"This is Jeopardy."

You are in Jeopardy for Must See TV Thursday this week.  Did I make you look behind you?  No?  Better check just to be safe.  I'd hate to say, "That's okay, I was just kidding" only to discover that there actually was a serial killer in your house about to perform some strange, twisted ritual which you could have escaped from if you had heeded my warning and hadn't been told it was a joke.

Wow, that was demented.  I should probably delete it and start again.  If you're reading this, I reached the station before I came up with a better opening.

As I mentioned last week, during my vacation I took a stroll down memory lane with WOF and Jeopardy.  While Wheel wasn't really my thing, Jeopardy was.  We even watched it as a family many nights.  That's a big deal because my mother was not a fan of the brain rotting box.  I actually had a TV ration every day - and it was non-transferable.  Just like the program budgets in the Federal Government, if you didn't spend the hour during the day, you lost it.  I probably never would have

watched Silver Spoons if it weren't for that rule.  I'm sure there are a lot of things purchased by Government middle managers for the same reason.  I digress in a big and dangerous way.  Double Jeopardy?

When I watch Jeopardy now I'm struck by how little Mr. Trebec has changed in 25 years.  Same hair, same pithy comments, same "I always know the answer and I'm so sorry you were wrong" tone of voice.  You know the one.  "Oh, I'm sorry.  The correct answer is Mount Rushmore, not the Mount of Olives.  So close.  Next category."  Always makes me smile.

I also think about the episode of Seinfeld in which George discovers that Jeopardy is played earlier on one network than another.  He watches, learns the answers, and then amazes his girlfriend by knowing all of the answers.  Even Final Jeopardy.  A trick that I have only pulled off a couple of times.  Were I ever to appear on the show, you may amaze your friends by predicting my ZERO dollar bet.

The last memory is from high school.  I was actually on a quiz show back then, part of a “hand-picked” team that represented the school in academic competition (we had the passing grades).  I'm not sure how many schools were entered in the "Eco-Logic" tournament, but we spent a couple of months getting out of class to go to weekly tapings of the show until we were knocked out in the semi-finals.  Pretty impressive for a small town hick school that everyone still makes fun of.  The host was the DJ of our local top 40 station and it was really neat getting to meet him and see the snakeskin boots he was always talking about.  But what's the tie-in?  They - my teammates and the Host - kept laughing at me because I would always answer the questions with a question.  Jeopardy style.  I tried to stop, but it was habit.  I was very lucky, the judges allowed my answers to count.

Answer:  The coolest part of being on an Eco-Logic team.  Question:  What was the coral colored Eco-Logic T-shirt?