Fondue with Hannah McIntyre

I recently caught up with Whistler's  Hannah McIntyre, who made TOTW in Week 3. She is the captain of BABS, a Jeopardy! champion, and an author.

Tim: You got 18(7) in Week 3 for TOTW. What was the question that you missed to get a full house? What did you like about Seat A1?

Hannah: I missed the Roman Holiday question. TV and film is my weakest category by far, and while I certainly have heard of the movie, and I know the Vespa scooter poster, etc, I wasn’t pulling it in fifteen seconds. I generally take seat 1 on my team, mostly because it was our former captain’s seat, but I’m not picky. I’ll go wherever if someone else ever wants it. I do like going first, though, and in OQL UK where about half the time I get to choose whether my team goes first or second, I will always choose first. 

Tim: How did you first get into trivia as a hobby?

Hannah: I was on my school’s Reach for the Top (kind of Canadian quiz bowl) team in high school, but I never realized there was a real community after that. It was just a fun thing for me, an asshole teenager who loved to know everything, to do. When I graduated I stopped completely, and when I moved to Australia around 2008 I started watching Jeopardy with my husband; it became our dinner routine. I did literally nothing with trivia other than sit on my couch and answer questions for half an hour a night for over ten years. Then, after I got on Jeopardy, I found out about LearnedLeague, and that there was a whole trivia community out there. It still took a few years before I joined–right around the start of the pandemic–and from the contestants groups I found out about OQL, which sounded like fun. I started playing OQL in early 2022, which both feels like way too long ago, and also like yesterday at the same time. 

Tim: How did you first get into OQL? How was BABS formed?

Hannah: I’m not an OG BABS member, so forgive me if I get some of the lore wrong, but I believe the team was formed in the Women of Jeopardy group as people who were interested in playing. I believe they were looking for one more player, and I just got pipped by Rooks in the comments. We laughed about it, and I was promised the right of first refusal when they needed another member. I believe one season later Amy decided to take a season off, I got brought in, and that’s how I started! 

Now BABS is an incredible amalgamation of some of the best ladies in trivia I know! Amy Rey, Catherine Ono, Fran Bigman, Natalie Ballas, Robin Miner-Schwartz and Seema Dallheimer, as well as our still-active-in-our-hearts-but-not-the-roster members, Rooks and Terrie Vasilopolous, who are now part of the incredible writing staff.

Tim: What other online leagues are you a part of?

Hannah: On top of LearnedLeague and OQL USA I play OQL USA Regions, UK, ICC and Knowledge Facts Ladder (KFL), a Ukranian-based online league. I also occasionally play Mimir’s Well when I have the time, or as a warm up before ICC starts to get myself back into the groove of the mimir format.

I’m also part of the management team at QuiP, Quizzing in Progress, a new trivia league founded with the aim of moving trivia into a more equitable space for everyone. We’re currently playtesting formats and working hard to get the best possible game out for everyone, and while I can’t reveal any specific dates, I recommend everyone interested join our Facebook group or Discord server.

Tim: What is the trivia scene like in your city? Is there a place you play at every week?

Hannah: I don’t play any in-person trivia. There is one bar in Whistler that does trivia, and it starts at 9pm, which is basically my bedtime because I am to my core a morning person. I don’t find bar trivia in general to be especially fun or high quality, and I don’t generally drink, so there’s not much appeal there for me.

Tim: What is the dining scene like in your city? What is your favorite food and drink?

Hannah: Being a resort town, we have excellent dining options, especially in the higher end. My favourite is the cheese fondue from Table Nineteen, along with their Pink Sky at Night which is a kind of raspberry flavored mocktail that’s absolutely excellent. 

I’m not normally a cheese person, despite being French, but when it’s melted and dipped in bread I’m willing to make an exception. 

Apart from that, I am easily pleased when it comes to food. Give me a good burger and fries, and I’m happy, but we have a ton of great options here. Other favourites in town include the breakfast poutine at Southside Diner–sauteed potatoes topped with sausages and bacon, grilled onions, hollandaise, gravy and cheese curds, the red Korean fried chicken donburi from Samurai Bowl and the pasilla beef burrito from La Cantina, with pico on top. 

TIm: Have you ever been to Geek Bowl, Trivia Nationals or SporcleCon? If so, what was each like?

Hannah: I attended SporcleCon last year, which was a ton of fun! I got to meet a lot of friends I’d only seen online up until then, and I’m really looking forward to going again this year. It was such an incredible time last year, and I had a blast meeting old friends and making new ones. I’ll be hosting a game called Pyramid this year as well, so anyone going to Sporcle, please check it out!

Tim: How long did it take for you to get on Jeopardy!? Did you befriend your opponents?

