22 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY march 2-8, 2023 www.montereycountyweekly.com tion and go, Ooohhhh, that’s a good one!’” A good one, per Doss, is a question with multiple points of entry—one that gives different people, from different walks of life, a chance at a correct answer. “The tiny intersection of two interests—that’s where trivia is at its most fun,” he says. Doss and Hutchings might be new to hosting, but they’ve already got regulars. “And one of our regular groups, they go to every trivia,” Hutchings says. “It’s incredible. Basically every day they play trivia.” Q: Whose family history with trivia includes solving a medical mystery with the help of the game show Jeopardy!? For all its fun and frivolity, trivia can be quite serious, too. And despite its reputation as a game full of small pieces of useless information, it might prove incredibly useful. Noah Doss has seen it happen firsthand. “My dad actually self-diagnosed a medicine side effect because of Jeopardy!” the Whisky Club co-host/quiz editor says. “He was taking a heart medicine for a period of time, and he was watching Jeopardy! every night…and he realized, ‘I keep knowing an answer and I can’t call it forth. I know I knew that answer and I know I knew the one before it and the one before that. But I wasn’t able to produce the answer.’ “And we were kind of like, well, you know, you’re nearing 60. And he goes, ‘No no no, this is something different.’ So he went and looked into it, and found that this is an extremely rare side effect of the heart medicine. He knew—‘I should be doing better at Jeopardy! than I am today’— and that is how he figured it out!” The elder Doss is now off that medication, keeping healthy with regular walks and a good diet. He still watches Jeopardy! regularly—often after walking the dog in the morning. Q: Which Monterey County trivia host plays songs between questions that may (or may not) hint at an answer? It’s a Tuesday night in Seaside and Other Brother Beer Co. is packed. Teams of people spill from picnic tables and crowd around high tops. Host JD Bates comes over the loudspeaker to announce that the competition, at 25 teams, is full. “If you haven’t got in yet—make eyes with someone and see if you can join a team,” he suggests. Bates got into hosting for the performance of it. He calls these appearances “shows” and says that, even with all the work that goes into creating question sets, it is worth it—“I like being part of the party,” he says. (That extends through his work life—through his company U Sing Karaoke, Bates hosts karaoke on Wednesday nights at the Bulldog and Thursday nights at Other Brother. He spends the rest of his week working as a server.) One round of Other Brother trivia is just 10 questions (there are two rounds per night), but it comes with a twist— for each question, teams must wager a point number (1-10) depending on how confident they are in the answer. Questions are asked one at a time, after which teams have two minutes to write down an answer and a wager and turn it in to Bates. While Bates intentionally includes questions he considers both easy and hard, he’s OK with the idea that some might be beyond his audience. “When nobody knows the answer we all learn something,” he says. After all the answers are in, Bates reads the correct answer to the question and the room fills with a mixture of groans and cheers. Teams note whether they got it right or not, and it’s on to the next. To contribute to the party atmosphere, Bates plays music during the two-minute answer periods. And not just any music—his playlist is carefully curated to complement a question or suggest (or perhaps misdirect!) an answer. A question one recent night about alcohol, for example (“What amendment repealed prohibition?”), is followed by the LMFAO hit “Shots.” (The answer is the 21st Amendment.) Bates says he spends three to five hours each week coming up with the questions, and at least another hour crafting the playlist. “It’s a lot of unseen work,” he says. But Bates holds himself to a high standard of entertainment—trivia night at Other Brother is, above all, a good time. “I try to look at it like being an entertainer is about the person being entertained,” he says. “I try to bring value to their experience. I want to do something the best I possibly can, because that’s kind of how I take everything…people say they’re having more fun at mine and I’m like that’s right, all right, cool. That’s my goal.” 1. Which U.S. state is Niagara Falls located in? 2. Name the chat app that has over 1 billion active monthly users. 3. What’s your astrological sign if you were born on Valentine’s Day? 4. Which Democratic presidential candidate lost the elections in 1896, 1901 and 1908? 5. How many dimples are there on a Titleist Pro V1 golf ball? 6. How old is actress Mindy Kaling? 7. A whisky sour optionally includes albumen, which is also known as what? 8. If you enlist in the Marine Corps in New York City, where do you do your basic training? 9. Which of the friends on the TV show Friends never got married? 10. What is the name of the route that runs from Highway 1 through Carmel Valley to Greenfield? For answers, see p. 40. Let’s play trivia! A trivia quiz with questions collected from local trivia nights. “I’ll look at a question and go, ‘ooohhhh, that’s a good one!’” Tuesday night trivia at London Bridge Pub is $1 to play, 51 rapid-fire questions, and the winner takes all. “We have a lot of serious players,” host Tony Malokas says. “It’s cutthroat.”
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