Jeopardy!, Wheel of Fortune, and the Family Gilch

If you've ever had dinner at my house on a weeknight, you know what happens between 7 and 8 o'clock. NCIS is turned off for it's only hour of rest from Grandma Duck's kitchen television, and we flip to channel 7 for Jeopardy! (now available in HD for those who want to see Alex Trebek that much more clearly).

Where have you gone, Alex Trebek's mustache?

We've been doing this longer than I can remember, precisely because my family's been doing this for longer than I've been born. Something about the simplicity of these game shows, Jeopardy! and its counterpart Wheel of Fortune, is attractive to the masses. You get the questions right, you win some money; you solve the puzzle, you win the money. It's not as simple as all that of course, but it seems like something just about anyone can do on a good day. And so, their current incarnations have been on air for going on 27 years now.

Trebek 2.0: Now he's zany!

Alex and Pat and Vanna have become household names over the past decades, although the only one who's gotten any better is (unsurprisingly) the beautiful woman of the group. Trebek no longer has his trademark glasses and creepy Canadian mustache and recently, prodded by ABC no doubt, has been primping his distinguished 70 year-old white hair up and, to the dismay of viewers, talking more and more. I'm not sure if anyone has worse comic timing or a cornier wit than Trebek (thank God he at least has the answers in front of him). Sajak seems to be getting more orange with age, and I fear that Merv Griffin Enterprises may soon just slap a bleached blond wig onto a Valencia orange and we won't know the difference.

Pat Sajak, standing next to Pat Sajak in 10 years

However lacking the hosts have become in their duties, the shows still remain strong, a slew of devoted viewers who have defined the 7th hour after noon each weekday as a time to play games. It's a wonderful thing to do with the family, and who couldn't use a break after work and school?

Not to be conceited, but in my family, I generally answer the most questions (question the most answers?) correctly. Please don't take this to be a statement of self-service; it's a statement of my admittance of being a huge dork. Grandma rejoices in knowing the questions about cooking, Dad about literature and classic movies, Lucy about recent books, Gabe about the Three Stooges, and Amelia just the other day about Selena Gomez (not sure who that is, but she was adamant about it). Jeopardy! has never caused much consternation within the family as we can all partake, but the Wheel is where frustration tends to mount.

Everybody has something they're unnaturally good at. Many people have things that are eminently useful  to society and well-being. Some can thread a needle and cross a stitch in a blur, some can diagnose disease with uncanny accuracy, some can pick up foreign languages with ease, some can catch all the lucky breaks at the right times. I, on the other hand, can solve Wheel of Fortune puzzles with no letters in them.

Now, I've met other people who can do this. Once again, this isn't just trumpeting myself. In fact, I lament that this is my special superpower. Honestly, x-ray vision would have been much more useful. I normally treat the family with some courtesy when I know the answer at such an early point that it would take the fun out of the game for everyone else. I'll go pour some coffee or remove myself from the room somehow so I don't blurt out something. It's not for the sake of knowing it that soon, but just because you get the puzzles quickly, it doesn't mean you now don't take any less joy in solving the puzzle that any of the crazy people on TV jumping up and down do.

Of course, if Gabe's at the table, I'll look at him directly, sip my coffee, and use the puzzle's answer in a sentence to mock him. I've never seen him madder.

Pictured: Gabe after looking at him and saying "I guess you won't be SUCKING YOUR THUMB anytime soon." 

I've been trying to get on either show for years, though I've never gotten as far as the audition process. If these shows will let me pay for college then so be it, I'll shout out answers like crazy, screw spinning the wheel. I already owe these shows a debt though. As silly as it seems, they bring my family together nightly, to laugh and to mock, to smile and to yell, to get as emotional as we do during any Giants game, but to be together nonetheless.

P.S. Game show host poll up in the corner of the home page. Vote if you'd like, and if you're an "other" kind of person, comment here and explain who and why.

O say, can't you see?

Ramparts are broad elevations or mounds of earth and stone which are raised as a defensive wall for the purposes of fortification. While I'm not sure if Christina Aguilera bothered to look up the word in a dictionary (or at the very least, Wiki it) before she sang the National Anthem at the Super Bowl, she certainly didn't get it right in her performance. Aguilera mistakenly replaced the line "O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming," with "What so proudly we watched were so gallantly streaming," which is not only incorrect, but leaves Fort McHenry quite woefully undefensed (which of course might have well have wiped out Francis Scott Key and his "Defense of Fort M'Henry," which has come to be the U.S. National Anthem).

Good singer; woefully incompetent military strategist

It's easy to mess up the words to a song. There are TV shows dedicated to getting the lyrics right and personal nightmares of my own that include singing the wrong words on stage and getting pelted with tomatoes and such. No one messes it up on purpose, of course, but I'd like to think if the NFL Czar of Halftime Shows (who I believe is Howie Long's less talented, less rectangular brother) went insane and tapped me to sing the Star Spangled Banner at the freaking Super Bowl, I would get the eight lines of the first verse of my country's national anthem correct.

