Monday, February 19, 2007

FUN FUN FUN at Hopewell Elverson

Well, I'm not going into great detailed with this. It was a fun match. We had fun. That's all that matters. To me, it was like a confrence-wide practice for the invitational. So I really didn't keep too much track on what went on. But I do know a little.

I arrived in the middle of a wedding reception. It felt awkward because I really wasn't dressed for a wedding. I don't know what I was dressed for. I had decided to dress like one of the jokers on a pack of playing cards: half black half white. So I a black shoe on my left and and a white one on the other. The socks complimented it. The black shoe had a white sock, and the white shoe had a black sock. The black pants complemented the white shirt ("I Survived Quiz Invitational 2004"). The crown I spray painted different prongs black and white. It was cool, but not wedding material.

I ate part in the wedding fellowship meal, but no cake. Then we went into practice. I got to scorekeep a few matches, giving funny team names and funny quizzer names. I seemed to do pretty good, but I was still nervous. Everyone was performing to usual performance. After a while we got free time.

Free time was wild. Mike and Tim got the cart back out. We found out that the snow on Spring City's lot was a nice sheet of ice. The cart went on the ice to see how much we can make it spin. It really didn't have no better action on ice. So then we moved on trying other things. I found two trash cans. We tried to get Bryan in it, but he held up a good fight so that didn't go. Michael found one of those spindals for electric wire. He tried to ride it by running on it the opposite way. Halfway down he fell off. The funny part was trying to get it back up. Every time Michael would try to push it up, and about two-thirds the way up, Michael would lose grip or steeping, or the weight downward became too much, and the spindal would start rolling back. Tim tried to do it, but he failed to. I tried to help Tim, but I almost killed him in process. Finally, with Christine's help, we got it back up. We finished up with body sledding. Fun. We had dinner and left.

At Hopewell Elverson we went around and looked at the room setup. The Jr. High Room was as crammed as ever with 4 team desks and a staff desk. The bar was part of the two tables. Since we had two matches in there, we decided to pray in the room. We then went to worship. After worship, Fred and Merv explained the rules, which I'll explain later. In the rules, Fred recognized Spring City as the leaders in errors. Then the matches began, with us stepping up to the sanctuary.

Before I go any further, let me explain the rules so everything will be understandable. 4 teams were up at a time. There were 18 questions. A quizzer quizzed out with 2 right answers, and errored out with only 2 errors. The third error, instead of the fifth, started losing 5 points. A team bonus was only 10 extra points, but all you needed was 3 quizzers for team bonus. If there was a tie, there would be three overtime questions, but only between those teams. Bonuses were given, but only once, and that was based on what I called "casting the lot."

In our first match, it was Spring City vs. Hope Community 1 vs. Zion 2 vs. Weaverland 1. I got an error, but I was able to quiz out. We still lost. Errors caused us to finish with 5 points. We had a break match, so I watched Reading and Zion 1 take on 2 other teams. There were a lot of contestable things. then in that same room we had a match. Spring City vs. Petra 2 vs. Good Shepherd 1 vs. Petra 1. The buzzing was so crazy fast. We didn't have the time to get in! Quizzers were buzzing in on "Who was", "Against who", "In what book" and "How many". Jesus seemed to work as the answer, as long as it wasn't us. We didn't have the chance to error, but still did. We finished with 10 points, 5 more than before. Not the best. I had to wait 2 rounds for my last match the last round, so I watched the Slate Hill 1 matches I been meaning to watch since the beginning of the year. Slate Hill did pretty good. The last match we only have 3 teams at once since Weaverland 2 had to leave early. We didn't win that one either, but at least we scored 25 points, the most all night. And Tim quizzed out for the first time that night. Mike and I both errored out.

So despite quizzing out and team bonus being easier to achieve, we didn't get team bonus and quizzed out rarely. The easier error out we have no problem. But it was a fun match, and it was fun, and we did have fun. But next week is serious again, and we will get serious again. Do not take us lightly Slate Hill 1 and Goods 1, because that will be a mistake. We will come back stronger.

Quizzing Question of the Post:
List the 15...

