass in gear the next two weeks. Between finishing Top 3 at the quizzes and getting physical challnge points, there is no reason any team can’t shoot to the top 15 in the next two weeks.

But there’s no time to waste. Your best shot to earn points? Right now it’s playing at City Tap House, Ugly American, and the Bards. They’re the easiest bars to score a win in right now. And furthermore, I’ll have physical challenge points to give out at actual quizzos this week. So be there! Hope to see ya this week!

3 Philly Funnymen You Absolutely, Positively Should Be Following on Twitter

It seems like the people whose tweets I enjoy the most also have the fewest people enjoying their tweets. It goes to show what a s**tshow twitter is. Whereas 8.3 million people are apparently fascinated by Kim Kardashian (latest tweet: “I learned so much about couture today!”), most of the funniest, most talented standups in Philly only have a couple hundred followers, if that. Well putting them on this site ain’t exactly gonna make them famous, but that’s not the point. The point is that if you are a fan of my quizzes and my sense of humor, then I think you’ll get a kick out of picking up what these guys are putting down. So each day this week I’ll post 3 new people who write my favorite accounts. And if you’ve got any recommendations for people I should be following, please post on facebook or in the comments. Oh, and if you wanna follow me on twitter, just click here. For day 1, I’ve got 3 of the funniest guys on twitter.

John Kensil. Completely off-key and hilarious. He once told me, “Never go for the first joke that comes to mind. Always go with the second one.” Thus his strange and zany twitter account, where his jokes never tend to end where you think they will. Here’s a sample:

I broke my nose watching womens soccer. The phone rang and my pants were around my ankles.

It’s so hot this morning I just saw a kid making tar angels in the street. Oh wait a minute. Breakdancing? No scratch that. It’s a seizure.

The Octomom had a flash mob in her uterus.

Jim Grammond. Edgy, hilarious, and clever. A former member of MAGMA from back in the day turned very funny comedian.

A lot of people forget that desegregation halved business for a lot of hardworking, honest water fountain makers.

These Tropical Starburst make me feel I’m relaxing in an island paradise that’s littered with Starburst wrappers and contains my work desk.

Going to Wildwood for the day because I want to dodge roving packs of trashy kids on wooden planks rather than sidewalks.

Chip Chantry. Just as hilarious online as he is in person. But don’t tell him I said that. I don’t want him to know that I think he’s funny.

Fireworks are like pornography: Professional ones are prettier, but amateur ones are way more fun.

Justin Timberlake & partners just purchased MySpace for $35 million. In a related story, Joey Fatone bought a futon off of craigslist.

Tone Loc pleads not guilty to domestic violence charge, stating “That’s what happens when bodies start slappin'”.

I’ll be back tomorrow with 3 more Philly funnymen.

Let’s Relive Our Childhoods Next Week

The Denver style quiz was weird. There were some things I liked about it and some things I didn’t. I liked the fact that you could blow it on one topic and still have a chance to win, and I liked the audio rounds. Those of you who didn’t play Thursday (and that was most of you. Where the hell was everybody on Thursday?) missed a damn good music round. Here’s a sample of what you missed. What did you think of the Denver style quiz? Vote here.

Next week we’re going to start acting like adults, with our “Cartoons, Comics, and Kid’s Stuff” week. There will be plenty of questions about the things that you were into when you were a kid, whether you were a child of the 60s, 70s, 80s, or 90s. Video games, board games, cereals, Saturday morning cartoons, Barbie dolls, etc.

We’ll also have an “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader” style round, with my mom writing questions she’s asked her 4th graders through the years. And of course child stars. Lots and lots of child stars. This is gonna be a good one. Oh, and speaking of cartoons, Koob and Kristy will be hosting an all-Simpsons quiz on Monday at Chenango.

There are rumors that I’ll be hosting a regular quiz in the Art Museum/Fairmount area in the near future. Are they true?

