Last night’s quiz

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I’m always interested about the varying standards of local pub quizzes. There are two main things at play here: the average difficulty of the questions, and the ability of the competing teams. And there are well known examples of all four of the possible outcomes from these two variables at quizzes in Cape Town.

Last night’s quiz turned out to be the easiest from this point of view: without wanting to sound rude, the standard of the teams playing wasn’t great, and the level of questions was fairly basic. I’m comparing this with other quizzes we sometimes attend where at least one of the two variables is set to “difficult” mode.

Still, it was good fun, good company and nice to win some good prizes.

What last night’s quiz did offer – aside from the winnings and the enjoyment – was the most annoying woman in quiz history.

And I’ve been doing pub quizzes for 30 years.

We all know at least one of those people who always need to be the centre of attention, even when they’re actually already it, but for all the wrong reasons.

This lady was like that, but on steroids cocaine.
Loud, shrill, squeaky – ruining everyone’s evening.

God, she was irritating.

Even her teammates were embarrassed. One of them actually left early rather than continue to sit next to her.

There were numerous warnings from the host, but he tried valiantly to keep it good-natured until, during the second half of the evening, she decided to shout out the answer to a question, at which point he (quite reasonably) snapped, looking her directly in the eye and delivering the long-overdue and much-appreciated line:

Shut the f**k up!

Delicious.

I mean, sadly it had very little effect, but it got a decent cheer from the audience, and it was genuinely a nice thing to hear.

Thankfully, all of the other good things about the evening just about outweighed the mouthy bint. And thus, we will likely be back to defend our title next time around.

Nothing has changed

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This is from the early 1980s.
Presented here without any further comment.

OK, actually presented with one further comment – the one 27 seconds in:

Don’t forget, once you start interfering in the internal squabbles of another country, you’re on a very slippery slope.

Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

Still going to braai

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It was nice this morning. A gentle breeze scurrying the little fluffy clouds across the blue sky, the sunshine playing in and out behind the vivid spring greens of the local trees. As I set out on my run, I thought “bugger me, this hill gets more painful every time I do it”, and then I also thought “We should braai this evening”.

And so, once back from the run and deciding that actually, no medical help was required after all, I went and grabbed a selected of meat and salad products ready for dinner.

Light it at 4, eat at 6ish. No huge hurry. No huge stress.
Just a laid back braai in the Cape Town afternoon sunshine.

And then the Cape Town weather stepped in:

Yeah, it’s no Hurricane Milton, but it’s also far from the best braai’ing weather. But the tjoppies are bought. The steak is marinated. And the fire is lit. So we’re going ahead, even if it chucks it down:

I’ll do my braai’ing in the rain.

Positive vibes and red wine. And possibly an umbrella.

Big plum

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Yep. The world’s biggest. 464.15g to be exact.
Grown in Waboomskraal, near Prince Alfred Hamlet by local farmers.
Well, who else was going to do it?

“I am extremely proud of our achievement. It is officially the biggest plum in the world and another feather in the cap for Waboomskraal,” Dean proudly wrote on his Facebook page after receiving the news that they have become the Guinness World Records title holder for the heaviest plum.

Another feather in the cap? That does suggest at least a first feather in the cap for Waboomskraal, and while PAH is a lovely place… mmm… I don’t know.

So that was Dean, the farmer. He’s the son of Deon. And Dean has a son called Wean. Of course he does.
This might sound funny, but it’s quite an Afrikaans thing. And I think that these guys are Afrikaans.

[picture some Afrikaans farmers in your head right now]

Aaaaand… Ta-dah!

I can also (like to) guess what card you’re thinking of. But… probably somewhat less successfully.

The world’s biggest plum, then.
Not quite as big as the world’s biggest potato, (wow, 16 (sixteen) years ago) but then, it wouldn’t be, would it?