Tuesday, February 21, 2012 Game Recap & Discussion [SPOILERS]

[Paucle]

Hmmm, do I root for the volunteer tutor at the homeless shelter or the perpetrator of the autobahn duck massacre?

But first, one question: Are auto and Otto homophones?

I'm AW-doe and AH-doe. Semi D sound on first word, and a bit more distinct on second.

[thejeopardyfan]

Does anyone remember a contestant wearing a polo shirt before? Isn't that almost as unusual as the woman wearing the hat? Maybe a little too cazh.

[MarkBarrett]

The writers surprised me by not using a classic Seinfeld death and disappointed me by not using Florida Evans and her Damn x 3 from Good Times. 6000 is 6000, so I'll take it.

Justin had me swearing and howling. Clemente had me sending a mental beanball his way. Horatio for Elgar had laughing through the next clue.

Leslie earned a wildcard spot with a near double up against a very strong player who owned her in regular play. We're not looking at a tourney deja vu all over again are we?

Asian Borders told me one thing off the category and that is I would very likely be guessing instead of using knowledge. Durand Line? Sure, if I knew where it was that would help. I tried Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to pick two. Tomorrow is an even number game for the tournament, so I expect to get one right.

[MarkBarrett]

Does anyone remember a contestant wearing a polo shirt before? Isn't that almost as unusual as the woman wearing the hat? Maybe a little too cazh.

Here's the master: http://www.j-archive.com/showplayer.php?player_id=5923

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How long are we keeping the presidential avatars?

[bpmod]

How long are we keeping the presidential avatars?

I was assuming that after Presidents' Day (which I somehow thought was Feb. 22) people would start changing them back. Of course, it's completely voluntary. I changed my non-presidential one to a non-Pime-Ministerial one, but nobody noticed, so I changed it back to a non-entity one.

Brian

[econgator]

Hmmm, do I root for the volunteer tutor at the homeless shelter or the perpetrator of the autobahn duck massacre?

But first, one question: Are auto and Otto homophones?

I'm AW-doe and AH-doe. Semi D sound on first word, and a bit more distinct on second.

DIH-doe.

[xxaaaxx]

How long are we keeping the presidential avatars?

Since mine serves two purposes, I'll hang on to it for a while.

[Fw1812]

That response of Horatio for Elgar's first name was hilarious! Had me going for quite some time.

I know my friends would get a kick out of it, so I wish I could show them a video instead of explaining what happened.

Does anyone have a tape they can upload for me? (If that's allowed on here, of course)

[Agggron]

Out of curiosity, how should we know that Hell poem at $400 is Dickinson? I'm used to Dickinson being in common meter and using rhymes so bad that I can't even classify them as slant rhyme.

The only reason why I got the Emily Dickinson clue was because I knew she had secretly written thousands of short poems, and I think the clue specified a random number poem.

Anyways, I guessed India and China only because I had heard of Kashmir being an area of dispute. Oh well.

[dhkendall]

For the first time ever, there's actually someone on the show who I used to know in real life, and am not currently in touch with so as to have the opportunity to anticipate it. Leslie took high school German from my ex-husband, and was one of a handful of former students we kept up with for several years (in fact, I still have her old email address in the Netherlands on my contact list - I guess I can delete that one now...). She's one of those people about whom I actually have occasionally wondered "whatever happened to...". I guess now I know. Yay!
Leslie, if you're reading this, (retro) good luck!!

Whereas I was cheering for her (even days before her show aired, after checking out the contestants on jeopardy.com) because she looks a lot like my wife! (As in, I very nearly did a double-take kind of resemblance).

Hmmm, do I root for the volunteer tutor at the homeless shelter or the perpetrator of the autobahn duck massacre?

But first, one question:

Are auto and Otto homophones?

Brian

I got the impression that she was pronouncing it the "authentic" German way (as one would expect from a German teacher), but I may be wrong. My sister's boyfriend lived in Germany most of his life (moved here just over 10 years ago), maybe I'll ask him how it's pronounced (although he still has a thick German accent).

