3. High School
If you want to be on Jeopardy, the best time to try out is in high school. The questions are ridiculously easy, and I remember an episode that featured a category on Top 40 Radio and no one knew who Mariah Carey was. Also, if you’re in AP History, you already know 70% of the questions right off the bat. When I took the high school test my senior year, I was cocky. I thought watching the show every afternoon and shouting out answers through a mouthful of Funyuns was enough to prepare me. It wasn’t.
2. College
The next time I took the test, I decided to prepare a little bit beforehand. I did this by going to my school’s store and looking at their sweatshirt options. When you’re on College Jeopardy, you have to showcase your school pride on your wardrobe. This troubled me, as I was never a fan of my college’s font choice. Another drawback was that I tend to look marshmallow-like in sweatshirts. And I did not plan to wear spaghetti straps or a muscle tee in front of Alex Trebek. I failed the test again.
1. Post-College
Now that I had to take the normal test, I had more important things to think about. What anecdote would I tell Alex and the audience after the first commercial break? Brevity was key. So was dry humor. I’ve seen people humiliate themselves by trying to incorporate song or rhyme into their stories. (One woman sang a song she wrote about her weinerdog.) This was bad since my go-to anecdote is usually about the time I met Peter Gallagher at a mall in Texas. That was awful. I wasn’t ready for Jeopardy yet. I needed more anecdote-worthy experiences. Also, I failed the test again.
