Monthly Meeting Minutes – 4th December 2020

The Shingle of Southsea Holmesian Society

Monthly Meeting Minutes

 

Date of Meeting: 4th December 2020

 

Location of Meeting:

My House, Portsmouth, UK

 

Attendees:

"The Entire Canon" (Paul Thomas Miller)

 

Apologies:

Whoever came up with that Elf on the Shelf nonsense needs to apologise. My Facebook timeline is now flooded with stupid people’s “cute” photos of the “amazing” “creative” “ideas” “they came up with”.

 

Shingle of Southsea Games Night:

For Christmas 2020 we decided to replace the usual Shingle’s presentation with a games night. Brenda The Headless Mannequin was invited back to partake of the festivities and we took her silence as confirmation that she would be thrilled to attend.

 

Game One: Monotony

Played with a standard Monopoly board. The winner is the player who can resist rolling the dice for the longest period of time. Brenda won.

 

Game Two: Canonical Quiz

One of our members set the quiz, reproduced below. Printed copies were handed out to all attendees. The quiz consisted of 10 questions about the entire Canon.

1. What was the name of Colonel Barclay’s Aldershot Home?

2. In which story does Watson brandish an egg-spoon?

3. How many shotguns feature in the entire Canon?

4. There are twenty-three ejaculations in the Canon, but who ejaculates the most?

5. There were four women called Violet in the Canon, but only one woman had violet eyes. Who?

6. Where was Doctor Watson shot? His leg or his arm?

7. In how many stories does Holmes mention his little monograph on the ashes of 140 different varieties of pipe, cigar, and cigarette tobacco?

8. At the end of STOC, which edible plant does Mr. Pinner resemble?

9. In Wisteria Lodge, what are our own colours?

10. Which is the best story in the Canon?

 

The answers can be found at the very end of these minutes.

At our event Paul Thomas Miller (The Entire Canon) scored 100%, while Brenda left her page blank and scored 0%. Paul Thomas Miller (The Entire Canon) won.

 

Game Three: Wheel of Gravy

The traditional Sherlockian game of Wheel of Gravy has to be played at any serious Holmesian Festivities and ours was no exception. We used a standard wheel and beef gravy.

Brenda won.

 

Game Four: Name a Pub

A new Holmesian game! Players take it in turns to name a pub from the Canon until finally no one can think of any more.

Paul Thomas Miller (The Entire Canon) won when he pointed out that every single pub in the Canon is called The Chequers.

 

The scores were tied. Two all. The final game was a tie breaker.

 

Game Five: The 100m Holmes-Draw Dash

Contestants were required to run 100 meters while drawing a picture of Sherlock Holmes. Paul Thomas Miller (The Entire Canon) won by default when Brenda refused to run. Here is his winning picture:

 

The meeting was concluded by a return to The Sherloft for mulled wine and general praise for our victorious champion; Paul Thomas Miller (The Entire Canon). Sadly Brenda had to be ejected after making some spurious allegations about other members.

 

Here are the answers to the quiz:

1. Lachine

2. A Study in Scarlet

3. Two – one in STUD and one in VALL

4. Watson (12 times) [followed by Holmes(7), Tadpole Phelps (3) and Neville St. Clair (1)]

5. Miss Alice Turner (BOSC)

6. Neither. He was shot in Afghanistan and in Nathan Garrideb’s rooms.

7. Two – STUD and BOSC

8. An Arty Choke.

9. Green and white.

10. The Mazarin Stone.