"How to tie a bow-tie" by Dick Carroll

Welcome one and all to the Trivia Club website. At this dot CA you will be able to find an archive of all Trivia Club live events from April 2012 to May 2022, including a record of in-person events until 2020, and our two years of live-streamed events on YouTube.

If you would like me, Russel Harder, to host Trivia Club or something like it at your very own on-line event please reach out for more details! Though our weekly events have come to an end for the time being, I would be more then happy to bring the game show experience you know and love to your private event!

While Trivia Club is no-longer a weekly event, the Trivia Club website is still hosting essays or as we call them, Thought Exercises! The occasional Thought Exercise will be posted on triviaclub.ca about any number of topics. Canadian Basketball! Canadian EGOTs! Something not even Canadian, maybe! Keep an eye out!

Finally, Trivia Club will still be hosting Extra Curricular activities (even if the Extra in that title currently feels a bit extra), including the annual Oscar Confidence Pool, and the now year-long Blockbuster Movie Wager!

Thank you for checking in on our Trivia Club website! It’s always a pleasure to see you. One day, at Farside, The Rec Room, The Sidekick, or somewhere new and unknown we’ll play again.

Until then, it’s not what you know it’s what you learn along the way!

 S o much has changed this year. I mean, I don’t have to tell you that. You were there. 2020 was the year for best laid plans to be laid out… and then set on fire for warmth. Still, if you could say home there was comfort and safety in that, and personally I had comfort in knowing that we were able to keep Trivia Club going in 2020, on-line streaming from the Trivia Clubhouse. One and all, I am your host Russel Harder, writing to you a recap of 2020 and a look ahead to 2021. Thank you for reading as much of this as you’re interested in.

Yes, before I get too far ahead of myself, I want to thank you all, for the first of no doubt many times in this post. Thank you for joining us any Tuesday (and the odd Wednesday or Monday) we put together Trivia Club, my producer and partner Krissy and I, which no doubt gave me and continues to give me a bit of normalcy in what we call life this past year.

Trivia Club had built itself into quite a large part of my schedule, and attention, and once the ability to hold in-person events with as large a crowd as you could muster ground to a halt… well, it took a while for me to fully adapt.

This past year Trivia Club began the calendar by saying goodbye to our home away from home in Hitch, a location that became our longest-running location when it came to time spent within the doors if not total number of events. Luckily at the start of March we were able to celebrate the Trivia Club community with the Trivial Awards at Farside, because by the end of March Trivia Club had gone on-line just like the rest of the world.

With so many more impactful and important moments this year, it’s tough to dwell on what this year meant to Trivia Club for too long, but suffice to say the loss of how much Trivia Club had grown throughout 2019 and was looking to continue into 2020 meant a step back for Trivia Club as a whole. As quickly as Trivia Club had been able to travel across Canada, with further licensed events planned thru The Rec Room in British Columbia, Manitoba, and Ontario, those plans didn’t just change as much as they ended.

Still, Trivia Club went on-line. Life persists, so what more can you do but pivot, and we were able to stream first from Facebook and then on YouTube live every Tuesday from the Trivia Clubhouse. You came out and played, and as some of you have told me it helped you through this first year of the pandemic. It’s helped me as well. The world changed in 2020, so any routine and familiar feelings were incredibly helpful. Thank you, from me to you for allowing Trivia Club to continue in 2020. For playing along every Tuesday. I said last year in this Recap/State Of write-up that “more people played Trivia Club then ever before”, and while I can’t say that’s entirely true for this year as well, I am happy to know that more people then ever before could play Trivia Club. With an adapted version of Trivia Club streaming on YouTube, it allowed past participants of Trivia Club live events, as well as my friends and family who hadn’t had the chance to play in-person, a chance to join in on the game show.

Trivia Club also returned to Patreon. With no more in-person events, simply enough Trivia Club was no longer making any money. So in asking you if you wanted to support Trivia Club, you truly are helping it continue to be available as an event in 2021 and beyond, as a patron of these trivial arts, and we are so happy and have appreciated that you agreed to do so! You of course can still continue to support us by playing every Tuesday, and to further support and get the perks of doing so you can become a patron at Patreon.com/TriviaClub or give on-time support through paypal.me/russelharder!


Now before I recap 2020, and then look forward to 2021, I would love to answer the questions that were asked of me across all of Trivia Club social media! A few times, during January of 2021, I asked everyone to ask me anything! Thank you for asking, without further ado here are my answers.

I do have a desire to bring back the Grand Prix for the Grand Championship (THE GOLDEN VCR!), even if it means holding those events over YouTube.

I don’t think the honor system nature of the current format makes it untenable, though for this upcoming anniversary month of April, I believe I would want to make the Grand Championship Grand Prix a celebration of regular teams. Including something of an “appearance number” gateway allows for a wide selection of teams while hopefully helping to establish that honor system amongst everyone who conceivably hasn’t cheated yet, and so won’t do so for the Golden VCR.

I honestly haven’t thought about this question since childhood, and even growing up I never really landed on a favorite animal that felt… legitimately mine? I remember saying Dolphin or Eagle growing up, but that was more to have an easy answer that included something uncontroversial so we could move on. At this moment I find Octopuses pretty incredible and weird and fun (though it should be noted that My Octopus Teacher is a psychological horror movie), and I have also been convinced that Pigeons are deeply misunderstood and unappreciated simply because they’re yet another sterling example of the western world being actively harmful for the sake of short-sighted fancies.

What day is it, and what mood am I in? Okay, I can pretend that this is an impossible question to answer or I can honestly tell you:

photo credit: Brendee Green Photography

 T he community grew exponentially this past year, going from two or three defined rooms in which a lot of the same familiar faces were able to come together and answer questions in the almost intuitive and sometimes surprising structure of Trivia Club… to a national game show which by the end of 2019 was hosted more by people who weren’t Russel Harder, then people who were. Trivia Club has been helped along by the owners, managers, and bartenders or servers of different locations but until 2019 it was almost solely steered by one man.

The same man who is writing this recap of the year that was and address of the year ahead (hello!) had only seen four others host Trivia Club in the six years prior, but in 2019 Trivia Club went national. Because of that, not only did more people host Trivia Club then ever before but it was a year in which more people played Trivia Club then ever before. In 2019 we held 247 live events across ten different locations, as well as special and private events at additional locations. Of those 247 live events only 142 events were hosted by Russel Harder in Toronto, or 57% of events. This included 45 events at the flagship The Rec Room Roundhouse, including our second annual Red Carpet Oscar Trivia event that brought a refined night of trivia and viewing party, and the second annual edition of The Roundhouse Royale Grand Championship! The Black Label location of Hitch, which became our longest-running location in 2019, held 22 events including the sixth annual Hitchens Cup, the fourth annual Trivial Awards and the Grand Finale of the Golden VCR Grand Prix. Our Friendly Neighborhood Farside held 20 events including the second annual clash to become Uncle Rubberknee’s Head of Class! 2019 also saw a number of limited runs take place, including 4 events at Black Lab Brewing to book-end the year, 2 events at The Thompson Diner at what was once the Thompson Hotel, and the final 2 events at The Ace, to go along with 8 special and/or private events that also included celebrating the birthaversary of Jen & Travis of the Fighting Mongooses!

