The facts of life
March 24, 2008 – 8:05 am
Some people only feel truly alive when they are singing, or dancing, or channelling their energies into creating great art. Me, I only achieve such self-realisation when I am participating in a pub quiz. In everyday life my disordered brain struggles to process routine information, like remembering that I need to pick up my keys before shutting the front door behind me. But ask it to answer random and entirely useless trivia questions - such as who was the first man to wear yellow trousers in the House of Commons, or how do crabs urinate, or which former West Ham goalie used to work for NASA* - and it clicks into gear like a well-oiled if slightly grey and mushy machine.
My year off meant I was able to devote more time than ever to harvesting nuggets of ephemera. Initially housebound for much of the day, I would flit around Wikipedia for hours stumbling upon precis of different breeds of owl, or Trotsky’s theory of permanent revolution, or the career or PJ Proby - anything that I could take on board within my two-minute attention span. The result of this was that my head became stuffed with all manner of nonsense that no amount of brainwashing will ever shift - such as where the world’s largest ball of string is located, or what is the collective noun for a group of ravens, or who invented the hovercraft**.
None of this rubbish has any practical value whatsoever, but I returned from my break at least hoping to take the capital’s pub quizzes by storm. Sadly, however, the triumph to which I am due has not yet materialised. This is because I cannot find one running anywhere near my house. I have moved into a trivia vacuum.
When I first came down south five years ago I was a regular at a music quiz run weekly at the Old Dairy in Finsbury Park. To prevent High Fidelity-style anoraks dominating proceedings, the master of ceremonies would always include a round on Rick Astley or Banarama. It was brilliant, but now I live across town and can’t get there in time.
So I’m issuing a heartfelt plea: if anyone knows of a decent pub quiz in north west London, let me know. I’ll come along and join your team and tell you (if you didn’t know already) what phobia Napoleon suffered from, which is the only mammal that can’t jump, and what bullet proof vests, fire escapes, windscreen wipers and laser printers all have in common***. Please. I’ve got to get all this drivel out there somehow.
* Benjamin Disraeli, through their eyes, Shaka Hislop
** Cawker City, Kansas (it has a circumference of 40 feet), a murder, Sir Christopher Cockerell
*** Fear of cats, the elephant, they were all invented by women
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