Underwhelmed

Listening to: Straightjacket Fits-Best of

I once had a fairly passionate debate about 'best of' collections with a workmate. He didn't believe in them, saying that the tracks selected were seldom an artists best (which I actually agreed with), and they thus devalued the rest of the body of work, as well as the loyal fans who had been buying the source albums as they were released.
My counterpoint was that if by chance, misfortune, apathy or incompetence you hadn't been in a position to buy the originals, or weren't into the artist at a time when they were released, 'a best of' provides an excellent way to introduce yourself to their work without forking over a massive wad of dough to buy the entire back catalogue. Which you shouldn't do anyway without having at least some idea of what was on those original albums.
Besides, 'best of's' can be really good compilation albums in their own right. This is why I have a few complete back catalogues and relevant 'best of's' in my collection.


The above is entirely an aside to the original point of the post, which was the underwhelming quiz at Murphy's Law (Petone) last night.

Or as I am thinking of it, the night a good quiz went bad.

It wasn't the needless technical issues (the picture is fine, just stop fiddling with it already!), or the inability of the announcer to pronounce words like 'Arabic' and 'Acronym'. Painful, but no-ones perfect, and I have seen far worse.

It was the 'challenge for points' rounds in between the question rounds that had us going
"W T F is this then?"

One representative per team fronts up. To do things like eat a plate of vinegar soaked weetbix and fries, or a plate of ice cubes followed by a mixed shot, or chop a half pint of beer with a raw egg in the glass. Do this faster than anyone else and you get 10 or 20 points (seriously) for your team.

Eh? I thought this was a quiz? We realised right then after witnessing the first challenge that no matter how many questions we answered right, we didn't have a shit-show of winning.

In truth I can see why perhaps this has come about. Us and two or three other teams have been dominating. And now we aren't. If it keeps up we won't be back. Sad, but if I wanted to see someone vomit half eaten vinegary weetbix onto the floor (as one contestant did last night) I'd go to a student flatwarming in Palmy or Aro Valley.

As the Don memorably summed up, "It's a quiz, not a f**king keg party." I admit, I may be having a total-sense-of-humour-failure about this, but I go to quizzes to test my wits, not my stomach (and teeth in the case of the ice).

Kudos and big ups to Lauren (weetbix) and Fishy (ice) for participating in the madness though, due to the apathy and sheer cowardice of the other team members.

The Simpsons Movie was fairly underwhelming as well, as very eloquently noted here.