Monday the 16th - I will be competing, and I am terrified!
The illustrious Amanda will be hosting, and she will be great.
I'm a good speller and sometimes a lucky guesser, but I haven't been studying like some people and I KNOW I will be nervous in front of the mike.
I just hope I miss my word with humor!
Thursday, July 12, 2007
Quarterly Finals - Dr. Bill bests Amanda and Kyle
BUT JUST BARELY!
Truly exciting and entertaining. The three of them spelled so many big words. I should take notes!
Truly exciting and entertaining. The three of them spelled so many big words. I should take notes!
Friday, June 15, 2007
Dr. Bill Long
Bill defeated a highly accomplished group of spellers this week ("only" ten, total, but I think only one person needed to use a second chance in the Round of Second Chances, and only one person was eliminated before that).
The rennaissance-man spelling champion (of at least three spelling bees that I know of), writer, professor, lawyer, man of the cloth, and problably more, has a great website.
He wrote a bit about the Bee this week:
... (O)n June 11, I ventured up to Portland again with a friend to participate in the weekly bee at the Mississippi Pizza Pub. The pub is one of the most interesting club/restaurant/hang out venues on the East Side of the Willamette. I love the easy atmosphere and friendly patrons. The spelling bee at the Pub began in January, and it is made more attractive by the excellent pronunciation and spirit injected into it by pronouncer, judge and general emcee Katherine Woods (I almost wrote "Words")-Eliot.
...(T)here were "only" ten competitors, we each were intelligent and even accomplished spellers. As is usual, Katherine "eases us in" to the competition by giving us two rounds of simple or "middling" words. We had "frustrated" and "gestalt," for example, while the only person who misspelled a word in the first two rounds missed the word "middling." The third round saw the onslaught of more difficult words, starting with lepidopterology, as well as the special rule which allows a person to get a "second try" on words this round. Most people didn't need that second try, however, because the remaining nine spellers breezed through the words.
The words got more difficult. I had matutine and pleiotropic, which I spelled correctly to the appreciation of the crowd. Another person correcly spelled obnebulate, which I might even have missed because the definition given ("becloud") I knew to be the definition of obnubilate. Turns out that the Unabridged lists both words, which both mean the same thing. A quick OED search on them says that both originated in the mid-16th century. So, we have two words meaning the same thing, both of which no one uses. Well, some people have three cars and only use one. The words roundlet (16th century hat) and nonnegotiable and recrement and myology and patriarchally and fain and hoary and plumose and koto were spelled correctly, and I thought we were going to be in for a long evening.
Three other words I had are also worthy of note: Euterpean, jornada and isotopic. The last isn't too bad, as long as you know the word "isotope" from your first-year chemistry class. Jornada (pronounced "hornada") wasn't bad, as soon as Katherine told me it was of Spanish origin). But Euterpean made me pause for a moment. I knew that Euterpe was one of the nine Muses of Greek mythology, but I had to stop and think whether the ending would be "ian" or "ean." I asked for the language of origin, and she told me it was "Greek." Greek uses "ean" as an ending. An example, which I have both gotten wrong and right (wrong once, right twice) at other bees is Terpsichorean. Terpsichore was Euterpe's sister. Thus, I figured that you had to spell them similarly.
Missed Words
So we kept going until a few spellers began to fade. Usually the thing that catches people is whether you have an "a" or "e" or "o" as an interior vowel when the word is pronounced as if the vowel is simply a "schwa." One person, for example, missed the word viviparous by placing an "e" after the "p" instead of the "a." One spelled nonagesimal mistakenly as nonegesimal. One person misspelled korrigan, the name of a fairy or witch in Breton folklore, noted especially for stealing children, by spelling it with an initial "c." Finally, there were two of us remaining: a woman and myself. I was given the word normothermia to spell. I had never heard of the word, it isn't in the Collegiate dictionary, and it was, as I have since discovered, a new word in the 1993 Unabridged. Yet, its first attestation in English goes back to the late 19th century, even though the OED gives us the first complete sentence with normothermia in 1949. "Normothermia is that range of normal environmental temperature at which there is neither stimulation nor depression of the activity of the cells." It is, in short "normal body temperature." I misspelled it, putting an "a" between the "m" and "t." My competitior also misspelled it, placing an "e" there. So, we were on to the next word, which my opponent also misspelled but which I then got right (I forget it now). My final word was koan which, to a former religious studies professor and an avid reader of David James Duncan in the past (he wrote "Mickey Mantle Koan"), was straightforward. So, I took the palm last night, even though I had misspelled one word along the way.