Monday, February 12, 2007

Chickentown? Tinkletown? Hinkletown!

It's the fourth week of quizzing, and this was the last week breakdown of Luke. We finished up with the trial, crucifixion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The team met on time. We had lunch together and got Secret Sponsor gifts. Everyone had a Valentine theme. Mine was a paper heart, crayons, and dark chocolate again. Sweet. My team got a group gift. It was a basket of bannans, each bannana had a quizzer's name on it. It was our second name badge for us for this week. Practice went as usual. There were quiz outs, errors, stupid answers from Michael. You know, the usual. We got a break halfway through. Mike, Bryan, and Tim took this time to ride a handcart. We had dinner, but I didn't eat too much because I was nervous. I had my Full Throtle Fury Energy Drink and dark chocolate.

The ride up to Hinkletown was full of questions. Dave got a break from asking questions. Tim asked Chelsea and Christine questions, while Mike and Bryan asked me questions. They helped me a lot. They gave me back some lost confidence. I'm not sure whether it was working in small groups or that I was getting more questions, or that Mike was asking them, it worked. We joked around a lot and that helped. We talked about the tomb that no one "was laid" in and that Joseph would rap that the chief priests would "try to catch Jesus teachin' dirty." Lol. You can't buy memories like those.

We had the first match of the night. It was against Paradise 3, at the time placed 13th. This would be the hardest match of the night. Boy, it was. Tim got one right, then errored out. I errored once and then missed a bonus before I quizzed out on question 12. Sadly, I was the only one to do so. At the end of question 14, we were tied at 55 points. Question 15, and Paradise 3 buzzed in. Our perfect win-loss record flased before my eyes. Paradise 3 errored on that, and we got the bonus right. We won 65-55. It was great that we won, but the score was unimpressive. That was the lowest we scored all year. That is also the lowest point margin we won by.

Between that match and our next one, I watched Hopewell 1 take on Akron 3. Tim, Mike and I might have been the only loud ones there. They said they were grateful for it. I'm glad to help in any way I can. In the beginning, it didn't seem to help. Only Bryant was able to quiz out. But then things got better. Hopewell 1 won by the end, but barely.

Now it was our turn to be on again. It was Bowmansville 2, third to last. I wasn't sure that we could get what we usually were able to do. At first, it seemed like we were nervous and uptight. After question 11, we were winning, but only by a score of 60 to 40. I was not ready to go through another match like the last one. But all of a sudden, we kicked in. We got 3 consecutive quizouts: Mike on question 12, Graham on question 13, Tim on question 14. To wrap it all up on the last question, Christine buzzed in, answered "the king of noble birth", went into review, got it right, and got team bonus. We won 135 to 40.

Now of course we were more fired up for our next match against Hinkletown 1. The home team in their sanctuary. No problem. Tim quizzed out as soon as question 4. I answered questions 5 to 7 consectively for a quiz out. Bryan got a bonus thrown of his way, he got it right! Congrats to Bryan Tedor on his first points ever!! Christine pulled through with team bonus again. Sadly, Michael was unable to get another quiz out. We did win, however, with score of 120 - 45.

Afterward, we went to the fellowship hall for cookies and drink. Mike decided he wanted to "make friends" AKA get some girls. He found one that he thought was pleasing to eye, but he was in for a surprise. She was an exchange student from Argentina! Nice try, Mike, but not this time. He wasn't too happy about that. As we were about to leave, the van didn't start up! The battery needed to be jump started. Fred tried to jump us, but his car was too small. Then someone came with 8-cylinder truck and that did the trick. We did get to leave the Hinkletown parking lot, and I got home at 11 PM.

Next week is the fun week! Stay tuned for a schedule on that!

Quizzing Question of the Post:
What 4 would a disciple rather say to his servant?

Sunday, February 04, 2007

STOGA STOGA

We had practice last night. It was late, but we stuck with it. Tim wasn't there, but in his place was Mel. I performed the same as in the last practice. I quizzed out 3 of the 4 matches, I errored the one match I didn't quiz out. That was scary. But the team did well. Mike did the same as me. There was one match where there was five quizouts: me, Mike, Christine, Chelsea, and Mel. The practice did help. I returned home to finish some homework.

