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I have to admit it. I'm a dork. I know random facts. And I'm in Scholar Bowl.
I actually joined it two weeks late, so I am not a Starter. We run our program on a point system:
You get five points for coming to practice and one point for each correct answer. The five people with the highest points are Starters.
Anywho, I'm not a Starter. But we have a competition this weekend. I'm going out to support the home team.
I've been told that, at some point, I'll end up as a Starter anyway. But, for now, I am just going to watch the team.
We've only had nine or ten practices, but I do a fairly good job. I'd probably be a Starter if I'd joined when everyone else did.
But, for the most part, what I'm trying to get at is that I know random facts and I'd appreciate it if you would wish my school's dorky team luck in beating other school's dorky teams.
I'm a dork, I know it. And I'm proud of it.
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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I was in Scholar Bowl when I was in high school. It was kind of funny because everyone assumed because I wore all black and had the sides of my head shaved that I was stupid. Actually, I was pretty smart. It disarmed a few people. And this was WAY back before goth. We were just weird! I had fun going to compete. I hope you enjoy it!
Posts: 601 | Registered: Sep 2002
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Yeah, I also wished we'd had something like this back when I was in school. But then, everyone already hated me for being smarter than them - this would have just cemented that hate-hate relationship. Ah well.
Posts: 8355 | Registered: Apr 2003
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I find it the variations on the names humorous, but I was in Knowledge Bowl and Hi-Q. My Knowledge Bowl team went to state 3 years in a row (we kept 3 team members the same, and only had the fourth person change), but the same team sucked at Hi-Q. Nevertheless, I am still full of random facts that no one else cares about, except now that I'm in college, there's not even a competetition to excuse it. I miss quiz bowls.
Posts: 349 | Registered: May 2003
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Ah, the memories! I was in Academic League in High School, and then in College, College Bowl. It was great fun!
In my town, we had two high schools (creatively named), "North" and "South". I went to North. We named our team the "North Academic Demons" or "NADS". Our team cheer was "Go NADS! Go NADS!" Until one day a teacher from an opposing team whispered in the ear of our adviser, who went all red in the face and told us not to say that any more because "It has a different meaning than we thought it did"
We changed our cheer to "Gimme an E -- Gimme an X -- Gimme an L -- Gimme an A -- Gimme an X -- What does it spell? EX-LAX! What does it mean? GO! GO! GO!"
Posts: 10397 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I was on the Quiz Bowl team in high school. Our team wasn't always that good, but at our last meet of my last year we went 1 farther than the 3 'placement' matches.
I remember one of our competing schools had a *fabulous* QB team. They would always completely kick our trash when we played them, and usually went on to win first or second place at any competition.
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Although many people believe that the official state bird of New Jersey is --|--, it is actually the Eastern Goldfinch.
Posts: 10397 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I've always thought that PHOAKS (People Helping One Another Know Stuff) would be a good name for an academic decathlon team (scholar bowl, whichever it happens to be in your region).
Random facts to come later.
Posts: 1368 | Registered: Sep 2002
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An Obscure Law in Georgia, that I stumbled across while stumbling across the living room:
No person is allowed to carry an ice cream cone in their back pocket if the day that the cone is pocketed is a Sunday.
Another one:
Mules can't be kept in the bath.
A Texan Law:
It is illegal to sell one of your eyeballs.
And, just for us Dan, a St. Louis city law:
It is illegal for a milk man to run while delivering milk.
Its funny, I found all of these in a pamplet on the government that talked about laws. It gave examples of some laws, and it gave examples of stupid laws. There were quite a number of stupid laws, but the above ones stuck with me because I found them to be quite humurous.
Do I qualify now Dan_Raven?
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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My own current personal favorite random fact:
Steven Spielberg's first choice to play the role of Roy Neary in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" was Steve McQueen. However, McQueen declined the role because he didn't think he could cry on camera as was required for the role.
Posts: 2454 | Registered: Jan 2003
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I've been in Knowledge Bowl for two years now, and I'm a fan of weird facts.
One I got the other day was about this other cool club in New York City. It's called the Tall Club. It is just what the name implies--a club for tall people. Established in 1942, the Tall Club became a popular social meeting-place. Requirements are that you must be at least 6'2" if male, 5'10" if female. That's pretty much it.
Sadly, I cannot join the Big Apple's Tall Club. But that's all right, since I live nowhere near New York anyway.
Posts: 973 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Contrary to popular opinion, 'anyhow' is not, in fact, spelled 'anywho'. I really don't understand why people make this mistake, it's not as though 'how' sounds even remotely like 'who'.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:Originally posted by SteveRogers: And, just for us Dan, a St. Louis city law:
It is illegal for a milk man to run while delivering milk.
This law was instituted, of course, because if a milkman tripped and fell while delivering milk no one would be able to tell if he was crying due to an injury or over the spilled milk. In St. Louis if you're gonna transgress against a platitude, they want to be able to tell.
Posts: 6394 | Registered: Dec 1999
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I once won a trivia game because of a bug-bunny cartoon I remembered watching. Sports is the subject that I am least prepared for, but I had to get one sports question right to win.
The question: "Who promised to turn you from a 90# weekling into a muscle man?"
Answer: Charles Atlas (as parodied in many Bugs Bunny cartoons, and about everyone else including Benny Hill)
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Tante Shvester: Well, the female seahorse gets pregnant, but then passes the products of conception over to the male seahorse to carry.
Way to go!
Actually, it is the male that gets pregnant. The female deposits un-fertilized eggs into the male's pouch and he releases his sperm into the pouch and carries the eggs until they hatch. link
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I love Quiz Bowl. I lettered as a freshman on varsity. My extensive knowledge of random facts helps a lot. Hey, steve, maybe we should play each other in a match (our teams, I mean). That would be cool.
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Fun fact: the Hudson River isnt a river, its a title estuary because it is deeper than the body of water it flows into.
Charlemegne is French for Charles the Great. There are three words in the english language that begin with the letters dw: dwindle, dwarf, and dwell.
Posts: 457 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I did a computerized version in middle school that I forget the name of. Schools all around the state competed and each school had a team. Ours was made of the AEP (Advanced Education Program) kids. We got to miss a full day of school for it.
Edit: Knowledge Master Open. Anyone else do it? It had auk-ful auk jokes like auk-cellent and vunderbars and things like that.
Posts: 2867 | Registered: May 2005
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Hmmm SR, are you sure you wouldn't rather be a geek than a dork?
One never knows though, maybe there is an upcoming film about a whale based on the writings of Herman Melville being cast.
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I did that too, kojabu. Absolutley horrid jokes is all that I remember. We did it after school, though. More of a party than a contest.
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Nanoarchaeum equitans is the smallest known organism and has the smallest genome ever sequenced.
Posts: 3546 | Registered: Jul 2002
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