Even Quiz Bowlers Sustain Injuries

Ms. Roberts, always looking out for her kids, came across an article explaining that each year there are 15,000 farm-related accidents involving minors.  Because Bart Taylor works on his family's farm, she kept telling him to be careful.  Seven days before we left for the national competition in Chicago, Bart tripped on the farm.

Timeline of Bart's Disability and Related Events

5/18/00, Email from Bart to Ms. Roberts Approximately Seven Hours After the Injury  "All I could think of when I hurt my knee and was writhing in agony on the ground (besides that my favorite song on the radio), was some figure that you gave me of teenagers getting hurt on farms. :) Weird, huh? At least it is 100% without a doubt truly certain that you are the one and only queen. You knew I was gonna get hurt didn't you?" 

5/19/00, Email from Ms. Roberts to Bart  "Just in case you have to deal with an extended convalescence, I've come up with a few alternatives to our plans to accommodate your temporary disability. I’ll get you a motorized wheelchair. Mr. Davis will secure the special ed bus with the mechanical lift so you can get on and off with ease. I’ll put in a call to Lake Forest tomorrow and request a dorm room with rails in the bathroom. Joe will assist you in bathing and dressing.

"In fact, this could work out well for the entire team. We’ll get to use handicap parking! You can pretend to be a paraplegic and sit lethargically in the wheelchair. I’ll periodically call a time-out to wipe the drool from the corner of your mouth and adjust the halo that keeps your head from lolling around. Everyone will be afraid to buzz in because they’re not giving the poor little cripple a chance. Meanwhile, you can dazzle them with your incredible math skills and command of the periodic table. Everyone will be rooting for us because of your harrowing bravery in the face of such a devastating disability. When we win the national championship, Joe will wrap his arms around your tiny, broken body and hoist you in the air as the team gathers around with tears streaming down their faces. I’ll give an emotional acceptance speech at the awards ceremony in which I detail your courageous fight against cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, hemophilia, hydroencephaly and chronic ringworm as you bounced from one foster home to another. We’ll appear on Meet the Press, Firing Line, 48 Hours, and the McNeill-Lehrer News Hour. I’ll ghostwrite a best-selling (yet completely fictionalized) autobiography for you. We’ll work out the details later." 

5/19/00 Email From Bart to Ms. Roberts  "I know for sure that there will be some kind of surgery, severity yet unknown. I go for an MRI on Monday. (By the way, I know what that stands for because of quiz bowl.) I see the doc on Wednesday to hear about the results, and they'll either tell me I'm gonna have ACL reconstruction (know what that means too :) ), or just a scope because he couldn't tell from the results. I went to the mall to get some shorts so that I can get them over this efff-ing brace."

5/22/00  Mr. Davis, who intended to somehow fit 12 people and their luggage on a 14-seat pup bus, finds out that Bart has to keep his leg elevated and agrees to take a real bus. Everyone thanks Bart for ruining his knee for life.

5/25/00, 7 a.m.  Bart hobbles onto the bus with two leg braces, crutches, a week's supply of anti-inflammatory medication, lots of baggy pants, and a mysterious apparatus with which he's supposed to perform some sort of electroshock therapy three times a day.

5/25/00, 10 p.m.  We arrive at the college campus where the tournament is being held only to find that the entire team is being housed on the third floor of a dormitory with no elevator.  

(At left) Bart and Ms. Roberts sit on the ground, exhausted, after traipsing through the Field Museum in Chicago while everyone else admires the smog hanging over Lake Michigan.  Note Bart's right leg in its typical post-injury position: straight and immobilized.

5/25/00, 10:15 p.m.  Ms. Roberts arrives at Bart's room and tells him they have fifteen minutes to get to a meeting on the other side of campus.  They get lost.  Larry Jones from Fort Smith-Northside agrees to give the two a ride.

5/26/00, 12 p.m.  Joe Burton begins a game in which he stands at the bottom landing of the stairs with Bart, yells "Imonagitchee!" (I'm gonna git ya) and races to the third floor, back to the bottom, then to the third floor again, beating Bart nevertheless.  Bart attributes his continual loss at this game as much to his laughing really hard as to his injury.  The scene replays throughout the tournament.

5/26/00, 1:00 p.m.  Ms. Roberts is doing a headstand when someone pushes her over.  She demands to know who toppled her, and everyone points to Bart, who's asleep in his bed.  "Oh yeah," she says.  "Blame it on the sleeping cripple."

5/27/00, Time Undetermined  Bart decides that if worse comes to worst and he has to have the leg amputated, he'll get a prosthesis with a secret compartment to hide whiskey in.

5/28/00, 6:15 p.m.  Crossing five lanes of traffic to eat at Red Lobster, Bart suddenly realizes that Illinois drivers aren't near so friendly as those in Arkansas.  He narrowly misses losing the other leg in a head-on collision with a speeding SUV while everyone else screams, "Hurry, Bart, hurry!" 

5/28/00, 8:00 p.m.  We visit what is billed as the world's largest outlet mall.  It's so massive that there are signs that read, "Spencers: 10 minutes ahead."  Bart foolishly decides to hang out with Joe, who spends the entire night racing from store to store trying to find a gift for his fiancee.  Ms. Roberts spots Bart alone and heads after him, but she can't catch him despite the limp.  Crossing the endless parking lot on the way back to the bus, Joe pushes Bart in a shopping cart.  

5/29/00, 5:45 p.m.  At the world's largest outlet mall yet again, Bart insists on hanging out with Ms. Roberts and Brent while Joe shops.  Sitting at a food court after buying his gifts, Joe suggests we go roller skating at the mall's rink.  Bart is not amused.

5/30/00, 2 p.m.  On the trip home, Ms. Roberts learns Bart hasn't been doing the therapy the doctor instructed him to do three times a day.  He explains that he couldn't because it sends a volt of electricity shooting through his body every twenty seconds. This, he claims, causes his brain to completely shut down three times every minute, so he'd have been completely useless to the team.

The Bald Knob High School Quiz Bowl webpage is an entirely independent creation of Bart Taylor. It is in absolutely no way sanctioned, authorized or supported by Bald Knob Public Schools, its school board, or employees. All questions, comments, etc., should be directed to the webmaster only.  Questions about the quiz bowl team itself should be directed to Bradi Roberts.
Copyright © 2000 Bald Knob High School Quiz Bowl
Last modified: June 24, 2000