Debate, schmebate. We know who we're voting for and the highlights will be all over YouTube tomorrow like moths on a porchlight. What could be better? Beer, pub grub, and two hours of trivia. Seattlest trivia, in other words, taking place this very evening at Ballard's own Old Pequliar pub. In fact, you can get started right now. Email the correct answer to this question to james at seattlest punkt com and you're eligible to......

You've got just one week to register for the World Affairs Council's second annual Transnational Trivia Championship. Brainiacs from around Seattle will gather and compete at 7pm on Friday, October 10, at the Seattle Center Fisher Pavilion. At $40 per person, the entry fee is steeper than the usual pub quiz, but your donation helps the WAC "bring the world to Washington and connect Washington to the world." (If you want to donate more, of......

DRINK FOR URBAN ART: The second Northwest location of Upper Playground, a San Francisco-based urban art and clothing store, opens this weekend--and there's a swanky cocktail party/gallery viewing at Chapel on Saturday night to celebrate. The clothing and accessories at Upper Playground are the epitome of dope, but what we're really into is the art. For a sample, check out these poster prints of various artists' renderings of Obama, going for $200 a piece. We're......

Larissa Kelly can stop looking over her shoulder. Local Jeopardy! champ Emily Thorsley was defeated by freelance journalist Greg Lindsay in her second game. We asked her a few questions about her experience. Are you going to carve "Jeopardy! champion" on your tombstone? I hope to live a long life full of accomplishments, so that winning on Jeopardy! is a mere footnote. On the other hand, it's pretty clear I've had my Warhol-mandated 15......

Back at the end of July, on the last day of Jeopardy!'s 24th season, local contestant Emily Thorsley dethroned a five-day champion and took the crown. And she's technically had it since then, because Jeopardy! has been running reruns and special tournaments during the summer break. This evening, however, season 25 begins, and we get to find out if Thorsley can turn her win into a streak. Having played pub trivia against her many......

And for answering one trivia question ahead of time, your team could win a free pitcher of beer: What Seattle-based company can be added to this list, and more importantly, why? Enron, Worldcom, 7-Eleven, McDonald’s, and Olive Garden Email james at seattlest.com with your answer. One team that gets it right will win the bar credit, but every team that gets it right will be emailed one of the super-secret round topics to help with......

Last weekend, Seattlest revisited the other Shorewood High School for our 20-year reunion. And it's been 20 years since Lloyd Dobler and Diane Court left Lakeside High, so on our flight to Milwaukee, we got reacquainted with Cameron Crowe's Say Anything.... Singles gets the Seattle-centric attention, but Say Anything... is the movie where Seattle first caught our eye, several years before we actually moved to the land of the Gas 'n' Sip. FACT: Seattle......

First things first: Yesterday's pre-quiz trivia question, worth $50 in bar credit. What city fills in this blank, and why? Seattle, Hong Kong, ________, Bangkok, San Francisco A couple of people guessed that they were the cities Bruce Lee had lived in, but they gave different answers for the blank. Great thought, but wrong. The correct answer: Sydney. Why? They're the floors in the parking garage at Pacific Place. Congrats to two members of team......

Yes, it's the second Tuesday of the month, but it's Seattlest Trivia night nonetheless. And for answering one trivia question, your team could be the proud consumers of $50 bar credit. That question: What city fills in this blank, and why? Seattle, Hong Kong, ________, Bangkok, San Francisco Email james at seattlest.com with your answer. After several months of relatively easy (i.e., Googleable) questions, this one's harder. One team that gets it right will win......

When we passed our in-person audition for Jeopardy!, we knew one other potential contestant: Emily Thorsley. She's a regular at the Old Pequliar trivia night, and her team (formerly the Laser Rocket Arms, recently the KOMO 4 Problem Causers) has kicked our ass on many occasions. So we were unsurprised when Emily appeared on Friday's show and mopped the floor with Mark Wales, a 5-time champion. Emily's one-day cash winnings total $29,800, but we'll have......

