Skip to main content

'University Challenged: Week Sixteen (06.11.17)


It says a lot about an edition of University Challenge when the most notable thing about it is the thickness of a man’s beard.

I remembered Raii’s facial hair from before; it’s pretty much engrained in my head, which was inevitable when you see just how pronounced it is. I don’t know how you’d grow one that’s so dense, and that’s coming from me: a proud pogonophile and pogonowearer; I can only imagine how satisfying it must be to stroke whilst pondering a particularly tricky brainteaser.

When I wasn't studying his impressive facial hair growth tonight, I was tweeting about it. See below for my meanderings. 

UCL Vs. St Hugh's - Oxford (06.11.17)


8:02PM: Raii's favourite book is The Catcher in the Raii.

8:03PM: "Shall we just get on with it?" Paxo loves his work.

8:04PM: Raii's beard is just PURE BEARD.

8:05PM: I've got an ousel-cock. I've also got thrush(es).

8:06PM: Looking at Raii's beard makes you instantly pregnant (just like Tom Selleck's tache).

8:07PM: UCL's Gray is suaver than Suave McSuave from Suavezerland.

8:08PM: Raii's beard is so dark, I'm worried the pixels might leave a permanent beard shape on my screen when I turn off my TV.

8:10PM: Mehigan isn't Mexican, despite the spelling similarities.

8:11PM: Gray's facial hair was patented by Desperate Dan.

8:11PM "Look at him" are the three words I say most when watching #UniversityChallenge 

8:14PM: Grainger's facial hair is on loan from the Alexandre Dumas' Three Musketeers Appreciation Society.

8:16PM: You could lose a hamster in Raii's beard...and I'm prepared to prove this.

8:17PM: Elais' shirt is based on my dining room wallpaper, circa 1986.

8:19PM: Raii's beard is made from the same substance as a letterbox draught-excluder.

8:21PM: Good to see so many female students on tonight's #UniversityChallenge; so many, they're periods must have synced up.

8:23PM: Fatty Acids is my pseudonym-of-choice.

8:25PM: None of these students will be familiar with the concept of a council area, Jeremy.

8:29PM: The answer to none of tonight's questions was "Jedward", predictably.
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Not The Bayeux One.

The Carole King album Tapestry has been my 'getting-ready-in-the-morning' soundtrack for the past few weeks.  It's been a favourite album ever since I was a student, which makes for a pleasantly gentle way to usher in the start of a day. I've always been a fan of a well-crafted song, which is something of a Carole King hallmark, ever since she started writing with her first husband in the early Sixties. Tapestry may be an unimaginative choice for a favourite LP, as it suggests I haven't delved that far into her career, but it's still an undoubted classic; anything with '(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman', 'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?' and 'You've Got A Friend' on it can't really fail; if nothing else, it proves she likes writing songs with long titles.  Next month, she's set to perform the album live in its entirety for the first time at a gig in Hyde Park, which I would have loved to have gone to, if it weren...
Read more

Shakerpuppetmaker.

Have Parker from Thunderbirds and Noel Gallagher ever been seen in the same room? The resemblance is uncanny. So much so, I think something’s afoot. If my suspicions are correct, I've stumbled across a secret that will blow the music and puppet industry wide apart. In the mid-60s / mid-90s at least. It doesn’t take long to see the signposts. There’s the similarity between the name of Oasis’ first single, Supersonic, and Supermarianation, Gerry Anderson’s puppetry technique. The Gallagher brothers would often wear Parkas . Live Forever was clearly a reference to Captain Scarlet and Standing on the Shoulder of Giants to the size difference between Noel and his bandmates. The more you think about it, the more brazen it gets. It’s fishier than Area 51, Paul is Dead and JFK's assassination put together. The only glitch to the theory is scale . According to Wikipedia, Anderson’s marionettes were 1’10” and Gallagher is 5’8”. How does he maintain an illusion of avera...
Read more

'...I'm Gonna Look at You 'til My Eyes Go Blind."

Over the past week or two, I’ve been on a bit of a Sheryl Crow kick, largely thanks to rediscovering her cover of one of my most-liked Bob Dylan songs. She has one of my favourite female voices, yet despite this, I only own one CD and that’s just a single (her '97 release ‘Hard to Make a Stand’); on that basis, you can only imagine how much of her back catalogue I’d own if I hated her (it would fall into minus-figures). Dylan, conversely, takes up more of my collection than anyone else, save The Beatles and Paul McCartney’s solo work. He’s one of those artists who, when you get him, you really get him - and once I’d tuned into his style as a student, I'd time and again be blown away by his lyrics; he’ll have more jaw-dropping imagery in one track than other people fit in a whole career. These days, I mostly listen to music in the morning when getting ready, and more often than not, this will consist of a suggested YouTube playlist when I’m in the bath, r...
Read more