By Sharon Ginsburg

Mountain Table, a new local business just north of Renick on Route 219 sometimes has Trivia Night Tuesdays with a themed dinner menu. Invited by a girl friend to come check out and support this new local business and watch her daughter and friends compete in the Trivia Night, I thought it sounded like a fun girlfriend evening out. Much to my surprise, her daughter canceled so we gathered with some of our own friends at one table. The MC of Trivia Night slapped a game paper sheet on our table, said we were a team and that we needed to come up with a team name. Oh well, $^@! happens. We struggled with a team name and kept crossing out what was written on the top of our game paper until it became Gangsters and then Geezer Gangsters or was that Gangster Geezers, I forget being one of those geezers. We commenced to write answers down for each question to be scored afterwards. Because there were six of us geezers at our table, apparently the largest number on any team that evening, at least one of us would come up with a likely answer. Questions were all over the playing field many of which I knew not much about. But one question, “how many sharps and flats in the key of C major,” I knew. Tables near us and even people at my table were trying to count the number of black notes in an octave. I said, “No, I can read music and you are being tricked by this question. The answer is zero for the key of C major” and zero went onto our answer sheet. I did not know the American history or pop culture questions particularly, but I was absolutely sure about that music question, even as other teams were still discussing and counting up how many black notes were in an octave. Later when the MC had tallied the answer sheets, winners were announced, starting with third place. Not us. Nor were we second place. Oh well, I thought, too bad not us. And the grand prize winner was Gangster Geezers! Totally amazed, we exploded into noisy excitement and laughter. We won! That was awesome because it took all six of us to have at least one brain cell operating at any one time and get a score of 24 out of 25 questions correct. Mountain table is a coffee roasting business that also hosts a farmers’ market with various vendors and serves locally sourced menu items for a treat or a meal. Check out their menu, events and hours on their web site mountaintablewv.com. On Trivia Night if you see a table of Gangster Geezers, you won’t stand a chance.