As was said in the introduction, this was the year that licensed events have truly become equally a part of Trivia Club’s story as the legacy of competition built in Toronto! London led the way, holding more events then any other single location for Trivia Club in 2019 with 47 events. The last half of the year at The Rec Room Masonville in London, Ontario was hosted by Justin Gayle, including the first annual London Royale Grand Championship, and a 50th event celebration! We also began events at The Rec Room Square One in Mississauga, Ontario with 30 events by the end of the year, alongside host Jeewan Gill! Alongside events in Ontario, we also brought Trivia Club to Alberta in April of 2019, with 28 events hosted by Ed Childs in The Rec Room South Commons, and 25 events hosted by CTV’s Graham Neil in The Rec Room West Edmonton Mall, to bring multiple locations to Edmonton, Alberta! In September of 2019 we went all the way east, bringing Trivia Club to Newfoundland and Labrador, with the wonderfully named Russell Cochrane hosted 12 events by the end of the year at The Rec Room Avalon in St. John’s! What follows is a recap of just some of 2019’s events in Trivia Club, so apologies if anything is left out.

 January  hit the ground running on a big year for the community of Trivia Club, with Kevin Avram being introduced as the new host at The Rec Room Masonville in London, Ontario for the inaugural event of January 8th and to kept things unpredictable it was the first tie-breaker outside of Toronto that Rodeo Clowns won! The Questionables, as Suck It Trebek, won the first Golden VHS of the year in Toronto on January 8th. Fighting Mongooses won the first Hitch event of 2019 on January 14th. The next day on January 15th at The Rec Room Roundhouse it was the first Golden VHS victory for Cookiefaced. To finish a big week for Trivia Club, Farside on January 16th saw not only the 100th appearance for 2 Fast 2 Curious, and not only the 20th Golden VHS for the team either, but a Triple Crown victory as well (and all on a Wednesday)! To end an eventful inaugural month for the year, January 28th at Hitch was cancelled due to Toronto’s Snowmageddon (which of course looks small compared to the blizzard in St. John’s to begin 2020), but the next day when the storm settled and we came to The Rec Room Roundhouse on January 29th it just so happened to be the FIVE TIMERS CLUB night for The Questionables!

 February  continued the momentum forward, as We Showed Up For 8! won a Golden VHS at The Rec Room Roundhouse for the second consecutive month to start 2019 with a win on February 5th. The Good Boys from Laramie Cigarettes won at Black Lab Brewing on February 7th, the first public event at Black Lab Brewing, which gave Laramie an all-est Triple Crown victory! Not One, Not Two, Not Three, Not Five… Four Gregs won the third annual Trivial Awards edition of Trivia Club at Hitch on February 11th and with the year’s highest score of 232 points! Fighting Mongooses grabbed the fourth highest score of the year as runners-up on the night, with 200 points. Matt of Four Gregs would go on to repeat as winner of our Oscars Trivia night at The Rec Room Roundhouse with Rob and SK, on February 24th! The Undefeatable Cheat-ahs would end the month, and our run at The Ace with a win on February 27th.

 March  began with the only event at Farside for the month with a big in for Fuck Billy Zane on March 6th. Team Name would win at The Rec Room Roundhouse on March 12th, while a week later it would be the break through win for Dead on the Inside, as All killa, No filla, winning their first Golden VHS after twelve appearances! Winning both events at Hitch for March were the Fighting Mongooses, taking the Golden VHS on both March 11th and March 25th.

 April  brought our seventh Grand Championship and a return to the Grand Prix with a points system based off of end of the night standings with points on the night used as the ultimate tie-breaker! Smartly Pretty and 2 Fast 2 Curious went head-to-head for the Grand Championship, outlasting eventual third place finisher and 2018 Grand Champs the Fighting Mongooses. The GCGP started in huge fashion with what would be the seventh highest score of the year as Smartly Pretty scored 192 points on April 3rd. Smartly Pretty won more Golden VHS tapes during the Grand Prix, five of the six nights in fact, but thanks to that one night which they did not win out right at Farside on April 17th, Smartly Pretty tied 2 Fast 2 Curious when it came to Grand Prix Points, and 2 Fast 2 Curious would win the Golden VCR on the final night even with a runner-up finish for the sixth Golden VHS of the month to Smartly Pretty… a down to the wire finish! Trivia Club debuted at three new licensed locations through The Rec Room, in Mississauga at Square One, and in Edmonton at both the South Commons and West Edmonton Mall! Matthew Cohen was the debut host at Square One, while Ed Childs and CTV’s Graham Neil hosted at South Edmonton and West Edmonton respectively. Finally out Saturday Night Live Fantasy League came to an end for another season with me, Russel H. with the Billion Dollar Murrays winning my first Phil Hartman Trophy by two points over the nearest competition, Rob M. with Hunter the Hungries Gotta Eat!

 May  saw the official name change for Suck It Trebek, as they became The Questionables and won their first Golden VHS since February 12th at The Rec Room Roundhouse on May 7th! Our 700th ever event of Trivia Club in Toronto saw Brewer’s Yeast Infection take the win and block 2 Fast 2 Curious from a threepeat at Farside on May 15th! At Hitch on May 27th, Patrick won on his birthday for a big win by The Sinking Ship!

 June  began with two consecutive wins for Dead on the Inside at The Rec Room Roundhouse, joining the Five Timers Club on June 11th! At The Rec Room Square One in Mississauga, Christopher Colbourne took over as host of Trivia Club, beginning some quality work in establishing a community in Mississauga. The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes won on June 10th at Hitch, for what would be his only Golden VHS of the year! On June 19th at Farside, 2 Fast 2 Curious scored 206 points, the third highest score of the year overall! Dead on the Inside would go for the threepeat on June 18th, but they were blocked by The Questionables who would win the last two weeks of the month including winning their TENTH Championship on June 25th.

 July  would see The Questionables continue their winning ways, with the first threepeat at The Rec Room Roundhouse on July 2nd, and then a FOURPEAT on July 9th. For the 150th event at Hitch, Team Name would return to our longest-running location for the win on July 8th. Dairy-Based Projectiles would win a tie-breaker on July 16th at The Rec Room Masonville, co-hosted by Justin Gayle the incoming host in London, Ontario! It would be the first of two tie-breakers at Masonville in three weeks, and Dairy-Based Projectiles would not only go on to win the first threepeat outside of Toronto but four of the five events in London in July! The Bastards ft. PETE! won at The Rec Room Roundhouse, stopping The Questionables, on July 16th for what would be the last Trivia Club appearance for the time being for Peter/Annika before they returned to Saskatchewan. Fighting Mongooses won at Hitch on July 22nd with a new personal best high score of 208 points, the second highest score of the year. Cookiefaced would be the fourth team to join the Five Timers Club at The Rec Room Roundhouse with their win on July 30th.

