(I am not necessarily sure ‘congratulations’ are in order…)

(Sunday Paper, Year V, Issue 5)

I wouldn’t exactly say it’s been a life-long dream of mine to appear on Jeopardy!

But I guess it could qualify as a bucket-list item.

An opportunity to be on TV?

An opportunity to show off my smarts?

An opportunity to win some money?

I mean, these are all right in my wheelhouse when it comes to things I enjoy.

But - and I didn’t mean to get you all excited there - this is not something you should count on happening soon.

On Tuesday night I took the online Jeopardy! test (yet again) and (yet again) I did not do well enough that I’m expecting the casting agents to come calling.

(If this sounds familiar it’s because back in March, 2018 [I can’t believe it was that long ago!] I wrote about the experience.)

I’ve improved in some of the categories since then…and some things have remained status quo.

I blew it on a Shakespeare question, even though I had read up on some Shakespeare since a test a couple of years ago. (This time around I confused ‘Hamlet’ and ‘Macbeth’.) I still don’t know enough about African geography…which seems like an easy enough fix.

I froze on questions I knew the answer to - about taxidermy and the capital of Kentucky.

Others I guessed luckily (but smartly) and ended up getting right.

I suppose I don’t need to itemize for you my struggles - all it means is that I think I’d fare well enough on the show…if I ever advanced to the point where I could get on the show.

Once I was there, I would need a sports category to do any damage.

It’s funny how those questions are so easy for me - I got one about the Dodgers that a number of people posted online about afterwards saying, “I think I got 49/50 - had no idea about the Dodgers!”

I was more in the 40/50 range…but I think I’d rather know a ton about baseball than Shakespeare anyway.

Writing

*I am really proud of the January I’ve just had. I was working a lot, and I also kept up with my creative side. There have been a few submissions (so February has the potential to feature some rejections) and I’ve worked on some other stuff that will keep me submitting in the coming months.

Comedy

*Comedy John from a couple of years back would be very disappointed in the January I just had, comedy-wise. But I’m comfortable with it.

*Oh, hey - Comedy Night at Exhibit ‘A’ is back on Saturday. There are still a few tickets left, you can click here to get them. Also, there are (usually) always standing room available the night of the show, so come on out. It’ll be funny. Promise.

(Comedy John from a couple of years back would probably be proud of Comedy Night at Exhibit ‘A’.)

What I’ve Been Enjoying

*I’m likely not going to re-up the satellite radio come February 14, when it expires, but lately I’ve been listening almost exclusively to the Broadway channel. It’s fun. I’m learning some things, and I’m hearing songs I had long-since forgotten about. And I really like the DJs and their name-dropping and their knowledge of Broadway.

Thoughts on Dog Ownership

*Tate and I get along really well. Sometimes she’s the only one in the house who actually listens to me.

Notes

*It’s Super Bowl Sunday, which is always a favorite day for me. I wrote about how much I love it a couple of years ago and you can check that out here. It’s even more favorite when I have no rooting interest - either for or against - in the game. This year I’m just rooting for number outcomes by the quarter.

*Speaking of number outcomes by the quarter, did you read this crazy story about the Super Bowl square pool where the guy faked his own kidnapping? Truth be told, I didn’t read the article. But I did listen to a podcast conversation with the writer and editor. Pretty wild.

*Going back to that first link, if you have a favorite Super Bowl memory, feel free to share it.

*The Puppy Bowl on Animal Planet is still a big deal in this house…my daughter pointed out that this year we’ll be watching with a puppy of our own.

*I finished Gone With The Wind. I think it’s OK to spoil a 90-year-old book here. I convinced myself ‘I don’t give a damn’ was a line in Casablanca. So I was pleasantly surprised to see it at the end of Gone With The Wind - there was a little surprise in the ending. Then I was like, Casablanca means ‘white house’, and Tara (the Gone With The Wind home) is described as a white house. Am I misremembering that there’s actually no movie called Gone With The Wind and Casablanca is the movie based on the book? My mom has assured me there’s a Gone With The Wind movie called Gone With The Wind. (No desire to see the movie, incidentally. Not a likable bunch of characters in that book.)

*So now I’m reading Hamilton. Let’s see what got Lin-Manuel Miranda all inspired. I meant to read Little Women next but it’s out of all the area libraries so I’ll get to that next when maybe the excitement dies down a little bit. I’ll just catch the movie later than I intended.

*This week’s Wednesday post on the Facebook page sure was popular. People seem to like pictures that celebrate anniversaries of some sort…that’s my best analysis of the Facebook algorithm. You can catch the next one (I don’t know what I’m going to post yet - panic is setting in!) on Wednesday by Liking the Facebook page, please. You can also follow me on Twitter here.