I'm too good to be on Wheel of Fortune anyway

:) Or at least, that is what I am telling myself to numb the pain of REJECTION.

I actually did really well in the auditions. Up until the point when they handed out a written test where we had 24 word puzzles. They gave us 5 minutes to solve as many as we could. I totally blanked out. I apparently don't work well under pressure, and I solved ONE. Needless to say, they "dismissed" me after they graded the test. I was so mad!

The worst part of the whole process was GETTING to the audition. They held them in a conference room in a hotel that was directly across from the Sony Studios in LA. I am scared to get on the freeways out here. LA is 76 miles from my front door. (That is what the GPS told me anyway.) Guess how long it took me to get there? Oh, only three hours. I was a nervous wreck the ENTIRE way. It was fine until I looked at the clock and realized I just might not make it. So I called Scott and told him I probably wasn't going to make it in time (DARN that traffic!) and he asked where I was and told me to exit and take surface streets. I started looking around and thought I MIGHT not be in the greatest of areas, but pushed my paranoia to the back of my head and kept onward. I knew I wasn't in the best areas, due to the fact that were were random people jay walking in the middle of the street, check cashing places on every corner, bars on everything, people loitering all over the place, and the overall feeling that I was the only white girl around (not trying to make this racial, but it's a fact). So, I got a little more uneasy and said (I was still on the phone with Scott) "Are you sure I'm in an ok area?? This looks scary." He told me to keep going and not to worry about it. I should have known that he was being very VAGUE about the whole thing.

Next thing I know, I start seeing signs that indicate that I WAS IN COMPTON.

Compton. Does that ring a bell, people?

I thought I was going to have a panic attack. Seriously. It was 9 in the morning and it was CRAZY. I've never seen anything like it and I was obviously out of place. Every red light I hit made me uneasy and I've never wanted to be BACK on a freeway stuck in traffic so badly in my life!

Growing up in Kerrville, TX (population 21,000...15,000 of which are all over the age of 75, and 2,000 of which are DEER) we used to refer to a particular neighborhood with rundown houses as "The Hood". And we were serious. I thought that was the GHETTO. The REAL hood. In Kerrville. It seems comical now.

I was wrong. Kerrville residents are wrong. If they would like to see the REAL HOOD, I invite them to come on down to the lovely community of COMPTON, south of LA.

THAT IS THE HOOD.

YOWZERS. So, I am about to wet my pants but I manned up (or womaned up) and made it to the hotel and out of Compton just fine, only to be rejected my the Wheel of Fortune. I can't help but be bitter everytime the show comes on now.

Afterwards, I called Scott and told him I was starving and was going to grab some food before I headed home. He hesitated for a minute and said "why don't you wait until you are in Orange County to stop." This was coming from the guy, who, a few hours prior told me, WHEN I WAS IN COMPTON, that "You're fine. You are not in a bad area". Now all of a sudden he didn't want me to get out of the car. I called him on it and we got a good laugh. He said "I didn't want to scare you. I just wanted you to get to the hotel in one piece. But now that I think about it, you were pretty close to Watts."

Do the Watts Riots ring a bell to anyone?

Man alive. I think my first adventure driving into LA by myself just might have been my last.

And Pat Sajack doesn't know what he's missin!!!!!!!