There have been far more severely butchered versions of the song (you will remember Roseanne Barr's classic rendition at the Padres' Jack Murphy Stadium and Carl Lewis' heart-wrenching performance at an NBA game), and I think the common theme here is people who are not qualified to sing such a song trying to sing the damn song. Obviously, Roseanne wasn't picked for her musical prowess, but it's difficult to give a "humorous take" on the American national anthem without making people incredibly uncomfortable, and I don't think Ms. Barr is your best bet there, anyway. Carl Lewis won 10 Olympic medals for the U.S. in track and field events, but what is he doing with a microphone?

She couldn't even listen to herself

I don't care how many Grammys Aguilera has won, she shouldn't be singing the national anthem. This may be quite an Archie Bunker/Dana Carvey's grumpy old man thing to say, but I really can't stand it when people jazz up the Star Spangled Banner. The patriotism of the song is felt through the familiar march melody of drum and bugle and fife, not in the aria-esque ornamentation that Aguilera and other pop singers add to the song's melody. Besides the fact, as Roseanne could tell you, it's a very difficult and vocally demanding piece in the first place, and the true beauty that can inspire awe in a listening concerning this melody is to belt the damn thing out correctly.

Basically, give me Patti LaBelle or give me death. I guess Aguilera could do it, too (she certainly has a more versatile voice than the auto-tuned Black Eyed Peas performers at halftime), but forgive me if I don't feel a rush of patriotism when the singer of "Dirrty" steps up on stage and muffs the words.

Betty White owns you

Unless you've been living under a rock lately, you... Wait a second. I hate that expression. Honestly, if one lives under a rock that could very well have all the luxury and accouterments that we surface-dwellers enjoy (Patrick Star pulls it off just fine). 

Ahem.

Unless you've been living under a rock without cable lately (much better), you've noticed that the lovable Betty White has had a bit of a resurgence. The octogenarian actor is darling and lovable and perfectly plays the role of the cute, harmless little old lady.

Tea, dear?

I was watching the SAG awards last Sunday, (not a shot at Ms. White, but a pretty unfortunate acronym for the Screen Actors Guild in this case, don't you think?) and the nominees in the category of Best Female Actor in a Comedy Series were announced: Tina Fey for 30 Rock, Jane Lynch for Glee, Sofia Vergara for Modern Family, and Betty herself for Hot in Cleveland. Now, I don't watch much TV Land, and if I do, I certainly don't associate the channel with new sitcoms. I'll watch an episode of Gilligan's Islandor McHale's Navy anytime, but Hot in Cleveland doesn't exactly pique my interest.

However, my sister Lucy is caught up in the recent overflow of love for White and watches the show all the time. From what I could tell, Betty White is as funny as she ever was, her always-quick wit and decades-practiced comedic timing are perfect and charming as always. This is no small feat considering Hot in Cleveland is a stupid, stupid show with lamentably corny and predictable writing aimed solely at people who think Valerie Bertinelli has any talent besides managing to breathe properly and worship the daytime television prowess and subtle nuanced style of Rachael Ray.

"CORN! YOU GUYS, CORN!"

I think Betty White is as cute as the next person, but as even she humbly pointed out during her acceptance speech, I didn't think she had a chance of winning the award up against such fantastic comedians as Fey, Lynch, and Vergara (on far, far better shows). Her win created a wonderful TV moment, and I applaud SAG for honoring the 89 year-old's work (even if they had to stiff worthier candidates to do it), but my natural reaction on the couch to hearing White's name read was to profess my incredulity.

You would think that I had just shouted some racial slur from the reaction of the other people in my living room. My sister and friend both scolded me, as if I had cursed in front of a child, for saying anything negative about White. Don't get me wrong, anyone who goes on Craig Ferguson's late show and pretends to have a suitcase which conveniently pops open to reveal copious amounts of cocaine is alright in my book. She seems to be a wonderful woman and an excellent wit, but that makes her some untouchable figure?

The demented smile of a crazed alcoholic

I realize I might not be making many friends here. One can only imagine the thought process I went through (little to none) to decide that my first blog post would be at all anti-Betty White. This is important, though. I'm beginning to think there's something more here. White's revival has seemingly come out of nowhere; she caught fire immediately and her star is burning brighter than Betelgeuse ever has (both the celestial body and the movie that gave me nightmares of Michael Keaton in heavy makeup for years). At this point, she could walk up to President Obama, kick him in the shins, turn around and make a cute offhand joke inferring that an 89 year-old woman still has a thriving sex drive, and not only get away with it, but having us all chuckling and nodding and praising her for looking so damn cute while the president hops around on one leg. Methinks some serious foul play is afoot. Betty White is on a mission: to take over the world.

DOWAGER: pictured here feasting on the flesh of the masses

"Demonic Overlord White: Age - Golden, Extra Ripe," or DOWAGER, as she will demand to be adressed, is lulling us all into a false sense of security as the adorable, helpless little old lady. We fawn over her every film cameo. We laud her television appearances. We praise her peerless work ethic during her old age. And all the while she grows stronger, fed by our sworn allegiance to her character, biding her time. Once we are all entranced and her increasing strength has led successfully to her immortality, she will resurrect the cast of The Golden Girls, and, together with Abe Vigoda, her co-star in this memorable Snickers commercial, they will take over the world. "Metamucil and Medicare!" we will shout, raiding pharmacies bound helplessly to the whims of White Power.

Sure. Call me crazy. Take the easy way out. I'm ready for the coming onslaught. The way I see it though, she can't be stopped. What have we wrought?

"Game over, bitch."