Robot Boner

Ethan and I at the local bar.
After I graduated from college I got married and moved to the rural small college town (population was about 9,000) where my husband and I worked. Living in a small town is kind of a funny way to spend your first years as an adult, and, as it turned out, all your child-free adult years. We'd run into coworkers at the grocery store(once while picking up the morning after pill, awkward!). We were considered regulars at all the restaurants (except Taco Johns, yuck. I'm a strait-up Taco Bell girl). And the rowdiest parties were held at the local Red Man's Club (I once seriously called the cops on a Metallica cover band they hired).

I could talk at length about the pros and cons of living in a small town. But I won't. Suffice it to say, small town living was nice, I liked knowing the people and being able to walk from one end of town to the other, but it was hard being so far away from my family, my hockey team, and Target (I'm never living more than 5 minutes from Target again). We eventually got new jobs and moved up to the Twin Cities, where we can be hip and eat sushi and go to shows (and by "shows"I mean Yo Gabba Gabba Live. Twice.), without driving over an hour to get there. But there's something I will always, always miss about those years in a small town: Bar Trivia Night.

Trivia night at the local bar was the best. It wasn't the kind of bar trivia you can do at Buffalo Wild Wings or those other fancy city bars. There were no TV screens, or electronic answer machines. No sir. There was a guy with a microphone and a box of Trivial Pursuit cards, and waitresses who handed out slips of paper. They'd read out the questions, you'd write down your team's answers, and each round you'd have a chance at winning a pitcher of beer, and the point totals were kept from week to week and at the end of the trivia season the top team got a tour of the local brewery.
Proof!

The whole thing had a great sense of community. And my team was the best, with the best/worst name ever: Robot Boner. We were a force to be reckoned with (a drunk force, but a force). In fact, we became well known enough that other teams started naming themselves after us. My favorite was "Premature Robot Boner Ejaculation", mostly because it was hilarious to hear the guy who announcer have to say that over and over each time he read out team point totals. They may have meant it as an insult, but to me it was totally a compliment. It was like being a celebrity  A metallic phallic celebrity. We even had our own (kind of disgusting) drink in the bar computer.

The Robot Boner:
1/2 shot of cream de cacao
1/2 shot cherry schnapps
dropped into a Schell's Dark beer.

We may not have won the grand prize, but we came close. And really, the true winners are people having the most fun. Or getting the most drunk (remember what I said about being able to walk across town? Well, we were only 3 blocks from the bar) And I'm pretty sure that was us. 

15 comments:

  1. You're right - as soon as I saw the title "Robot Boner" I just had to read this. Great team name!

    Also, my fav little pub is right across my apartment building here in NYC. Stumbling home!

    Phil
    www.blog.theregularguynyc.com

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    1. Thanks for stopping by.

      Stumbling home is the best way to get home. :)

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  2. Yep. Robot Boner totally pulled me in. :) Great post!! And your own drink?? THAT is awesome!

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  3. Great post!! I grew up in a small town. (My graduating class had 12 of us!) Now I'm a full on never going back San Diego Girl. Small towns were great for growing up though.
    Connie
    A to Z-ing to the end
    Peanut Butter and Whine

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    1. Wow, 12? I grew up in the cities and had 660 in my graduating class. Everybody must have known everything about everybody.

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  4. Wow, I still live in a small town and we don't have fun trivia nights like that. Sounds like a good time

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    1. I guess I was in a super cool small town. :)

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  5. Robot boner sounds like fun ...can't go wrong with American Dark Lager. We have couple nights at local restaurants (there's drinking, but in parent style since there are kids around sometimes).
    Fun post.
    Silvia @ Silvia Writes

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    1. I'm actually more of a lager/pilsner/Belgian ale fan, but for some reason we always got at least one pitcher of dark during trivia night...

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  6. I wish you lived close to me. We would totally be friends. :) Jennifer a.k.a Urban Gypsy Girl

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    1. Yes! That is the worst part about finding awesome people online. :)

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  7. Just reading the ingredients of the Robot Boner made me a little queasy--the whole rest of the post, though, just made me jealous. I kick ass at "pointless knowledge" as my husband calls it. Alas, though my population 5000-ish town has several bars, it has ZERO bar trivia.

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    1. I know, it's a pretty gross drink. My husband suspects that ours bar trivia was more possible because of it being a small *college* town, and if there's anything academics love, it's useless trivial knowledge. :)

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  8. Small town life can be fun! Being asked how your head is by the bouncer because you had a huge one the night before? Yeah maybe too familiar?? Thanks for hooking up to the Hump Day Hook Up

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