Today’s contestants:
(from left to right; Kathleen Mikulis, Ari Stern, Mary van Tyne)
(Does anyone else thing Kathleen could double for Catherine Keener?
The resemblance was especially pronounced today.)
You know I can’t resist telling every triple-stumper that I got right! It doesn’t get old! So here are today’s, all in the Jeopardy round (and I want to know if you knew them).
In Philosophers’ Country of Birth: “Pico della Mirandola, Boethius.”* Kathleen seemed proud at the beginning of the show when Mr. Trebek acknowledged she picks clues so randomly. She did just that and went to this one somewhere in the middle of the category, which is can make the clue more confusing than when the clues in a category had been chosen from the top down. When she rang in on this one and missed it, she stayed true to form and went to another category.
Kathleen’s erratic manner of selecting clues is not her worst habit, though, and the randomness may even lead to this other habit: She can at least pick clues e-x-t-r-e-m-e-l-y slowly, so much so that Mr. Trebek actually told her to hurry in the final seconds of Double Jeopardy. I don’t think he had a choice. She took so long I had to wonder if she was ever going to pick one. It’s no surprise that there were clues left at the end of that round.
What about this triple-stumper, in “G” Men?: “Wellington’s last words, ‘Yes, if you please,’ came when asked if he’d like some tea, maybe this prime minister who followed him.”*
Here’s one in Fruity Language: “A small reddish blemish of the skin is known as this fruit’s mark.”* Now, this one did stump me too. What I found so interesting about it is that Mr. Trebek seemed surprised that no one had heard of it (I hadn’t either), yet he didn’t know what a ‘theremin’ is? (Ari mentioned in his interview that he can play the theremin.) Sure, Mr. Trebek.
Another one in Fruity Language: “Referring to something dear, this phrase originated in Deuteronomy 32:10 and refers to the pupil.”*
Double Jeopardy featured a couple 2000 clues that I thought were too easy to belong there, while more difficult clues were higher up in the category. Like in Third Prize: “Walter Dix of the U.S. ran a 9.91 to take third in the 100-m. at the Beijing Games; this Jamaican ran 9.69 to win.”* Was that really harder than this one in the same category?: “In the 1924 Olympics she won bronze in the 100- and 400-m. free; 2 years later, she swam the English Channel.”* I mean, who is that?
What about this one, in Talking Real Estate: “It’s the joint ownership of a vacation property by several persons with each occupying it for short periods.”* Harder than this one in the same category?: “An ‘assumable’ one of these legal commitments is taken over by the buyer when the home is sold.”* I realize this is an age-old argument for Jeopardy! fans, and we could go on forever!
Ari found the first Daily Double of the Double Jeopardy round. The category was A-B-C, and the correct responses contained those letters in that order. Ari wagered only 800 on this clue, which wound up being a wise move: “Any of a group of chemical substances such as doxycycline or streptomycin.”* He missed it, and I’m proud to say I got it. Did you guys know it?
The second Daily Double, which wound up being the last clue of the round, was found by Mary. She had 6600, while Kathleen had 8600 and Ari had 14200. Mary wagered 4000 on this clue in You’re Fired: “If you’re a Glock 17, you fire bullets of this metric caliber equal to .35 inches.”* I got it wrong, and so did she. An inconvenient time for a miss with a pretty big wager!
The Final Jeopardy category was The Oscars. This was the clue: “Only Orson Welles and this man have been nominated for best actor and original screenplay in the same year while in their 20s.”* I answered confidentally while Mr. Trebek was still reading the clue. I kept my answer, and I was oh-so-close, but wrong. All three contestants got it right! Ari wagered enough to win if Kathleen doubled (she didn’t anyway), so he is your happy-looking new champion. We will see him on Monday.
By the way, I am expecting to watch tomorrow’s weekend episode, and will likely blog about it Sunday. This will also be the first chance to see if my rigging of my parents’ VCR worked to record every Saturday episode.
One more thing…GO BIG RED!
*Italy, Earl Grey, strawberry mark, apple of one’s eye, Usain Bolt, Gertrude Ederle, timeshare, mortgage, antibiotics, 9 millimeter, Matt Damon