Then the questions began to appear on the video screen. Some were easy ("She plays Buffy on the WB series") but others were tricky ("This capital of Syria..."). I was doing well until question 25, when I realized that I should have been on question 26. Oops. I continued to fill out the answer form, carefully hiding my answers from any would-be cheaters. Then the test was over. The Jeopardy representative collected our forms and said that he'd return in fifteen minutes after the answer sheets were co rrected.

While we waited, we were supposed to fill out the pink interview form; the information provided would ultimately be used in the meet-n-greet portion of the show. As usual, I described the joy of squirrels. After only ten minutes, Jeopardy Man returned t o the room.

He thanked us all for trying out for the show, but they could take only scores in the top ten percent for the next round. Blah, blah, blah. He read about a dozen names off the list, but none of them were mine. I was in disbelief; I was certain that I'd done better. I'd known what "L'oiseau de Feu" meant, for Pete's sake! So I toddled up to Jeopardy Man and told him that I'd messed up on my answer form. "Oh, we account for that," he replied. "We don't penalize for that sort of mistake." Hmm.

Dejected and embarrassed, I began to turn away. "Hey," said Jeopardy Man. "You can always tell your friends that you missed making it to the next round by just one point. They'll never know." And certainly nobody would know if I were to lie. But I still believe that I did better on the test--I was robbed, I tell you. Robbed. Now every time I watch Jeopardy, I'll bitterly stare at Alex Trebek, knowing that I should have been the one to win big with the Daily Double.