Score 54, where are you?

So, I played trivia tonight with some friends at a local pub. One question, which will delight my fellow Whedonites, was this: "Aside from the series finale, how many Slayers appear in the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer?"

Whedonites, take a moment to count them up, then scroll down to see the answer.

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The correct answer is 6. (Buffy, Kendra, Faith, Nikki Wood, that Chinese Slayer that Spike killed during the Boxer Rebellion whose name I don't quite have right now, and The First Slayer, whose name I also don't have right now.) The correct answer is 6. We answered 6.

The MC announced that the answer was 3. Buffy, Faith, and Kendra.

I pounced on him like Garfield on a lasagna. (Or was that Heathcliff? I always confuse the two. What I don't confuse is my Slayers.)

He apologized profusely and said he had to take the official answer the trivia company had given him, flippety fling blang blah. That mistake cost us 5 points and gave countless other teams in the bar points they did not deserve for answering the incorrect answer of 3. I was thoroughly disgusted.

When the scores were read, we had an unfair 49 instead of our rightful 54. The first place team's score? 54. And who even knows if their 54 was padded by points unjustly awarded from that Slayer question!

I may sound like a raving lunatic to many of you right now, but you can't ask a question about something that has a rabid fandom, declare an incorrect answer, and not expect to have some explaining to do. You can't say Tattooine has three suns. You can't say the TARDIS is yellow. You can't say Faramir took the ring from Frodo. (Yes, Peter Jackson, you have some explaining to do.)

My teammate wrote the trivia company a strongly worded email, but she has yet to receive an answer. In the end, we were sidelined by a round in which you had to name the World Series champions of the past twenty years. I actually got five of them (someone get my sisters the smelling salts) but that pretty much took us out of the running.

Still, Tattooine has two suns, the TARDIS is blue, Faramir never took the ring, and there were 6 Slayers before the series finale. These things I know.

You don’t know how I suffer.

Short story: I have an earworm and it's driving me mad.

Medium-length story: This weekend I went with J to Harrisburg for our friend Melissa's birthday party. We listen to the 80s station on Sirius when we roadtrip, and this weekend there was a particularly awesome run of 1984 hits that was strangely punctuated by a hideous song from 1987. Breakout by Swing Out Sister. Wretched. If one song were going to infiltrate my brain, it couldn't be Footloose or When Doves Cry; it had to be that clunker.

I have tried everything. Listening to other songs, singing other things in my head, Liz's Billie Jean trick... nothing WORKS. I am suffering. It's not unlike the two weeks I spent in Mississippi with Murray Head's One Night In Bangkok torturing me. Swing Out Sister is vicious.

There are, like, two people who read this blog who will know that song, and to those people, I sincerely apologize for passing my earworm on to you. It is inexcusable, but I am in pain and I cannot be responsible for my actions.

This is how I feel.

Cheaters do prosper. They get free wing dings.

I certainly know how he'd handle this.

In our Trivia Night exploits we have encountered many delightful things. Camaraderie, delicious stromboli, the sweet taste of victory, and free appetizers purchased with the gift certificates we won. There is one thing, however, that we do not enjoy: The cheating. The blatant cheating.

There are various tournament rules applied to Trivia Night, the first one being that you shall only have seven members on your team. Several teams routinely break this rule (It’s rule #1, people.), having eight and sometimes nine people present. It’s obnoxious and, frankly, insulting. And the management has demonstrated a total inability to curb this activity.

Instead of getting angry about it, I have thus far chosen to adopt a Mr. Bennettish air of derisive detachment. For example, when they announced that our team got 9 points out of 10 in Round One and a cheater team got a mere 5, I snidely remarked, “Hmmm. Eight people and only 5 points. How disgraceful.” And this snide derision had been enough to sustain us. That is, until the top three teams tied for first place last night and we entered into a bonus tie-breaker round. A few extraneous people from other losing teams decided to shuffle over to one of the tiebreaker teams and join them for the tiebreaker round.

Yes, you read that correctly. Not only too many people, but ringers from other teams! (Although I don’t know if someone from a losing team could technically be called a “ringer”, but you get my point.) The brazenness of their cheating even upset Brian, and we had had just about all we could take, so Melis shouted across the bar, in the righteous voice of the enraged, “Hey! Guys! You’re not on their team!” And when the cheating cheaters didn’t respond, she shouted again, “Hey! Stop helping them. You’re not on their TEAM!”

