It was the 27th of October and our hopes were high. We had been practising for weeks and we felt ready. For this was the Book Quiz and today was the day. In the morning we were in Tech and had accomplished great things (we had sawed a piece of wood in two). In my class there were four of us taking part and we all met after second period to make our way to the library. The four of us were first to arrive and we sat down. The others arrived in time and Mrs Agnew briefed us on our game plan. We were to win no matter the cost and crush the opposition. This is absolutely what she told us. After perhaps fifteen minutes we were ready. The group made our way down outside and then onto a bus.
The bus driver took us all the way to Our Lady’s High. We entered through the main entrance and were taken by some Prefects to a big hall. Inside the room were roughly thirty tables each with a team name. We sat down at our desk and the competition began shortly.
The teams trickled in, in the end all desks were full. A man told us the rules and we began shortly. The four in my team made our way through the rounds. We chose the Mythology round to be our double scorer. We, not I, never let it be said it was only me. Dire mistake. I think we fell perhaps ten places that round. We made desperately to recover but couldn’t, so I’ll give you the good news first. We bet the other Airdrie Academy team, we won one of the rounds and got book prizes, we bet more than half of the opposition. However there is bad news. We came fifteenth. I think one sentence sums it up well.
We set out to become champions…. and we didn’t quite make it.
James McManus
