1 Vs. 100, Post-Game Report: Episode Three

Well, if you watched my third appearance on 1 Vs. 100 tonight, you saw that my man Kwame was eliminated, leaving 36 Mob members -- including me! -- to split the $62,000 he had accumulated to that point. I'll do the math: I won another $1,722!! And twenty-two cents. Which brings my grand total as a contestant on the Mob to $6,143.27!! Not bad for about two hours of on-air work. (Post editing, that is. You all know it took a lot more time and effort than that for me to get on the show and to tape those three episodes. Still, it beats my usual pay rate!)

And sadly, you also saw me get eliminated on the next contestant, on an extremely easy question, which I don't even want to reiterate here. I'm embarrassed. What can I say? I froze, I choked, I picked the wrong answer, I suck. And that contestant went on to get eliminated -- on a question I definitely would've gotten right -- which makes it even worse. Since taping that episode, there has literally -- and you know how much I hate misuse of the word "literally" -- there has literally not been one single day in which I did not stop at some point, struck by the memory of that moment, and, in the middle of whatever I was doing -- driving, reading, watching TV, showering, attending a baptism, whatever -- grit my teeth, clench my fists, and shout to the heavens: FUUUUUUCK!! And there probably will not be another day in which I do not continue to do the same for at least another year. Or three. Or fifty.

I'm very proud of making it as far as I did -- 26 correctly answered questions in a row, before getting knocked out on the 27th -- and I'm very thrilled with making as much cash as I did. But to have blown it on a dumb question, when I know I could've gone farther -- that will always rankle. I try to think of the positive, I really do -- over six thousand dollars! -- but then I think, "I could've made $5,000 more from that one contestant alone if I had only answered 'C'!" If I had had only five more seconds to think about it -- to take a deep breath, calm down, and think -- ah, but I did not have five more seconds, and there's the rub.

I'll have more to say later about the end of last episode, which I still haven't gotten around to writing about, and the end of my run in this episode -- but for now, this is about all I can stand thinking about it. The promise of my prize money coming sometime in the next 90 days eases the pain, but only a little. Thanks for watching my TV saga -- though if you missed this episode, I might be a little relieved, frankly. One less witness to my shame!