Winner and a "Fuedal" Story

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Thanks to all of you that visited my blog during the Grow Your Blog Party! I'm still working on visiting everyone myself!

So have you all been waiting with bated breath to know what three things I won from Richard Dawson?

Well, those of you who just typed "Richard Dawson" into the search box on the blog haven't been. =) (This is what I expected you to do, by the way! I tried to make it easy, but I guess I failed!) The answer was ten dollars, a bouquet of Tootsie Roll Pops (his "thing" to give out...although most people just got one) and a kiss (every women who set foot on the stage got one of those, too ;).

Without further ado, the winner is...

Ziggyeor!

Please email me your mailing address and I'll start to ruminate on what I'm going to make. =)

Now, here is the whole story, which I haven been threatening to tell for a while. When I was in the fifth grade (10 or 11), we went out to visit my sister in California. At the time, we were HUGE fans of Family Fued, so we decided to audition for the show while we were out there. Unfortunately, at the time they had specific weeks when "out of town" families were to audition (so they could film them the same week), and we weren't there during that time. I think the lady who we auditioned for really liked us; even as young as I was I could tell she was thinking hard about how she could fit us in the schedule, but it wasn't to be. She did, however, give us tickets to a taping.

At the the time, I was trying to be a preppy young thing, so I was wearing a plaid pleated skirt, blue blazer and red sweater with a white monogram, similar to this one...

Source: annexvintage.blogspot.com via Courtney on Pinterest

In this style of sweater, the initial of your last name was placed in the center, with your first initial on the left and your middle on the right. This will be important later in the story.

During the taping, whenever there was a break, a producer would come out and take questions from the audience. Sometimes they would invite the questioner on to the stage and film a little "bit" with her (I don't think there were any men who asked questions, LOL!). These "bits" were always placed in the show just after a commercial break, I assume to pad out the show to the proper time. For instance, one woman got up on stage because she had bet her mother-in-law that she could meet Richard, so they filmed a bit with her where Richard admonished the mother-in-law for being so hard on her daughter-in-law.

My mom desperately wanted me to ask a question, but when I was a kid, I was a strange mix of bold and shy. By the third show taping (they did a few at a time), I was almost ready to go. I said to her, "What should I ask?"

My mom replied, "Just raise your hand and say, 'I came the whole way from Mississippi to get a kiss from you.'"

So I did.

This, surprisingly, was not the embarrassing part.

Richard happened to be walking back on the stage just about the time I piped up with my question, and he asked the producer what I'd said. When the producer told him, he said, "Tell her to come down here."

So I traipsed down onto the stage and shook his hand, and they explained they were going to roll the cameras and I should just talk to Richard. To start, he asked me to repeat what I'd said in the audience, which I did, causing laughter all around. I don't remember what else he asked me, until....

"That's a nice sweater. What do those initials stand for?"

"Heather Dawn Stehman."

At this point, Richard looked a bit confused, so in my childish authority, I explained to the stupid grown-up by pointing to each letter as I said my name again. More laughter. "They put your last initial in the middle," I supplied.

"Who's 'they'? Who made this sweater?" he asked.

I was stumped. We had bought the sweater in a store, and I wasn't personally acquainted with the person (team? elves?) who had manufactured it. I believe I got out an eloquent, "Uhhhh..." before Richard came to my rescue with "The people at the store, yes?"

"Yes!" I cried, "The people at the store!"

"Well then," said Richard, "don't you think they should have put your middle initial in the middle, and your last initial on the right, so they would be in order?"

I paused and considered. "Well, yeah, that does seem pretty logical."

The audience exploded with laughter. Apparently, a 10-year-old child breaking out with the word "logical" was too much for them. I had no idea what was going on. Richard immediately demanded an entire bouquet of Tootsie Roll pops and said, "Who's got ten dollars?" A hapless stage hand or camera operator pulled out his wallet and handed Richard a ten dollar bill (I often wondered if he ever got paid back). They edited this part out of the broadcast. Then he gave me the lollipops, the ten bucks "for saying that seems logical," and a kiss, on the lips (which I returned with a "MWAH!", giving my mother no end of amusement).

When I got back to my seat, I told my mom he wasn't a very good kisser.

Now comes the embarrassing part. I went to a pretty small school, so when the story got out that I was going to be ON TV, the WHOLE SCHOOL watched it. I found out and demanded to stay home that day. For the next year at least, everyone made my life miserable by quoting "that does seem logical" at me or calling me "Miss Logical" (which is not really an insult, but you know how kids can make practically anything sound horrible).

The real loser in this story, however, was the woman whose mother-in-law didn't believe she could meet Richard. Her "bit" was taped during the same show as mine, but apparently there wasn't time to put both in, and I, the "cute kid" won out. I hope that somehow, her mother-in-law believed her without the film evidence, but from her story, I kind of doubt it. I'm so sorry, random woman! I felt bad about it even as a kid!

And that's the whole story. =)

JiffNotes
Ah, show business!