Here's the entire essay.
The rennaissance-man spelling champion (of at least three spelling bees that I know of), writer, professor, lawyer, man of the cloth, and problably more, has a great website.
He wrote a bit about the Bee this week:
... (O)n June 11, I ventured up to Portland again with a friend to participate in the weekly bee at the Mississippi Pizza Pub. The pub is one of the most interesting club/restaurant/hang out venues on the East Side of the Willamette. I love the easy atmosphere and friendly patrons. The spelling bee at the Pub began in January, and it is made more attractive by the excellent pronunciation and spirit injected into it by pronouncer, judge and general emcee Katherine Woods (I almost wrote "Words")-Eliot.
...(T)here were "only" ten competitors, we each were intelligent and even accomplished spellers. As is usual, Katherine "eases us in" to the competition by giving us two rounds of simple or "middling" words. We had "frustrated" and "gestalt," for example, while the only person who misspelled a word in the first two rounds missed the word "middling." The third round saw the onslaught of more difficult words, starting with lepidopterology, as well as the special rule which allows a person to get a "second try" on words this round. Most people didn't need that second try, however, because the remaining nine spellers breezed through the words.
The words got more difficult. I had matutine and pleiotropic, which I spelled correctly to the appreciation of the crowd. Another person correcly spelled obnebulate, which I might even have missed because the definition given ("becloud") I knew to be the definition of obnubilate. Turns out that the Unabridged lists both words, which both mean the same thing. A quick OED search on them says that both originated in the mid-16th century. So, we have two words meaning the same thing, both of which no one uses. Well, some people have three cars and only use one. The words roundlet (16th century hat) and nonnegotiable and recrement and myology and patriarchally and fain and hoary and plumose and koto were spelled correctly, and I thought we were going to be in for a long evening.
Three other words I had are also worthy of note: Euterpean, jornada and isotopic. The last isn't too bad, as long as you know the word "isotope" from your first-year chemistry class. Jornada (pronounced "hornada") wasn't bad, as soon as Katherine told me it was of Spanish origin). But Euterpean made me pause for a moment. I knew that Euterpe was one of the nine Muses of Greek mythology, but I had to stop and think whether the ending would be "ian" or "ean." I asked for the language of origin, and she told me it was "Greek." Greek uses "ean" as an ending. An example, which I have both gotten wrong and right (wrong once, right twice) at other bees is Terpsichorean. Terpsichore was Euterpe's sister. Thus, I figured that you had to spell them similarly.
Missed Words
So we kept going until a few spellers began to fade. Usually the thing that catches people is whether you have an "a" or "e" or "o" as an interior vowel when the word is pronounced as if the vowel is simply a "schwa." One person, for example, missed the word viviparous by placing an "e" after the "p" instead of the "a." One spelled nonagesimal mistakenly as nonegesimal. One person misspelled korrigan, the name of a fairy or witch in Breton folklore, noted especially for stealing children, by spelling it with an initial "c." Finally, there were two of us remaining: a woman and myself. I was given the word normothermia to spell. I had never heard of the word, it isn't in the Collegiate dictionary, and it was, as I have since discovered, a new word in the 1993 Unabridged. Yet, its first attestation in English goes back to the late 19th century, even though the OED gives us the first complete sentence with normothermia in 1949. "Normothermia is that range of normal environmental temperature at which there is neither stimulation nor depression of the activity of the cells." It is, in short "normal body temperature." I misspelled it, putting an "a" between the "m" and "t." My competitior also misspelled it, placing an "e" there. So, we were on to the next word, which my opponent also misspelled but which I then got right (I forget it now). My final word was koan which, to a former religious studies professor and an avid reader of David James Duncan in the past (he wrote "Mickey Mantle Koan"), was straightforward. So, I took the palm last night, even though I had misspelled one word along the way.
