Look for my interview with yesterday‘s Lori Hohenleitner at the end of this post! Tomorrow, come back for my interview with Julie Bratvold Ghanbari! I’m also interviewing today’s Alison Parakh and Leo Lopez. I saw a commercial for today’s episode while visiting a friend in the hospital. Alison tossed her head back in apparent happiness. Was it misleading? Let’s find out. Today’s contestants:
 |
| Leo, of Brooklyn, NY |
 |
| Alison, of Santa Barbara, CA |
 |
| Jenny Healey of Burke, VA |
I negged by saying “San Francisco fire” on this very first clue of the round, in New York Times Historic Headlines: “April 19, 1906: ‘Over 500 dead, $200,000 lost in’ this disaster–‘nearly half the city is in ruins.'” It was the only one I missed in the category. That means I got this triple-stumper: “February 14, 1935: this man ‘guilty, sentenced to death for the murder of the Lindbergh baby.'” Alison got the 1906 clue right. She and I went on to sweep The Female Lead Vocalist. At the first break, Alison had gotten 9 right and 2 wrong, and had 3600. Jenny had 1 right and 1 wrong, and had 200. One-time champ Leo had 3 right and 1 wrong, and had 1000.
There were 5 clues left when Mr. Trebek gave the less-than-a-minute warning. We saw 3 of them, and the other 2 were both in Go Fish. Alison found the Daily Double with 3 clues covered, in A Hammer Fest. She’d gotten 4 right and 1 wrong since the break, and had 4600. Jenny’d gotten 4 right and had 2800. Leo had gotten 3 right and had 2400. Alison took her time and wagered 1200 on this clue: “The Soviet constitution of 1918 said that the coat of arms should include these 2 items, handles down.” She and I got it right. Jenny got the next clue right for a total of 3400 at the end of the Jeopardy round.
I got this triple-stumper off the bat in Novelists: “This French novelist’s futuristic ‘Paris in the Twentieth Century,’ written in 1863, was found 126 years later.” (It was a guess.)
I didn’t get this next clue, also a triple-stumper, but Mr. Trebek reveled in one of his “Duh!” moments and acted like the words “Polish-English” were enough (also in Novelists): “This Polish-English novelist collaborated with Ford Madox Ford on 2 novels, ‘The Inheritors’ & ‘Romance.'” Mr. Trebek even said then, “Wanna go somewhere else?” Leo did.
As a tennis lover, I was pretty happy about Net Flicks once I knew what it was about. I only went 2/5 though and negged on this one, saying “Match Game”: “Tennis pro Jonathan Rhys-Meyers is smitten with Scar-Jo in this Woody Allen film with a tennis term title.”
Leo found the first Daily Double of the round in Novelists. He had gotten 4 right since the round began, and had 6400. Alison had gotten 1 right and had 6200. Leo wagered 2000 on this clue: “He was named for a distant cousin who was aboard a sloop during the 1814 bombardment of a Baltimore fort.” Leo and I got this right.
Jenny found the next Daily Double only a couple clues later, in Capital Steps. She had gotten 1 right since Leo’s Daily Double and had 3800. Alison had also gotten 1 right and had 7800. Jenny wagered 3000 on this clue: “In 1955 it beat out Aberystwyth to become capital.” I knew we were talking about Wales but blanked on the capital. Jenny said “Belfast.”
I swept “Ox” Marks the Spot and Patron Saints. There was less than one minute left in the round when the latter category began, but we saw all the clues this time. I got these two triple-stumpers in the category: “As the first person in the New World to be canonized, she’s the patron saint of the Americas & of Peru in particular.” And “This gospel writer is the ‘beloved’ patron saint of physicians.”
At the end of the round, then, Leo had gotten 5 right since Jenny’s Daily Double and had 13600. Jenny had gotten 5 right and had 7600. Alison had gotten 4 right and 1 wrong, and had 10600. The Final Jeopardy category was Antarctica. This was the clue: “This country that explored the Antarctic interior is the most northerly nation to claim territory on the continent.” I got it wrong on a fairly wild guess. Jenny got it right but wagered nothing. Alison got it too, after crossing it out, writing something else, crossing that out, and writing the correct response again. She added 4601, which means she’d have more than Jenny even if Jenny had doubled. Leo got it wrong and lost 7601. Alison threw her head back like in the commercial. We’ll see her…in 7 weeks?! Kids Week starts Monday, followed by a six-week hiatus. Yippee.
My Coryat today was 27600 (31000 without negs). My Coryats have been getting higher. Have yours, and if so, are we getting smarter or is the material getting easier? Other recent Coryats:
originally 1-12-11: 34400 (My Coryat the first time I played was 25600.)
originally 1-13-11: 23400 (D’oh! I didn’t keep my Coryat the first time because I missed the clues before the first break.)
originally 2-7-11: 29800 (The first time I played, my Coryat was 28600.)
And now…Lori Hohenleitner! Thanks, Lori!
Q: You were described by Johnny as an executive director for a nonprofit. Can you tell me a little more about that?
Lori: There is actually an article today about my program here.
Q: Can you explain your Daily Double and Final Jeopardy wagers?
Lori: My daily double wager was half of the distance between me and Leo. I should have wagered more! Final Jeopardy I was going to wager $0 and I balked at the last minute and made it a number that would hopefully get me to an even $10k. In the post-game chat with Alex, I mentioned that and he very sincerely looked at me and said, “Lori, this is not the most important thing that will happen in your life.” Of course I had several friends and family members tell me that I should have wagered $0 after they watched last night! No kidding! 🙂
Q: When I searched
for you, I saw that you do some acting?
Lori: I have done a lot of community theater. It’s a fun way to continue my love for the arts.
Q: Anything else you’d like to say?
Lori: I had a ton of fun filming Jeopardy. Doug [Thornton] and I are in touch and I hope to see him again soon. We joke about how high my platform was during the taping. He is 5’10” and I am 5’2″. It was interesting balancing during the show.