I lost on Jeopardy, baby

I was there to match my intellect on national TV
Against a plumber, oh, and an architect, both with a PhD
I was tense, I was nervous, I guess it just wasn’t my night
Art Fleming gave the answers
Oh, but I couldn’t get the questions right -ight, -ight

I lost on Jeopardy, baby (oooh)
I lost on Jeopardy, baby (oooh)

–“I Lost on Jeopardy”, Weird Al Yankovic

So, my shameful secret is out: I got killed on Jeopardy. I didn’t just lose—it was on a whole other level of meta-suck. I could have played more conservatively, but after a certain point, when it became clear that I was going to come in third place, I figured there was no reason not to ring in every time I had an inkling of what the answer could be (third place contestant gets $1,000 no matter what). Mostly, though, I just stood there under the hot lights contemplating my supreme humiliation on national television.

I didn’t expect it go down like that. I have always been a trivia queen, and I was on varsity quick recall in high school. I was, in all modesty, rather good at it. And I must have been pretty decent when I did the final tryouts for Jeopardy in Atlanta last year, otherwise they wouldn’t have invited me to be on the show. So why did I stink it up so bad?

Friends, I had a baby, and it kicked my butt. Baby Girl was one month old to the day when I went on Jeopardy, and I felt like the walking dead. I had been getting 3-4 hours of sleep a night for that entire month, with a one-hour nap in the afternoon if I could get both the kids to sleep at the same time. And I went back to work two weeks after giving birth. Little known fact: one of the biggest side effects of chronic sleep deprivation is an extremely delayed reaction time. This is not terribly helpful when you live and die by the buzzer.

On the other hand, all the lightning reflexes in the world don’t matter when the categories are absolutely not your thing. The Vatican Online, weapons, geometry, and second-tier world leaders would all probably be on my short list for Jeopardy! Categories From Hell.

But…what can you do? You do what you can with what you have, and if you know you’re going to bomb then you ride that bomb straight down to the ground and hold your head high afterwards. Also, wave your cowboy hat around a bit if you’re so inclined.

“ That’s right, Al–You lost. And let me tell you what you didn’t win: a twenty volume set of the Encyclopedia International, a case of Turtle Wax, and a year’s supply of Rice-A-Roni, the San Francisco Treat. But that’s not all. You also made yourself look like a jerk in front of millions of people. You brought shame and disgrace to your family name for generations to come. You don’t get to come back tomorrow. You don’t even get a lousy copy of our home game. You’re a complete loser!”

When I was invited to go on Jeopardy, I had an agenda in mind. I wanted to prove to my kids (especially my daughter) that it’s cool for girls to be smart; that you don’t have to trade in your brain just because you want to breed. Obviously, I proved nothing of the sort, what with my stellar performance and all. But there’s something else to be learned from this whole fiasco:

When I came back from L.A, cringing in horror, I realized all over again how amazing my friends and family are. Because every single one of them has been wonderful, even though I wanted to run away with my shame and hide under a table until it was all over with. That’s what I want to remember about this, what I want my kids to know: that it’s important simply to try, and even if you fail horribly, publicly, and at something that you knew in your heart you were born to rule—the people who love you will still love you and encourage you, and nothing will change that. And that, I think, is a much more important lesson after all.