Precalled Henry Blake for the Sitcom deaths category.

Again, with the recent Afghanistan final, and both me and AP referencing "The Great Game" when that Final aired (btw, AP, with you on the Aouzou Strip like, not surprised you know about it too), surprised there wasn't more gets. To be honest, I was thinking of India/Pakistan briefly, but I quickly determined that the 2001 part was the most important part of the clue. Figured it had to be Afghanistan (after a needless detour to Iraq - its 15 minutes of fame (geopolitically speaking) came a few years later), and after going through all of Afghanistan's border countries (with a quick eye-roll at China - knew they wouldn't do that so close), along with another dead end detour at the Afghan-Soviet border (after which I reminded myself that it was 2001 and the clue was referencing a present border anyways), and with its continued relevance (Afghanistan-Pakistan is the only border in that area mentioned even now), was a very quick get.

[TenPoundHammer]

Having taken two years of German, I can verify that the German pronunciation of "auto" is indeed "OW-toh".

Also, I think my favorite German word is "fahrvergnügen".

(Still doesn't have quite as much ring as THE HAWLEY-SMOOT TARIFF.)

…Sorry, couldn't resist.

[debramc]

For the first time ever, there's actually someone on the show who I used to know in real life, and am not currently in touch with so as to have the opportunity to anticipate it. Leslie took high school German from my ex-husband, and was one of a handful of former students we kept up with for several years (in fact, I still have her old email address in the Netherlands on my contact list - I guess I can delete that one now...). She's one of those people about whom I actually have occasionally wondered "whatever happened to...". I guess now I know. Yay!
Leslie, if you're reading this, (retro) good luck!!

Whereas I was cheering for her (even days before her show aired, after checking out the contestants on jeopardy.com) because she looks a lot like my wife! (As in, I very nearly did a double-take kind of resemblance).

Strangely, Leslie looks just enough different now from almost-20 years ago that I was not 100% certain right away that she was the same person I knew back then and not just someone with the same name living in the same place and teaching a subject that I would totally expect her to be teaching.

But first, one question:

Are auto and Otto homophones?

Brian

I got the impression that she was pronouncing it the "authentic" German way (as one would expect from a German teacher), but I may be wrong. My sister's boyfriend lived in Germany most of his life (moved here just over 10 years ago), maybe I'll ask him how it's pronounced (although he still has a thick German accent).

Just chiming in to agree with TPH - Leslie pronounced Autobahn the German way. And to answer Brian's question in general, no, in German Auto and Otto are definitely not homophones.

Again, with the recent Afghanistan final, and both me and AP referencing "The Great Game" when that Final aired (btw, AP, with you on the Aouzou Strip like, not surprised you know about it too), surprised there wasn't more gets. To be honest, I was thinking of India/Pakistan briefly, but I quickly determined that the 2001 part was the most important part of the clue. Figured it had to be Afghanistan (after a needless detour to Iraq - its 15 minutes of fame (geopolitically speaking) came a few years later), and after going through all of Afghanistan's border countries (with a quick eye-roll at China - knew they wouldn't do that so close), along with another dead end detour at the Afghan-Soviet border (after which I reminded myself that it was 2001 and the clue was referencing a present border anyways), and with its continued relevance (Afghanistan-Pakistan is the only border in that area mentioned even now), was a very quick get.

I failed to catch that they were looking for two present-day countries - I got that they were referencing current tensions, but somehow thought they wanted to know the names of the countries in 1893. (The clue is clear enough, I just mis-parsed it.) So I said Afghanistan and India, knowing that Pakistan didn't exist yet. Rats!

[seaborgium]

Out of curiosity, how should we know that Hell poem at $400 is Dickinson? I'm used to Dickinson being in common meter and using rhymes so bad that I can't even classify them as slant rhyme.

I can't speak for everyone, but a non-reductive view of how Dickinson wrote certainly helped me.

My first miss of the tournament [edit: I mean on FJs, of course]. I thought of Pakistan, and I thought of Afghanistan, but not in relation to each other. I only thought Pakistan/India, threw that out, couldn't come up with a satisfying Afghanistan-bordering country, and settled for Iraq/Iran.

