Red 4, Green 2, 30 seconds, 10 seconds, Time!

I was the timer at Quiz Bowl at my church today. Quiz Bowl is like the "GE College Bowls," back in my day, or like the "High Q" shows they used to have in the 80's. I had to hold a timer and start it after a question was read. Most of the questions were 10 seconds, unless it was a hard question like a math question. Then I had to stop the timer when someone from the red or green team would buzz in. Then if they were wrong I had to reset the box. Sometimes, I would mess up and BOY! did I hear from the audience (aka the coaches from other teams...Mr. S, was completely patient!). Once I didn't give them enough time to answer (I thought I did, but I guess according to the opposing team coach I didn't). Another time I had forgotten to reset the box and the green team couldn't buzz in, so the red team could. So we had to throw out the question so it would be fair to the green team. (Secretly, I was rooting for the team that did the less complaining from there on out).

THEN, I would mess up in answering. I would look at red team and the green team would answer. DUH!!! I'd be like green 3 and red 2 would be the one who buzzed in. Towards the last I had a nice kid tell me to reset the box. So that was kind of him. (I was thinking, what team is that kid on?) I found out it was K town. I know a few people from out there. So they were a nice bunch to deal with.

Some of the math questions were hard...a lot of story problems. With these types of problems the coach would have know which person to put in. One from H team was quick, I could tell that her favorite subject was math. There would be easy (easy to me) sports questions. S used to be on QB last year and answered a lot of sports questions. Hopefully J will want to do this in a couple of years.

Over in the other room was "Battle of the Books." These students must answer obscure questions regarding the 16 books they read. Not just author and title but they must know some picky little detail. S did this when she was in 6th grade. I am persuading J not to do this activity. I have a hard time getting him to read anything let alone the required reading. Flute's K1 is in "BOB" and really enjoys it. The majority of the team are boys, such a switch when S was on it. There was only one boy on the team when S was in it.