This is only a snippet from the 2022 Second Scotland Distillery Inspection Tour, two weeks of riding around with local guide and grand friend Thomas* McIvor. Toward the end we were overnight in Edinburg staying in a new construction apartment right under the nose of the huge castle. We were also less than a block from Grass Market Square, a pedestrian mall with shops and pubs and more. Closest to us is the Black Bull Pub where we elected to dine.
The Black Bull is a rather large, very lively and noisy bar. Huge yummy hamburgers and Guinness for me. On the table in front of us was an 8X10 sheet of paper inviting those present to join the trivia quiz. It had a QR code and I shot it with my phone.
We had to choose a team name. The quizmaster announced the theme for team names that night was “low level curses”. I mistakenly thought that meant a curse like those in Harry Potter (written only a few blocks away), but NO, just anything mildly evil to wish on another hapless person. Ultimately, Thomas gave our name as “May you be a lawyer in your next life”. This may have cost us some points as we only started using it in the second round.
We assumed that we might get one answer correct, but in the end we got more than 30. Many were delightful surprises, like “an element used in amalgams” my guess, roundly opposed, but entered into my phone was mercury…..and a winner!. While we certainly didn’t win, place or show, we had a grand time.
We were packed and waiting in the courtyard for Thomas and the car. A young couple with a dog named, Bernie, were there celebrating the start of a new business located in the front building. The husband turned out to be the fellow who writes the pub quizzes for Scotland, wrote our quiz and has a podcast where, among other things reads the names of unusual teams. Yep, our low level curse name was read that morning. So, perhaps we did win.
*Brother George and I met Thomas in 2000? When he was our official guide to Ireland. He being totally compatible with us is now a keen friend and buddy. George and I have always referred to this fine gentleman as “Tommy”. That is until this year when he finally informed us that we two are the only two that call him “Tommy” That is to say we were definitively instructed that he was not “Tommy” and we needed to adjust our use of the name. We struggled but largely were able to not call him Tommy, at least whilst in his presence.