 August  saw 2 Fast 2 Curious win a Golden VHS at Farside on the 7th for the seventh of eight months in 2019, with the outlier being what was overall a quieter month in March. The Cunning Stunts swung big and won their first and only Golden VHS of 2019 on the first and so far only consecutive week of Trivia Club at Farside on August 14th, on a night in which they scored the fifth highest score of the year with 196 points. Dairy-Based Projectiles became the first members of Trivia Club’s Five Timers Club outside of Toronto with a win at The Rec Room Masonville on August 20th. Fighting Mongooses made their forty-eighth consecutive appearance at Hitch, breaking Last Place Team’s one-location record of appearances of forty-seven at Cardinal Rule. The Fighting Mongooses set this Iron Team record while also winning the Golden VHS at Hitch on August 26th. A potential threepeat for Cookiefaced was blocked by The Questionables on August 27th at The Rec Room Roundhouse. Our inaugural event at the Thompson Diner was won by David Bowie’s Corporate Whores on August 29th.

 T his past year of 2018 was truly a new beginning for Trivia Club. We wrote in the prior Recap & State Of that it felt like the end of book one, and in our first post-Cardinal year of the Greatest Game Show in Toronto it felt very much like an all new era for Trivia Club. We experimented with the size and scope of Trivia Club and shifted away from certain projects while also partnering with more people then every before for more special events then ever before. Speaking of partnerships, our relationship with one specific location grew in what could be a very exciting direction, for years to come.

In 2018 we held 145 live events across four different locations hosted by Russel Harder plus special events at additional locations. That new all-time high for events in a year also includes 19 events hosted by new hosts to Trivia Club across two licensed locations. With no location hosting more then 50 events for the first time in four years, this meant more locations enjoyed more Trivia Club then ever. The flagship at The Rec Room Roundhouse saw 47 events, including our inaugural Red Carpet Oscar Trivia event which had us enjoy both trivia and a viewing party! The Black Label location of Hitch held 28 events over the year including a string of weekly events, and our fifth annual Hitchens Cup. Our Friendly Neighborhood location of Farside held 21 events over our first full calendar year their, and we also debuted at The Ace in the spring of 2018 and eventually held 18 events at what would become a wonderfully cozy lo-fi late night experience in a return to Roncesvalles.

This year Trivia Club also began Licensing the game you know and love to select hosts and locations, with Anthony C. of Lt. Dance hosting three Trivia Club events at Gin Mill, and Trivia Club coming to The Rec Room Masonville in London, Ontario and holding 16 events hosted by Christopher H. by the end of the year! In special and private events, we held the follow-up to the Canadian Opera Company’s Opera Trivia event which this past year took place in the Four Seasons Centre! We also tested the Ballet knowledge of the National Ballet of Canada’s Turnout donors with some Barre Trivia! Fundraiser partnerships included teaming up with Youth Without Shelter for an event at The Rec Room Roundhouse and celebrating the Echo Women’s Choir! We also teamed with Black Lab Brewing to help introduce Rover to the neighborhood! In total Trivia Club hosted 12 special events in 2018, making it our busiest year by far for fundraisers, parties, team building, and other special events!

 January  was a busy month to start a busy year of Trivia Club, with the Cunning Stunts winning the year’s first Golden VHS on the second day of the year at The Rec Room! The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes would continue The Good Winter on the east end of Toronto with the first Golden VHS of the year at Hitch and Farside on the 8th and 17th of January, respectively! January would also see us host our first trivia event with the National Ballet of Canada!

 February  saw a few notable achievements, with the Fighting Mongooses becoming the latest members of the Five Timers Club with their Golden VHS win at Hitch on February 26th! What's Opera, Doc? would see us bring Opera Trivia for the Canadian Opera Company's Opera Insights program to the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts on February 15th! Following up their Golden VHS win at The Rec Room to begin the year the Cunning Stunts became the first Active Triple Crown Champs and the first team to win at SIX different Trivia Club locations with a win on February 7th at Farside! Two weeks later on February 21st the M. Night Shaym-Aliens would join them as Active Triple Crown Champs with the teams 25th Golden VHS Championship that would also see them score 244 points on the night, the second highest score all-time at Trivia Club that would also prove to be the High Score of 2018!

 March  would have both notable Golden VHS Champs, Extra Curricular wins, and the debut of our fourth active location in 2018 where-in Trivia Club would return to Roncesvalles! We saw are first event at The Ace in Roncesvalles, with Chillasaurus alumni going by the name Thursday Morning’s Regret outlasting both their friends and The Unusual Suspects among other notable competition to win the debut Golden VHS at our new lo-fi late night location on March 14th! Earlier in the month on March 4th we would hold a Red Carpet Oscar Trivia Club spectacular! Former Golden VHS Champs and Saturday Night Live Fantasy League alumni Rob, Sarah, and Matt would make up most of the night’s VHS champs Three Holo-Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri 2049! Rob M. would win more then just the VHS, as he would take home the sixth annual Oscar Confidence Pool on the night, beating Mark P. of the Cunning Stunts on points even if the repeat reigning winner of the Pool had made more correct picks! One of the first milestone location numbers that we passed in 2018 was the twenty-fifth event at The Rec Room Roundhouse! The March 20th Golden VHS Champs were I Look Like Vince Vaughn! Speaking of fun numbers, Trivia Club helped Sean of the M. Night Shaym-Aliens celebrate his 30th Birthday on March 25th at Hitch! Happy Birthday Sean! Congrats on your Golden VHS win against your family and friends! The Simple Minds would win their first Golden VHS at the second event at The Ace on March 28th! The Simple Minds would quickly establish themselves as the team to beat on the west end, at least through the summer!

 April  proved that even though we no longer had Cardinal Rule, we could still celebrate the anniversary of Trivia Club with an even wider spreading Grand Championship Grand Prix to see who would hold the sixth annual Golden VCR! The Fighting Mongooses would set the pace early with an April 9th Golden VHS win to begin the GCGP for 2018! Other notable GCGP would be the Cunning Stunts two days later on April 11th at The Ace which saw Mark P. join the small group of solo winners! The Cunning Stunts further pushed for a repeat Golden VCR victory with a win at Farside on April 18th! Both teams would miss the April 24th leg of the GCGP at The Rec Room Roundhouse which was won by folks from trivia website Factinate! A day before that Lt. Dance would become the fifth Century Team of Trivia Club, making their 100th appearance on April 23rd at Hitch! This was a week after winning the 100th edition of Trivia Club at Hitch on April 16th, a win that also made Lt. Dance a Triple Crown winning team! Finally for the GCGP Finale at Hitch on April 30th, the Fighting Mongooses would go from Trivial Award winning New Comers of the Year for 2017 to the Golden VCR Grand Champions in 2018!

 May  would prove to have less of a post-Grand Prix hangover then past years, while the weekly run of events that began at Hitch last September would come to an end and return to a Twice Monthly schedule that our Black Label debuted with in 2013. Team Name, one of several legacy teams from Cardinal Rule that understandably had a quiet 2018, would win their twenty-fifth Golden VHS on May 1st at The Rec Room becoming the latest team to join the Five x Five Timers Club, before following it up with their twenty-sixth win overall on May 22nd! One day later on May 23rd, Anthony Couto of Lt. Dance would become the first person to host a Licensed Location of Trivia Club with the first of three events at Gin Mill! The M. Night Shaym-Aliens would take part, but Drug Ford would win the debut Golden VHS for a Licensed Location! Shelby, along with a mix of other Shaym-Alien alumni, would be more successful on both May 2nd and May 16th at Farside, winning consecutive Golden VHS tapes in May! Of course on May 14th at Hitch, the Fighting Mongooses not only won their ninth Golden VHS but also notched the high score at our Black Label location for 2018 becoming just the twelfth team to score 200 points! A huge Extra Curricular moment for Trivia Club was the finale of our fifth season of Saturday Night Live Fantasy League coinciding with the 43rd season of SNL, which saw Rob. M and The Party Andersons win his first Phil Hartman Trophy!

