The Cheshire Cheese

Where: The Cheshire Cheese Inn. Located at 4585 Dunbar Street

When: 8PM Tuesday, Weekly

Web Presence:  None for the quiz itself.

Registration Fee: Nope

Team Info: No team size limit that I could see.But then again, I didn't see any 9 person megateams either, so maybe there is an enforced limit that everyone already knew about and therefore no one even bothered to say it, as it was a deeply ingrained cultural thing.

Prizes: Distributed "key" style, except that instead of keys, you get slices of cheese at the end of each round (3 to 1st for the round, 2 for 2nd, 1 for 3rd). At the end, they draw the slice of cheese, and the winner gets a gift card, redeemable on some other night.

Format: 3 Rounds, 12 questions per round.There was one bonus "lightning round" where you could win extra "slices" of "cheese."

Food and Drink: Pub food, doing their best to keep the English tradition alive. I've never eaten here, so I can't comment beyond what it looked like.

This quiz is all the way out in the barren wastelands near Dunbar and 30th, which really isn't that hard to get to, but also isn't near much of note. You can also take this review with a grain of salt, because I've only been here once. The place is a nice community pub, and seemed to be full of regular patrons. The crowd was significantly older than you'd find at most of the other quiz nights, which suits the area it is located in just fine.

Each round is scored separately, and there is no announcement of which team won it all at the end, but the top scoring teams in each round are always called out. The questions? Well, to put it cordially, they seemed primed to keep everyone within a reasonable score tolerance of one another. There were a lot of incredibly easy non-questions (Detective with a pipe and deerstalker! Tallest mountain on Earth! Your name!), mixed in with multiple choice and true/false questions. There were a lot of questions that fell into the standard trivia categories, like definitions of funny sounding words, and word roots. The bonus round - Name the 7 Big 4 sports teams named after cats - was a lot of fun, though. The quiz finished promptly at around 10 PM.

Yet again, the quizmaster insists on marking all the quizzes himself. Ugh.

The Coles Notes? Fun enough, fairly quick, friendly atmosphere. But pretty easy. If you want a quiz where you are rewarded for knowing tough things as opposed to being punished for missing easy things, this may not be the quiz for you.

The Fray

Well, It looks like the Fray is closed now, so this trivia night probably doesn't exist anymore. If you've lost your weekly quiz, you have my condolences, and feel free to checkout Vancouver's other Wednesday options. Debbie, the quizmistress, has set up residence at the Cedar Cottage Neighbourhood Pub, down the street on Kingsway. That should hopefully fill that East Van Quiz-shaped hole in your Wednesday nights.

Where: The Fray. Located at 3980 Fraser St (at 24th)

When: 8:30PM Tuesday, Weekly. I'd show up before 7:40, but it doesn't truly fill up until game time

Web Presence: None for the quiz, alas

Registration Fee: Nope.

Team Info: No team size limit, so bring as many as you want

Prizes: Distributed as at the Cove: Win keys, hope the number on your key is drawn. Winner of the draw gets a $50 gift certificate. Most points gets to write a question for the next week's quiz, and a pitcher of beer.

Format: 3 Rounds, 15 questions per round. A music question after every round. The music question is worth a lot of points

Food and Drink: Pretty good, in the 12-20 dollar range for a dinner. Drink specials which are not all that cheap, but at least they are better than nothing. All the food is local, which is a nice touch.

This quiz is run by the lady who does the Cove, and as far as I know, it's the first quiz on Fraser, which is nice if you are in the area. Do you want the a quiz that is similar to the Cove quiz without having to go the fucking Kits? Well, now you can! The crowd has all the attendant benefits/drawbacks of being closer to main street and further away from UBC.

Every now and then there a contentious question pops up, and you just have to suck it up and admit that you're wrong, and the nice lady is right. After all, that is only good trivia manners. Conversely, why do some quizzes insist on having one person mark all the papers? I don't get it, it takes a long time to do, AND is less fun. Since you read out the answers anyways, so you may as well put the kids to work marking each others' papers. Also, the 3 'name that tune' questions are worth 6 points each, which is bordering on absurd. If you happen to know the name and artist of 3 songs, then congratulations! you just got the equivalent of a perfect round and then some on top of your score!

There is a full score rundown after each round, so you usually know exactly where you stand. There seem to be 2 or 3 regular teams who always show up and do quite well. The quiz takes about 2 hours and change, so expect all to be said and done at about 10:15, which is about the average for a quiz that starts at 8. There are minigames to win free pitchers, and usually drinks get handed out for general spirit. Don't be too boisterous, or you may end up being awarded shots, though.

Can you say it in less words? Sure! Head on down, it is pretty good, even with the undue weight on the music questions. Wednesday night is shaping up to have some good options for trivia nights.

Cascade Room Trivia On Hiatus

The summer downtime in quizzes is here, and with that, the Cascade Room will be taking more than a monthlong break, until mid-September. I can't give you the exact date that it will be back, but I'll try and let you know. Until then, go to the Cascade for some mixed drinks or frosty pints, but not for quiz.

James Bond Trivia at the Cascade!

