Pub Quiz Report

Pub: The Wishing Well, Bellenden Road. I only live a few minutes from here but I haven’t been in for years and it’s completely changed. Not for the worse, but apparently it was re-modelled as the set for Peckham pubflick ‘Last Orders’, though I have to admit I didn’t recognise it. Spacious, friendly and relaxed, it was an ideal place to meet old friends who were in sunny Peckham for the night. And ‘ oh! ‘ there was a quiz on! Just adding to the nostalgia was a very nicely kept pint of Bass, which was my learner beer.

Quiz: charmingly old-school. Twenty questions, general knowledge, no picture round, no music round, no jackpot accumulator, no messing about. Thursday night. Unusually, the quiz didn’t kick off until well after 10pm. Happily, the pub stays open until well after 11, so all was well.

Prize: similarly no-nonsense. One prize, a crate of 24 bottles of Stella for the winners. No runners up, no third place, no consolations.

Questions: the kind of thing you might know but might not; good, solid, well-judged quiz questions, like ‘what was the name of Henry VIII’s first child?’ or ‘what colour flag does a ship fly to signify it is in quarantine?’

The quizmaster: laid back to the point of not giving a monkey’s. This actually added to the relaxed late-night feel of the whole enterprise.

Will I go again? Yes. This isn’t a quiz to cross town for but it’s a nice, low-key, local way to kick off the weekend (Thursday being the new Friday, of course). I’ll have to get through all this Stella first, mind.