Hannah: I believe I took the online test three times before I got my first audition. I auditioned in February that year, which I remember well as it was the day of a massive snowstorm and I left Whistler at 6am for my 2pm audition because there was no way I was going to let the highway stop me from getting there in time. I got “the call” in the form of an interview with the local TV station, which was incredibly fun, a couple of days before my 30th birthday. It was also the day before my husband was due to write his Canadian citizenship exam, so I remember doing the first bit of my Jeopardy cramming inside the cafe where I had just bought my birthday cake while waiting for him to finish writing that.

I have stayed friends with some of my opponents, yes! Joanna Rom is my LearnedLeague referrer, and I always look forward to playing her and Jill Hurt in our season’s private rundle. Others I haven’t stayed in as close contact with, but absolutely still consider them to be friends.

Tim: What are your other hobbies besides trivia?

Hannah: I have been ski racing for over a decade now, and skiing is my primary non-trivia hobby. I love getting on the mountain, getting the fresh air in my face, and going fast. But, at the same time, I am to my core a competitive person, so getting to race scratches that itch for me very well. Ski racing, and the wonderful people I’ve met through that community, has taught me a ton of lessons that I apply to trivia, especially surrounding routine, preparation, and mindset. I attribute ski racing to being one of the main reasons I won on Jeopardy, and I love that everything in my life can come together that way, even when it doesn’t feel like there’s anything similar between the two.

Tim: Have you read any good books in 2024? What authors are your all time favorites?

Hannah: I no longer read a ton for pleasure anymore since it’s become my job; I find it incredibly difficult to separate reading for enjoyment from reading to improve my craft. That said, some recent books I’ve finished and enjoyed a lot include Africa is Not a Country by Dipo Faloyin, Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto and Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati.

My all-time favorite author is J.R.R. Tolkien, as I love Lord of the Rings more than any other book. I saw the first movie when it came out in theaters, decided I needed to read the books to see how it ended, and that was the start of a lifelong love affair with the greatest series known to man. I love the movies and the books, and can recite the movies basically word for word from memory.

Tim: Do you study on UK topics since you play OQL UK? How much flashcarding do you do?

Hannah: I don’t hugely go out of my way to study UK-specific stuff, but I have made a handful of cards aimed at some more uniquely British knowledge. The day an M25/M60 pair comes up, I will be ready and waiting. Which means it’s going to be a day when I’m reading, and not playing, because that’s Trivia Law. So far, the only card I’ve made that has come up has been Dunkery Beacon being the highest point in Exmoor National Park, and that point remains a highlight.

Our team did win the division 8 champions trophy in our first season (shout out to Aaron Wegner, Alexandra Wax, Amy Rey, Anupama Srirangan, Trevor Alexander and Veronica Vichit-Vadakan, my amazing teammates!), so we’ll see if we can pull that feat off again in division 7.

At the moment, I’m doing about 600 flash card reviews a day, with about 30 new cards daily added to that total. I generally do about 100 before I get out of bed in the morning, then I do them here or there when I get a few minutes. Every time I take my dog out, I can usually run through a handful, and then after I’m finished work I’ll go through whatever I’ve got left for the day. I love my little dopamine hits that come from answering a card correctly, and the even bigger dopamine hits that come from answering correctly in a trivia game, especially when it’s something I’ve put in specific and intentional time to learning.

Tim: What sports teams and athletes are you a fan of and what are your top five moments as a sports fan?

Hannah: Being Canadian, I’m a massive hockey fan. I’ve been a Washington Capitals fan since around 2014, as around 2012 I decided it was obvious under Jim Benning the Vancouver Canucks were not going to be good for a long time, and I wasn’t willing to go through the twenty-first century equivalent of the Mike Keenan years again. 

For the first year I cheered for the Florida Panthers, as I liked Jaromir Jagr, but it never really fully gelled for me. Then, I decided to switch to the Washington Capitals, since I really liked Alexander Ovechkin’s style, and they were gaining a reputation as playoff chokers. And I went “yes, this feels like a team that will be fun and heartbreaking at the same time, I am in.”

That first season I cheered for them, they got a 3-1 series lead against the Rangers (who had knocked them out of the playoffs the last time they had made it, two years earlier) before blowing it and losing in game 7 of OT, and I knew I had found the perfect team to ruin my life.

Anyway, in 2018 they won the Stanley Cup, and now Ovechkin is 42 goals away from breaking Gretzky’s all-time goals scored record, which means it’s a phenomenal time to be a Capitals fan because we are on a side quest, so it’s easy to ignore that the team low-key sucks at the moment and has no chance of winning a cup for the foreseeable future, and it’s going to be an epic celebration as the countdown to 895 continues.

My top 5 moments as a sports fan:

5) Training ski racing in New Zealand for a couple weeks, which allowed me to watch Mikaela Shiffrin train on the run next to me for a few days. Seeing her skill and work ethic in person is incredible, she is wonderful and deserves all of her successes as the greatest ski racer of all time. She also joined me on the t-bar once, and we had a very fun conversation.

