Serves me right, I guess, for using the sanctity of the "Hey, Watch It" blog to celebrate my "Horatio's Sunglasses of Victory" trivia team's victory two weeks ago at the Cafe Montmartre is Smarter Than You Are trivia night.

About last night's bout -- well, we started strong. After three rounds (including a round of computer-related questions and one on sports), Horatio's were in the lead. We knew we were earning the other teams' respect because there was a healthy round of boos every time our score was announced, although that may have been because emcee Paul Guse kept saying we were "from California."

For the record, three of our team members did live for years in San Francisco, but are not native Californians. But I love the idea that we're this outsider team from California, like we're a bunch of carpetbaggers who packed up in a van and headed east to take trivia contests away from worthy local teams.

And then round 4, "Government and Money," came along. And we flamed out in a fairly spectacular fashion, missing questions such as how many denominations of paper money are in circulation (7), or where Sarah Palin ranked on Maxim magazine's "World's Hottest Politicians" list (2nd). Our biggest tactical error, however, was betting the maximum 20 points on the Daily Double (that was my idea), for which all we had to do was spell the last name of the president of Iran. I came up with one spelling, my friend Sheryl came up with another, and neither of us were right.

That hurt. Although we had a respectable final round, we were out of the running to win anything. But winning isn't everything (especially when you don't win), and it was still a really fun time, especially the "Thigh-Master" physical challenge. We'll be back in two weeks.

And nothing lifts the spirits like winning, so if you're the first person to e-mail me the correct spelling of the last name of the President of Iran, you'll win a copy of Okkervil River's new album "The Stand-Ins," which is awesome. See if you can do it without Googling it.

Also, some member of Team Ass seemed miffed that I didn't mention them among the elite teams in my last trivia blog entry. So, Team Ass, Team Ass, Team Ass. There you go.