Alex Trebek giveth, and Alex Trebek taketh away - yes, friends, the reign of Brooklyn-based freelancer and man-about-town Peter Rubin has come to an end, but not before he won a whopping $29,400. Go Peter! Highlights from his last night: "Who is Jack Welch?" "What is 'Shook The World?'" "What is Uruguay?" Lowlights: Wrongly identifying Christina Applegate as starring in the musical "Chicago."* Good guess...FOR SOMEONE WHO DOESN'T LIVE IN NEW YORK! Here, Peter, hold out your wrist. Now, slap. (Here, you can borrow the well-worn ruler from your brand-new pal, all 10.5-inches-and-counting of it.) Otherwise he missed answers from "Menopause" The Musical" and "Sunset Boulevard" (Peter Rubin is ready for his closeup, Mr. DeMille). In Peter's own words after being dinged straight through the Musical Theater category by his showtune-warbling opponent:

I just stood there, blinking. My mouth was probably a little bit open too, but mostly the blinking. Where's my "Dancehall Reggae" category? My "Mid-90s Hip-Hop" category? Nowhere, I tells ya. It's all New Testament and show tunes. I made up for it in "Word Lore" and "The Winter Garden" though. Suckas.

Well, suckas except for the whole not-losing thing. Still, he got to go home with a fistful o' dollars and his pride mostly intact, except for some trash-talking from Trebek:

The first night I was on I picked up 21,000+...had a rhythm going with
the buzzer and didn't have to contend with things like my own ignorance. Your tipster, sadly, missed that show and was able to zero in on Monday, and what what was likely one of the uglier victories in Jeopardy history. How could it not be? So, so ugly. So ugly, in fact, that Trebek saw fit to open Tuesday's show with a broadside--it was edited out in the airing, but he said something about "hopefully tonight will go a little bit better than last night." Believe me, you haven't lived until you've been browbeaten by a man like Trebek. It was all I could do to keep answering in the form of a question.

Well, Peter, all's well that end's well, except for the whole showtunes thing. The New York Post picked up the story (we're going to brazenly take credit), but THEY didn't get to rub Peter's bald head. I'm just sayin'. Congratulations on your win, Peter, and don't worry about the whole not-knowing-who-Abel-was thing, in a week all that will be soooo 2005, except for when I repeatedly reference it on Fishbowl. Thanks for playing!

p.s. Number of emails from young ladies who also wante to rub Peter's shiny bald head: 1.

GQ 'Pardy Pooper [NYP]

*It's "Sweet Charity."