Same stuff different day, plus Q & A with Robert Chodola

Posted By: jeanie February 1, 2013

     This title refers to my own performance today, not those of the contestants! 🙂 First, a couple of season 25 Coryats:
Originally 5-5-09: 29400 (32200 without negs)
Originally 5-6-09: 38000, and no negs! I didn’t notice til there were 4 clues left in the Jeopardy round that I’d only clammed on 4. I got those last 4, so I went 26/30.
     It’s Day 2 of the Teen Tournament quarterfinals. Here are the contestants today:

Nilai Sarda of Marietta GA
Katie Stone of El Paso TX
Brittany Poppen of Goodyear AZ

     Nilai came to play; that was clear from the start. The girls answered the first 7 clues, but when he got his chance, Nilai dove to a 800, then 1000 clue. He got the next two right too, then found the Daily Double. He had 3400. Brittany and Katie answered 4 and 3 correctly respectively, and had 2000 and 1200. Nilai wagered only 1000 on this clue in Near the End of the Century: “In 1799 the Rosetta Stone was found in this country.” Not surprisingly, he got it right. He appeared to pump his fist a little bit! This clue, category Archaelogy, was a Daily Double on the 5-5 episode above, which I watched after this one: “Carved in 196 B.C., its text was written by priests to honor Ptolemy V.” Also in the 5-5 episode, we saw this triple-stumper in Geography: “Bloemfontein is the judicial capital of this nation.” Here is its partner in today’s episode, in Near the End of the Century: “In 1899 the Bloemfontein Conference didn’t prevent this South African war.” Then, I kid you not, this one in Look What You’ve Won from 5-5: “For your third-place finish in the Olympic 200M Butterfly, just a bit behind Michael Phelps: one of these medals.” And from today’s episode, in Sports Talk: “When Michael Phelps talks about the 200 Fly, he means a race using this stroke.”
     Before the first break, Nilai answered one more correctly and Katie answered 2 more. Nilai had 4600 then and Katie had 3000. Brittany still had 2000.
     Nilai was the runner-up in what Mr. Trebek called the “National Geographic Championship” in 2011. I like that. I wonder if he participates in the National History Bowl. I’m a little surprised TPTB didn’t have him redo his interview. Mr. Trebek said “last year,” and Nilai started to correct him. Then Nilai said “I guess it was last year. 2011.”
     I thought everybody knew this lame joke, from One Direction: “An old joke answers ‘How do you get to Carnegie Hall?’ With this 8-letter word.” I got this triple-stumper too, in Breakfast Cereals: “Cap’n Crunch came out in 1963; by the end of the decade, Crunch Berries & this other flavor hit the shelves.” Nilai and Brittany guessed; the first negs of the game. At the end of the round, Brittany had gotten 3 more right and 2 wrong. She had 2000. Nilai had gotten 5 right and the one wrong, and had 7000. Katie had gotten 3 right and had 4400.
     I wish I’d rung in on this triple-stumper in Jewish Stars: “This Israeli supermodel said she might consider using JDate–‘maybe if I’m still single when I’m 40.'” I convinced myself I only thought of her because of the “-aeli” in the clue. I did get this next clue in the same category, another triple-stumper: “This Canadian ‘Take Care’ rapper spun the Backstreet Boys at his bar mitzvah.” I knew that and teenagers didn’t? Katie moved to another category then, even though there was one clue left and it was at 200. Nilai got the next clue correct, then he found the Daily Double in India. Mr. Trebek reminded him (like it was necessary) that geography is a strong suit for Nilai. He’d gotten 3 right in the round and had 8600. Katie had gotten 2 right and had 6400. Brittany still had 2000. Nilai wagered 2200 on this clue: “The waters of the Palk Strait separate India’s Tamil Nadu state from this island nation.” Like on his first Daily Double, Nilai looked like he knew this while the clue was still being read.
     I got this triple-stumper in Meet the Monotremes!: “The bug-loving echidna is also known as the spiny this.” Katie had her first neg here.
     Nilai found the third Daily Double too, in Around the White House with Alex. He’d gotten 4 right and 2 wrong since his last Daily Double, and had 12400. Brittany and Katie both had gotten 4 right and one wrong. They had 4800 and 10800, respectively. Nilai only wagered 1000 on this clue: “The kids from last year’s Teen Tourney went along too. Here we all are on this directional part of the property.”

