Who's Brainier?

Frederic Chopin. He wrote the "Minute Waltz".  I know, because I've timed myself playing it, and it takes me five minutes, including repeats.  It was the only question, out of 166, that I could answer last night at Beloved Daughter's School Quiz Night.

Normally I win quiz nights, but last night my team "Snowflakes Plus", comprising three members of the school ski trip and some ringers, came sixth out of seven.

When I say "I don't know anything about anything" this is not false modesty.  It's entirely true, despite my having benefitted from (allegedly) the best education in the land I cant remember anything whatsoever.  My method of winning quiz nights is an innate attraction to highly intelligent people - I am drawn to them like a magnet.  I then ask if I can be on their team and sit there, open mouthed at the things that they know, contributing nothing at all, or possibly buying the drinks.

Ever since studying graphology (handwriting analysis), I have been particularly interested in different kinds of intelligence.  Graphologists tend to look at four: memory retention, practical, original, and planning.

Once upon a time I would have felt highly inadequate after an evening like last night's.  Even though we only came sixth, I still thought that every member of our team was intellectually electric!  I was stunned by how much they knew.  Especially about James Bond.

But I wondered how many of them would succeed commercially on their own.  To run a small, efficient, successful entrepreneurial business such as a B&B, I would say that you need common sense, concentration, energy, a sense of prioritising, more common sense, and charm.

So I don't feel too humble in the presence of brainboxes anymore.  I merely gaze at them with affectionate awe.