And JGTSI scores coming Monday. There are two weeks left to get your team in the mix and represent Philly in the City vs. City Smackdown. Otherwise, you’ll have to take your chances on Wild Card Week, where to earn an invite you’ll either have to win that week or perform some damn hard physical challenges. You’ve got until Monday to earn 6 points via a very easy physical challenge. If you wanna earn an invite to the most important quizzo in Philadelphia’s history, 6 quick points can get you right in the thick of things.

 

Geeks Who Drink Rules Week

As you know, City vs. City Smackdown is going to be the city of Philly versus the Geeks Who Drink crew. We’ll be taking on some of the best teams in their “Big 3” cities of Austin, Albuquerque, and Denver on August 7th to determine who wins the City vs. City Smackdown…and who gets to name the trophy that will be presented at Geek Bowl (if one of their cities wins) or Quizzo Bowl (if Philly wins.)

Well, the event on the 7th will be using Geeks Who Drink rules (the last time we did City vs. City, we used Philly rules), so I figured we needed to warm up a bit using their rules this week. That means that this week we’ll be dropping our normal scoring system for their asinine system. Here is how it works. There are 8 Rounds of 8 questions each (still trying to figure out how to do this in less than two hours. I may actually have to start on time this week.) Here’s the deal, courtesy of Dicker of GWD fame:

8 rounds of 8 questions. All rounds worth 8 pts unless otherwise indicated.

R1-theme round
R2- music round – 16 possible points
R3 – 50/50 or speed round
R4 – theme round
R5 – visual round
R6 – theme round
R7- audio round (usually clips from movies/TV)
R8 – random knowledge –  16 possible points

Joker: can be played on one round only by circling the joker icon on answer sheet. Doubles points for that round only. Once a team decides to joker, their decision is final.

Conventional wisdom is that if a team knows they got 12 or higher on round 2, they should joker it since round 8 is completely random in subject matter and difficulty.

Mama Goodtimes’ Summertime Questions

My mom wrote a round for Thursday’s quiz (and asked the questions at Ugly American). Here is that round. I think you’ll agree it’s kind of tough. In fact, it was harder. I made her change a few questions to make them easier. There are only 9 questions because one of them was the question of the week. Answers are after the jump.

1. The largest beach city in Orange County, this city with beach in its name infuriated residents of Santa Cruz by trademarking the name Surf City, USA.

2. What former Philadelphia prostitute made the lyrics “Summertime, and the living is easy” famous?

3. Three species of sharks are responsible for almost all shark attacks. What three species are they?

4. This US city has by far the most days a year above 99 degrees Fahrenheit, with over 100 days a year at over 99 degrees.

5. This month, which gets its name from the Roman Goddess of weddings, has been considered the most popular month to get married for centuries, thought it now looks like that may be changing.

6. What creature kills more people per year than any other, being responsible for the death of over 2 million people per year worldwide?

7. When does the summer solstice occur in the Southern Hemisphere?

8. Folly Beach is a popular wedding destination found near what southern city?

9. Who were the two stars of Muscle Beach Party, Bikini Beach, and Beach Blanket Bingo?

Continue reading “Mama Goodtimes’ Summertime Questions” →

JGTSI Scores Updated Through 5 Weeks

Here is the updated scoreboard. With a win and 6 physical challenge points this week, Brown Betty has taken a commanding lead. Now that Steak Em Up is way down the list, maybe I should offer a prize for whoever scores the most points. I’ll think about it. Teams in yellow are in contention for the bonus prize, while teams in blue would also earn invites if the season ended today. Teams in the green…well, they better start scoring some points in a hurry, or they won’t get the opportunity to defend Philly’s honor against Denver on August 7th.

Your best place to score points in a hurry? There have been 7 different winners in the past 7 weeks at O’Neals, and City Tap House has been wide open this summer. Things have slowed considerably since school ended at CTH, but the prizes are just as awesome as ever, and during the summer they are easier to win. $100 Gift certificate to the winner, $50 for 2nd place. If you want to win and get into the mix, I’d highly suggest the City Tap House next week.

Updated JGTSI Scoreboard

Here it is, the scoreboard through 4 weeks. (This does not include the latest “overrated” physical challenges.) We are now halfway through the contest, and things are looking really interesting. A 2 person squad is in 3rd place, Steak Em Up has fallen to 7th, a team that hasn’t played yet is tied with Duane’s World for 4th thanks to physical challenges, and perennial contenders Savage Ear, 1022, and Insert Topical Team Name are nowhere to be found on the Top 20 list.

