judgment calls

A few of the snap decisions I had to make on last Tuesday’s quiz:

Question: According to legend, Laocoon and Cassandra both warned against accepting what large gift?
Correct answer: the Trojan Horse
Team asked: Can we have credit for “horse”? They didn’t call it the Trojan Horse.
Verdict: No. Too general. I would’ve given credit for “big wooden horse” or something, but not just horse.
In the cold light of day: I probably should’ve given them the point. In Quiz Bowl or on Jeopardy!, no, but for pub quiz, probably OK.

Question: In Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Sleeping Beauty, what present does Carabosse give Princess Aurora on her sixteenth birthday?
Correct answer: spindle
Team asked: What about “spinning wheel”?
Verdict: OK.
In the cold light of day: I’m still OK with it, though a friend of mine noted that they aren’t the same thing.

Question: In the O. Henry story “The Gift of the Magi,” Jim sells his watch so he can buy what present for his wife Della?
Correct answer: combs
Team asked: Will you take “brush”?
Verdict: No, because they’re not the kind of combs you use to comb your hair, so a brush is a different kind of thing altogether.
In the cold light of day: Good call.

Question: Bob Dylan tells Mr. Jones — rather than Mr. or Mrs. Charles — that “something is happening here, but you don’t know what it is” in what song?
Correct answer: “Ballad of a Thin Man”
Team asked: What about just “Thin Man”?
Verdict: No, because a) that just capitalizes on my hint, and b) it’s not the complete title.
In the cold light of day: Good call.

It’s an esseintial part of hosting, but I hate having to make judgment calls. I can sympathize with both sides — it’s frustrating to be denied credit for knowing the right answer but not articulating it correctly, but it’s also frustrating to see people get credit for something you remembered accurately and they didn’t.

Last night, for some reason, was rich in arbitration opportunities. The three I remember:

1: Geography
I screwed up when I wrote a question. At some point while futzing with word order, I dropped “the longest” from “What river forms part of the border between Ontario and New York?”

The answer I wanted, and read as correct: the St. Lawrence. Another correct answer: Niagara.

A couple of teams came up to ask about that, and I thought I remembered the Niagara being part of the St. Lawrence. But I opted to give them their points. Unfortunately several other teams who wrote Niagara didn’t ask me about it, and I was delegating data entry to someone else, so several teams didn’t get credit for a correct answer.

Happily, this morning I discovered that adjusting all the scores to give credit for Niagara didn’t affect the final standings. Whew.

Lesson learned: announce any inclusion decisions — “Did you write Niagara? Come up and let me know.” — and take advantage of a data entry person to double-check that. Double-checking all the answers is a lot harder when I’m hosting solo, though.

2a: Name the bride (picture round)
The picture: Uma Thurman in Kill Bill v. 1.

The controversy: I wanted “Beatrix Kiddo” as the answer. A number of teams said “The Bride.”

Result: I gave credit for “the bride,” then heard a (justifiable) mass outcry from teams that had the correct correct answer. So teams that answered “Beatrix Kiddo” got 2 points, while “The Bride” got 1.

If I were doing it over again, I’d be a hardass and only give the point for Kiddo. And I’d write “not ‘the Bride'” on the answer sheets. Including the Bride of Frankenstein as a possible answer opened up a can of worms on what I meant by “name,” so I understand the confusion, but I also remember, as a player, being annoyed when teams got credit for answers that weren’t as good as mine.

In short, the team that wrote “James=pussy” by Uma was right.

2b: Name the bride (picture round)
Controversy: A photo of JFK and Jackie post-ceremony, cutting their wedding cake. I accepted “Jackie Bouvier” or “Jackie Kennedy” as correct answers, but nixed “Jackie Onassis.”

I stand by this one. It’s obvious from the photo who Jackie just married; she wasn’t Jackie Onassis when the photo was taken. Yeah, teams who wrote “Jackie O” knew who I was talking about, but accuracy counts on quiz night.

I’m also not sorry in retrospect for not accepting Twin Peaks as an acceptable substitute for Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me.

Tag: judgment calls

Tuesday Night Judgment Calls (12/5/07)