When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one quizmaster to repeatedly insult his favored quizzers, we call this "Thursday." Last night, gentlemen from both Venezuela Went To Shit After Chavez Died and Dick Trickle (the team, not the person) bore the brunt of much of the attacks. I'm okay with this, but I don't want to leave out a certain bearded, driving-capped former carpenter from team Ape Froman, Sausage King Of The Jungle. They also win "best team name of the night" and tied for "most players," with 7. Cheaters. Not very good at cheating, though...

Obviously, there are other people who deserve insulting. Turner and Poochie, for example. Two wonderful guys, one short from their usual team and hence not using Cart-Drawn Horse, but obviously fans of Poochie, the rockin' dog. This is, of course, one of the worst characters ever to grace a television set within a television set. Itchy and Scratchy were just fine without Poochie, but he had to horn in and you two jerks had to side with the moneygrubbers at the studio!

It'd be pretty cool to have my own tv show, while I'm on the subject. It'd be modeled after Craig Ferguson's, I think. He dicks around with the standard format of talk shows and makes things really interesting. I'm for it. He also rings a doorbell and dances while two interns in a horse costume run around stage pretending to be Secretariat. I wonder if I could work that into quiz. Somebody please write to the Geek Overlords requesting that I be given a pair of interns and a horse costume. Y'know, for science.

So while that's all pending, I'm gonna take my leave. I'll see you all next week for our next episode of TALES! OF! INTEREST!

John Madden Football has been kicking ass since 1988, but, as we discussed at quiz, I've only been playing since '95. And that's the only version I ever owned. I've never understood the appeal of sports video games. Sports are something I can actually do. I can't personally go outside and stab a giant or call down a giant magical beast to destroy my enemies. I certainly can't walk around shooting people. That's what video games are for. But football? Not exactly hard to get outside and toss a football around. Are you gonna play at the level of the pros? No. Unless a pro football player happens to be reading this. If so, 'sup? Whatcha doin' next Thursday? Come to quiz, man. It'll be fun. Anyway, you can at least play.

There are, of course, exceptions to this rule. Stephen Hawking couldn't play legit football. Somebody could toss him a ball and smile, but it's not like he's going to catch it. It'd be a sad charade that Dr. Hawking is above. Or Tim Tebow. He can get himself on a field somewhere, but nobody's going to let him throw the ball. With video games he can! And Bo Jackson can get back to a time before his injury. Man, that guy was good.

But back to Madden '95. Its cover is just fat ol' Madden with a play going on in the background, but the players' numbers have been changed so they're just kindof generic. It's apparently Erik Williams of the Cowboys and Karl Wilson of the 49ers. This was produced before the Panthers and Jaguars joined the league, but you could put in a cheat code that let you play as them. The entire team was maxed out stats. You basically couldn't lose. I also basically just threw hail marys the whole time. I don't think I ever kicked a field goal in that game. I don't think anyone else did, either.

This, of course, is real football. American football. Not Aussie Rules Football, where the rules are made up and the points don't matter. It's one of those games like cricket that I think are just an elaborate hoax by foreigners who want to confuse Americans. Doesn't really make much sense, as confusing Americans isn't exactly a challenge, but there you have it.

And I'm done. Thanks for coming out, guys! Hope you had a great time! See ya back here next week!

Last night I saw something happen that has never happened before in my entire time as a quizmaster: Somebody took their shirt off before Johnny did. Now, many of you don't know Johnny, or "Cousin Chet" as his cousins who don't know his name call him. I probably see him shirtless about 80% of the times we hang out, and no, we've never hung out somewhere that going shirtless was appropriate. But CHASE! HELL YEAH! You took that dance off straight into Johnny's territory and you whipped his ass. Kudos to you, sir. Kudos to you.

As to the rest of you, I'm sorry. I'm so very sorry. There was a lot of flabby man gut flapping around last night. Thankfully the kitchen had closed by that point, so your food was probably already safely down. I don't know about the well-being of your beers at that point, though. If you could keep them down, I'd have recommended continuing to knock 'em back 'til you'd killed every last brain cell that for even a moment processed the image of a shirtless ginger grinding up against a guy once thrown off the set of My Name Is Earl for looking "too white trash." You do look better with the fu manchu thing you've got going on instead of the full beard, though, Johnny. Or "Jonathan," as nobody calls him ever.

I alwso want to give a big shout out to the 9th graders of America who have been forced to read "The Color Purple" and already made the mental leap to "The Color Purple Nurple" that we took you to last night. It provided several seconds of childish giggling for me, at least, and I feel like the rest of you momentarily reverted to the early stages of puberty (mentally speaking) when you realized it as well. A good Before & After can do that for you. The example was brilliant, too. 

Who WOULDN'T watch "Baby Got Back To The Future?" I presume it involves Sir Mix-A-Lot's journeys through time to hook up with not only Marty's mom, but also Erica from Red Dawn, Beverly from Howard The Duck, and Caroline in the city. Essentially, hooking up with as many incarnations of Leah Thompson as possible. He might not, since she's not exactly known for her butt, but I'm choosing to believe that he'd make an exception in this case.

That does it for me. You guys have a great week, and I'll see you all back here next Thursday!

• The Royal Hilltop - Aurora 8:00 PM
• Darcy's Bistro & Pub - Denver 8:30 PM
• Prickly Pete's - Denver 8:00 PM
• The Whiskey Bar - Denver 7:00 PM
• The Cheeky Monk - Westminster 9:00 PM
• The Ram (Meridian) - Meridian 9:00 PM
• Lisa's Restaurant & Lounge - Augusta 7:30 PM
• Opal Divine's (Marina) - Austin 10:00 PM
• Opal Divine's (Penn Field) - Austin 10:00 PM