After I finished the book and writing in my journal, I switched to breakfast and snow-related animated specials. Frosty's Winter Wonderland brings everyone's favorite snowman back from the North Pole, but he's lonely when the kids go home. The kids make him a snow woman as a companion, but she's not "all-livin'" like he is. Even as they try to figure out how to bring her to life, Jack Frost is determined to eliminate Frosty and make himself the most popular winter character.
She's a Good Skate, Charlie Brown has Snoopy coaching Peppermint Patty for a big local figure skating competition. She insists on Marcie making her costume, but Marcie is hardly a dress designer. Snoopy ends up doing that, too, then has to fight with Schroder and several other boys playing hockey for the right to use the ice. It looks like her routine will end before it begins when Snoopy can't play the tape with her music, but Woodstock lends a wing so she can skate.
Put on Press Your Luck, which took over the noon spot on Buzzr starting today, while having a quick lunch. I came in just as a woman got hit with Whammies. She didn't make much money, but the guy next to her hit a hot streak. He ended up with over $11,000 and a trip to the Grand Canyon. He was the champion on the episode after that as I called Uber.
No trouble at all there. The driver going there picked me up in 4 minutes. The one going home didn't even take a minute to arrive. He even shared his pretzels and can of Pepsi Zero with me. No traffic going there, and not enough to hold anyone up going home.
Most of work wasn't really a problem. Once again, I spent the majority of the day pushing carts. It was cloudy and cold when I arrived. The snow didn't begin until around 1;30 - quarter of 2. In the afternoon, at least, all it did was look pretty coming down. It didn't really stick to anything until I was 40 minutes from being done, and it wouldn't stick to the streets until over an hour after I got home.
I just wish they hadn't made me do the sweeping when I only had fifteen minutes left until the end of my shift. I would have done it earlier if they asked me, but the head bagger did it. Fifteen minutes usually isn't enough time to get the sweeping done. I rushed through the store, pushing that broom fast as I possibly could. I just barely got out on time.
Watched Olym-pinks when I got home while changing and taking the laundry downstairs. The Pink Panther is part of the US ski team at Lake Placid, but one of his teammates is very jealous of his success. His attempts to cheat or match what Pink does usually ends with him in the lake or the snow and getting nothing but a cold. Meanwhile, Pink dodges a piano that is determined to chase him halfway across New York State.
Worked on writing for a while after that ended. When the quartet come across a canyon they can't jump, Avery says he'll get them over. Joyce points out how brave that is, even as Avery says he's scared to death.
Switched to Match Game '79 while eating dinner and putting the laundry in the dryer. Gary Burghoff is very nervous to help the contestant with "Bless Your __" in the Head-to-Head during the first episode. In the second, we meet a very peculiar contestant who collected rhino memorabilia, including a huge concrete rhino his wife didn't like.
Finished the night at YouTube with episodes of Password featuring Betty White, whose birthday would have been Wednesday, after I brought the laundry upstairs. Betty White began playing the daytime Password in 1961, but she wasn't seen on the nighttime version until '63. She quickly proved to be one of the show's best players, moving lightning-fast and never failing to come up with a good description of a word.
Contestants weren't the only ones who appreciated her prowess. Host Allen Ludden was so impressed with her good heart and her quick mind, he married her in 1963. They announced their wedding on a nighttime episode with Jack Paar, who was a good friend of theirs. Their love and warmth is easily seen by their adorable, teasing interaction here. Betty continued playing this version until its demise in 1967, including when it switched to color in 1966.
ABC revived Password in 1971. By this point, Betty and Allen were so associated with Password, they appeared together in an episode of The Odd Couple where Oscar Madison is invited on the show and Felix Unger tags along because he's dying to play. Sadly, ABC recorded over most of the episodes from this series. One of the few remaining shows comes from just a few months before the end of the run. Betty got to host Password while her husband played, and they both did very well, too!
Part of the reason for Password '71's quick exit was it added way too many gimmicks in order to compete with bigger, newer shows like The Price Is Right and $10,000 Pyramid. Format owner Goodson-Todman finally figured out a way to update the format and make it work with Password Plus. Now, contestants and celebrities guessed clues to a word. They they got five words, they'd have to guess what the subject was.
Allen once again hosted...for the first year. He got sick, and Bill Cullen took over. By 1981, Allen was in bad shape, and Tom Kennedy had taken over. Betty is seen here in a very funny earlier episode teasing her husband by dancing with handsome John Phillip Law, and a later Kennedy-hosted episode where Betty is joined by Robert Pine, Brian Kervwin from Lobo, and Denver Pyle from The Dukes of Hazzard, all in character from their current shows. (Betty is supposed to be Sue Ann Nivens from The Mary Tyler Moore Show.)
Password returned again as Super Password in 1984. Same deal, only this one was hosted by Bert Convy and included a mini-game where contestants had to answer an especially hard word. Betty continued to make frequent appearances on this show as well. Bert at one point called it "her show." Bert and the other celebrity that week Richard Simmons even celebrated her birthday on this episode from 1986.
Betty made one last appearance on Million Dollar Password from 2008. This one got hit hard with the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire bug, adding lifelines and a ladder that really didn't help gameplay. Regis Philbin was even the host. She appeared twice, the first time with comedian Adam Corrolla. The young man who played with her was utterly thrilled to have her for his celebrity. They even showed scenes from the Password episode where she and Allen announced their marriage; the look on Betty's face when she saw it again is priceless.
The password is...Betty! Celebrate the birthday of the Queen of Game Shows with the show she played so well, she married the original host. (And warning that the second Password '75 episode is inverted, in rough shape, and in black and white, but it's the only copy of that episode currently known to exist.)
Oh...and the Philadelphia Eagles' season ends on a very low note, losing to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 32-9 in Florida.
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