A Girl and a Wheel and to Be Cheesy, a Dream...Chapter Two

Pre WOF Game

Welcome to installment number 2! Okay so I left off with my practicing the Wheel pre-LA trip. So here’s the LA trip. Oh geez. What a daunting thing to think about writing. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity and I am now sitting in LAX, so VERY crushed that the experience is over. I was telling Amy this morning over free omelets courtesy of the Sony Studios via the Doubletree Hotel (a “welcome” in the form of a warm walnut chocolate chip cookie, and a “come back soon” in the form of a fresh omelet and fresh-squeezed orange juice…surely you can see why I’m having such a hard time thinking about this experience having come to an end) that I keep thinking, “I can’t wait to do this again next year,” as though it was a race I was participating in or something. But it’s not; it’s not something I can do again. Boo. But before you judge me for complaining, I’m not. I’m just expressing the awe that I feel when thinking about this whole 3-day experience. We were playing my favorite, the highlight-lowlight game, and we were both having a hard time stopping ourselves from sharing more highlights. So, anyway, let’s cut to the chase. One of my lowlights I mentioned was getting my Bath and Body Works shower gel, lotion, and leave-in hair conditioner taken away from me because like an idiot, I forgot to ensure I’d have 3oz bottles. But that moment passed and I was able to move on because I was going to the Wheel, baby! The trip was smooth, which was a great thing. In the shuttle to the hotel we met Ed and Gloria, who were an extremely precious older couple heading out to Hawaii on a cruise. They learned that I was going to be on the Wheel, freaked out in their cute older couple way, and I loved them. Then upon our arrival to the hotel, we were welcomed with a warm walnut and chocolate chip cookie. SHUT. UP. You know you’ve made it big when that’s your welcome. It was right up my alley. Like my cousin Dave said, the only thing that would make it any MORE up my alley, was if they came out with an ice cream cone. I’m sure they had them back there. The cookie itself was literally warm and so so good. I felt welcomed immediately. I am officially a hotel snob and refuse to go anywhere other than Doubletree. Or if I do, perhaps I will bring my own tupperware of cookies and just pretend. Anyway, you know it’s up my alley when I just keep talking about it. I will force myself to move on. But I can’t promise that I won’t bring it up a bunch. That night we walked to the grocery store and got dinner in the form of a veggie platter, an orange, and Greek yogurt. I know. Awesome. I was SO excited for Amy because we passed a bunch of pretty people (oh wait a second, they’re ALLLL pretty people in Los Angeles) in the hotel lobby singing a-cappella style and then she freaks out because it was the group “Afro Blue” from the show Sing-Off. I have seen this show once so recognized the name but was indifferent. But I was SO happy for Amy so I grabbed my camera and we casually walked back downstairs to “check out the Jacuzzi”. Well, there was no Jacuzzi but know what there WAS!? Afro Blue, and my friend who went right up to them, totally willing to act like she was 12, and I asked them if I could take a picture with them altogether. Mission accomplished. Warm cookie, veggie platter, Afro Blue picture. It was gonna be a TOP NOTCH trip.

That night I was curious to see if I was going to sleep. Was I going to be nervous? When I did the Ironman, Phebe and the rest of my family were shocked when I NEVER got nervous. Phebe kept asking me, “are you nervous yet!?” And I was only excited. It was the same for the Wheel. I had done everything I could, I knew I had so much support behind me (you!), and whatever happened, would happen. I am so so so grateful that I have a relationship with Jesus. I firmly believe that my relationship with Him enables me to keep in mind that whatever happens, happens because He allows it to happen. If He gave me a ton of money, if I stunk and took home a measly $1000, if my hand got stuck on a spoke and it flew me ‘round and ‘round (that would secretly be awesome, no?), it would be His doing. I think this is part of why I feel this all excitement and no nervous thing. I don’t know. Anyway, all I know is it’s an awesome feeling to know that there’s a heck of a lot more to life than money. This doesn’t mean I don’t WANT to win the million. But it keeps me nice and level-headed. So…I slept like a baby. I mean, I got up at 2:15 LA time, but that was bound to happen. And, the early bird catches a worm. I had a bunch of worms to catch on this particular day.

So I put on my outfit, finished it with the touch of my cute earrings, gave Amy a hearty high five (she’d arrive later, at 11am, with the other guests of contestants), and was on my way. At this point I was so excited I couldn’t contain it. I smiled while walking down the hallway, still not believing what I was about to do and really wanting to do heel kicks all the way down to the lobby. I blame it on the bag I was carrying. And my hair. And I was scared to break a nail. Just kidding. Okay fine I just didn’t do them. But I felt them in my heart. The surreal just never went way. I joined the other contestants who were also privileged enough to have been welcomed with a warm cookie (is it clear yet how awesome this part of my stay was!?). I was secretly looking for enthusiasm signs. Were they more enthusiastic than me? What if I played against some of these people? It was a very interesting dynamic, because we all started asking those annoying “how did you apply?” and “are you nervous?” and “when did you get your letter?” questions. They’re comparable to those gosh darn college orientation questions we all had to answer a bajillion times when it was our time to shine at the tender age of about 18. But we were all full of conversation and excitement. Maybe we were still partly feeling the sugar high from the warm cookies.

