Drinking from a different cup

Well, since tonight was Tuesday night, it must have been Wine Tasting Night! Not just any Wine Tasting, but Actuarial Wine Tasting! You non-actuaries maybe can't imagine quite the excitement I had. And. Not. Just. Actuarial Wine Tasting, but Competitive Actuarial Wine Tasting (with prizes). Here's the rules:

1. There are eight rounds.
2. In each round you will taste one wine.
3. The first four wines are white.
4. The second four wines are red.
5. There is no rose. That's for girls.
6. In each round, you must determine the country, then the grape, then the region.
7. In that order.
8. 1 point each.
9. The team with most points in each round wins either a) a bottle of the wine you've just tasted; or b) a corkscrew.
10. The team with most points at the end is the overall winner and has a Lot Of Prestige.

We were four teams of six or so... What would follow here would be a blow by blow account of exactly how it went down. But I have neglected to remember all the details. So in summary: Round 1: We won. Round 2: We won. Both these wins were pretty much down to me having very lucky guesses on the country. Rock. Rounds three and four we still got the country right, but other teams had started to get their game together and we lost both rounds. However, we still had a clear two point lead at the end of the white wines.

On to reds. First country we got. But then... Oops. And we failed to win either of the next three rounds. With one round left, three teams had won two bottles, one had won one. Strangely, nobody had chosen the corkscrew option. So far.

One round left, all to play for.

We got one point. It was enough. Other teams also scored one, but we were first to hand our sheet in, which clinched the round for us. Three bottles won, and also we claimed the title of Best Tasters Of Wine (Red and White) October 2004 (Actuarial Section) or BTOW(RW)O04(AS). A prestigious title indeed.

And more importantly, we beat all the other teams, including the one which my boss was in, and the one in which the Second Most Senior Actuary in the company was in. That's not his official job title by the way. This was ok, because new roles had been sorted out against the wall yesterday. I was bound by virtue of drinking from the Cup Of Choosing, and so they could not retrospectively use the fact of me defeating them in a Wine Tasting Competition against me.