Who Wants to be a Millionaire Houston tryouts!

When I heard that Millionaire (from here on referred to as WWTBAM since I am lazy) was holding auditions in Houston, I wanted Andrew to try out. He knows a little something about almost everything. Seriously, we will be watching a TV show and he will be able to tell you which actors have been in what else and the character they played. Honestly, it's almost a little annoying :). He remembers tidbits about history and geography and knows pretty much everything about sports a person could want to know, so his knowledge of crap is pretty immense. I wanted him to go to the audition and basically become my sugar daddy. Well, the tryout started early in the morning. It was pretty far from our house. So, he did not want to go alone. I managed to get out of going to work for the day (remember my awesome boss who let me leave to go get a wedding dress? Told ya she was awesome!) and I made the trek with him so we could go audition together for WWTBAM's "Play to Pay for your Wedding" week. We figured that there would be fewer people trying to get on as a couple and hoped our chances were good. We got up at 4:30 am to make our way across town. We arrived at 5:45, and even though no one was supposed to get in line until 6 am, there were at least 200 people in line when we arrived with over 100 more waiting by the time we found a parking space! Around 6:15, the doors opened and everyone was allowed in a ballroom, still in their line, packed in like sardines. Andrew and I were gifted with lovely WWTBAM magnets, numbered 374 and 375, as well as pencils for our scantron test. We were informed that everyone would go into the testing room in groups to take both the general test as well as the movie test for a special Netflix week.

Me and my magnet, ready to take the test!

The line started moving into the testing room around 7. Luckily for us, 400 people were allowed in, so we barely made it. The only bad thing was that Andrew got seated in the last chair on one row and I had to sit behind him and on the other side. The general knowledge test had 30 questions ranging from pop culture to current events to history to... just plain junk that you might happen to know. We had ten minutes to take that. I felt pretty good when it was over and thought I got at least 23 questions right. I stank on the movie quiz, but I knew that would happen. They killed time while they graded our tests by having people do impersonations to win WWTBAM t-shirts and then called our our numbers to tell you who had passed the test and would go on. They started calling, and the first number was 390-something, so my immediate thought was "Oh, crap." I soon realized that the numbers were random and heard "374" so I looked to Andrew to see he was looking back at me. A split second later, "375" was called and I was smiling soooooo big! We both made it!!!

The magical laminated pass that granted me admission to the interview.

About 30 people passed the general test and maybe 10 passed for movies. We had to stand in line for an application and to take a photo (like a mugshot) and were told to come back at 12:30 with the application filled out for interviews. They took pics of Andrew and I separately, as well as one together since Wedding Week was our ultimate goal. The application was kind of hard- we had to do the regular one as well as one that was engagement-related with questions about how we met, how we got engaged, our dream wedding, what we love about each other, etc. It was kind of annoying to have SO MUCH time to kill because we didn't want to drive home, but should we get on the show, it will be well worth it! I won't bore you with what we did in our down time, but we got back to the site around noon to wait in line outside.

Trying to keep cool while waiting for interviews...

The lady (I should really say "girl" because everyone working there was no older than 25) who checked IDs and collected passes came to Andrew and I and said "Oh, you're the couple, right?" and I told her yes and asked if there were any others. She said that no others had gotten through (both people had to be present and pass the test to be considered). We went inside, waited in another line, and were seated. We were told that everyone would be given a very short interview and then they could leave. Andrew and I were the first people called and we were called up together. We were asked how we met and how we got engaged. She then gave us yellow release forms to fill out to authorize them to record our audition! I was super excited about this because earlier in the day, someone asked about taped auditions and they said NONE would be conducted. We were asked the same questions as before, as well as about our first date, what we would do with money for our wedding, what we planned so far, where we wanted to honeymoon, stuff like that. We were on camera for about 4 minutes and I feel like we did as well as we could have. I have been reading online message boards about Millionaire auditions and most people have said that getting taped GREATLY increases your chances of getting on the show! Now all we can do is sit and wait... everyone who was interviewed will receive a postcard in the mail in 3-4 weeks letting them know if they are in the applicant pool or not. I found one girl who auditioned for wedding week last year and got a phone call before her postcard arrived in the mail. If we got that lucky, I would be ecstatic! For now though, it was a fun experience. I hope that something more comes of it and I am keeping my fingers crossed!

In line together... put us on the show, Meredith! (Don't mind my weird face... I was trying to make sure we were both in the pic!)