I like to pretend this journal is for learning and growing and not just a vanity project. An entry from 2019 recently reminded me that I used to increase my car's bass on the equaliser at the start of summer, and on the first day of daylight savings I saw that it was ready to be upped again.
I don't have a reputation for being a “clutch” person. I might appear calm under pressure, but often that is just politeness.
I did not journal the event of last Thursday night, despite them being something worth reflecting on and growing from. It started at pub quiz, a highlight of 2025 life spent with Timmy and Mark plus other guest stars over the weeks.
We had just finished equal first, which I was annoyed about because I knew that I had crossed out a correct answer about The Hobbit and replaced it with an incorrect one. So I felt responsible for us not winning outright.
One person from each table is sent up for the tiebreak and this time it was me. The question is always a numeric challenge, with higher or lower being the response until someone gets it right. That night the question was: In what year was the novella The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde first published. My opponent and I did the usual routine of setting boundaries between 1850 to 1900, and then getting closer from there. As usual, as we got closer the available numbers diminished until there was only 1886 or 1887 to choose from. My opposing quiz participant selected 1887, and the response was, “lower”.
That was it then, I'd won. All I had to do was enunciate the only remaining possibility and we would receive the $50 bar voucher and glory.
Unfortunately this realisation wiped my prefrontal cortex completely and after it rebooted I lost what number was remaining. I knew it was in the late 1880’s but something told me it had a 7 in it. So I said, “1876”. Which was wrong. The next response was correct. I had choked in front of a dozen tables of pub trivia peers. I had let down Vanessa, Annie, Mark and Tim.
I know the brain is just a bunch of lipids, proteins, nerves and electricity. It is only human to experience chemical failures. I didn't feel bad, although I regretted my earlier meddling with the answer sheet.
And so I spent a week not intentionally dwelling on my screw up, yet somehow constantly reminded of it by my somehow now eidetic brain. Every few hours I would recall what happened and cringe. Of course there are worse problems in the world, but none that affected me so tactilely. The memory did help me shave two seconds off my PB for 20 calories on the echo bike…
I did reflect on the event, in unwritten thoughts. I reflected about how I needed to heed to my old maxim of knowing the difference between recognition and understanding. I thought about strategies for keeping track of numbers in high pressure situations. I vowed I would resist meddling with the answer sheet again.
In tonight's trivia we started well, and finished strongly. I didn't change anyone's answers. It wasn't enough for us to win, but we did finish equal second. Suddenly we were faced with another tiebreak. I thought someone else should go up, but everyone turned to me and I realised that fate was giving me a chance for retribution or to double down on my failure. Even more coincidentally, my opponent was the same guy from last week!
Breathing steadily, we parried answers to the question of Taylor Swift's latest album's runtime. And somehow the available numbers were down to 42 and 43, and when 43 was the wrong answer it was up to me to say, “42”.
And I did. Clutch! A brilliant moment of satisfying redemption to cancel out a pathetic moment of incompetence and panic. I didn't choke. And now, finally, I felt able to commemorate this in my vanity project.