I feel that as the resident blogger about Vancouver pub quizzes, I should let you know about these things. The Cascade has held (and will hold again), James Bond themed quizzes. If you fancy all thing 007, I advise you come check it out. Since one was just held tonight, the next one won't be until the fall, to coincide with the premiere of Skyfall.

Come on down, and work that MI6 brain!

In case you were curious, yes, this does supersede the regularly scheduled quiz.

An Open Letter To People Running Trivia Nights

Hi there! How are you doing today? Well, I hope. This brief missive will take the form of a simple questions and answer. Stop paying attention as appropriate.

Are you writing a trivia night or pub quiz? If no, stop reading now.

Are you planning on including any kind of music round? If no, you don't need to go on. You're in the clear.

Does your music round include the song "Cats In the Cradle"? If no, don't worry about it, move on. Include some rap songs next time.

Still with me? Cool. Now, bear in mind, I love the fact that you are running a quiz. It is awesome and a lot of fun. Keep it up. That said....

"Cat's In The Cradle" is not by fucking Cat Stevens. It was written by Harry Chapin, and the version you think is by Cat Stevens is by Harry Chapin. It is on the album Verities & Balderdash. Seriously. Your mp3 that you downloaded off of napster or limewire or kazaa or god knows what is labelled wrong. Please, trust me with this. Cat Stevens recorded a song called "Father and Son," which is similar thematically, but is not the same song. They are both good songs, but only one is "Cat's In the Cradle," and that is by Harry Chapin.

But wait! What's that I hear? Cat Stevens recorded a version? Please, compare it to this version here. If it sounds identical, it is actually Harry Chapin. Have you heard the truth about Santa Claus? Well, I hate to break it to you, but there is no version of "Cat's In The Cradle" by Cat Stevens either. If you think you have found it, please send me a copy, so long as it is different from the above song, which hopefully youtube hasn't taken down.

So, save yourself some trouble and leave the song of the the list. If you leave it on, you'll end up with one of two scenarios:

1) You say it is by Cat Stevens and you are wrong, and then the people that are correct will argue and make life miserable for you
2) You say it is by Harry Chapin and are right, but the people who are wrong will argue that it is by Cat Stevens because they don't know any better and their ID3 tags have been lying to them. These people will then make life miserable.

So, in conclusion, please save yourself some misery, and use the Ugly Kid Joe (or Guns N Roses, as the tag may be) version instead.

Love,

People at trivia nights who like songs by Harry Chapin

Not actually defunct!

Fear not! Vancouver Pub Quiz reports have not died! They just got delayed, while its owner moved across the city. Many new updates planned, trivia nights to attend, etc, etc. In pub quiz "news":

- Cascade is on hiatus for the next month, not returning until the first week in April
- 131 Water's 5 week "win a gift certificate" promotion resets itself after next week. The quiz has been picking up a good amount of steam lately, I recommend heading down!

The Cove

Heads up: the Cove has changed the people running the quiz as of March 26th, 2013 - see our updated report!

Where: The Cove. Located at 3681 West 4th, in Kits

When: 8PM Mondays, every week.

Web Presence:  A facebook group, with Quiz info, including a free answer every week

Registration Fee: Nope.

Team Info: No team size limit, so bring as many as you want

Prizes: Distributed in a novel fashion: The top placing teams in each round get to choose some keys. At the end, the teams with the highest score get the remainder. At the end of the night, a key is drawn at random, and if you have the key with the correct number on it, then you win the prize! Which is a cash prize, I think. The better you do the more keys you win, and the better your chances at taking home the prize. First place still gets the bragging rights, though

Format: 3 Rounds,as far as I remember, but I haven't been here in a while. 15 questions per round when I was there.

Food and Drink: The food's pretty alright, and they have pretty decent specials on "craft" beer on Mondays.

The Cove is located in deepest, darkest Kits, which works out great if you live there, or at the University, but is kind of a pain otherwise. Its a pretty fun quiz, always fills up with people, (but not until about 7:45 or so) and the bar usually has its share of Monday night Football watchers as well. If you like football, and quiz, then this is probably the one you want.

This quiz night is run by a lady named Debbie. You can read a news article about here running quizzes as a side gig. It seems to pay pretty well. There's a few extracurricular activities that don't affect the quiz itself, but I guess can win you some beer, if you are fast and good at naming groups of things (Security Council countries, brat pack members, etc). The questions themselves aren't usually bad, but I have been blown away by really awesome questions. No music round/pictures, which I'm fine with. The hostess marks all the papers herself, which slows down the quiz quite a bit in between rounds.

They usually give out free answers on their facebook page every week, so check that if you're a newcomer. If you're a regular, stop reading this. You probably know the place better than I do. The facebook page is also handy to let you know if things have been rescheduled. I don't know how often it happens, but I have shown up on a Monday and been quizless in Kitsilano. The bar itself is a nice place to watch a game, as there are tonnes of TVs. I can't say how well the quiz behaves during a Canucks game, but the culture seems to be good enough that I imagine they'd just let the game run silently in the background, and then turn up the sound while the powers that be marked papers.

Too Long? Didn't read?, Not bad, but not great. Better than any other options in Kits though, and runs every week.