Chamber Trivia Night Champions.

News Release: Twelve teams from throughout the Carthage community gathered at the Carthage Memorial Hall Friday the 18th for the Carthage Chamber‘s 7th annual Trivia Night.

This year’s categories included, The History of Carthage, Entertainment 80s-Now, Pop Culture 60s and 70s, Literature, Geography, Science and Nature, Local Trivia, Sports, Inventors and Inventions and International Culture.

The Grace Notes sponsored by Grace Episcopal church took first place in the competition with 83 correct answers out of 150 questions. The Deflowered Headlines sponsored by Florette by countryside and The Carthage Press placed a very close second with 81 correct answers. Trivial Pursuit of Happyness sponsored by Leggett & Platt rounded out the top three with 74 correct answers.

Other team sponsors were Beimdiek Insurance, Carthage Water & Electric, Charles Burt Homefolks, Cornerstone Dental Group, Lakeland Office System and Carthage Health and Rehab, Locarni Marble, Schmidt Associates, Southwest Missouri Bank, UMB Bank.

NASCAR THIS WEEK

By Monte Dutton

An Upset for the Ages

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- If you didn’t know better, you’d think the winner of the Daytona 500 was an English chap, perhaps on holiday from the festival at Goodwood.

But the winner of NASCAR’s biggest race, Trevor Bayne (not Trevor Howard, not Claire Trevor) only turned 20 on Saturday. Sir Trevor Bayne would have a nice ring to it, but, alas, the accent he affects is from Knoxville, Tenn., not Liverpool or Kent, and when he praised the Lord afterward, he sounded as if he meant it.

Truly, Bayne knew all about the power and the glory after winning at Daytona International Speedway, NASCAR’s sacred shrine. About all that could have been more surprising about his victory would’ve been a walk across Lake Lloyd on the way to victory lane.

"If I tried to put this into words, I wouldn’t be able to do it justice," said Bayne, to which reporters replied, "Please try."

"Anybody I drafted with was headed to the front," he said among all the gushing and hosannas, "and the big thing was that these guys (Wood Brothers Racing) gave me a rocket ship."

"When we were testing down here, he didn’t get to do any drafting because I wouldn’t let him," said Bayne’s crew chief, Donnie Wingo. "He wanted to, but I knew he had the poise to race it. Some young drivers can go fast but can’t race. I could tell Trevor was different."

How did this upset of epic proportions occur? Forget going back to the start of the race. The final laps read like a novel. With six laps remaining, Regan Smith, who is not exactly a household name, led. Bayne was 10th.

Exit Smith on lap 197, jettisoned from his draft with Kurt Busch and relegated to fifth place (he finished seventh). Behind Smith and Busch, Ryan Newman, Clint Bowyer and Denny Hamlin crashed.

That guaranteed a "green-white-checkered" finish and led to a "green-yellow-green-white-checkered" finish. A.J. Allmendinger, Newman (again), Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Martin Truex Jr. crashed on lap 203, leaving first place in NASCAR’s biggest event to ... Trevor Bayne.

Tony Stewart’s Chevy dropped quickly when he couldn’t get up to speed in a drafting tandem with Mark Martin. Carl Edwards’ Ford closed in but arrived too late. The third-place finisher wounding up being another long shot, David Gilliland.

Attrition played a bigger role in this 500 than any in recent memory. Placing outside the top 20 were seven of the drivers who took part in 2010’s Chase for the Sprint Cup: Hamlin (21st), Jimmie Johnson (27th), Jeff Gordon (28th), Matt Kenseth (34th), Greg Biffle (35th), Jeff Burton (36th) and Kevin Harvick (42nd).

What was Ford’s 600th victory in NASCAR became the 98th victory for the Wood Brothers, who have been around just about as long as NASCAR itself. Glen Wood, with brother Leonard turning the wrenches, finished 34th in the first Daytona 500. Now Glen Wood’s sons Len and Eddie are the owners.

Used ta have a dog that would start shakin’ all over and hide behind the couch whenever it started to thunder. No talkin’ to that dog. Just wouldn’t listen.

No matter how calm we spoke, or how much we petted that dog, it wouldn’t move from it’s security furniture.

I don’t suppose it really hurt anything that the dog was so fearful of a rumble or two. There was somethin’ that made us kids want to get the dog to face the thunder.

‘Course we were prob’ly lucky not to be struck down by lightnin’ durin’ some of our adventures durin’ rain storms.

I suppose now there would be some dog shrink tellin’ us that we could somehow work the animal through its fears and make it a more functional pet. The dog lived a normal and healthy life. Sometimes you just have to let shakin’ dogs lay.

This is some fact, but mostly,

Just Jake Talkin’

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Weekly Columns

CLICK and CLACK

TALK CARS

Love your show and your column! I’m sure you have seen the Viagra commercial on TV in which the intrepid driver notices that his muscle car is overheating. He swings jauntily into a service station, buys a cold bottle of water and immediately pours its contents into his radiator, then drives merrily on his way. Now, I’m just an old schoolmarm, so maybe my information is out of date, and if so, you can set me straight. But I was always told: (1) Never even try to take the radiator cap off of a hot radiator. It could blow scalding steam in your face. (2) Never put water in an overheated engine, as you could crack the block. (3) When you do add water, you should start the motor before you pour anything into the radiator so that it circulates. If I’m right, and the guy in the advertisement is wrong, then ED is the least of his problems. Please comment! -- Chrissy

RAY: You’re right, Chrissy. On most cars, if he popped off the radiator cap while the car was overheating, he’d have second-degree burns all over his face and arms. And no amount of Viagra is going help him if he looks like he just got worked over with a bag of chisels.

TOM: In general, you never, ever should remove a radiator cap while an engine is hot. Especially if the car is overheating. You want to give it a good 45 minutes to an hour to cool down, and then, still, open it very slowly and carefully, using a large rag for hand and arm protection.

RAY: Unless you have a car with a separate, unpressurized coolant-recovery bottle. Then you can remove that cap right away. The 1969 Camaro used in that ad may have been one of the last cars to have one of those. So you’re right, Chrissy, but this particular car is an exception to the rule.