August 3 2020 Recap (Ash)

Ash was certainly a brilliant player, and I applaud Sony for bringing some neurodiversity to primetime, but I can't help but feel bad for Ash because of the composition of his winnings — some rough back-of-the-napkin math tells me he only won about $13K in cash, which is just about enough to cover the total taxes on the car (if he decided to keep it). The trips, of course, are of very inflated value and won't actually cost that much, but they still represent a big tax bill next year.

If they didnt care about it at all it wouldnt still be on teh air, but i get it. Jeopardy has the Better Ratings. 

^ Since about Season 29, AND is almost-always used over & except in Same Letter, Same Name (interchangeably AND/& until late S35, permanently been using & since then), and Triple Toss-Ups. Besides that, the only time we really see & anymore is when they need to force a puzzle to two rows, or if the puzzle's format just looks better aesthetically with &, especially if the other words are long words. If the D in AND would go in one of the extreme right-side monitors in the second or third row, they'll usually just use &. The Bonus Round has not used & since 2012, or any punctuation other than a hyphen since 2014.

Good grief, Ash, give 'em a chance, why don't you?

I'm kidding. What an awesome performance. And what a way to bring in new Wheel shows for the first time in months!

Congratulations, acwof !
I'm going to start reviewing episodes again:

^ Yes, it was used as a Bonus Round on January 21, 2019, reran on April 13, 2020, the day this episode was supposed to air.

Hi, everyone.

Thanks for all the positive comments about my episode! It was truly an experience I'll never forget!

I'll try to do a write-up in "Spinning Stories" later on, because boy do I have a story to share about how I even got to where I am, now!

I love you all!

- acwof

^ Sorry cu. Next time, I'll avoid making those comments.

*Quick note to begin with, this post isn't a complaint, I'm just providing my opinion based on my personal experience*

I think personalities has been a strong influence for quite a while.  I auditioned in 2015 and I feel like I did very well--I never called a letter that wasn't on the board (I only lost my turn when they moved the arrow to Bankrupt); I solved at least two puzzles that I can specifically remember (and if I remember correctly, for one of them, I solved after getting 3 letters when the wheel landed on $5000); after taking the written test (which, if I remember right, was on whichever colored paper I saw posts on here saying was the harder version) when they left to check them, a group of us started talking and I had gotten more of them than anyone else in that group who had taken that one, including someone who was selected for the show.

I am a pretty laid back person and not particularly graceful socially, and I do remember being reminded to smile a couple of times during my turns.  After they called me back up to the front to play a second time, I knew it was slipping away based on my personality and tried to adjust.  Unfortunately, either I didn't do enough or it was too little, too late, because I knew of two people at the audition who come to BAV and saw them post about getting their letters.

In hindsight, I've wondered if my occupation (advocate for sexual assault victims) could have played a part in that it's a family show and that might be a bit awkward in the introductions after the first tossup.  I wish I would have worded it differently.  Either way, I practice my smiling and energy now when playing WoF on my PlayStation (thankfully my wife doesn't think I'm a weirdo for doing that) and if I get another chance, I'm going to try to come out of my shell more.  But like I said, this isn't a complaint and at the end of the day, even though I was heartbroken, I figured that it's their show and they can pick who they want.