“New Hampshire” was also a dead giveaway.
Love him.
The line is:
“The name of the town is Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire just across the Massachusetts line: latitude 42 degrees 40 minutes; longitude 70 degrees 37 minutes.”
I have no idea how one would have determined lat and long in 1938. Perhaps the map or whatever was not exact enough. An absolutely beautiful play, in my opinion.
I really like Austin. Yes, he mugs during the intros, but he settles down during the actual play. With an occasional finger point, whatever. The man is smart and has betting guts. And no, he is not on the spectrum. Just because someone is animated or a little quirky does not mean there is something wrong.
I shouted out the correct answer as soon as the FJ! clue was revealed Wednesday. Sometimes I impress myself.
Latitude you can determine by measuring the altitude of Polaris above the horizon. For longitude, you need two clocks, one set to your local mean time, the second set to Greenwich mean time.
10/5/2017 episode spoilers:
Austin had some good competition tonight. He was looking vulnerable there for a while–trailing much of the first round and the beginning of the Double Jeopardy round. I thought this might be it for him. It felt like he was guessing too often when he wasn’t very sure of his answer, and losing a lot of points that way. But then he surged with that last Daily Double and a strong run of answers after that.
Regarding Final Jeopardy, my own thought process before the contestants’ answers were revealed was “Kenneth Branagh? No… Anthony Hopkins? maybe… Oh! Laurence Olivier!”
I knew Olivier was in two out of three. The “1940s” remark confirmed I was right before they revealed the question.
Or you could look at a map.
I mean, he was close. It isn’t like he used latitude 110, longitude 360. My complaint is, why use wrong coordinates, which are distracting, when not using coordinates at all would be easier and not noticed. When people came to my house I didn’t say I live at 44°4′17″N 89°17′23″W.
Friday 10/7/2017 episode:
Another good game where he had some tough competition, and he pulls it out again. A big bet and miss on a Daily Double set him back early, but he rallied and had the lead going into FJ, where he was the only one to come up with the correct response. I had come up with Mongolia, but couldn’t think of the corresponding 'Mon-" country in Europe. :smack:
Here is a brief Washington Post article on Austin and the reactions of Jeopardy viewers to him:
Aside from how viewers feel about Austin: my impression is that Alex* really* likes him. (Looking for a hosting-heir, perhaps???)
Bozo won again?
Maybe I’ll just delete last night’s from the DVR.
I don’t know why Alex would like him. He hates anyone showing him up. It’s like his biggest fault. I think Alex is just being a good host. He’d never let his true opinion of a guest be known.
“Sherbert” in not a New York thing. I lived in and around NYC for 25 years, and I pronounce it “sherbet”.
“I’m sorry; the correct answer was ‘Ra’. Ra. [beat] But, hey, who frickin’ cares?”
It certainly would represent a major change in direction for the show. :eek:
On the other hand, I think everybody in Minnesota calls it “sherbert,” just like they call caramel “carmel.”* I presume this extends to other parts of the Upper Midwest as well.
*At least they did when I was growing up there.
How do you think the mapmakers did it? :dubious:
Nowadays, you can with GPS. 
Problem is, I don’t think most people realize Monaco is a country. Like Wales, it’s a principality.
It is pronounced (and sometimes spelled) “sherbert” in much of New England. I would guess that fair amounts of New Yorkers and New Jerseyans also say “sherbert”. I was sure that they would come back from the commercial break and announce that the judges had decided that “sherbert” was an acceptable dialectical pronunciation. I suppose they didn’t allow it because the question was specifically about the spelling of the word.
Looks like Austin found a barbershop over the weekend.
Doesn’t seem to have messed with his Sampson-like powers much.
He’s still kind of a mix of slightly funny, slightly annoying. I did LOL when he told that stupid joke and got Alex to give him five up high.