If you want to get your team in contention, you can almost instantly. Just get a photo of you performing the latest physical challenge on facebook by Wednesday at noon. After that, we’ll be taking the rest of that week off from physical challenges, so don’t wait too late.

And be sure to look over the scoreboard and make sure I have your points right. Some teams switch names each week so I don’t necessarily give them all the points they deserve.

Quizzo Overrated Says Philly Mag.


Philly Mag is a magazine written for Lower Merion moms, who as a demographic don’t play a lot of quizzo. So I don’t think Philly Mag’s assessment of quizzo as “Overrated” will really affect my bottom line a whole lot, but I do think it’s a bit of a low blow. For one thing, I was asked by a Philly mag staffer (who shall remain nameless, but is a good friend of mine who runs a certain local food blog. But again, no names) asked me to help give him some overrated/underrated ideas, which I gladly did. Then, after spending my time (free of charge, mind you) sending them ideas, quizzo gets trashed in their overrated piece?

Apparently par for the course for Philly publications. A few years ago, Philadelphia Weekly asked me to help rate their top 50 bars. I gladly did so, only to pick up the issue and that in that very same article they had listed Fergie‘s as the best quizzo in town. Was everyone who makes editorial decisions for local publications raised by wolves? Manners, people, manners.

But that’s not what really bothers me about this. What really bothers me is that the assessment of “Overrated” doesn’t make any sense. Overrated how? Is quizzo overrated because of the non-stop media coverage? The numerous corporate sponsorships? The people rioting over it in the streets? Furthermore, how does anyone on the Philly Mag staff know if it’s overrated? I don’t think they have quizzo at (Insert Flavor of the Month Scenester restaurant here), where the draft beers are $8 and the passenger pigeon terrine is “to die for”, so I’m not sure what they’re basing it on.

Quizzo is what it claims to be. A simple way for friends to have an excuse to drink a couple of cold ones at the bar on a Tuesday and hang out for 2 hours. How can that be overrated? If you’re gonna say that I’m overrated, or Irish Jon is overrated, or what have you, then you at least try to have an argument. But I’m not sure how quizzo itself can be construed as overrated. That’s like saying that beer is overrated or a night on the town is overrated.

Furthermore, your magazine is called Philadelphia magazine, and you’ve never run a piece on quizzo (that pic of me in Philly mag a couple of months ago was awesome, but the article was about the Phillies, not about quizzo), which has gone from a small Irish bar tradition among friends to a multimillion dollar national phenomenon in the past 20 years, and which started for all intents and purposes right here in Philly. That would make it different from some of your overrated things like cheesesteaks and Rocky, which you’ve written about, oh I don’t know, every single month for the past 35 years.

But that’s not what really pisses me off. What really pisses me off is that they have both Cole Hamels and the Palestra as “Rated”. Cole Hamels is the most underrated World Series MVP in history (he got booed earlier this year AT HOME) and the Palestra is half-full for most games despite being the coolest basketball arena in the country. I know most of you don’t get a chance to watch sports while you’re drinking French 75s at Swanky Bubbles**, but then goddamnit all hire somebody that knows something about sports. I know a guy, and as much as he rails against it, he loves passenger pigeon terrine. Furthermore, he was raised by wolves.

**Is that place even still open?

The Philly Team Funded by Cocaine, the Draft Day That Destroyed the Sixers, and a Mini-Stadium

The answer to this week’s question of the week was Larry Lavin. Interestingly enough, he bought one of Philly’s most historic venues in 1980, then moved a minor league basketball team in there. The end result was a disaster for the team, the arena, and for Lavin.

In 1986, the Sixers destroyed a dynasty in about half an hour. Here’s how it went down.

Ten years later, they became the only team in NBA history to spend back to back picks on future Major League baseball players.

An interview with miniature stadium creator Steve Wolf. You have to see his miniature stadiums to believe them.