I had the pleasure last Saturday of being the MC for a “trivia night” competition at the Houston Senior Center.
The event was designed to benefit the Houston Friends of the Library, which is certainly a worthy cause for a fundraiser. Plenty of people attended (probably about 50) and Friends of the Library members Robert and Sue Simpson did a fine job of compiling 100 questions for the competition (10 each in 10 categories), and as I read them into the microphone, I took the opportunity to add comments and observations related to my fondness of irony, sarcasm and general humor. I had a blast, and basically – as the cliches goes – fun was had by all.
But as I operated the Powerpoint software while sitting with Robert Simpson (who acted as the official timer, making sure teams didn’t spend more than 30 seconds pondering their answers), I couldn’t help but be amazed at what was going on in the room.
To put it simply: People were answering lots of questions correctly.
After each “round” of 10 questions, a panel of three judges examined each team’s answer sheet. Then, team scores were announced – both for the round and cumulative.
The categories ranged from entertainment to science, geography, military history and more. No matter, though, because some team was always turning in eight, nine or even 10 correct answers. Sure, there were close to 10 people on some of the teams (and only two on others; that was kind of weird), but the fact that anyone at all would know which planet the moons Europa and Io revolve around or what the world’s smallest sovereign country is was impressive to me.
Mr. Simpson was equally amazed. We jointly concluded we were in the presence of some fairly well informed people.
And remember: These are folks from a podunk small town in flyover country. Perhaps the knowledge of people in such places isn’t limited (as some “city folk” might assume) to things like what channel airs reruns of The Andy Griffith Show or where the auctions will be held this weekend.