Vera on the right
Other way round
Rex
Yes, but no leotard
The one 9 letter word of the evening
One of the few pictures of me known to mankind
There has to be a group photo sometime doesn't there
Rex's birthday cake, made by his daughter
BRISTOL COUNTDOWN SOCIETY
I first heard about the club via the Countdown Forum on Yahoo. However it has been going for about 12 years, meeting fortnightly on Fridays in a church hall in Filton, to the north of the city. There are about a dozen active members, which makes it fairly manageable - in the past there have been as many as 25 at meetings. The chairman is a gentleman by the name of Rex Clegg who gave a good welcome and explained the format of the games.
They play with one large letters/numbers board so everyone has the same selection. For the first half of the evening they play individually, so the score you achieve on each game is added to your total. After four rounds (each round is 3 letters, one numbers and a conundrum) the scores are totalled and the players pair up with the top two playing each other, then the next two and so on. One member handles the letters and numbers and one acts as DC.
I happened to come along just as they had started the first round, as everyone had been present a little before 7.30. I saw Jilted as soon as I walked in so that started me off with the same score as everyone else. In Round 2 I saw Abnegate well after the time had expired, exactly as in the first round of my TV appearance. From then on things settled down and the games progressed smoothly, although I was surprised when Faquir was disallowed as it is in Official Countdown Words, though apparently not NODE.
I was second on points after the first half, so I was paired with Vera, who has appeared on the TV version. I was told 'she always comes first' and she did, thanks to four very fast conundrums. I was disallowed Boohed and Summate and my opponent had Quorn disallowed after much discussion. But I muffed a numbers game and she beat me on another so it was pretty conclusive really.
|
Vera on the right |
Other way round |
Rex |
Yes, but no leotard |
|
The one 9 letter word of the evening |
One of the few pictures of me known to mankind |
There has to be a group photo sometime doesn't there |
Rex's birthday cake, made by his daughter |
Jerry can be contacted by mailing mail@jerryh.org.uk. He can give you details of the dates and venue if you live in or around Bristol and are interested in visiting the club.