I met up with the team again today at 9 in the morning for some practice during the Sunday School hour. We read the material and had two practice matches. Some of the questions were from before, some were made up on the spot. I got two quizouts. That was good enough for me. Next we had church. As they had communion, I was reviewing the material on the first communion! As church ended, we grabbed our secret sponser gifts, some warmed up their lunches, and we left. My secret sponser gift was a CD and dark chocolate (sweet). Yes, I was huffing it a lot. Some of my fellow quizzers got some carzy things. Tim got a giant cookie, bigger than the ones at CD! It was like the size of a medium pizza! Bryan's secret sponser spoiled him with a giant bag of M&Ms, over 2 pounds! Mike took a while getting in the van, he had to warm his chili. Lucky for us, he didn't release any gasious side effects while in the van. I had a hoagie with every condiment on it except dirt from the ground. It was very messy, but I kept it pretty clean.

We made it to Conestoga in good time. So we took a rom and began practice. It was the kindergaten room, one step up from the one we were last time, the preschool room. We sat in little seat next to a little table. We tried to make the table "levitate" by all putting our legs under it, but that fun was quickly ended by a certain coach. After prayer, we read through the material once, then split up for rounds of questions. That went well.

As the team rolled into the sanctuary, memories of the last time we were there flooded my head. I remember the last time we were there, we quizzed against Blainsport and lost bad. It made chuckle a bit. I also remember that the sanctuary is where we got the devasting news that West Liberty was no longer hosting the invitational, but rather PA was. When the mentioned the Invitational this time, I held my breath, hoping not to hear bad news again. It wasn't. All they wanted to do was gather registration earlier for the ease of the hosting conference, one that hosts less. They also made some rulings changes. They say now that apostles and disciples are sometimes interchangable. For that quizzer, that translates into, "they really aren't interchangable too often, so you're better off knowing direct text." They also said headings will be allowed to be used. They will not be questions, but a quizzer can use them in answers. That totally changes everything, and in the quizzer's favor. It makes up wonderfully for quizmasters being allowed to use "you" in a question.

Our match didn't start until the 3rd round. It was against Hope Community 1. The last time I recall quizzing against Hope Community 1 was in last year's ACC tournament. The team was different though. It wasn't the Hope Comm 1 I remember. No Ben, No Spazz. Like Christine told me, it was pretty much last year's Hope Community 2 moved up. I saw Ben's brother though, and he looked like a smaller version of Ben. The quizmatch was fast for me. I got a bonus right question 1, and buzzed in on question 2 and 3, and got them right. I quizzed out on question 3! It would have been more impressive on all buzz ins, but I took what I got. Tim quizzed just before review on question 12. Michael got a buzz in right, but Christine, Bryan or Chelsea could not get team bonus. Michael was unable to quiz. But we did win 80 to 55. 80 is the lowest we have scored all year so far. Hope Comm 1 kept us from our average, but we did the same to them, in a more hurtful fashion. Like Dave said, until us, they had a pretty easy schedule. Spring City was a challenge to them. Luckily, their next match of the day was Bowmansville 2 (I didn't watch it, but I think it was in their favor).

We had a round to rest before we were in the sanctuary for our next quizmatch. The quizmaster was Jamie D, favorite quizmaster by all. The opposing team was Hopewell 1. (I didn't know this in the match, but last time we were at Conestoga, we quizzed against Hopewell 1! I don't know what the score is. All I said was we lost.) I sat across from I wasn't able to quiz out as fast, but did quiz out on question 6. Christine delievered again. She gave team bonus. Tim quizzed out on question 10, shortly followed by Mike quizzing out on question 12. Chelsea scored, getting 30 points on the year. Mike picked up another one when a bonus went his way after a quizout. At one point, it looked like Hopewell would lose points on errors and have a negative score, but they managed to get 10 points, and not error more than 4 times. We won 155 to 10. Not as great as when we shut out a team in the first week with the same score, but it was good.

