The Left Lane
'Jeopardy' Islander
It's all in the timing.
That's the word from "Jeopardy!" college tourney contestant Tony Nagatani, a 20-year-old Punahou grad now studying in New York.
Courtesy "Jeopardy!" Productions, Inc.
"Everyone there was so intelligent," said Nagatani, a film studies major at Ithaca College. "It was less about intelligent players and more about how everyone handled the buzzer."
Tony Nagatani is a competitor in the "Jeopardy" college tournament.
He called from Chicago's O'Hare airport last month to tell his hometown paper about the annual College Championship of "Jeopardy!" taped at UCLA-Pauley Pavilion in Los Angeles. The tournament — which pits 15 of the nation's top collegians against each other for a top prize of $50,000 and a new Volvo — begins airing tomorrow, but Nagatani doesn't come on until Monday.
The trick, he explained, is to buzz in just as Alex Trebek finishes reading, the exact moment when a person off-screen activates the buzzers. If you buzz in too soon, you're penalized with a half-second delay; too late, the other contestants may beat you to the punch.
So ... did he win?
"I can't comment on that."
— Mary Kaye Ritz, Advertiser staff writer
Santa's mail goes on
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Letters to Santa Claus mailed to the town of North Pole from all over the world will be opened this holiday season despite the anthrax scare, the Postal Service said Friday.
Postal staffers in Alaska had worried they would have to ignore the expected heaps of letters, usually answered under Santa's name by volunteers. As many as 60,000 Santa letters arrive each year. Postal headquarters in Washington, D.C., decided Thursday to let the tradition continue.
"The anthrax situation has not come this way, and we don't expect it to," said Nancy Cain Schmitt, Alaska spokeswoman for the Postal Service. "We're not going to it ruin our tradition of working with Santa and getting the letters opened and answered for children."
— Associated Press
Sculpture in progress
Site-specific artist Patrick Dougherty uses natural materials to create sculptures that transform their sites. Next on his agenda is a work at the Art Building at UH-Manoa, where faculty and students have been gathering truckloads of bamboo, palm fronds and other vegetation in anticipation of his visit.
Dougherty will be visiting artist at the university today through Nov. 23. Visitors may stop by the Commons Gallery to see his work in progress. It will be completed and on view Nov. 20-30.
Dougherty will give a free talk about his work at 7:30 tonight in the UH Art Auditorium.
— Virginia Wageman, Advertiser art critic
