Zachary and the Bee
My oldest son participated in his school spelling bee today. Here were the top five moments (in my opinion):
1. The microphone was setup on stage at a medium height. When it was Zach’s turn, he walked up, and like a pro, re-adjusted it many inches lower. Everyone that came up after that had to crouch down to spell. The mike stayed at that lower height for the entire bee.
2. The 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade classes all filed in to watch (only students from those grades participated in the bee), and in between rounds they were allowed to ‘stretch’. I was expecting to see some upraised arms, torso twists, etc. These kids were contortionists! One dude was actually doing backbends! I kept myself entertained in marveling at how they chose to ‘sit comfortably’.
3. A fourth-grade friend of my son’s asked for the word origin of ‘squeeze’, but then in the next round fired off the spelling of ‘rutabaga’ without even stopping to consider.
4. The winner had a baby voice and clearly knew her stuff. Oddly enough, she won with the word ‘curtain’ even though almost all of the previous words had been considerably more difficult.
5. When it was explained to the audience that the runner-up would fill-in at the county-level spelling bee if the winner could not be there, it appeared that the runner-up was fantasizing about a dark-alley meeting with his nemisis. (It was his own fault that he missed ‘brigadier’…he got cocky, blurted out a few letters, misspoke, tried to back-pedal, and it was all over but the ‘curtain’).
01/08/2010 at 2:25 am
I would've lost on rutabaga
01/08/2010 at 3:57 am
I always get tripped up on stationary/stationery.
01/09/2010 at 1:48 pm
I can't spell at all. I'd just be glowering in the audience.
01/09/2010 at 8:57 pm
I used to be a strong speller, but after depending on spell check for a number of years, my ability has gone down hill.
rutabaga would have thrown me for a loop(:
01/10/2010 at 8:01 pm
what a hoot! Your son sounds brilliant–It amazes me how people just don't DO things like that–raise a microphone, pick up a fallen chair every one is tripping over, prop open a door everyone is using…
01/10/2010 at 8:24 pm
I love the commentary! My own first spelling bee word was "yacht." I got stuck on it for a second (I think I was in the 3rd or 4th grade?) but made it through that round.
Ditto Sara's comment — rutabaga would have lost it for me!
01/11/2010 at 3:55 pm
Thanks for stopping by my blog last month! I had my baby on Dec. 11th and am just now getting back to posting. I'm always interested in blogs by writers, so I'll definitely stop by again!
01/11/2010 at 10:06 pm
I once won my school's spelling bee only to get knocked out on my first word at the citywide competition. The word — Pale
A hillbilly kid like me only thought about pail, as in bucket, so I never asked for a definition.