Trivia at the Fuller Roadhouse

It’s been a long day.  Yes, I know most days are 24 hours in length, there’s nothing truly longer or shorter about them.  But I needed to go play trivia, and there’s unwritten rule #5 when it comes to trivia in the Capital District – don’t play more than twice a week with the same organization’s trivia games.  This way, you aren’t hearing the questions on Monday night, which might get recycled for another bar on Tuesday night.  Now, you can let the host know ahead of time, telling them hey, I played on Monday night, don’t use any of those questions, or you can just space your trivia for a couple of times a week.

But since I had planned to go to Side Door Cafe on Thursday night, I decided to try my hand at a different type of Capital Region team trivia, and that meant going to the Fuller Roadhouse on Fuller Road and playing “Memorama” trivia.

Follow along.

“Memorama” trivia involves 60 questions – ten questions per category, one point for each correct question.  At the end of each category, the team with the most points for that round receives a coin flip of either food (heads) or drink (tails).  At the end of the night, the team with the most cumulative points gets $20 off their bar tab.

Oh, and you are allowed to “double down” on two of the six categories – every correct answer in those categories would double your points.  So if you’re strong in two of the subjects, you can “double down” on those categories.  Hey, whatever works.

The host, a blonde girl named Kelly, started out the game by handing everyone their score sheets, and asking ahead of time which two topics people wanted to double down.  Of the six choices, I selected Presidential trivia and state capitals.

The game began.

When it comes to 60-question games, I aim for an average score of 42 points (assuming that I answer seven out of ten questions correctly per round as par).  WIth that in mind, I hit a birdie on the first category, television; and another birdie in the second category, pot luck.  A 12-man team calling themselves “PYC” (and who apparently were the house team at Fuller Roadhouse) aced the first round and used one of their “double downs” to take a commanding lead after the second round.

This was a big concern for the host.  I didn’t know – until the game actually began – that tonight’s game at Fuller Roadhouse was a qualifier game for something called the Memorama Team Trivia Tournament of Champions, which would be held next Wednesday at the Riverfront Bar and Grille.  The tournament final would include a ton of prizes, including two tix to the Counting Crows concert at SPAC and several restaurant gift cards.

But see, the concern was that PYC had already won a berth in the tournament last week, and they were trying to win a second “golden ticket” at the Fuller Roadhouse.  I was still plowing away, scoring in the top of the pack but not enough to catch PYC, and at that point I figured I would just be happy with winning food and drink that day and coming back another time and trying harder.

I should also note that there is some sort of running joke between Kelly and her scorekeeper Lindsey regarding the country of Yemen.  Apparently Lindsey calls out “Yemen” for certain answers during the game, whether or not the Middle Eastern country would be an appropriate answer.  Don’t know what the reference means.  And after a few times hearing it, I didn’t care either.

I finally won a round – the fifth, Presidential trivia – and Kelly came over to where I was seated at the bar and handed me a quarter.  I flipped the quarter – heads was food, tails was drink – and got another diet soda in the process.  The “drink” prize was beer, but I begged off the beer, sticking instead with the soft drink.

After the fifth round, Kelly read off the scores.  I was in second place, and unless PYC started writing “Bob Saget” for every question in the final round, they were assured of winning for the night.  The category for the final round was music trivia.  I answered the first four questions correctly, and then Kelly walked by and said something to me.

“Just letting you know, I’ve already confirmed with the Memorama trivia organizer – my brother Scotty – that PYC isn’t going to be eligible to win a second golden ticket for the tournament.  It’ll go to the second place team tonight.”

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Right now it’s you,” she said, “so don’t screw up.”

Not a problem.  I aced the music round, ten for ten, and finished in second place.

And with that, I earned a golden ticket for next Wednesday’s Tournament of Champions at the Riverfront Bar and Grill at the Corning Preserve.

Oh yeah, and another flip of the coin.  This time it landed on heads; I received an order of chicken fingers to go.

Memo to self – contact Jeremy and Alexis and see what they’re doing Wednesday night.  This could be fun.