Good afternoon all. Firstly, I’ll be posting the answers to yesterday’s questions later on today. But first I’m going to fill you in on how my day has been.
This morning started off with a disappointment as I received an email which told me that the article in the Irish Independent had been put back until “early next week”. Sad, true, but what can one do? When I hear any more about it I’ll let you know.
Not being a big fan of driving in the early morning, I had travelled up to Dublin last night and stayed with my friends Bob, Keith and Maurice, who very kindly gave me a bed and a parking space. Thanks lads. I had been asked to present myself at the RTÉ Radio Centre at 10am, with my appearance on-air scheduled for 10.15.
I was quite surprised to find that, after kicking up my heels in a waiting room, I was basically brought straight into the studio when the call came. I had presumed I’d meet the team beforehand, perhaps during the 10am news. I was introduced to Ryan Tubridy during an ad break, so obviously our preliminaries were quite rushed. I wonder if all radio presenters have Tubridy’s ability to engage in banter while keeping an eye on a clock counting down? I hadn’t even noticed he was doing it until, just at the end of a sentence (in our private chat), he pushed up a fader and, almost in the same cadence, announced “And we’re back …” into the microphone!
My 15 minutes of fame lasted about 15 minutes. So that was nice. It did fairly fly by though. So much so that I forgot to mention this site – and that had been my main reason for agreeing to go on in the first place! Oh dear. 😦
During the course of it, Ryan Tubridy tested me with 10 questions on history and 10 on TV & film. I did a bit better in the first one than the second, and he was a very generous quiz master. I can’t remember them all at the moment but I do recall feeling smacked around the head when the very first second* question was:
- Which countries attended the Munich Conference of 1938?
Yikes!
If you missed it earlier, and would like to find out how I got on, please click this link right here: http://www.rte.ie/podcasts/2011/pc/pod-v-03021116m08stubridytrivia-pid0-968568.mp3. You’ll also get to hear Damien Owens, the author of the new Trivia TV series. Also, here’s a link to the Tubridy show blog. Update: audio of show here.
Finally, here’s a picture:
Other news:
- Trivia starts tonight: RTÉ One, 10.15pm. Watch it!
- My night hosting the quiz in Gilligan’s, Claremorris, has been brought forward to next Tuesday, February 8.
* Just listened back to it. Funny how memory plays tricks on you.
I’m sure if you asked them, they’d mention the site tomorrow morning and link to it from the site for a couple of weeks.
Well done John. You were great…………so relaxed with Ireland’s top broadcaster……….. you’re a natural. And you did really well in the quizzes especially as the questions were coming at you hard and fast. Top man! Well done. Looking forward to article in the Irish Independent. Also have to say you write really well….interesting, precise, very descriptive, look forward to visiting the website every day….I’m hooked!
Also just wondering if you have the answers to the Irish Times Christmas Quiz 2010. I missed that issue of the paper with the answers. Thanks for all the entertainment. T.P.
Thank you so much for this lovely comment!
I have bad news I’m afraid. I missed the Irish Times Christmas Quiz altogether. 😦
[…] Comments « Latest from the news room […]
Good job on the radio John, you came across really well. It was great to hear a familiar voice on the radio.
Hope the year of the Rabbit is going well for you so far.
KIF
Thanks Kif! Year of the Rabbit going fine, I’m glad to report. 🙂
Competition for you:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/feb/06/watson-ibm-computer-jeopardy-compete