Trivia Hound

Some people are pussy hounds and to those people I tip my hat and beg of them that I may accompany them on their next voyage.  We also have actual hound dogs that befriend young foxes and subsequently refuse to kill them out of a code of honor and deep friendship.  If I were to classify myself as a hound, I would call myself a trivia hound.  When I pick up the scent of random factoids and questions being asked in a game show like atmosphere, I lose all my bearings and run like mad to find a small eraser less pencil and a piece of paper.  Once the call of the trivia has been answered, I shed my mild mannered personality and become a creature of unbridled competition.  I must win.  Nay, I can’t “just win”; I must win in a fashion that proves I am far superior to all those who dared enter the trivia cage match.  It is my duty as a trivia hound to prove how much better I am at answering a collection of twenty odd facts based around a certain subject matter than the average participant.

My trivia hound was awakened recently when my team of four won a $150 bar tab by soundly defeating eight teams at Black History Month Trivia.  We were the Malcolm X-Men and the beast had been unleashed.  Trivia is a sport that changes me.  Sure I compete at my fullest at physical sports like Tennis and Monopoly, but it is the blood sport of trivia that brings out my warring side.  I know I can win at trivia.  I’ve proven my trivia skill countless times on Sporcle (my training gym).  Sometimes, I’ve defeated Sporcle quizzes without cheating.  Nothing can compare to true trivia with real stakes and oh did we have some.  It was my friend’s birthday and I didn’t want to spend money on drinks for him or me.  What better way to hide my inherent cheapness than to win that bar tab and cover his drinks under the guise of my share the victory attitude.  T’was a genius plot and yet it nearly fell askew.  We fell flat out of the gate, stumbling a trifle on the arts and literature section, until righting ourselves on the history train (all me baby), and staying close in the music area (all my teammates baby) until we pounced on the final question.  My teammates, well at least one of them, were able to impose a guise of chumminess and frivolity.  I sat there, stoned faced and unable to comprehend their lack of intensity.  I could see people talking and I saw their words floating on past me, but I could not for the life of me recognize their meaning.  Only the triviateer held any meaning to me.  Everything else was at best, frivolous.  Is this what the great athletes felt at their very own moments of reckoning?  I assume they did, because the alternative is being a try-hard.  And everyone hates a try-hard.  

The final question came, and it was an easy one (of course) as the answer was “Freedom Riders”.  We commenced waiting mode to see if the team that stood ahead of us would make a critical error and, in layman’s terms, fuck up.  Indeed they did fuck up, and we ended up winning the tab and all the glory that comes with winning a trivia game over eight teams of nice Brooklyn people.  My friend got his free drinks and I basked in the ecstasy of being a cheapskate once again with a celebratory drink of Jamesons.  Upon sipping the Irish whiskey, I immediately remembered I am quite the featherweight with alcohol and I promptly order a Cosmo, because let’s face it, that drink is delicious.  Trivia called and I had answered her siren call with a moderately well-deserved victory.  We had won and my personal hound retreated back into his home to curl up near the fireplace and lay dormant till the next event emerges.  He lays there waiting for the next challenge whether it be general trivia or women’s history month trivia.  Always waiting.  Always waiting.