Now, if you’re reading this and you’re a member of my family, you understand completely her reaction and can only wonder at her restraint in not flinging jalapeno poppers across the barroom. And you know that, at our family gatherings, game-playing infractions far inferior to this would get you tossed out into the dark Pennsylvania night, post-haste. Jessica, Kevin, and Travis, however, are not quite as hardcore as the rest of us. They were... shall we say mortified? Kevin pulled his hat down around his ears and I think Jessica actually retreated into her scarf. I’m not sure what Travis did because I was concentrating on trying to set the cheating team’s beers aflame with only the power of my furious gaze as Melis demanded for a third time that they STOP.

So imagine for a moment my disgust when the cheater team won the bonus round. Life is so unfair sometimes. My only comfort is that their dismal performance in the tournament overall will keep them out of the final round, and our hefty lead is still quite hefty.

Still, I can’t help hoping they choke on the appetizers they order with that first place gift certificate. Wretched, wretched cheaters.

CORRECTION: I've recently been informed that I was incorrect. Kevin was NOT mortified. In fact, he was screaming along with Melissa. Awesome.

So, I'm sitting at my desk...

...and I cannot get the cap off my water bottle. Blargh. This is my water bottle:

It is the orange one, and it is full of ice cold, delicious, Brita-filtered water and I really want a drink and I cannot get to it! I have twisted and pulled and shaken and... nothing! And I'm really getting thirsty. If anyone has any ideas, I'm all ears.

Sick, sick, sick.

Well, I feel wretched. I don't know what's wrong with me, but I'm achy, tired, and all-around miserable. Sort of like Marianne in Sense and Sensibility, although thankfully no one is bleeding me from the arm. (shudder) I came home from work last night and and thought, "I'll just lie down for a nap." Well, that nap lasted about fourteen hours. I plan to repeat it again tonight.

The worst is I haven't seen my sweet little niece in almost a week. Blargh!

This is how I feel. (Minus the lovelorn.)

I rescind all my snide Cinderella-related comments

I don't know what's going on today, but I keep falling out of my shoes. I got some new socks and I don't know if they're too big or the fabric is slippery or what, but I cannot seem to keep my shoes on.

I suppose it's only a matter of time until they fly off and I trip over them and face-plant on the floor in front of the color printer. Who's more graceful than me?

My lips are so chapped, I look like I've had collagen.

That is all.

Dear Consumers, it's possible that we poisoned you. Sorry about that!

So, what's worse than finding a carton of peanut butter crackers in your drawer that the manufacturer has recalled due to salmonella contamination?

Finding half a carton of peanut butter crackers in your drawer that the manufacturer has recalled due to salmonella contamination.

Thanks a lot, Kellogg's.

An open letter to the members of award show audiences regarding applause during the In Memoriam montage

Dear Award Show Audience Members,

As we head into award season I have one request of you. Please refrain from applauding during the obligatory In Memoriam montage of the various award shows. Each year we, the viewing public, tense up and, with dread, prepare ourselves for the awkward-fest that is the In Memoriam montage, knowing, as we all do, that we will be forced to listen to the applause swell and diminish in proportion to how well-known the featured individual was. Someone on the level of the well-remembered and beloved Bob Hope receives a hearty round of applause. Max the screenwriter who got his start when Greta Garbo was making films, not so much. And so, instead of being a respectful remembrance of those in your craft who have passed on during the last year, it becomes a popularity contest. A cheap, tacky popularity contest made all the cheaper and tackier by the fact that the contestants are dead.

So I beg of you, the next time you’re sitting in the audience of an awards show and you’re tempted to clap for those dead people whose names you recognize, take a moment to imagine yourself dying at a ripe old age, when you’ve outlived your fame and you’re barely a memory to the small segment of the audience old enough to have seen your films, and then imagine the pathetic smattering of applause your photograph receives during the montage. Applause that will swell in the most humiliating fashion to a cacophonous roar when your photograph is followed by that of a glamorous, handsome young star who tragically bit it at the height of his fame due to an unfortunate combination of sports car and animal tranquilizers. And then imagine the even more awkward resumption of silence when his photo is followed by that of an obscure sound editor who worked in the film industry for 63 years but who was, let’s face it, only a sound editor and therefore not terribly well-known, even to the few people who know what sound editing entails.

