Just came across a column about quizzo in Columbus. I was reading along and enjoying it when it came to this part: “It’s something that’s so prevalent in other cities — Indianapolis, Minneapolis and, obviously, New York. Um, what in the hell are you talking about? There might be a few pub quizzes here and there, but don’t give me this “Obviously, New York” crap. New York is known for a lot of things. Quizzo is not one of them. Everybody in Philly knows quizzo. I bet 9 out of 10 New Yorkers don’t know it. Sorry Columbus, but get your history straight before you go spouting off to the liberal media.

Alright kids, we’ll have our first Bounty Bowl in over a month next week. Duane’s World won for the 5th straight time last night, so next week at the Black Sheep there will be a $20 bounty on their heads. According to my calculations, they are the 6th team to have a bounty put on their heads (but I could be wrong. Let me know if your team has had a bounty on their head before), after the Sofa Kingdom, MAGMA, the Jams, Satan’s Minions, and the Young the Old and the Restless. Pretty good company that. Also, good news. JGT shows up on the first page when you google “Bounty bowl”, just a notch below the infamous 1989 Eagle-Cowboy games. I’m pretty proud of that. So is Luis Zendejas.

Yeah, so this week’s quiz is hard. Mad hard. Hardest ever. Last night, I had two teams score in the 80s, two in the 70s, and I think all of the other teams scored under 60. And we had plenty of teams at both spots. I might ease off the gas just a bit tonight, but not too much. There’s still money on the line. My money. The good news about a hard quiz? It was hard for everybody, and we got two fairly random winners last night. I love my regulars, but parity is a good thing. We’ll see if that carries over tonight. As for Quizzo Bowl, well you cheap bastards have spoken. 2 out of 3 people want to do it somewhere for $20 instead of the Marriott next month, so it looks like we’re pushing it back a month. It will be late March/Early April. Once I get my car fixed I’ll go talk to the folks at 8th and Washington and see if we can do a dim sum Quizzo Bowl. That might be a lot of fun.

• Tonight, we kick off at the Rendezvous at 6:15. The Mission, as always? Knock off the Jams.
• Then, at 8 p.m., Duane’s World goes for 5 straight at the Black Sheep. Can you stop them?

Trust me on this one. It reminds me of worst album covers ever. I want to thank my good man Jim for sending this in. Got anything that you think I should post? Send it in!

Our friends out in Denver just had their Geek Bowl III, and it was apparently a huge success. 360 people, and they sold out in five days. Their Big Event is a little harder to put together in some ways (They have 8 freaking rounds) and easier in others (Their venue rental fee was $500. That would pay for an room for us if I was able to cut Quizzo Bowl down to about a 10-15 minutes run time.) But all in all, it sounds like it was a major success, and he’s hoping to go bigger next year. I am planning on attending next year, and if any teams want to make a mid-winter weekend getaway to a place that’s even colder than here, let me know. By the by, one thing I noticed is that a lot more teams in Denver had team outfits made. I cannot have that. I think team uniforms may be worth extra points this year at Quizzo Bowl. I will not allow Denver to have more flair!

RELATED: More Geek Bowl goodness.

• Here’s something worthless to know I just found out the other night: Former STP front man Scott Weiland, who played at the TLA Friday night, uses a teleprompter to remember his lyrics when he’s onstage. Is that kind of cheating? (Don’t ask me how I know that.)
• Here’s some fun geography facts.
• Today is National Geographic’s 121st birthday. Celebrate by checking out some of their cool photo galleries.

Alright, kids. Michigan entered the Union on this date in 1837, so under pics of last weeks winners I’ll have a question about Michigan. One guess per person.

OK, first of all, I’m getting a ton of questions about Quizzo Bowl. Unfortunately, I was real close to signing a deal with the Marriott. But I thought I could convince them to drop a few more bucks off their room rental rate and they refused to do it. So here’s the deal. If I charge $25 a head, we can get the Marriott and do it next month. If I charge $20 a head, as I had initially hoped, I gotta find a new place and we won’t do it until at least the end of March. The $25 a head includes the normal entertainment (band, etc.) and a great venue but does not include alcohol (yes, there will be alcohol for sale but it’s not included in the $25 price.) I’m posting a poll below. Let me know what you think.

There is also a problem that doesn’t happen much but sometimes it does and I need to throw out a reminder. Do not come to quizzo if you are going to drink water and not order any food. I mean, you don’t gotta drink, but if you’re not gonna eat either then I would rather you not come. No offense, but these bars are running a business not a charity. If you’ve got a table of 8 and your bill is $20 you are wasting everybody’s time and space. Again, this is pretty rare and hardly worth mentioning, but I just want to make sure we’re all on the same page here.

Biggest hot streaks right now? Duane’s World has won 4 in a row. The Jams have won 3. As far as best chances to win? I’d say right now, the Black Sheep may have supplanted the Good Dog as most wide open. No offense to Duane’ World, who are a great team, but they have not had a good, solid rival in a while, now that Catdog has been scarce. If you want a solid shot at winning, I’d suggest Black Sheep.

And finally, a rather amusing antecdote for all of you Sofa Kingdom haters out there. They missed 3 questions out of a total of 80 in two quizzos this week…and lost both quizzos.

…the birthday of one of the most idiosyncratic history makers of the 20th century. I’ve read several books about this guy. I mean, could you imagine if Malia had some unusual disease, and some crazy charlatan was the only person who could cure her, so Obama started having this strange guy stay at the White House, and while he was there he started sleeping with the wives of all of the higher-ups in government, so they had him killed? And then, well, if you don’t know about his death, do yourself a favor and read about it. Die Hard, folks. Oh, and he had a huge penis. Happy 140th birthday Grigorii!

It would be the 78th birthday of one of my all time favorites today if he were still alive. Cooke was killed under very strange circumstances in 1964. Here’s the background on what happened.