Spellbound

Last week was our school spelling bee. Since our principal has fallen for the common misnomer that "you're the "speech lady," so you must speak well"--I was placed in charge of it, as the official "pronouncer." This, I promise, is no easy undertaking. I'm pretty sure I spent as much time studying as any of my students did. (Yes, that is slightly embarrassing). This is complicated by dialectal differences. Arizonans do not pronounce words the same as Hoosiers. Last year the audience erupted into riotous laughter when I said the word "chimichanga." They didn't think it was a word. (Being from AZ, I thought that was one of the easy ones). All I remember from spelling bees growing up was 1) I was never in one (thankfully), and 2) my friend Sarah spelled the word "house" wrong.

So, in honor of the spelling bee, here is some "spelling bee" entertainment for you, so that you can all get geared up for the national spelling bee this spring--which is my favorite thing to watch on ESPN. (by the way, a kid from West Lafayette won it last year! Pretty cool, huh??)

1) Spellbound is probably one of the best movies--it's a documentary about the national spelling bee. Hilarious. I own it, if anyone would care to borrow it. I promise you will laugh. A lot!

2) Brian Regan has a great skit about spelling bees. It's a part of his "Stupid at School" routine. Click here. "I wasn't even close, I was usin' numbers and stuff!"

3) For our practice round, I got to choose the words. In honor of my friend Sarah, "house" was one of the words. The poor student spelled it wrong. It must be a cursed word or something.