 June  was a big month for the M. Night Shaym-Ali-Ace, as Shelby would lead a third consecutive team to a Golden VHS victory at Farside to notch her own personal threepeat at Trivia Club on June 6th! Returning competitors to Farside, Andy Winners Czar would win their first Golden VHS at Farside on June 20th after a few attempts, to at least give the Shaym-Alien Reign a rest for a week or two! After joining the Five Timers Club earlier in the year, the Fighting Mongooses would join the Ten Timers Club on June 25th at Hitch with a solo win! The Simple Minds would have their threepeat attempt broken up by a returning Last Place Team, now known as 2 Fast 2 Curious, who would score 204 good for a new high score mark at The Ace on June 27th, a new personal best for the team, and an early passing of the torch for house team of The Ace back to our west-side regulars The Team Formerly Known As Last Place Team!

 July  began with Suck It Trebek winning their first Golden VHS at The Rec Room on July 3rd before going on to become the house team at The Rec Room Roundhouse for 2018. OZMA would also win his first Golden VHS after a couple attempts at Farside on the independently-minded July 4th! Trivia Club helped Youth Without Shelter run a fundraiser at The Rec Room on July 8th for our first Sunday night Trivia Club! Sunday Night Trivia Club was won by Intergalactic (semi-redundent) Space Cats, Meow!! Two days later Really Makes U Think won their first Golden VHS at The Rec Room on July 10th! The Simple Minds would join the Five Timers Club with their FIFTH Golden VHS at The Ace on July 11th! July 13th saw SPARTACUS alumni Michelle Cabral start a three show winning streak on Jeopardy! to become the first Golden VHS winner (to our knowledge) to also win on Jeopardy! Her four-episode cash winnings total $48,693! The Shaym-Aliens said goodbye to Mary with a Golden VHS win as the M. White Sha-Mary-ens on July 18th! This event at Farside was also Trivia Club’s 600th event overall! One week later Trivial Knowledge won the tenth edition of Trivia Club at The Ace and in doing so joined the Five Timers Club!

 August  had the Fighting Mongooses become the tenth Triple Crown Champs and third Active Triple Crown Champs with consecutive Wednesday wins at Farside on August 1st and then at The Ace on August 8th. After a run of events as both a team member of The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes and Wookiee of the Year, likeable underdog The Sinking Ship became the latest solo Champion at Hitch with a win on August 13th! Smartly Pretty, also known as Electric Bastard alumni Matt & Pat, returned to Hitch and found a new home base in a win on August 27th! This would be the first calendar month since our run at The Ace began that The Simple Minds would not win at least one Golden VHS, after Les Quizerables scored 190.5 points to win the VHS on August 22nd! Conversely it would also be the last event at The Ace in 2018 that 2 Fast 2 Curious or at least one member of the team, would be defeated.

 September  actually began with some notable Extra Curricular excitement, as Peter M. of PETE! won the sixth annual Summer Movie Wager, his first win after competing in all six, against an especially tough field bolstered by Avengers: Infinity War! The first anniversary night of Trivia Club at The Rec Room saw the location’s first TIE BREAKER! The September 4th event was also the first tie-breaker that was decided with a first to answer anagram, as that just happened to be the unchosen Pardo category on the night! David Bowie’s Corporate Whores became the fourth Active Triple Crown Champs with a win on September 5th at Farside. Biscuits! won the Golden VHS on September 19th at Farside, marking the return of SPARTACUS captain John M. to Trivia Club! We’ve been burying the lead with September as it had not one but TWO GRAND CHAMPIONSHIPS celebrating both our Black Label location’s FIFTH anniversary and the first anniversary of the Big Stage in The Roundhouse! The Rec Room Trivia Royale (not to be confused with our traditional question number ten) was competed over across September 18th and 25th, and Not Turner would combine their points over those two nights to walk away with the first Grand Championship at The Rec Room before ever having won a Golden VHS! As if September wasn’t a big enough month for Trivia Club already, we debuted our first Licensed Location with The Rec Room, as Christopher H. debuted as the host of Trivia Club at The Rec Room Masonville in London, Ontario! At Hitch the fifth annual Hitchens Cup saw The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes return from a summer away to up end the Fighting Mongooses and also defeat Matt & Pat! Two weeks later however, it was Matt & Pat, or Smartly Pretty, going by the name of Fatty’s Big Chance who would win their first Grand Championship at Hitch as the fifth Hitchens Cup Champions!

 October  saw Suck It Trebek win their third Golden VHS at The Rec Room Roundhouse for our FIFTIETH event at the location which took place on October 2nd! Following up their Hitchens Cup victory Smartly Pretty, as The Mangy Stevedores, won at Hitch on October 15th to join the Five Timers Club as a duo! The next day Not Turner, the new Trivia Royalty at The Rec Room, would win their first Golden VHS on October 16th! A potential conventional threepeat for 2 Fast 2 Curious was broken up when the team members themselves were their own only competition on October 24th at The Ace! With the threepeat on pause, Sam as Palpatine Was Right! won the second solo Golden VHS in the history of The Ace! Finally on October 29th, the Frightening Mongooses won the Halloween edition of Trivia Club at Hitch.

 November  had its own gilded celebration for one year of Trivia Club at Our Friendly Neighborhood ‘side! For the first time since Shelby had joined the M. Night Shaym-Aliens, the M. Night Shaym-Aliens won a Golden VHS without their M. Night Sham-Ali-Ace on November 7th! It could not have come at a better time either, as the Shaym-Aliens took the first of the two part Grand Championship at Farside! Biscuits won their second Golden VHS on November 21st, but the Shaym-Aliens held back both Biscuits and the Cunning Stunts, to win the inaugural Gilded Skull as Uncle Rubberknee’s Head of Class! On November 8th we were pleased to team up with the Echo Women’s Choir for a night of Trivia in the Tranzac Tiki Room! November 14th saw 2 Fast 2 Curious win an unconventional THREEPEAT at The Ace! Wookiee of the Year, or Makin’ Wookiee became the latest team to join the Ten Timers Club with a Golden VHS victory on November 26th! A day later, on November 27th at The Rec Room Roundhouse, One Man Army + would win their second Golden VHS of the month, having debuted with a first and gold on November 11th!