     How cool is that? Nilai got it right. There were 6 clues left on the board then. Nilai got 3 of them right, Katie got 2 and Brittany got one, plus one neg. The scores at the end of the round were: Brittany 4400 (!), Nilai 16600, Katie 12400.
     The Final Jeopardy category was Fundraising. This was the clue: “In 2011 the city of Savannah granted an exemption allowing the sale of these items outside Juliette Gordon Low’s birthplace.” This is one where I toss my pen, if I’m still holding it. Instaget. I was surprised anyone missed this, but Brittany did. She lost 3000. Katie got it and added 1400. Nilai got it too and added 1400 too! Strange, that’s what Brittany was left with. Nilai pumped his fist again. I like seeing that he cares. It means something to him. I think he’s looking quite strong to make the Finals. Here is the list of contestants we’ve seen thus far, and their final totals for the wildcard race:

Kelton Ellis (win)
Nilai Sarda (win)
Irene Vazquez ($15000)
Katie Stone ($13800)
Lila Anderson ($4800)
Brittany Poppen ($1400)
—–
     My Coryat today was 23800, with 8800 in negs. 🙁

     

Now, are you ready for Q & A with Robert Chodola? He played on Tuesday this week. Here we go:

Jeanie: You were described as a graduate student of education. What are you planning to do with your degree?
Robert: I got my bachelor’s degree from UC San Diego in 2009 in History, and now I am at UC Irvine getting my teaching credential and Master’s degree in Teaching.  I’ll be doing that through
July, and then off to the job market; my ideal teaching job would be teaching World or U.S. History in high school.
Jeanie: Since you want to teach history in high school: Do you know about the National History Bowl and unofficial Jeopardy! reunion?
Robert: I haven’t heard of it, thanks for telling me!  I’ll look into it, but I’ll probably be too busy student teaching to make it to D.C.
Jeanie: I thought “After Eight” was a good get.
Robert: I thought it was too.  It was one of those Jeopardy clues where the wording really leads you to the answer.  I think the phrasing involved time or clocks, and as is often true with Jeopardy!, they like to include words to guide you to the right answer.  My memory of “After Eights” comes from a game I played once with friends where you have to put one of those mints on your forehead and find a way to eat it without using your hands.  Strange story, but true!
Jeanie: I just watched your contestant interview again: Do you like avocados? I love ’em!
Robert: I love avocados.  The upside to being from the “Avocado Capital of the World” is that either you or someone you know has at least one avocado tree.  So, if you’re ever in need you can just go outside, to your neighbor’s, or call up a friend.  Fallbrook is also called “The Friendly Village.”
Jeanie: Can you explain how you decided on your Final Jeopardy wager and response?
Robert: Going into Final Jeopardy, I knew what my chances were.  I had less than half of the second place amount, so I knew that in terms of numbers there was really no way for me to reason through strategy on wagering.  On top of that, I had very little confidence in the category “Meteorological Terms.”  So, I knew I was down in numbers and content knowledge.  I wagered what I did because I wanted to bet a fair amount without ending up with an amount of zero in the end.  For my response, I had absolutely no idea what an anemometer was, which really put me at a disadvantage.  I knew “50 below” was wrong when I wrote it, but again, I didn’t want to not write an answer; there’s no penalty for guessing when your only other option is to write nothing!

Jeanie: Is there anything else you’d like to say?
Robert: It really was a fantastic experience and I would tell your fans and readers to take the online test each year.  Just do it!  I tried out in college and got an audition, but didn’t get on the show.  I tried out last year with the thought that if anything comes of this, great, but if not, that’s fine too because I can always try again next year.  The threshold for getting is really two things: your breadth of knowledge and your ability to keep the show moving in a fun way.  When you get to be on the show, every other contestant there is just as knowledgeable and able as you are, you really are competing among peers.  The key once you’re there is getting your timing right on the buzzer; if you can do that, you’re golden, but if not, well, you watched me play, you know how it goes!
     Thank you, Robert!