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The Wheel of Fortune One-Letter Solve

By Brian | November 11, 2010 | Share on Facebook

It’s been years since I watched Wheel of Fortune regularly, but this came across my news feed today and gave me quite a chuckle:

This, to me, addresses the true magic of the Wheel of Fortune game. If you’re looking at a puzzle and you don’t know the answer, it seems impossible that anyone else could ever figure it out. Once you solve it, though, it seems just as odd that everyone else in the world doesn’t see it too. I mean, seriously – “I’ve Got a Good Feeling About This.” What else could it be? It’s so OBVIOUS…

Topics: Primetime TV | 6 Comments »

6 Responses to “The Wheel of Fortune One-Letter Solve”

  1. Janet says at November 11th, 2010 at 10:54 pm :
    I have a higher tolerance for both televised golf and “Wheel of Fortune” than I likely would have otherwise because I associate both with spending time with my grandfather. One visit, when I was a teenager, I knocked his socks off by solving a puzzle with NO letters. We were sitting together on the couch; the category was “place” and I looked at it and somehow immediately saw it was my own home town – “Providence Rhode Island.” The wonderful thing was not that I had solved it, but how absolutely tickled he was by it. He kept telling his friends for the rest of my visit. He died almost 19 years ago; his birthday (he would have been 110!) was last Wednesday. I still miss him.

  2. Brian says at November 11th, 2010 at 11:13 pm :
    That’s a great story, Janet. I also have similar memories with my grandparents, around seemingly trivial things (mine involve kids’ classical music on the piano and dominoes), but still – the memories live on…

    As for solving with no letters, I think that’s basically what happened here. I didn’t link to the article I read with the video, but this woman figured out the first word because it was 3-letters and had an apostrophe after the first letter (only two possibilities: I’ll and I’ve). From there, she thought of “I’ll have a” and “I’ve got a” and the second one fit the board. After that, she basically figured it out, so when it was her turn, she already had it solved.

    When asked why she chose “L” and not “G” or “T” (which would have won her an additional $1,800), she basically admitted that she was nervous – the “L” was in the middle of the biggest word, so that’s the letter that she blurted out. In any case, she walked away with >$50,000, so not bad for a half hour’s work.

    And, she’ll be the answer to a very obscure trivia question for the rest of her life, plus she earned herself a spot on the inevitable “Best of Wheel of Fortune” restrospective when the show finally does go off the air (someday?)

  3. Jeff Porten says at November 14th, 2010 at 11:02 pm :
    Bah. Wheel of Fortune hasn’t been any good since Chuck Woolery left.

    Yes, I know I’m the only person on the planet who feels with way.

    For my grandmother, she’d plop me down in front of Jeopardy as a parlor trick when her friends were around.

  4. Brian says at November 14th, 2010 at 11:30 pm :
    You’re the only person on the planet who feels that way because you’re the only one who remembers Chuck Woolery hosting it (and I say that assuming that his parents are both gone, and that he’s long since blocked out the memory…)

    As for Jeopardy, I’ve had the opposite experience. As the “smart kid” in the house, people would look at me funny whenever I didn’t know an answer. Too much pressure for a game show, especially given I didn’t win any money for answering correctly…

  5. Janet says at November 18th, 2010 at 6:02 pm :
    Was it the “going shopping” part that you liked best from the Chuck Woolery days, Jeff? Or was it Susan whatever-her-name-was?

  6. Brian says at November 19th, 2010 at 12:32 am :
    Did anyone ever buy that ceramic dog?

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