 December  ended 2018 with a memorable month of Trivia Club, and started with nothing short of Smartly Pretty as I’m Sorry About Venom notching the 2018 high score for The Rec Room on December 4th! After an unsuccessful debut during the anniversary month in November the DDTs returned not with moustaches (surprise) but as the EDDTs with moustaches to win their first Golden VHS at Farside on December 5th! A busy opening week to the final month of 2018 continued with Rover presenting Trivia Club and Trivia Club presenting Rover to the fine folks at Black Lab Brewing on December 6th! This Dog-themed night of Trivia Club was won by Instagram celeb-puppies, including Horton McSnorton! Finishing off the week we celebrated the holidays with archaeologists from ASI at El Loco Local, proving that this is a very fun job. Even with an unconventional break in the middle, 2 Fast 2 Curious became the first FOURPEAT Golden VHS Champs at The Ace with a win on December 12th to end the year on the west end as winners from September to December! With wins by One Man Army + and Not Turner to finish the year at The Rec Room it truly felt like The Roundhouse, known for its first time winners, had started to establish a fun mix of regular competitors to compete alongside Suck It Trebek and Really Makes U Think, with a mix of familiar Trivia Club teams from other locations as well! The Festive Mongooses notched another holiday Golden VHS to end the year at Hitch on December 10th! Before a break for the holidays, Christopher H. hosted his sixteenth and final event at The Rec Room Masonville, having seen a selection of wonderful teams compete in London, Ontario, including two-time winners Artillery, two-time winners Quiz In My Pants, two-time winners Full House, and four-time winners Quizzitch Captains! Kwik-E-Smarts figured out the Finale question thanks to television they watched with dad growing up, and beat Smartly Pretty and Biscuits to win the last Golden VHS of 2018 as unheralded but ultimately successful first time competitors!


Thank you for taking a trip through just some of the highlights of Trivia Club for 2018 with us, and as always apologies if anything was missed! Now that we’ve looked back at the year past and recapped some of our major events, what is the State of Trivia Club in 2019? As always with this State of Trivia Club, I’ll be switching from the “we” of Trivia Club in the year prior, to the “I” of Russel, as I talk about what I’m excited about for this upcoming year of Trivia Club. At least in terms of what I can tell you, as of the first week of January!

Starting things off I want to thank everyone who supported Trivia Club on Patreon and enjoyed the Pause + Play podcast across its first fifty-seven episodes. Because a new episode hasn’t been posted since March of 2018 both have been inactive, but don’t think they have been forgotten. As you can tell by the recap, it has been an especially busy year for me in terms of live events so sadly the Podcast Network has gone into hibernation. The moment I find time for it however, the Trivia Club Network including Pause + Play will be able to return and your support on Patreon will as always be deeply appreciated!

I believe my intention to collaborate more in 2018 was very successful however, as not only did I host more special events last year then ever before, and partner with some truly unexpected people and organisations, but Trivia Club was also able to License Locations. For the first time (aside from a guest host spot or two from Matthew Smith or Mark Piggott), I wasn’t hosting Trivia Club! It was thrilling to first dip my toe into licensing with an excited new host and noted alumni of the game for Trivia Club at Gin Mill in Anthony Couto, before taking things a step further and expanding on my partnership with The Rec Room. Seeing Christopher Hachey do such a wonderful job as host of Trivia Club Masonville in London, Ontario in 2018 was thrilling. It is the beginning of giving participants the chance to compete at Trivia Club at The Rec Room and seeing how you might compare against other people across Ontario and maybe even Canada. I’m already saying too much, but I will say… watch for more news concerning our partnership with The Rec Room in the new year!

Back to specifics I can talk about, on January 25th I’ll be partnering with the National Ballet of Canada once again for Barre Trivia to test the NBoC’s Turnout donors on their ballet knowledge! PUBLIC special events include Trivia Club’s return to Black Lab Brewing on Thursday, February 7th presented by Healthy Pets! This night of trivia for the on-line Toronto-based veterinary consultants will coincide with a rebroadcast of their episode of Dragon’s Den on CBC!

WEEKLY Tuesday events return to The Rec Room Roundhouse on January 8th, while we are back to TWICE MONTHLY Wednesday events every second and fourth week at The Ace starting January 9th! We return to Hitch with TWICE MONTHLY Monday events every second and fourth week of the month starting January 14th! TWICE MONTHLY Wednesday events every first and third week of the month return to Farside beginning on January 16th! Yes, I’ve messed around with my calendar a bit, but only for January. And of course if you are in London, Ontario, you can play Trivia Club at The Rec Room Masonville with new host Kevin Avarm, who began his duties as the new WEEKLY Wednesday quiz master on January 2nd!

Now every year I like to choose a keyword, a single word as a mission statement. It works as a broad concept to keep as a mantra in the back of my head to push the year forward and remind me of the kind of stuff that I’d like to accomplish in the year ahead. Think of it as a resolution but with minimal strings attached. For Trivia Club’s first year that keyword was “CREATION”, the reason for which goes without saying, while in our second year it was “EXPANSION”, as Trivia Club found its way to four different locations including our Monday night Black Label location. Still, in our third year we needed to think about “STABILITY”. As Trivia Club did indeed stabilise after expansion, in our fourth year we wanted to concentrate on the “LOYALTY” that made it happen, celebrating participants on triviaclub.ca, while also beginning the Trivial Awards. In my fifth year working on Trivia Club, I made the keyword public for the first time with my intention for “MOBILITY”, which also meant ushering in new regular locations , and the Pause + Play podcast! For year six in 2018, as I’ve already talked about, my mind was on “COLLABORATION”, and though I originally intended that collaboration to be more person to person, I was pleasantly surprised with the steps Trivia Club took as a business. Whether it’s working alongside international corporations, or licensing Trivia Club across Ontario with The Rec Room!

This leads us directly to the state of Trivia Club in 2019:

“CONNECTION’.

Each year of Trivia Club we’ve been able to build on the year before, after we began at Cardinal Rule, we expanded out to the likes of Hitch, and other locations. After that expansion it was important to stabilise this community of locations so that people participating come out, week-in and week-out and expect that same great game show. Because of the stability and reliability of those live events, we were able to reward and celebrate your loyalty both in person and through this website. Trivia Club became a more mobile concept because of what was possible with the website, and new live events, and because of those ever-expanding events, we were able to work with and collaborate alongside more people than ever before.

This is why connection is so important to me in 2019, because as Toronto’s Great Game Show becomes Ontario’s Greatest Game Show becomes… the Greatest Game Show in Canada… it’s more important then ever that Trivia Club feels like the same group of like-minded pop culture fans that it has always been. As much as I enjoy giving Trivia Club a polished look and feel of a well-made game show, I never want to lose that DIY nature of a black sharpie on golden spray-paint either.

In addition to the regular monthly and annual scoreboards that allow you to see how you stack up against the rest of Trivia Club’s competing teams on that week, month, and year, I will also be sharing more questions from the prior week on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! On Facebook I will also look to create groups for our different locations so you have a place to interact with Trivia Club that isn’t simply our page or the event pages for those locations!

Finally, I will be writing a new bi-weekly newsletter called Q+A for Trivia Club, a project that I’ve been toying with for a while. Not only will it be a recap for recent events and a calendar for upcoming events for those who aren’t on social media or have stepped away from social media a bit, but it will also have a mix of trivia, it will share interesting new music, and will also give insight on recent Golden VHS tapes!

The third annual Trivial Awards for 2018 will take place on January 28th, 2019 at Hitch! If you aren’t able to make that night we may also have additional awards handed out at our other locations too.