Seven facts in honor of Little Miss Seattlest's first-ever movie, WALL-E, which we saw at the Cinerama—one of three three-panel Cinerama theaters left in the world. FACT: The Seattle Cinerama is not Seattle's original Cinerama. That'd be the Paramount, which sacrificed 1600 seats to fit the screen and three projection booths required. They screened Cinerama films from September 1, 1956, to January 26, 1958. The Cinerama we know and love today opened January 24,......

Photo courtesy of Seattlest Flickr pool contributor Sprizee.Why? For one thing, you could win a free pitcher of beer--cool, refreshing beer--if you come in fourth place at half time. (Such a useful brain!) Or if you can answer this trivia question: Which Batman villain is a Seattle native? Email your response to james at seattlest.com. If you're right, you might win beer--I'll randomly select among everyone who submits the correct answer. You do have to......

We were at trivia Tuesday night—playing, not hosting—plowing our way through the audio round. Our host played a snippet of a song that sounded kinda familiar, but we couldn't actually name either the song or the band. No half points for us. We wrote down our obligatory "funny" guess ("Do the Bartman," by Bart Simpson ) and waited for question 9. Someone from a nearby team heard us belaboring our stumpedness. "Think of a really......

First things first: Much to our own surprise, the [edit: second] most populous city in Eastern Washington (which is everything east of the Cascades, people; it's in Wikipedia, so it must be true) is Spokane Valley. We know. We thought it was Yakima, too. Turns out that when we triple-checked it, all the sources we had cited the 2000 census—but Spokane Valley incorporated in 2003, after the census. We stumbled into a trick question, but......

Wanna win a free pitcher of beer tonight at the Old Pequliar? You could make sure your team is in fourth place at halftime. Or you could answer this question: What's the second-most-populous city in Eastern Washington, after Spokane? Email your response to james at seattlest.com. If more than one team answers correctly, I'll pick the winner at random. Of course, you also have to show up at the Old Pequliar tonight to play pub......

Seattlest has heard good things about the All-Star Pop Culture quiz at Jillian's ever since it started up. We still haven't had a chance to check it out—Tuesday's our regular trivia night, even when we're not hosting. But since the spring season kicks off tonight, we did the next best thing: interviewed Trevor Trifiro, the brains behind the quiz. Assume I've never played pub trivia before. What should I expect when I come to All-Star......

It's the first Tuesday of the month, which means it's time to slip your brain into first gear and head to the Old Pequliar for Seattlest Trivia. You'll win cash if your team takes first, second, or third place, or you'll get swag if you win the battle for the bottom. You know what else? You can win a free pitcher of beer plus a copy of local trivia king L.M. Boyd's Boyd's Curiosity......

FACT: Founded in 1927, the Henry is the oldest public art museum in Washington State. Take that, SAM! FACT: Horace C. Henry was fond of French and American landscape paintings. He founded the Henry with his 172-piece collection, a hefty endowment, and his OK for the museum to move beyond the works he'd collected and showcase contemporary art. Fellow museum founders the Fryes, on the other hand, required their museum to display the works they'd......

1) In the beginning, Dick's just sold hamburgers, cheeseburgers, fries, shakes, and ice cream. The Deluxe and the Special are johnny-come-latelies, debuting in 1971. The only other major menu changes? Swapping out orange soda and swapping in Diet Coke. 2) Dick Spady, the gent who put the Dick in Dick's, got the idea when he was a regular at Portland's Carnival restaurant. Now that Carnival's gone, PDX has a dearth of old fashioned burger......

First things first: You can win a free pitcher of beer. All you have to do: be the first person to email us (james at seattlest dot com) with the correct answer to this question: Who was defeated by Jean Godden in 2003 and by Ken Jennings in 2004? Oh, you also have to show up tonight at the Old Pequliar. And while you're there, you might as well play the quiz. Details: Trivia starts......

