Jan. 8: I’ve been everywhere, man.

Have you gotten hooked on Trivia Crack yet? All the cool kids are playing.

What I like most about the game is that Katie and Jack think I’m brilliant because I know so many of the answers. They don’t understand yet that it’s called “trivia” because it’s “trivial.” My brain is so crammed full of useless information that I forget important things like how fractions work and my own middle name. Knowledge is a curse, folks.

Although sports is my worst trivia category, I’m most frustrated when I miss the geography questions. I think it’s because I expect them to be trick questions but most of them aren’t, at least not in the Trivia Crack game. The geography questions also make me realize how little of this world I’ve actually seen. I have NOT been everywhere, man. Prepare to be sad:

• Highest point in the world: Mt. Everest, Nepal (29,035 feet)
  Highest point in the US: Mt. McKinley (Denali), Alaska (20,320 feet)
  Highest point in the lower 48: Mt. Whitney, California (14,495 feet)
  Highest point I’ve ever been (still touching earth): Pikes Peak, Colorado (14,110 feet). I have a picture somewhere of me and Vic in front of the sign at the summit, but Vic’s giant head is covering the “14” so it looks like we scaled a 110-foot mountain. Yaaaay.
• Lowest point in the world: shore of the Dead Sea, Israel/Jordan/Palestine (1,371 feet below sea level)
  Lowest point in the US: Death Valley, California (282 feet below sea level)
  Lowest point I’ve been to: Probably somewhere in California, close-ish to Death Valley. Memorable, obviously.
• Northernmost place in the world: North Pole (duh)
  Northernmost place in the US: Point Barrow, Alaska (71st parallel).
  Northernmost place in the lower 48: Lake of the Woods, Minnesota (49th parallel)
  Northernmost place in the world I’ve been: Amsterdam, The Netherlands (53rd parallel)
  Northernmost place I’ve been in North America: Vancouver, British Columbia (49th parallel)
  Northernmost place I’ve been in the US: Blaine, Washington, or whatever that space between Blaine and the border is called. (48th parallel-ish)
• Southernmost place in the world: South Pole (duh)
  Southernmost place in the US: Ka Lae, Hawaii (Big Island)
  Southernmost place in the lower 48: Key West, Florida
  Southernmost place in the world I’ve been: St. Maarten/St. Martin (the Caribbean).
  Southernmost place in the US I’ve been: We visited the southernmost point of the US in Hawaii (totally violated our car rental contract getting there), and also the one in Florida, which technically isn’t the southernmost point because there’s a military base on land south of the marker, so pfffftt.
• Westernmost point in the US: one of those Alaskan islands. The one Sarah Palin thinks she lives on.
  Westernmost point in the lower 48: Cape Alava, Washington
  Westernmost point in the US I’ve been: Somewhere on the Oregon coast
• Easternmost point in the US: West Quoddy Head, Maine
  Easternmost point in the US I’ve been: An airport around Washington, D.C.
  Easternmost point in the US I’ve actually spent time: Port Canaveral, Florida
• Farthest from home I’ve been: Brussels, Belgium

I would ask you to share your “-est” places but it would just bum me out even more, so keep ‘em to yourself, ok?

Oh, and download the Trivia Crack app. You’ll probably kill me in geography.