Speaking of awards, keep an eye out for news on the Oscar Viewing Party returning to The Rec Room for 2019! Not only that but feel free to jump into the Oscar Confidence Pool for our seventh annual Oscar Pool as well!

In March we will see the inaugural Grand Championship in celebration of one year of Trivia Club at The Ace! We look forward to celebrating our anniversary at our lo-fi late night trivia spot on the west side of Toronto!

The Grand Championship Grand Prix will return in April, with the Grand Prix once again taking place across our four locations, with the Finale location still to be decided!

The sixth season of the Saturday Night Live Fantasy League will conclude in May, so keep an eye out on this very website to see how it continues from episode to episode! With the Kate McKinnon Rule in full effect it has been a tighter knit field then usual!

The seventh annual Summer Movie Wager will take place beginning at the end of April and concluding in September, and you are invited as always to take part!

In September we will see not one but TWO different Grand Championship competitions with the sixth annual Christopher Hitchens Cup at Hitch, the only drinkable trophy awarded through Trivia Club! We will also see the only playable trophy awarded or the second annual Trivia Royale at The Rec Room!

We will have a few milestone live events in Toronto for Trivia Club as well, with the 100th edition of Trivia Club at The Rec Room, the 25th edition of Trivia Club at Farside, and 25th edition of Trivia Club at The Ace, as well! We will also see the 666th edition of Trivia Club all-time, and 700th edition of Trivia Club all-time as well!

Naturally, if you’ve read these 4,500 plus words dear reader then you should most certainly think about staying connected to Trivia Club! Sign-up for the Q+A newsletter, keep an eye out for more exciting news throughout the year as well, and of course if you have an idea or would like to work with Trivia Club… we’ve got space for you! Whether it is a podcast for the network, an eye for design on Trivia Club merch (we really should get our own pens already, hey), an idea or op-ed that would fit nicely into the .CA, or of course a feature for the upcoming newsletter! Don’t be surprised if we come your way for ideas either!

That’s what we know about 2018… and that’s what we’ll learn along the way in 2019!

 I f Trivia Club were a story, then in many ways 2017 was the end of book one, the last year in which Trivia Club was so easily connected to how it all started. From the first week to the last, Trivia Club enjoyed unprecedented landmarks, spectacular starts, and amazing records. 2017 of course also saw the end of Our Original Home, with the last events at Cardinal Rule.

In 2017 we held 97 live events across four different locations and two special events, including 50 events at Cardinal Rule for the fourth straight year. We also held 29 events at our Home Away at Hitch (the most ever events there in a calendar year), the first 14 events on The Big Stage of The Rec Room, and 2 events at our New Home at Farside! We also held a special event at The Rec Room coinciding with the season 7 premiere of The Walking Dead, and for something completely different began an annual Opera Trivia event with the Canadian Opera Company’s Opera Insight program! We also began the Pause + Play podcast, continued a limited run of our podcast The Panel, held two more annual championship celebrations, and presented our very own awards show for the second straight year.

 January  saw 2017 begin with Wookiee of the Year winning the year’s first Golden VHS at Hitch, with David Bowie’s Corporate Whores following things up with the first Golden VHS of the year at Cardinal Rule two days later. Later in the month, the Cunning Stunts would win their fiftieth Golden VHS, an impressive milestone to be sure but not their last milestone of the year. Girl Gon Git It would do one better then Tiny Tim's... during the 2016 Hitchens Cup, and with 217.5 points set a new All-Time High Score at Hitch! In January, Trivia Club would also partner with the Canadian Opera Company for the first time, with the first Opera Insights Opera Trivia night!

 February  was notable for a number of reasons, including our 200th event at the Original Home of Trivia Club, Cardinal Rule! It was the first of two Golden VHS victories on the month for the Cunning Stunts, against a whos who field of Trivia Club competition. Also winning twice on the month were The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes, who would begin quite the successful year for the mostly solo-manned team with repeat wins in February that would notch into a historical note in March. Karen from Finance would win their second Golden VHS at Cardinal Rule. Mark P. became the first person to repeat as the winner of Trivia Club’s Oscar Confidence Pool.

 March  began with The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes becoming just the third team to ever THREEPEAT, and the first team to do so at Hitch. Interestingly enough all teams to Threepeat had won at least one Golden VHS in February. The Cunning Stunts would go on to win another two Golden VHS tapes at Cardinal Rule, being matched in this month at least by the Unusual Suspects with one of those wins for the Suspects coming on the first Steamwhistle sponsored nights of cho-cho-choosing at Cardinal Rule. Last Place Team would also grab their first win since closing out 2016 at Cardinal Rule, win as Diet Last Place Team! The portable podcast version of Trivia Club’s live event, Pause + Play, appeared on CBC Radio One (99.1 FM in Toronto) as part of Podcast Playlist. By the end of 2017 we would record 50 episodes of the Pause + Play podcast, a project we are very proud of.

 April  would see the fifth annual Grand Championship Grand Prix take place, celebrating not only five years of Trivia Club, but also Trivia Club at Cardinal Rule. As part of the celebration we also made merchandise available for the first time, including stickers, pins, t-shirts, and those sweet sweet Trivia Club mugs. Back to the Grand Championship Grand Prix though because tt the time we could have never known that this would be the last Grand Championship for Cardinal Rule. It would be a fittingly competitive event for such an occasion. Tiny Tim’s… would make some of their last appearances of the year, as Petit Peiere’s… and finish in a strong third place, ahead of the M. Night Shaym-Aliens, Last Place Team, the Unusual Suspects, Wookiee of the Year, and David Bowie’s Corporate Whores. The four Cardinal Rule scores would be added up with a team’s highest Hitch score, awarding the accumulated highest scoring team with the newly redesigned Golden VCR! The Cunning Stunts would ride the wave of a strong start to the year to a 559 to 550 over the Electric Bastards, the closest in points that a Grand Championship Grand Prix had ever finished! For a team that had competed in all five years of the Grand Championship, it was a win that was a literal and figurative long time coming.

 May  saw calming seas as per usual, in the post-Grand Prix hangover, which also opened up for interesting returns and unexpected experiments. The Man with the Candy would begin the month with their first win at our Home Away of Hitch since our fourth event on he east-end, a full three years, six months, and four days between wins! Later in the month, at Hitch, Matt & Pat would return… but not as Golden VHS winners The Electric Bastards, instead as Golden VHS winners Like A Muffin Or A Beet! While all this was happening on the east-side of town, The M. Night Shaym-Aliens would win twice at Cardinal Rule, and would come oh so close to a threepeat, only for their streak to be broken up by The Unusual Suspects! Our fourth annual Saturday Night Live Fantasy League, coinciding with SNL’s 42nd season, would come to an end, with fifty participants over seven groups taking part. Matthew S. of The Electric Bastards, et al., and his team The Ignorant Sluts would win his THIRD Phil Hartman Trophy! Other winners included, Ireland’s Kevin K. and Night Crawlerz winning the third annual Gilded Radner in impressive fashion, Meg C. and the Lazy Sunfeys winning the Weekend Warrior Award, Megan M. and Go Gene Rayburn! winning the Special Guest Star, Justin L. and The Weekenders winning the Yvonne Hudsucker Proxy, V.E.E.P winner Mark P. continuing quite the impressive year with his team Dan Akroyd Rage, and Steve C. and El Nino winning the Golden Rocket Man!