Tonight's the night: The smartest trivia players in Seattle gather at the Old Pequliar for eighty questions. At stake: cash -- all the entry fees, doubled by the bar. Seattlest James is hosting, because it's the first Tuesday of the month. (It's also Super Tuesday, so he'll be glancing at the bar's television sets to see if "yes we can" translates into "yes we did.") Want a free pitcher of beer? Be the first......

In yesterday's PI, Regina Hackett wrote about Ryan Hobson, a local artist who's put together the Serial Killer Trivia Game but who's having a hard time getting it published. Apparently people think it's too morbid -- one publisher rejected it because "it's too dark, morbid, not funny, not PC and sick-o," though that critic did "admire his execution (design/production)." We're not amazed that a nice illustrator of children's books has a dark side. We've been......

After winning $3,022,700 from Jeopardy!, Ken Jennings could've retired to a Seattle suburb to roll around in piles of dollar bills. Instead, he became America's answer to Ben Schott, wroting about trivia: a book its history, a regular column in Mental_Floss, a popular weekly trivia quiz, and most recently a hu-frickin'-mungous collection of questions, the Trivia Almanac. In short, he's got the career we've secretly wished we could have since we were nine years......

Brand new year, same familiar venue: Seattlest Trivia returns to the Old Pequliar tonight, with Seattlest James hosting. If you're reading this, you probably know the drill: 5 players per team at most, $5 per team to play, the OP doubles the pot and first place wins a bunch of cash. Signup starts at 7:45, but the real mystery is when tables run out -- claim your spot early! We think this month's quiz is......

We have it on good authority -- namely, the UnSpun list of Best Pub Quizzes in Seattle, which we created last week and which has been voted on by a whopping 4 people -- that the quiz at the Old Pequliar is the 9th best trivia quiz in Seattle. Imagine how much better it will be this week, when we're not hosting! Instead regular player Kevin hosts. He's part of a team that regularly squashes......

Observation: Seattlest James hosts trivia at the Old Pequliar on the first Tuesday of the month. Observation: Tomorrow night is the first Tuesday of December. Conclusion: Seattlest James is hosting trivia tomorrow night at the Old Pequliar. What does this mean for you? A chance to pickle your brain while having your brain picked. A chance at fabulous prizes, including cash, cash, cash, beer, or t-shirts. A chance to hang out with your friends......

Look out, Kate's: Mulleady's is a new contender for Seattlest's favorite Monday trivia quiz. And since we only came in second place, you know we actually like it. The host kicked off trivia with theme music, and we were immediately jealous. If we can figure out how to play Darth Vader's entrance theme next time we host at the Old Pequliar, we're totally ripping off that idea. The questions were a potpourri -- some......

Seventeen teams showed up at the Old Pequliar last night to see if our voice would give out. We managed to get through the evening without having a Peter Brady moment, but we're grateful to those of you who were willing to step up to the mic at a moment's notice. We thought we'd produced a slightly more difficult quiz than usual, but we were proven wrong -- every team got 40 or more......

Here's the thing: we're hosting trivia tonight. And, in a refreshing change, our voice is less Gilligan yodeling for the Skipper and more Will Arnett narrating the Grindhouse trailer for Don't. That comes at a price, though, since it's due to a friendly virus brought home by our toddler. Our voice may give out entirely, or we may just not be able to amp it up to our usual volume. We'll be there for you,......

In 2004, Ken Jennings redefined success on Jeopardy!, banking over $2,500,000 as he won 74 games. Those of us who get paid in bar credit know it's hard to make a living through trivia, but Jennings has done it. He turned his obligatory cash-in-on-your-15-minutes book, Brainiac, into something much better and broader, an examination of trivia history and culture. He also moved from Utah to the Seattle area. That, and Brainiac's paperback release tomorrow, gave......