4) Being in the middle of the standing-room-only Rendezvous Lodge on Blackcomb, watching Marie-Philip Poulin score the game-tying and then game-winning goal at the 2014 Sochi Olympics in overtime along with thousands of other people cheering so loudly I genuinely wondered if the building could handle it.. 

3) Sidney Crosby scoring the overtime goal at the 2010 Olympics to win the gold medal over the USA in men’s hockey.

2) Evgeni Kuznetsov’s getting a breakaway pass from Ovechkin in overtime of game 6 in the second round of the 2018 playoffs and scoring against the Penguins, taking the Capitals to the Conference Finals for the first time in over 20 years and breaking the playoffs curse.

1) The Washington Capitals lifting the Stanley Cup in 2018. I know I’m biased, but I genuinely think it’s one of the best cup celebrations in modern memory. 

Tim: if you could play trivia and have dinner with any five people from history, whom would you choose?

Hannah: I’m really a student of the classics. Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great would be two of my picks. Both military commanders, both of whom gained the respect of their troops by joining them and being a part of their lives, as opposed to leaders who rule from above with an iron fist. I find that mentality as a leader to be so interesting, and I also think it was crucial to both their successes and would love to speak about it with them more.

Plus, given that Aristotle was a teacher of his, I bet Alexander would crush the philosophy questions.

Another person on my list would be Ella Baker. I find her to be one of the most interesting people from the Civil Rights era, and I would love to just listen to her speak for however long she would want on literally any topic she chose.

My fourth choice would be a high priestess from the Minoan civilization (we know the names of literally no one from that civilization that is confirmed to have lived; if we’re choosing people named in mythology who could have lived I’m going for Ariadne), so that I could ask her how to decipher Linear A, the Minoan language that is as of now unknown. Bonus points if I could get someone who lived right around the time of the Bronze Age Collapse, to find out if the real reason for it was the mythical Sea Peoples. I don’t think she would be very helpful at trivia, but I would get SO MUCH CREDIBILITY in the “We Pretend It’s Bronze Age Internet” Facebook group. Oh, and I guess the linguistics world, too.

Finally, and this is a pick that I have a hundred different people to choose from, but I would go with Artemisia Gentilleschi. I wanted to pick a woman whose works were overlooked in her lifetime and in the immediate aftermath, so I could tell her that it took a long time, but we’re finally discovering her works, and she’s finally getting the recognition she deserves. As a fan of Carravaggio’s art, Gentilleschi is another favourite of mine (I stan a good chiaroscuro artist), and Gentilleschi in particular especially made it clear she wanted to subvert the traditional role of women in her lifetime, and I think she would appreciate the knowledge that she is know spoken of in the same sentences as Caravaggio, as Bernini, as Correggio, as Titian. 

I don’t think this team would be especially good at trivia, but boy would it be an interesting dinner.

Tim: Have you been to all the Canadian Provinces and Territories?

Hannah: Technically almost, but they’re very much technicalities. I’ve been to Gander, Newfoundland after our flight home from Europe wasn’t going to make it to Toronto due to an unexpected headwind, so we had to stop off there for fuel. But I never left the plane.

When we moved from New Brunswick to British Columbia when I was three years old we drove, so that covers Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and when my mom’s parents visited from France after I was born we went on a trip through Nova Scotia and PEI, but I have no memory of that on account of being six months old.

I’ve really visited BC, Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and the Yukon. While it’s not on most people’s lists, I found the Yukon to be absolutely incredible. It was one of my favourite places I’ve ever visited in Canada, and if you ever get the opportunity, I could not recommend it more. The outdoor adventure possibilities to be had are wonderful. Taking a canoe trip along the Yukon River outside of Whitehorse was one of my top travel experiences. 

Tim: What are your books about and would you ever write something where characters play your game at SporcleCon?

Hannah: My books are all contemporary mysteries. I have three series, set in Hawaii, San Francisco and Cornwall, England (although the series set in San Francisco is ending this year, after book 7 releases in September. They’re meant to be mostly light-hearted, funny mysteries in a world people can escape to without having to think too hard. I write under the pen name Jasmine Webb, and all of my books are available on Amazon and Audible (with one series being on Overdrive, for library listeners).

As for whether or not I’d ever write a book where characters played my SporcleCon game, no. As fun as that might be for me, personally, I do have to factor in that this is my job, and it pays my bills, and I do have to write what the market demands and what makes sense for my characters. One of the Mackenzie Owens mysteries does feature a scene that takes place at a pub quiz in England, though! And Zoe, the best friend of the main character in the Charlie Gibson books, is a Jeopardy fan. That’s probably the closest I will ever get to writing about trivia in my books, though. 

Maybe in a few years, when I’ve sold the television rights for millions of dollars, am semi-retired, and can write what I want for fun…

Tim: Thank you for your time and I wish you good fortune in the wars to come.