The In Memoriam montage roller coaster of applause makes those of us viewing at home intensely uncomfortable. Even more so than when we brace for an acceptance speech by the humorless Sean Penn. So please, for the love of decency, sit there respectfully and silently, with your hands in your lap until it’s all over. It’s the least you can do for expecting us to hang in there until Best Picture is announced.

Sincerely,

The Viewing Public

That's not your mother, that's a man, baby.

Someone on the spamverse thinks I’m a dude. More specifically, a dude named Jack. I keep getting spam with the subject line, “Jack, find great singles in your area” or “Jack, take online surveys for cash” or “Jack, buy cheap Viagra here!” (Apparently Jack has problems of his own.)

Has someone been messing with my email, joining mailing lists and giving the name Jack? It wouldn’t be the first time somebody messed with me like that. Oh yeah, I’m looking right at you, Kristen!

Right now, my Olympic spirit is about as existent as Australia's ability to judge gymnastics.

So, I have just about had it with Olympic gymnastics. Someone call the police because Nastia Liukin was robbed.

Could someone explain to me how the Australian judge scored He Kexin three tenths of a point higher than Nastia? Three tenths! Ladies and gentlemen, in a sport where the winners are decided by hundredths of a point, a three tenth difference is the Australian judge effectively saying, “You and your routine can head straight to the ninth circle of Hades, mate!” Between this and the improperly lowered height of the vault table at the Sydney Olympics, hasn’t Australia done enough to screw up gymnastics? Is it wrong to think that perhaps they shouldn’t be allowed near the sport?

Oh, and! And! This crap tie-breaking system! The whole point of gymnastics scoring is that the results are not determined by a single judge (who may or may not be incompetent--I'm looking right at you, Australia), but by a whole panel. So why would you take two performances so comparable in their execution, and apply to them a tie-breaking rule that does rely on only a single score, on a single judge’s opinion? That makes the opposite of sense.

Please tell me why two gold-medal-worthy performances can’t just be rewarded as such? Is it so necessary to crush the hopes of a young athlete like that? Boo, gymnastics! Boo!

And I still think you shouldn't get a medal when you fall on your face.

No, that's no problem if you fall on your face. We'll still give you a medal. Because you're Chinese.

Oh honestly, what is going on here, people? I know it's really important to stick your landing when vaulting in gymnastics, but I was under the impression that it was even more important to actually land your landing.

I'm just going to have a Bela Karolyi-type outburst here and say that I'm about sick of the favoritism being shown to the young ladies and pre-pubescent 12 year-olds that make up the Chinese gymnastics team. You can talk about start values all you want. The girl FELL ON HER FACE.

Whatever!

I expect to get my senior citizen's discount any day now.

I am sitting here watching the women's gymnastic team final, and it has to be said: if those Chinese girls are sixteen, then I'm forty-nine.

Oh, please.

These previews are making me sad.

Oh, James McAvoy, please, please do not take the career path of Nicholas Cage. Don't do that. Don't do that. You're so talented. Stop and think about what you're doing.

This? Looks like a crap-flavored Nicholas Cage movie. The presence of Morgan Freeman does not fool me. It saddens me, but it does not fool me.

Really, James. Call up the Coen Brothers or something. Because it's so easy to start out with an Oscar nom for Leaving Las Vegas and then all of a sudden you're starring in Ghost Rider. Don't do that.

Ditch the apostrophe and stop declaring your ignorance to the vehicle-driving public.

So, today I was driving behind a Jeep and on the back window was a pink decal with the words:

Silly Boys, Jeep's are for Girls

And all I could say was, "Silly girl, grammar is for everyone."

Frustration, thy name is Penn Dot.

So I had to run an errand for my dear sister today, which necessitated me driving on that kind of road that makes you want to speed in the most egregious manner. You know that kind, all smooth surfaces and gentle curves and the sun is shining and the sky is blue and you just want to be that guy in that obnoxious Jaguar commercial where they pronounce "Jaguar" in three very distinct syllables.

Well, I couldn't be the guy in the Jag commercial. I couldn't even be the guy in the Dodge Caravan commercial. I got behind one of those Penn Dot line painting trucks that travels the road slowing people down so the paint has time to dry. It went 15 miles per hour as I followed it for almost 40 minutes. Forty minutes! No, seriously, take a moment to yourself to imagine that. You back? Okay. I couldn't pass because there's a big No Passing sign on the back of the truck, I couldn't take another path because there was no other path, I couldn't drive my car off the cliff and end my misery because I would have crossed the lines and messed up the paint. So, I said to myself, "I can't get out of this situation or change this situation so I'm just going to sit here and listen to my music and enjoy the sunshine and the scenery as it creeps past me literally in the time it takes for paint to dry." I was feeling very Zen.