I'm happy for the last two wild cards.

[Lefty]

Horatio Elgar is best known for composing the "Rag to Riches".

[TheConfessor]

For the first time ever, there's actually someone on the show who I used to know in real life, and am not currently in touch with so as to have the opportunity to anticipate it. Leslie took high school German from my ex-husband, and was one of a handful of former students we kept up with for several years (in fact, I still have her old email address in the Netherlands on my contact list - I guess I can delete that one now...). She's one of those people about whom I actually have occasionally wondered "whatever happened to...". I guess now I know. Yay!
Leslie, if you're reading this, (retro) good luck!!

I played against Leslie in a pub quiz Monday night. She said doesn't like seeing herself on TV and had no plans for watching the show. That led me to think she probably didn't do very well. I'm glad she advanced to the next round. Go Leslie!

[goforthetie]

I was wondering about the wagers. Not glaring errors like we usually see, but what was Leslie thinking? That six out of ten would end with zero, and she needed to beat that for a wild card?

Which is more likely: that 6 players drop to $1 or $0 on FJ, or that the 4th-ranked runner-up (out of the other nine) would have exactly $12799 or $12800? To me it's pretty clear that it's the former.

[Spaceman Spiff]

No chance on FJ. I went with India and Pakistan, not realizing that England had anything to do with Afghanistan.

Ah, very much so - just read up on the "Great Game."

The key was the year, since there was no reason another border situation - see the Koreas or India/Pakistan or my favorite, the Aouzou Strip - would become so noteworthy in 2001.

Exactly - the key was the year. I settled into the correct answer after ruling out some other borders set up by the "colonials" that had subsequent conflicts. Iraq-Iran and Iraq-Kuwait came into my brain first, but the year was wrong for that (the Kuwait invasion being in 1989 or so). Like econgator, I briefly though thought of India and Pakistan (and/or East Pakistan/Bangladesh), with a touch of Kashmir thrown in, but those issues all date back to the late 1940s. (OK, they date back a lot farther, but you get my point....)

So, I went with Afghanistan and Pakistan, and hoped for the best.

[John Boy]

This is the second day in a row I've missed final, but the eventual winner went with what I did. (P. Gauguin with Mary Ann and India and Pakistan today with Justin) , thought of India and Pakistan only because I thought of British colonies in the area. Fail on my part.

I suspect there will be a lot of folks like you (and me) who never heard of the Durand Line and went with I & P as the "logical choices." Oh well.

[John Boy]

Not a bad game for me overall. When I saw the categories in the first round I sighed a deep sigh, wishing those could be the categories on MY game (which will no doubt be this season ).

I ran Crossword Clues -- "S", All-Stars, and (of course) Classical Composers' First Names, where I scooped up $2200 in Lach Trash. Was 4/5 in a couple of others. Added running "PET" in the second round, although with a few stupid misses and no clue on FJ.

I thought Leslie's wager was very appropriate, as she almost certainly would never have advanced with $6400 and, if you're going to wager at all, may as well go all in. The extra buck one way or the other should be absolutely no factor.

Not knowing the cutoffs to advance, I thought Pian was the one with a hard decision to make. In her situation, and with that category, I might very well have decided to stand pat and hope. Unless I missed something, I think her $11,800 would not have advanced, not so?

[bpmod]

Not knowing the cutoffs to advance, I thought Pian was the one with a hard decision to make. In her situation, and with that category, I might very well have decided to stand pat and hope. Unless I missed something, I think her $11,800 would not have advanced, not so?

In hindsight it's always obvious, but it appeared that the two of them (Leslie and Pian) knew that they only had to beat each other; the next wildcard spot was $11700, so if Pian had stood pat, she would have been in had Leslie not made a big wager and answered correctly. But 'knowing' she had to beat Leslie, Pian couldn't stand pat, and since she had to answer correctly to assure that, the actual amount of her wager was made moot.

But, of course, there is no way that either of them could have known (any of) that at the time.

Brian