 June ’s big story would be Last Place Team doing something that no team had done before, and that is win three consecutive times at Trivia Club with none of those wins coming at a February event! Last Place Team became the second team to THREEPEAT in 2017, but only the fourth all-time, and only the second at Our Original Home of Cardinal Rule! It would be an epic feat that included a win against Trivial Knowledge all three times, against the M. Night Shaym-Aliens two of those times as well (fun fact, the M. Night Shaym-Aliens are the only team to have competed against all four Threepeat teams during their respective streak), with the third consecutive win also coming against the last two Grand Champions, the Cunning Stunts, and David Bowie’s Corporate Whores.

 July  would see Trivial Knowledge win their second Golden VHS only 187 days after their first. We say only, simply because the first Golden VHS took 1 year, 6 months, and 24 days. Their second Golden VHS victory would take place on the 222nd edition of Trivia Club at Cardinal Rule, and to add to the symettary, one half of the team’s core duo has a birthday on February 22nd!

 August  began with Trivia Club launching a page on Patreon, which as the page also mentions, will sustain Trivia Club in the long term along with our Trivia Club live events. You can also think of it as a weekly passing of the pitcher, as Cardinal Rule is the location where we solicited donations on site, so Patreon helps keep Trivia Club a player supported event. By year’s end Patreon support came from Jarrad Robinson, Dylan Morgan, Matthew Smith, Kevin Morgan, Rob Moden, and Travis Fudge. Also in August, the Fighting Mongooses won a Golden VHS in their first two appearances at Hitch, our last bi-weekly events at our Home Away before the event became weekly just in time for our four annual event at the location. August would also seeing Cardinal Rule victories for the returning Treasure Butt, at Cardinal Rule, as well as Last Place Team winning their twelfth Golden VHS at Cardinal Rule, and the sixtieth Golden VHS win by the Cunning Stunts.

 September  was a HUGE month for Trivia Club, as we celebrated our fourth year of competition and participation at Hitch, while also launching a new #TuesdayTrivia event at The Rec Room! The Rec Room saw The Bastards return on Tuesday to our inaugural event at the massive Cineplex-supported barcade, and win the inaugural event in The Hall, taking one more The Dawg! Oh Shoot! would end our first month at The Rec Room becoming the first team new to Trivia Club to win a Golden VHS on The Big Stage, while also setting the location’s high score for 2017 in the process. Ticklish Boys (?) returned for their first time in more then a year to win at Cardinal Rule, while Trivial Knowledge won their third Golden VHS in record time. Not only would the Unusual Suspects win a Golden VHS in September, but the son of the father/son duo, would win our fourth annual Summer Movie Wager! Yes, unlike last year, the ghosts of the past would bust in favor of James C. floated by the success of Dunkirk. Also in Extra Curricular news, the Saturday Night Live Fantasy League returned, but this time with the smallest field since our first year of our comedy nerd take on Fantasy Sports! With everything happening with our live events, it was the best decision going forward. In the fourth annual Christopher Hitchens Cup at Hitch, The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes would take an early lead against their budding rivals in the Fighting Mongooses, before both teams were surprised by the eventual victors, taking their first annual championship by a single point… the M. Night Shaym-Aliens! A stunning victory for the house team of Trivia Club.

 October  began with the 100th edition of Trivia Club at Hitch, with Lt. Dance blocking the M. Night Shaym-Aliens chances at a threepeat, while also giving Estelle Getty Lee the last of the traditional Triple Crown victors! Another achievement in October at Hitch, would be Wookiee of the Year joining the Five Timers Club! The first two-time Golden VHS Champs at The Rec Room would be a former house team for Cardinal Rule, before Last Place Team took the mantle, Team Name! Winning one week later at The Rec Room would be The M. Night Shaym-Aliens, making them Golden VHS winners at five different locations. In support of the season 7 premiere of The Walking Dead, Trivia Club would hold our first special event at The Rec Room! We would also hold our FIVE-HUNDRETH overall event of Trivia Club, which took place at Cardinal Rule, and see the Cunning Stunts continue an all-time year with the milestone win. The week after Trivial Knowledge would win their fourth Golden VHS, what would prove to be the tenth last Trivia Club at Cardinal Rule. Ending October on All Hallows Eve, we would hold a spooky edition of Trivia Club at Hitch that would see the scary good West Virginia Losers Club notch the new All-Time High Score at Hitch, with 234.5 points!

 November  1st would begin in the same scary good way that October ended, with a new All-Timer High Score for all of Trivia Club and for Cardinal Rule being set, when the Cunning Stunts scored 240 points. This would set the stage for a truly unexpected eleventh month, as Chillasaurus, an unheralded team of first-timers, would win their first Golden VHS by half a point over Last Place Team, only the fourth time such a thing had ever happened and the first time in more then three years. The first half of November would see wins from two of Hitch's more established teams, Wookiee of the Year and The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes, who won their tenth Golden VHS, while the second half of the month would see first-timer winners take the Golden VHS home! Team Name would win the Golden VHS at The Rec Room for the third month in a row, along with some Three Billboards swag! Before the 240th edition of Trivia Club, it was announce that Cardinal Rule would be closing and thus Trivia Club would be ending its run at its Original Home. The Electric Mayhem would return, from a reported Retirement Tour earlier in the year, and win the fifth last Trivia Club at Cardinal Rule. The Bastards would win the week after at Cardinal Rule, retaining most of the previous week’s Mayhem team. November would also see us make our long-awaited debut at Farside, our second new location of 2017! For the first time Trivia Club would take place on a Thurday, and at our inaugural event it would be Trevor Tyres who would win the Golden VHS to ring in our New Home!

 December  would truly be a month of mixed emotions. First off, the M. Night Shaym-Aliens would win The Shape of Water night at Hitch! But not only were we celebrating all that was, in the months before, and all that could be at our newest locations, but also all that we had experienced at Cardinal Rule for our final three events at our first home. The third last event at Cardinal Rule saw a untraditional Threepeat by the Electric Bastards broken up by a one point victory from nominal first-timers, the Dollywood Massacre! The next week at our penultimate event at Cardinal Rule, we would hold our second annual Trivial Awards! Celebrating 2017, Trivia Club would celebrate a number of participants, including more Hitch-centric teams for the first time! The Electric Mayhem would once again lose by just a single point, with the VHS going this time to David Bowie’s Corporate Whores! The Good Folks from Laramie Cigarettes would end 2017 in a most memorable way with a win at the second Trivia Club at Farside, and then just four days later they would close out the year at Hitch with the Gold! Leading into the last Cardinal Rule event, Last Place Team would participate at a deeply appreciated 49 events on the year, including 47 consecutive by the years end. The Last Rights & Wrongs at Cardinal Rule would be a night never to be forgotten, as the final event at Our Original Home would see the Electric Mayhem (or something like them) win their third Golden VHS of the last five events, with the two losses coming at a combined two points… closing out the true retirement party for Doctor Teeth’s band of misfits by raising their jersey to the rafters to the tune of a new All-Time High Score, more points then ANY team to participate in Trivia Club, 247 points! The Electric Mayhem 24-7. Cardinal Rule forever.