Last match was on the last round. Go figure, last round match during the Super Bowl. It was against Weaverland 1. They were placed in 9th. I predicted this would be the 2nd hardest team we were going against. I nervously sat in seat 1. I......I cant' believe I'm talking about this. I'm really upset with what happen. I think that if I talk this out, I can get over it better. I do feel like I should have done that last time I failed. What happened.......I couldn't quiz out. Mike quizzed out, Tim quizzed out, I couldn't get on board with that. Weaverland 1 was too fast for me. I got two buzz ins, but buzzing in on the 15 question, "How much wheat...", I was too stressed out to remember what it was. I knew this like that back of my hand in week 1, but like I always say, I don't like review. We won 90 to 65, but I feel like I failed my team. I could get the 3rd quizout to get 105 points. It would have been better for both my average and our average. I couldn't beat my perfect weeks record again. I've been trying since 2004 and have failed once again. I am frustrated. It's not easy to avoid being hard on myself. I could have.....should have done better. I was so upset I left right away.

We got home 5 PM, enough time for the Super Bowl. Currently I am watching it now. Indianopolis is winning against Chicago 29 - 17. The Colts on the offense with about 9 minutes left. It isn't looking hopeful for the Bears. I think the Colts are going to win, but I've said that for 3 weeks. I voted for Kicker Adam Viniteri to be the Super Bowl MVP. And I don't feel like waiting for the game to end to tell you. Watch it yourself to find out the winner.

Quizzing Question of the Post:
Who began mocking and beating Jesus?

Thursday, February 01, 2007

2 weeks running

This week we got the standings on Wednesday, not as late as Friday. I knew where I was, so the first thing I wanted to see was where my team was. Our average dropped by 14 points, but did we drop in placing, too? What about Paradise 4, the only team ahead of us? I saw the standings, and was pleased. Our 131 average was enough to keep us in first place in League A. It was close though. Petra 1's average is 128, 3 away from ours not much room for error...or should I say not too much room for errors. Not only no. 1 in League A, but my team has the highest average of all quiz teams in the ACC! Paradise 4 dropped to 114 point average. Now the first place team in League B is Rockville, with their average at 125. We are above that. This is the highest I have ever been with a team because that's as high in the standings you can go. The next part I wanted to check out was the individual standings. I got a perfect score, so of course I was in first place, but how many quizzers was I tied with. I knew of one: Tim. On top of Tim and me, there were 18 others. So there are 20 pefect quizzers, I am one of them. Mike, who was only one question away from being perfect is in 24th place, tied with 13 others. Not too bad. They messed up Christine's score. She should have 40 points, not 3o points. They gave the 10 points to Chelsea. But besides all that, it's very good. For 2 weeks running I am a perfect quizzer and for 2 weeks running, our team is in our first place.

This upcoming Sunday I am at Conestoga for quizzing. This is the first time this year we will have 3 matches. The setup is interesting. 2 of the matches will be 2 of the top 4 hardest teams will we quiz this season. The other match is 1 of the 4 easiest. I want to really be able to keep up with our average. If not, the best thing we can do is just win. The win will be able keep our average ahead of the tough team, and prevent them from maintaining their average. I really want to quiz out. By being a perfect quizzer 2 weeks running, I have tied my record. Quizzing out all 3 matches will make me perfect for one more week, breaking my record. I want to do it so bad. I need to keep studying.

Studying and going to quiz practice. We had our normal 4 matches. I quizzed out 3 matches (yay!) and errored out 1 (boo!). Tim quizzed out the 1, but errored out 3. I shouldn't worry, Tim always comes through in the end. Michael as on fire and kept quizzing out first. Christine also got some quizouts. We did good, but there was room for improvement. So we decided to have an extra quiz practice on Saturday night. With what I saw tonight, I think we can do it with some extra practice. We just need a little more work and need to beat the other team in with the questions.

Quizzing Question of the Post:
What 4 will the disciples be betrated by?

Quizzing Joke:
Q: What will happen if you wore a rabbit skin hat in the end of the age?
A: It would come back to life because not a hair/hare on your head will perish!

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