When we got there, one of the staff that had been at the audition in Boston brought us into the contestant holding room, and we were instructed to sit at a chair and fill out some paperwork. There were 20 people altogether. Six groups of 3, since there were 6 tapings that day, and 2 poor
alternates who were locals and who would play if something happened to a contestant. I don’t know, like if someone got Wheelogitis, or who sprained their hand from Vanna’s firm handshake. UNDERSTATEMENT! She had the weakest handshake, I can’t wait to tell my math kids because I have them work on firm handshakes on their way out of my class….I finished that handshake feeling like I needed closure of some sort. I felt like giving myself a handshake or something. Then we had to stand up one at a time and practice our shpeal for our home’s TV station ad. I had to say, “Hi! I’m Jaquelin from Beverly. Watch me play Wheel of Fortune on WBZ.” Then I had to smile awkwardly for 3 seconds afterward. Well, I was 4^th to go, and I am proud to say I was the rebel (I know, right? …little ol’ me!?) who had gum in her mouth. They told me to throw it out and I freaked out for a second, but then remembered that they were the suckers, I was already going to be a contestant and they couldn’t NOT call me or send me a letter. Then that got me thinking, “just what ARE the reasons in which an alternate is used? What if I look at them the wrong way? What if they see that I have a zit? What if they learn that my toenail is falling off” (True story…too much intense contact between my toes and shoes because of training…TMI)? Well, I can proudly say that after I threw it out, I saw another put hers in a piece of paper. So really, I was just doing everyone a favor. I totally had planned that. You’re welcome, other contestants.

I was ashamed that they had to tell me to do it again; I wasn’t enthusiastic enough. WHAT? Man, the pressure. So I yelled a little louder, showed a little more teeth, and put a little more twinkle in my eye. Whew. While we were doing this, some guy who looked like Mr. Hollywood, with the cool black-brim glasses, short spiky hair with bleach blond tips, skinny-ish jeans with boots and a coolio casual jacket, sat in a director’s chair in the corner watching us. Who WAS this strange and mysterious fellow who was obviously all that? Turns out he was the one in charge of the contestant staff and what he says, goes. His name was George. Anyway…after this we sat and they went over the paperwork with us. You know, the one were I sign my financial life away. It included lots of hereby’s and therefore’s but they explained it more and I had looked it over again on the plane, so I felt confident that they weren’t going to steal my identity and leave me in an alley. Whew. Vanna would never do that, right?

THENNNNN, they took us out to the studio. O.M.GEEEEEEE. So awesome. The room was much smaller than how it appears on television, the wheel was all neony and pretty and wheely. They taught us how best to spin the wheel. With your left hand hold onto the ledge in front of you, then with your right hand reach as FAR to the right as possible, pull it hard, and push it once it passes your midline. When grabbing the spoke, it was best to grab the top half of it so as not to hit the little triangle thingies that determine what wedge you landed on. SO MUCH to think about. It was good to practice, though, and have I said it yet? SURRREEAAALLLL. The Wheel was Real Surreal. Bam. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. But my hand still is a bit sore right around where it hit the top of the spoke after all the spinaroos. It’s a reminder that yesterday really did happen. That and the 2 Wheel of Fortune pens, the key chain, and the AWESOME blue name tag that says my name. Man, this shadow box mentioned in my first chapter is going to get quite busy.

Then…I lose track here. I think we took our turns to officially give our current town advertisement on camera. So…if you’re from Boston…you’ll be able to see me awkwardly smile for 3 seconds while staring at the camera, after saying that you should watch me. After this, I don’t remember what we did. Around this time, though, while in the contestant holding room, the famous, the beautiful, the wrinkly-behind-all-the-Botox, Vanna walks in wearing faded jeans, some cheapo Sketchers slip-on shoes, and a neon orange sweatshirt with the name of some tropical place written on the front. Wait! How does she have TIME to pull herself from all the screen touching and dress wearing and waving to get to St. Whatever-it-said-on-her-sweatshirt? Well, I don’t know how she does it. Wonder Woman, that Vanna. And REALLY skinny, too. She should really try one of those warm cookies. Or fifty. Also, as I said earlier, her handshake was HORRIBLE. The kind of handshake that makes you want to squirm. You would think that with her background and job, she’d be taught to give a firm handshake. OR, was she taught to simply contact the other person’s hand, with the intention of making that person want to shake her hand again, and in turn, cause the shakee to love her even more? I don’t know. I understand I’m not making sense. But com’n, her HANDSHAKE doesn’t make sense. Anyway, I will tell my math students that they do NOT want to be like Vanna when it comes to handshakes. I will now call the handshakes in math class Better-Than-Vanna’s Handshakes…or something. “Woops, (student’s name), don’t forget to give me a Better-Than-Vanna’s Handshake on your way out!” Yeah. I’m totally starting that.