If you were there for Trivia Club in 2017, then that was all just a pleasant and/or bittersweet reminder of some of our highlights. Sorry if anything was missed. What does 2018 hold? Once again, like last year’s recap/statement of intentions, I’ll be switching from the “we” of Trivia Club, to the “I” of Russel, as much as possible, as I talk about what I’m excited about for this upcoming year of Trivia Club.

To begin, with this writing coming at the end of January in 2018, Trivia Club has already had a few notable events that will carry forward into the rest of the year, both schedule-wise and symbolic to my intentions for the year.

On January 13th Trivia Club partnered with the National Ballet of Canada, to bring Ballet Trivia to an event at Hemingway’s for the NBoC’s Turnout donors. Right away we jumped into a private event to begin 2017 and it was a big reminder that I want to do more one-off, or singular annual events this year.

On January 17th, a Wednesday, we held our last monthly event at Farside with the decision going forward that it will be a TWICE MONTHLY event, every 1st and 3rd Wednesday at the month. This will most often then not move it away from the some-teenth of the first three events unfortunately but it will also put Farside in the welcome position to bring a new warm and cool location to Wednesday. This makes me want to bring up two points. I wouldn’t have moved Farside to Wednesday, a night I suspect a lot of teams will forever associate with Trivia Club at Cardinal Rule, if I didn’t think the location was deserving of it. It is the kind of inviting, comforting, and cool place that I want to share with as many people as possible in a Trivia Club way.

Also, with Farside being twice monthly, this still leaves the rest of the month to a location in the west. Parkdale, Roncy, or The Junction, it hasn’t been decided… but it has been looked into. As someone who lives on the west side of Toronto, I know that is where I want Trivia Club to be.

As I noted last year, every year I like to choose a keyword, a single word mission statement, a mantra in the back of my head to push the year forward and remind me of what I’d like to accomplish. In Trivia Club’s first year it was “CREATION”, which was simply enough making Trivia Club, and continuing it. In our second year, the keyword was “EXPANSION”, which was successful in that we did indeed expand (to four locations, at one time during that year) but... some kinks needed to be worked out, that's why our third year was about “STABILITY”. Things crystallized into what you might have become familiar with, a bi-weekly Monday event, along with weekly events on Tuesday (for the most part) and Wednesday. In 2016 the keyword was “LOYALTY”, this was about working with the individuals that made Trivia Club a success and giving them more diverse places to play, from the Trivia Club Network for podcasts and the .CA as a more stable and easy to navigate home of live event recaps and Stats, among other things, not to mention a push to celebrate teams with what would become our first Trivial Awards.

The state of Trivia Club in 2017 was the first time I made that keyword, that mantra, public with a statement of “MOBILITY”. With that in mind, we found a new Tuesday night weekly event at The Rec Room in the late summer. We then introduced a second new location at Farside early in winter. And of course, another big step forward in mobility was producing a weekly Friday podcast called Pause + Play, a portable version of Trivia Club.

Which leads us to the state of Trivia Club in 2018:

“COLLABORATION”.

This word was subtext in 2016 and 2017, and in 2018 I want to make it surtext. For Trivia Club to continue to grow, I want to bring together and work more with like-minded individuals on events and projects that continue to excite me. I want to also continue to partner Trivia Club with out of the norm and interesting spaces and places. On February 15th we will once again bring you Trivia at the Opera! which will be co-produced by the Canadian Opera Company and take place at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts in their Education Space!

March will bring our first livecast and Oscar Viewing Party at The Rec Room on March 4th, but also a Red Carpet Trivia Club that Sunday, taking place during the Red Carpet portion of Oscar Night! Saving you from awkward E! banter, we’ll instead test your trivia knowledge and then see which Oscar predictions you are most confident in!

The Grand Championship Grand Prix will return in April, with the Finale and structure still not fully decided on, it will most certainly be for the Golden VCR for the sixth year! What will our first year away from Cardinal Rule bring us? We’ll have to see!

Our Summer Movie Wager will return in 2018, so be on the lookout for invitations in may, on the eve of the summer movie season! There may be one or two big movies coming out. I think? You tell me!

In the summer of 2018 we are proud to introduce Park + Play, a loosely connected series, which will take place in Toronto’s beautiful big parks. High Park, Christie Pits, and Trinity Bellwoods are all possibilities, with the schedule being subject to change due to weather on the day but also a Trivia Club event onto itself because of the wonders of the green space.

Then in September we will give out the FIFTH Christopher Hitchens Cup at Hitch, as the only drinkable trophy awarded through Trivia Club either annually or otherwise will be given to a team who at that time will be competing at not only second-longest running location (which it already is) but featuring our second most events (which it soon will be), as we celebrate our pride in our Hitch family over the past five years!

The Trivial Awards will also return for the third time, and like the Grand Championship Grand Prix, for the first time it will take place outside of Cardinal Rule! As like the Awards themselves, the location will be more clear the closer we get to the end of the year. With sparkling new locations in Farside and The Rec Room, and with Hitch still working through those new weekly event ins and outs, and of course with a west-end Toronto location TBD… it’ll happen, but in what capacity? I’m also excited to see!

We have less milestone numbers ahead in 2018, not like the 100, 200, and 500 that we celebrated last year. Still, look for the 10th edition of Trivia Club at Farside, the 25th edition of Trivia Club at Farisde and The Rec Room, and of course a potential 50th edition of Trivia at The Rec Room within the upcoming calendar year, if you enjoy your numbers round.

Another collaborative step moving forward will be our evolving relationship with The Rec Room! With fourteen events in 2017, and more every Tuesday in 2018, we’re beginning to plan even more special events with The Big Stage, things similar to The Walking Dead premiere party, and like our Oscar viewing party and trivia night, but also bigger and wider reaching live events, the details of which I am very excited to get into when I’m able to… later this year, or early in 2019! Wow, already thinking of next year. How did we get here?

Of course, don’t think I forgot about you, dear reader. Players, Trivia Club participants! You are the creators that I am most excited about collaborating with. Trivia Club, our .CA that is, is built for more then just my posts! Want to run a Fantasy League of your own, but you don’t have a place to put it? How about just an Extra Curricular game? Maybe just an op-ed? Or running the Trivia Club Book Club, or collaborating with me on music, or I like to put it... Thinking Music? If design is more your speed, I want to have more eyes on the merchandise world Trivia Club. Whether it be pushing more which of my designs look the best or introducing something new of their own.

Our Trivia Club Network also has no limit to the number of podcasts it can be home to. From one-off episodes to on-going series of indiscriminate regularity. You notice my podcast posting history outside Pause + Play? I ain’t going to judge. I just want to point and click to present to the world. In 2018, I plan to produce at least one additional podcast that allows me to work with and talk to exciting teams of people and individual creative minds that inspire me. Maybe it’ll be called “Team Building Exercise” or “A Host of Questions” or something else. Either you heard it here first or I’ve since thought of something more clever. So, if I’m convincing you to join me with on any of these adventures, you know exactly where to find me. The Trivia Clubhouse will always have room to grow.

That’s what we know about 2017… and that’s what we’ll learn along the way in 2018!