Dan’s Papers Trivia Team Strikes Back
Last night, the brilliant minds of Dan’s Papers Townline BBQ trivia team, Thursday Night AA, came in first place in an evening filled with questions about physics, literature, current events, movies and more. Even more exciting was that we stayed in first place the entire game. With was no final act upset to throw us off, we had a clean, solid victory that felt like a long time coming.
Perhaps it was teamwork that ensured us the win:
A physics category question asked for another name for an Einstein–Rosen bridge.
“Oh! It’s like a portal!” I exclaimed. “What’s another word for portal?”
“Wormhole?” Brendan suggested.
“YES! It’s a wormhole!” I replied excitedly. Correct!
Or maybe it was Kelly’s deep knowledge of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium series, naming The Girl Who Played with Fire when asked to name the second “The Girl Who…” book. It could have been our team’s ability to cancel out every fantasy comedy film from the ’80s to identify a quote from The Princess Bride. Or Dan Koontz’s encyclopedic knowledge of Dickens novels.
All of these contributed to our win last night. But our real secret weapon? An old relic that promised to bring us untold fortune and luck.
The Katayama-branded figurine, titled Ding Dong Bell, features a little boy and little girl holding a black cat by a well. The cynics in our team initially thought that this yard-sale find depicted the children about to throw the poor cat into the well to its doom, but upon finding the “Ding Dong Bell” nursery rhyme we realized we were wrong.
Ding, dong, bell,
Pussy’s in the well.
Who put her in?
Little Johnny Flynn.
Who pulled her out?
Little Tommy Stout.
What a naughty boy was that,
To try to drown poor pussy cat,
Who ne’er did him any harm,
But killed all the mice in the farmer’s barn.
So we assume that, unless the creators of the figurine had sick senses of humor, the little figurine shows Little Tommy Stout pulling the cat out.
At any rate, the little antique gave off good vibes all evening. We’ll clearly be bringing it with us every week. Interestingly, Katayama figurines were created as cheap knockoffs of the more expensive Hummel collectibles; judging by last night, though, they have mystical powers that far exceed any monetary value.
Hopefully we’ll be back next week with another tale of victory from Townline BBQ. Have a great weekend, East End!
Note: This is the Dan’s Papers trivia team’s fifth 1st place finish at Townline BBQ Trivia Night in Sagaponack. Read our past victory blog posts: First Win, Second Win, Third Win. Fourth Win.