Tuesday 29th July, 2003 – Pub Quiz

Yesterday we won our local pub quiz for the second week in a row. Naturally I was pleased, but the buzz was not as great as last week, when Jane and I skipped home, drunk on glory – we went to bed but couldn’t sleep, and when we did sleep, we had quiz-related dreams. What a feeling. The man from the Lightning Seeds would have described it as ‘the tippermost, toppermost high’. Stupidly.

Yesterday however, the victory was tarnished. The previous week, we had been plucky underdogs, fearlessly squaring up to the five joyless, curmudgeonly Goliaths who were the reigning and perpetual champions. Overcoming them, and watching their haughty, professional quiz-players’ faces crumple as they realised they had been beaten was half the thrill. As they solemnly trudged out into the night, I felt like a king. LIKE THE KING!

Returning as champions yesterday was an altogether different experience. We were there to be shot at. If we won, then it was only to be expected. But if we lost, then we would be yesterday’s news – forced to walk out, like ‘Tie Me Giraffe Down, Sport’ before us, into the cold trivia wilderness, never to return. They were notable by their absence yesterday – broken men, no doubt - but their non-attendance only threw our situation into sharper focus. It is lonely at the top.

As it was, we swept into the lead from Round One, carding an impressive 9 in the film round, and were never to be pegged back. Sweeping all before us, we became arrogant and presumptuous, scrawling our answers with barely a second thought. I could see what we were becoming, and I hated it. And yet I couldn’t stop it.

As I looked into Jane’s eyes, I caught sight of myself – was this the same fresh-faced, quiz-hungry youth who had innocently set out the previous week with nothing more than a couple of drinks and a good time in mind? Staring back at myself – now a cadaverous, jaded quiz journeyman, hollow of cheek and cruel of mouth – I felt my gorge rise violently. Taking a woozy step sideways, I tilted my head back and launched a powerful column of vomit at the ceiling. Metaphorically.

What I am trying to say is that it was slightly less fun this week, because we had won the previous week. Worse still, when the final scores were announced (with 42 out of 50 questions correct, we set a new Three Pigeons Monday Night Quiz record), we were booed! In truth, the boos all emanated from one team – two podgy, fleece-wearing, flat-faced, prematurely balding students who had been marking our quiz sheets throughout the evening. Perhaps they had overheard my disparaging remarks as they failed to identify Rat Scabies as a member of The Damned, or to recognise a photograph of Legally Blonde actress Reece Witherspoon. Perhaps they simply resented our success. Either way, it was an ugly way to end the night, and just added to my sense of deep, quiz-related ennui.

We will go back next week to defend our crown, but at what cost to our souls? TO OUR SOULS????