This attitude served me well when a garbage truck pulled out in front of the Penn Dot truck, so not only were we going 15, we were stopping every two blocks. I burst into the maniacal laughter of one who has achieved peace with her soul-crushing highway experience and calculated how late I'd have to stay at work tonight to make up for my extended lunch break. But it's okay. I’m Zen. Really. Very Zen.

George Costanza, visionary, serial napper.

“Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth.” Isn’t that one of the clichéd things that guy says in that song they like to play at graduation ceremonies? Well, he should have added “and the ability you currently have to function without sleep.” I am a big proponent of the “life just keeps getting better” school of thought, but I am forced to admit that somewhere around the final year of grad school, I lost my ability to pull an all-nighter without repercussions. It used to be that I could skip a night of sleep once or even twice a week and I felt just fine. Then I got to the point where I needed the help of a caffeinated beverage to pull me out of my all-nighter-induced funk. Now the caffeinated beverages don’t even work. I can feel the tiredness underneath the caffeine alertness. And the caffeine alertness isn’t even actual alertness. It’s that shaky, twitchy, feeling-a-little-nauseous, maybe-I’m-gonna-snap-at-the-next-person-who-speaks-to-me kind of alertness. Which isn’t even really alertness. It’s closer in feeling and exhibition to schizophrenia. Or maybe post traumatic stress disorder. No wait, that’s not what I meant. I meant the other one, you know, the other one. Wait, what was I saying?

Man, I need a nap. And maybe one of these.

Blargh! I hate being sick!

I have been felled by the wretched sinus infection once again. I'm walking around in the kind of haze I imagine would be induced by chugging a bottle of Dimetapp. I’m so out of it, I slept for 13 hours last night. I’m so out of it, I put conditioner on my hair before I had washed the shampoo out of it, and let me tell you, it's doing nothing for my coif. I’m so out of it, I may actually be asleep right now and just dreaming that I’m typing this.

Yeah, we know he died 700 years ago. Just go with it.

Oh my gosh, you guys, I’m watching the Showtime show The Tudors right now, and it’s making me nuts. I was really excited to Netflix this show because I love Tudor history. I’ve watched two episodes thus far, and I now realize the last person who should watch this show is someone who loves Tudor history. These people are making radical departures from historical fact, for the mere amusement of it. They are the Oliver Stone of British television.

The show opens with King Henry’s uncle being murdered. But all of Henry’s uncles were long dead by this point, and were hardly to be expected to rise from the grave just to be stabbed by a bunch of French dudes. I was so confused and I expended a significant amount of mental energy trying to figure out what the year was supposed to be, only to realize that they were jumping around, at will, to events that occurred anytime in a 20 year period. Infuriating!

Zombie uncles were the least of my problems. Daughters and husbands who never existed were crawling out of the woodwork. Princes were called by their siblings’ names because apparently nobody on this show knows how to access the Wikipedia. The daughter of Henry’s younger sister looked to be about his age. Or older! She must have been conceived while her mother was still in the womb.

Henry had an older sister who married the King of Scotland and a younger sister who married the King of France. They merged these women into one character and had her marry… who else? The King of Portugal! Yeah, that makes sense. And let me tell you what, they’re going to regret that later when they need all that English-Scottish “We’re family but we’re enemies” tension.

One character said, “My father was executed by the king’s father,” and I’m screaming at the TV, “No, he wasn’t! Nobody executed your father! Your father was not executed!” And that was only one of many things I was shouting at my screen as my neighbors surely debated whether to pound on the walls or just try to have me committed. Others:

“Just establish what year it is. Just give me a year. Please, for the love of decency, give me a year here!”

“Why is she talking about her husband? She’s not supposed to be married!”

“Dude, you don’t have a daughter named Anne. You have an Elizabeth, a Catherine, and a Mary, but no Anne! Just call her Catherine!”

“Why are they calling him Pope Alexander? They just made up a pope! That is an entirely fictional pope right there.”

At this point I wouldn’t be surprised if Charlemagne walked through the front door. This show is not good for my health.