I think it was around this time that we were told the groupings for the rounds. I was put with an older lady named Cathy, and a FIIINNNNNEEEE young man named Tannen. Oh my. Pitter Patter. AND we’re already Facebook friends (for the record, HE requested MY friendship earlier today), so I’ll go ahead a custom this status/link so he doesn’t see just how much of a tall glass of water (is that the saying?..well whatever, you’re getting the idea that I about died…easy on the eyes, this man) I thought he was. Anyway, more on that later. So after it was announced that the 3 of us would be playing against each other, I could tell that Cathy didn’t have my type of sense of humor so I targeted Tannen as the one to jokingly do the “I have my eyes on you” gesture. He enjoyed it, and I enjoyed that he enjoyed it. I was told that I’d be the “ball picker” for my group. Not sure why they don’t change this title. It’s a little disconcerting. So what it ended up being was the one who picked a golf ball out of a bucket, and the golf ball had a number between 1 and 6 on it. This decided what group would go when. I looked to Tannen to see what he wanted, and he requested that I try my darndest to pick out number 4. EXACTLY what I wanted! Well, I picked 5; very close and I was just glad it wasn’t 1, because then we’d go first, or 6, because we’d be in “America’s Game” and our episode wouldn’t air until April, rather than the last week in February/early March. So THIS means our episode airs on Friday night. Which means a couple of different things. One, big party that night…I am hoping, anyway. Two, it’s a Friday night…who stays in to watch Wheel of Fortune on a Friday night? I’m sure not as many people as the other nights. But wait, the people I WANT to watch it will watch it. Oh yeah. No sweat.

So…sometime around now we all took turns getting make-up applied. I was so excited about this because I don’t use makeup, nor do I have any desire to do so. MAN it’s tough to take that stuff off. And the extra cost is not something I miss. But if I get it done for free by someone who knows what she’s doing, sign me up! So Kimber was my make-up gal. Foundation, eyes, lips, blush, the whole bit. Very fun. The lady who did the touch up after I ate something and right before I went on talked about how she had been doing this for 30+ years, and she had worked on Home Improvement, some other sitcoms I don’t remember, and she does Alex Trebek’s make-up for Jeopardy. Sweet! Back to after my first application, though. How do people eat sandwiches after they put lip gloss on? For some reason they fed us sandwiches made with flaky rolls, which didn’t make sense, because after I was done eating I felt like I had sandwich all over my lips. Wow, I’m being quite detailed. I felt like I had sandwich all over my lips? Who says that? Me.

We’re still at the point after I had gotten the first application. After I ate the sandwich we went out to the studio to sit and watch the other contestants battle it out. It was GREAT practice for me and I was so happy to be going 5^th. This way I could get a ton of practice in. I was definitely a “game-player” during this time because Tannen and I sat next to each other a couple of times and he would whisper the puzzle every now and then when he knew it. I decided to keep it to myself when I knew the answer because I didn’t want him to know what he was going up against. I didn’t want him to know what to expect. I also noticed that a TON of times whenever I looked toward Cathy, she had her eyes closed and had her trusty red blanket from Delta draped over her. She couldn’t stay awake. I thought that the combination of my getting the puzzles before Tannen and Cathy having a hard time staying awake was killer. Woo! I was psyched!

Between games 3 and 4 we had a 45 minute break, which was fine, but by this time I was just excited to spin the wheel and talk to Pat. He was a little disappointing, as he didn’t introduce himself to us prior to the games like Vanna did. I had heard that he wasn’t the nicest game show host, and his failure to introducing himself didn’t help his cause. Anyway, during this break they fed us pizza. I thought this was an interesting choice, since I’m sure lots of people were nervous and pizza seemed like the last thing many people would want to make them feel better. Well, again, I didn’t have nerves and didn’t bat a mascara’d eye as I ate 2 pieces. Hey, we had a fuel up. And the lip glass had not been freshly applied so I was feeling better already.

After the second application of make-up, Shannon one of the crazies went through the cue cards that Pat would use to introduce us to the audience. I had been freaking out about this because that’s a lot of talking in front of the world, when PROBABLY it can’t be done again. There were 2 separate things I was worried I’d say wrong, and I wanted to practice exactly what he’d ask and how I would respond. Well, we didn’t do this. So I freaked out a bit. And as long as I said the correct mileage for the bike in an Ironman, I’d be fine. I literally woke up in the middle of the night last night because I panicked that I said the wrong amount of miles for the bike. Welp, guess I have to wait until March 2^nd to either breathe a sigh a relief, or cower in the corner and be the laughingstock of all Ironmen out there. Oh geez. SO MUCH LIGHTS, CAMERA, AND ACTION!

Alright well probably to your relief I think that about covers the pre-show experience. Because after I freaked out about the no-practice thing, we were up. We walked out of the stage and stepped up to the wheel….

…stay tuned for the night of March 2^nd and come back to read my take on the Wheel of Fortune experience. Now. To practice my poker face. If you know me at all, and surely you do, this will not be something that comes easily.