Trivia Night at Tonic

Because Tonic is on George Washington University’s main campus, be prepared for most of the trivia players in the bar’s third-floor lounge to be students — and think about how that might affect the questions.

This is the most pop-culture-heavy quiz we’ve seen: There were questions about which boy band Omarion was a member of, the band that became breakout stars after being featured on “Friday Night Lights,” and know which liqueurs were used in certain raunchy-named shots. At one point, the host admitted that she’d stolen a question from the “Real World/Road Rules Challenge.”

That said, it’s a lot of fun to play. There are six rounds of five questions each, and two timed “free response” rounds where you might have 90 seconds to list every state whose name does not contain the letter N.

The scoring for most rounds is “confidence-based,” and wasn’t well explained, so pay attention: After answering all five questions, teams assign them a point value between five and one — giving five to the ones they’re certain are right, down to one for the answers they’re not sure about. All correct answers receive the point value they were assigned, so answering two questions correctly in a round could be worth either nine or three points, depending on how the responses are ranked.

Final word of warning: There’s no quiz this Monday, because “that’s the first Monday back after spring break.” It will be on the Tuesday instead. The specials, meanwhile, include $3 Miller High Life, $4 bowls of Tater Tots and $5 PBR 16-ounce cans.

Pro tip: Watch the Tonic at Quigley’s Twitter feed (@TonicatQuigleys) for a hint about one question each week.

The prize: a $50 gift card for the winning team.

-- Fritz Hahn (March 15, 2012)