About Me

Oh, my name it means nothin' – my age it means less.
The country I come from is called the Midwest
(Bob Dylan: With God On Our Side)

I would love to tell you all about myself, but I'm just a bit twitchy about brodcasting my life story on the Internet.

You can of course see my name at the bottom of this page – or any other page on this site! It's Haydn Thompson. As for my age: well let's just say I've had a lot more time to work on this website since I retired from paid work.

The country I come from is called the North West – the North West of England, that is. Or rather, that's where I've lived for almost all of my adult life.

I've been a quiz fanatic since the early 1980s. That's about when I started playing in Macclesfield Quiz League, and I've played in it ever since. Since 2009 I've also been playing in Stockport Quiz League. And of course I've been to my fair share (probably more than my share, if I'm honest) of standard pub quizzes – by which I mean the sort where lots of teams turn up on an ad–hoc basis, as opposed to a pre–arranged head–to–head fixture between two teams.

I've been on television a few times, with some success but hardly any material gain: 15 to 1 (several times), Countdown, and Today's the Day. I've also been turned down by Mastermind (several times), The Chase, Pointless, and of course Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?. (I say "of course", because you'd be shocked if I hadn't applied – so given that it isn't one of the ones I've appeared on, it had to be one of the ones that turned me down.) I suppose my greatest success was on 15 to 1 (in the William G. Stewart era) when I got to two Grand Finals, and in the second of those I got to the last three. (I then blew it by buzzing in on the most mundane question you could imagine, and getting it wrong.)

Not just a Quiz Monkey

My other interests include music, travel, reading and hill walking. I like a lot of different kinds of music, including pop, rock, folk and classical. I like to read modern literary fiction, classic fiction, and a fairly wide range of non–fiction – including quite a lot of travel.

In the football season I travel all over the country (England) following my team, which is West Bromwich Albion. It's many years since I lived in the Midlands, but Albion was the club my dad supported from when he was a boy before World War II, and it's the club that my whole family – with one or two notable exceptions – supports.

I will watch most sport on television, including tennis, rugby, snooker, and even golf if I'm really desperate. I draw the line at horse racing – except for the Grand National, but I'm usually at the football when that's on – and I will watch Formula 1 only as edited highlights.

It's a long time since I played any competitive sport. I had one very successful season as a slow left–arm bowler in my school cricket team, but the last thing I did that's worth mentioning was probably the Great North Run. I've done that four times – the last time being in 2002. If you're interested, I never quite managed to do it in less than two hours. (I swear I would have done, if it hadn't been for all those other people getting in the way ... )

© Haydn Thompson 2017