“We probably have at least 175 people here,” Zimmer said.
It was Trivia Night, like it is every Tuesday and Wednesday at the bar.
Every table was filled, but Zimmer said the event was popular enough that teams sometimes stood along the walls just to participate.
“Sometimes we have maybe 50 to 70 more people here,” he said. “This is about an average trivia night.”
Zimmer said there were around 20 to 30 teams that played.
In a corner next to the door, a group of IU graduate students stood in a circle. They made up a team: “Too Big to Fail.”
David Massie, one of the team members, said their name was optimistic.
“We won one time last semester, then we came in second, then we came in third,” Massie said.
Massie said the people on his team were mostly geography and anthropology students.
“It’s an excuse for grad students to drink during the week,” Massie said.
His teammate Karli Schmidt agreed.
“We don’t need an excuse to drink on the weekend,” Schmidt said.
Massie said he believed there was a strategy to playing.
“I think the secret to doing well is when you are looking at things online when you are supposed to be doing something else, and remembering all of that,” Massie said.
Schmidt nodded.
Above the bar and the entire venue was the announcer and DJ, Colin Gregory. He sat under bright green lighting, explained the rules and delivered the questions in dramatic tones.
“Alright, for your first question in the first round, hoverboards replaced skateboards in this key scene from what film from the 1980s?” Gregory said.
The tables began to murmur. He repeated the ?question.
Massie looked to his teammates.
“Does anyone know?”
They were at a loss. R. Kelly’s “Ignition” thumped in the background. Servers snaked their way to tables and dropped off glasses of craft beer.
When the song was over, Gregory announced the movie was “Back to the ?Future Part II.”
Schmidt jumped up and yelled, “No!”
Other tables laughed and echoed choruses of “I knew it.”
Gregory announced the next question would be from a geography category.
Massie smiled.
“Yeah, we got this one,” he said.
Gregory put on a Rihanna song.
He said that he had been DJing and running the game for a year a half.
“I decided I needed extra money, so I got on Craigslist and this was the first job I applied to,” Gregory said. “They called me back, and I’ve been doing it ever since.”
Gregory is a senior at IU, studying biology.
“I like doing this a lot,” he said.
Trivia Night takes place from 8 to 10 p.m. every Tuesday and Wednesday at the Tap, 101 N. College Ave.
