I Suck At Trivia Night

last night, karen and i met up with my friends (marc and kelley) and my bff (kerry). the five of us attended the wake for my friend's (aimee) mother who passed away over the weekend.

one of the interesting things about the wake... aside from the fact that i got to see some old familiar faces in which i probably would not have seen under every day circumstances... was the chinese tradition involving candy and money. sadly, i know very little about chinese customs. (growing up, my parents tried to do everything american with my brother and i because they believed in the american dream. unfortunately in doing so, i never got to really partake in many of the traditional chinese customs. or it could be that i just never paid attention... which could also be the case.)

as it turns out, there is a chinese tradition whereby guests attending a funeral are given a white envelope containing a piece of candy and a coin. apparently, the envelope, which symbolically is a gift from the deceased, is called "bak gim" or "white gold". the piece of candy is supposed to sweeten the memory of the event; and the coin is supposed to be spent on something to bring happiness to the event.

of course, i had to learn about the details from my friend (trinh). trinh knows a lot about chinese customs. so i defer to her when it comes to knowing things that are chinese-related. my friend (jen), who was also curious about the significance of the candy and coin, actually googled the tradition as well.

following the wake, karen, marc, kelley, kerry and i went to blue 22 located in quincy. on the agenda: trivia night. now, i suck at trivia night. the last time a bunch of us got together for trivia, we were completely awful at trivia.

meeting us at blue 22 for trivia was my friend (andrea). as well, my friend (cass) also stopped by to join us. the last time we got together for trivia, cass was curious as to why we didn't invite him. (in case anyone was curious, marc figured cass was working... because cass is usually a workaholic... and consequently marc figured cass would be busy. and true enough, cass was working the last time we did trivia night.)

regardless, all of us were determined to perform better than last time. truth be told, it really was not that hard to be better than last time because we were absolutely terrible the last time we played. this time, however, we were better prepared... and we had our good luck charms: kerry and cass.

needless to say, it was a good night. i really didn't know many of the answers, but it was just fun to hang out with my friends and be silly. i had fun. of course, the watermelon martinis may have also helped. we ended up naming our trivia team "garvin sucks" after my friend (garv) who owns blue 22. i think garv, who was working that night, got a kick out of it. the person (vicki) running the trivia night even poked fun of garv and his musical taste.

incidentally, we also saw my friend (carlos) at trivia night. carlos had walked in... and ordered some wings after his workout. it was a rather random encounter, particularly since the gym that carlos goes to is not even near blue 22. but it was good to see him. i'm not sure, but i think it was the first time that carlos met cass. speaking of which, yesterday was also the first time cass and andrea met.

the highlight of night was probably karen's excitement for knowing the answer to a fruit question. (i guess it pays to be a registered dietitian.) i don't exactly remember what the question was, but the answer was the tropical fruit known as a loofah. to be honest, i don't even know what a loofah is... the fruit or sponge version. karen was pretty stoked about knowing the answer.

anyway, our team actually was on a roll for quite a while. we did remarkably well until the end. we ended up finishing in second place, which is definitely an improvement over the last time. i'd be happy to go out finishing second, but i think some of my fellow team members want to keep playing until we finish first.

regardless of our finish, we ended up winning what we wanted: the jamison glasses! the first place team can have their cheesy $20 off voucher. we were all about the jamison glasses. incidentally, we were supposed to get a pitcher of beer to go with the glasses, but we never did. (proof that "garvin sucks"... just kidding.) i would have been happy with the other consolation prize, a round of shots, as well... yes, i'm easy to please.

surprisingly, karen really liked the jamison glasses. karen was pumped: first with the whole loofah thing, and then getting the jamison glasses. i don't think i have ever seen karen get excited over glasses, especially considering the fact that she told me that she thought we had too many useless glasses around the house.

truth be told, the jamison glasses are cool. (and what can i say, i'm a sucker for all things irish.) i'm glad our team won the glasses. hopefully we can keep the trivia momentum going. we'll see.