Dear Friends,
I’m looking forward to welcoming my wife Kate home from her extended trip to Chicago (last week) and Ithaca (this week). Having spent much of this week on or around the campus of Ithaca College, she is looking forward to returning home tomorrow.
Speaking of Ithaca, I feel like Odysseus’s wife Penelope at home with our son Telemachus, waiting for my venturing hero to return to our hall, even though it’s a small hall. Luckily I don’t have to feed or fend off any suitors. Rather than weaving the burial shroud of Laertes, I’ve been weaving together lines of poetry.
The most famous 20th century poem about Ithaca was written by the Greek poet C.P. Cavafy. After it was read at the 1994 funeral of Jackie Onassis, interest in Cavafy’s work skyrocketed in poetry communities. Translated by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, the poem begins this way:
Ithaka
By C. P. Cavafy
As you set out for Ithaka
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.
When Kate returns, we will have two parents at home in charge of one kid, something we remember from before our son Jukie was born, 23 years ago. Jukie is rather headstrong, like Cavafy’s wild Poseidon or like Katherine in The Taming of the Shrew, so at times Kate and I will feel like that play’s Gremio and Hortensio.
Because either a Gremio or a Hortensio is necessary for handling our charge, I’ve asked a Pub Quiz friend and regular participant, Toby, to guest-host tonight’s Pub Quiz. As you will be able to tell, I’ve still written the quiz. For once I try not to include any difficult to pronounce words, such as “Gremio” or “Hortensio.”
Apprentice Quizmaster Toby has a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Pittsburgh with minors in Religious Studies and Studio Art. An inveterate traveler, he has lived in New York, Pennsylvania, Florida, New Mexico and Arizona before settling in California 15 years ago. At least one of those states will be a topic of conversation during the quiz tonight.
Toby has been coming to Sudwerk since the Dock Store opened back in 2011, so he is a known quantity to the staff, and still they keep welcoming him back.
Impressively, Toby was a DJ for five years at a dance club in Pittsburgh. His high school and college classes in drama and public speaking prepared him to be a teacher on various technical subjects.
He looks forward to trying his hand tonight as a substitute Quizmaster. Despite his Bachelor of Arts in English degree, he will likely make fewer unexplained literary allusions than I do. I hope you will stop by to see how he does.
Please plan to partake in the Pub Quiz festivities this evening at Sudwerk in Davis. Bring your team to the beautiful outdoor patio where the misters are misting and where we have room for almost everyone. The jollity will be unfiltered. As Ralph Waldo Emerson allegedly said, “It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.” Tonight some will want to play indoors. I encourage you to come early to snag a table. We filled the restaurant and patio last week, and I expect that we will continue to do so throughout August and beyond.
In addition to topics raised above, tonight’s pub quiz will feature questions on dating apps, innocuous conspiracy theories bass players, Olympic games, no smoking signs, ice chases, fictional councilors, allotropes, dams, academies, odes, Canadian-Americans, latitude measurements, Hawaii exports, notable Americans, southern singles, Californians, Hams, supervisors districts, princes, letter carriers, alliterative commands, early sport heroes, human body parts, letters and science, buckets, people pleasers, people named Tim, hammers, current events, books and authors, and Shakespeare. Sometimes a question is substituted at the last minute because of the day’s news.
Thanks to all the new players joining us at the live quizzes and to all the patrons who have been enjoying fresh Pub Quiz content. Thanks especially to new subscriber Sophie! Every week I check the Patreon to see if there is someone new to thank. I also thank The Original Vincibles, Summer Brains, The Outside Agitators, John Poirier’s team Quizimodo, Gena Harper, the scintillating Mavens who carefully take note of casual adjectives and precise pronunciations, and others who support the Pub Quiz on Patreon (where I am also sometimes sharing drafts of poems). Thanks again to Toby. I would love to add your name or that of your team to the list of supporters. I appreciate your backing this pub quiz project of mine!
Best,
Dr. Andy
P.S. Here are three questions from last week:
- Robin Williams. When the father of the female lead of the film Mrs. Doubtfire suddenly passed away, Robin Williams kindly arranged for the filming to focus on scenes in which she did not appear so she could go be with her family. Name the actress.
- Federal Services. According to a Pew Research Center survey, the least popular federal agency and the most popular federal agency have three words in their names, with the first word ending in the letters NAL and the third word being “service.” One of the two is the Internal Revenue Service. With a 76% favorability rating, what is the other?
- Pop Culture – Music. Born with the last name of “Duckworth,” what 5’5” tall rapper and songwriter won the Pulitzer Prize for Music for his 2017 album Damn, making him the first non-classical or jazz artist to receive the award?