The AFL Dave's Mom's Thanksgiving Pie Thanksgiving-Pie-Guessing Contest

2008 Pie Contest Report

Dorothy's Pies

It was an exciting Pie Contest this year. Dave's Mom threw Dave for a loop this year. There was not only no pumpkin pie, but no fruit pies either. This year she baked a Peanut Butter Pie and a Pecan Pie.

Nobody guessed Peanut Butter for Dorothy's pies, but several folks did guess Pecan, for a score of 20 points. We went to the Tie Break. The Pie Committee counted 44 pie utterances on the Late Show. Of the folks tied for first place, Pat Fleet and "Laurie" came closest on the pie utterances, with guesses of 42 and 46 respectively, each only 2 away from the actual number of utterances. With Pat Fleet and Laurie still deadlocked after the Pie Utterances, we went to the Hat tie-breaker. James put Pat Fleet's name on three pieces of paper and Laurie's name on three pieces of paper, put the papers in a top hat, mixed them up, and drew one slip of paper at random.

And the winner is: Pat Fleet! Congratulations to Pat Fleet, this year's Dave's Mom's Thanksgiving Pie Thanksgiving-Pie-Guessing Grand Champion, and our first two-time winner!

David Yoder earned an honorable mention for nailing the Late Show Pie Utterances at 44.

The Pie Machine

For the Virtual Pie Guessing, we had another exciting contest.

After one misfire (in which the Pie Machine spit out Canned Ham, French Toast, and Spaghetti and Meatballs), Helen calibrated the Pie Machine and continued with Regulation Play. The Pie Machine baked an array of 10 virtual pies:

Points were awarded only for exact matches, no partial credit. After Regulation Play no contestants had reached the threshold score of 50 points, so we went to Sudden Death Pie Overtime, in which two arrays of 5 pies were virtually baked.

The first set:

The second set:

At this point we had three people tied for first place with 40 points each: Patti Crouse, Dan Graham, and Kath Creel. As we went to the Tie Break, we lost our conference call. Traci made several attempts to get me and James back on the line, but it kept disconnecting from my end. We eventually resumed the committee meeting via e-mail. (At least the Dial-up was/is working, even if something has gone hinky with my phone.)

The PM314159 emitted 595 Virtual Pie Utterances. Patti guessed 15 virtual utterances, and Kath had 120000. Dan came closest with 384 and was declared the Virtual Winner.

Congratulations to Dan Graham, the Dave's Mom's Virtual Thanksgiving Pie Virtual-Pie-Guessing Grand Champion 2008!