QUIZZYLIMPICS COMES TO SAINT JOHN FISHER'S IN PRITTLEWELL 

This was a long time coming after this quiz had changed venues and dates on more than one occasion but after advertising this in the bulletins around the five parishes and seven churches locally, the Knights of Saint Columba finally held this event in the Borough of Southend-on-Sea on the evening of Saturday 20th February and a very enjoyable evening was had by all present. This regional quiz was contested with a chance to reach the grand final as part of an initiative by the Brentwood Catholic Children's Society (BCCS) and was free to enter which made the evening very attractive.

The teams set about choosing a name for their tables and if points were awarded for the names they all picked then the scoring would have been high before the quizmaster had even asked the first question.

Sitting at the top table helping the quiz to function along its merry path can certainly give you a relieved feeling when you see the questions and think 'Oh I know that', and then when the answer is finally given, you realise that what you thought was a name of a type of tortoise was in fact one of the most deadly snakes on the earth. Yes I was having a bad day and lucky for the teams that I wasn't placed on one of their tables!

With that confession out the way, the quiz was highly contested with two teams tying for last place and two teams finishing joint first. Thankfully the two teams that came first represented two different churches so they qualified to both go forward to the BCCS Quizzylimpics final on March 18th in the hall at Brentwood Cathedral.

We held a mid quiz raffle with some fantastic prizes on offer; well it wouldn't be the same if we didn't and a retiring collection for the BCCS ensured that as a fundraiser the whole evening was a worthwhile exercise.