Here's the entire essay.
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
Commentary on the Rules
I try, I really do. But not all of the National Spelling Bee rules are appropriate for our version of the Bee. So at the last Bee, I implemented a tweak to the head-to-head rounds that was just silly and confusing. Luckily, the two spellers were both very talented and it really was an even bet as to who might win (and Michael, I know you'll be back to work your odds again!).
So, next week I will try to simplify.
If you have any ideas about keeping the Bee running smoothly, let me know!
portlandspellingbee@gmail.com, or post a comment here.
So, next week I will try to simplify.
If you have any ideas about keeping the Bee running smoothly, let me know!
portlandspellingbee@gmail.com, or post a comment here.
MORE Tag Team Spelling!
That was so fun a couple of weeks ago that I've got to do it again.
Tag Team Spelling, June 18th.
Bring a partner or find one at the Bee (don't worry, I'll facilitate!).
Trust me, it's really a blast. It was fun to watch the spellers confer with each other, and hear their whispers over the mic. You've got to come.
Tag Team Spelling, June 18th.
Bring a partner or find one at the Bee (don't worry, I'll facilitate!).
Trust me, it's really a blast. It was fun to watch the spellers confer with each other, and hear their whispers over the mic. You've got to come.
Too Many Words to Count!
Had a fabulous head-to-head spell-off after the two final contestants had eliminated some great spellers, included at least a couple former champions.
Lucky number 13 finally won! Seriously, the number 13 HAS been a curse, it seems. Hmm. (Well, figurin' figures isn't my job at the Bee, so I feel free to make very mathematically improbable statements!)
Next Quarterly Final: July 9! I'm looking forward to it, of course.
Anyone want to play music anytime soon? Email me: portlandspellingbee@gmail.com.
Or drop by and tell me in person!
Lucky number 13 finally won! Seriously, the number 13 HAS been a curse, it seems. Hmm. (Well, figurin' figures isn't my job at the Bee, so I feel free to make very mathematically improbable statements!)
Next Quarterly Final: July 9! I'm looking forward to it, of course.
Anyone want to play music anytime soon? Email me: portlandspellingbee@gmail.com.
Or drop by and tell me in person!
Friday, May 25, 2007
In the Oregonian!
http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/portland_news/117964950244430.xml&coll=7
Katherine's with a K, but spelling's with a bee
Thursday, May 24, 2007
By Spencer Heinz The Oregonian
The judge rises. She carries a plastic pitcher of words, and she rapidly gets to the point.
"Hello, I'm Katherine with a K," she tells the crowd, "and welcome to the Portland Spelling Bee."
She wears half-frame glasses and stands before a microphone in the Mississippi Pizza Pub. Sixteen contestants on folding chairs, with numbered cards on their chests, spell words she pulls from the pitcher.
She starts with easier ones, "writhed" and "velveteen" and the like, then enunciates her way through harder terrain from, say, "opsimath" to "saxifrage."
Her name is Katherine Woods-Eliot. She says she employs no word she cannot pronounce. A business card describes her as a "Bon Vivant, Dilettante," and what follows is the arc of a woman who went from simply loving words to an action figure with few peers -- at least in local pizza pubs.
Born in 1973 in Tacoma and raised and schooled near Seattle, she recalls spending recess with a friend writing and doing plays. By high school's freshman year, she had immersed herself in the study of gerunds, subjunctives and related innards of grammar.
"Most kids found it really boring and punishing," she says, "but I thought it was fascinating to find out how all those cogs work."
While in and out of college, she had a daughter and a son, finished a history degree at Reed, then spent a couple of years studying accounting at Portland State before hiring on as a research associate for a local financial services firm.
Yet something was missing, as they say, and then she saw the ad. This was last December. A North Portland pizza pub would interview applicants to emcee a weekly spelling bee.
First exhilarated and then panicked, she looked inside herself. She had debated in high school but hadn't given a speech for a long time. Then again, she had been hoping to build her public speaking skills, so she focused on her strength: The pub wanted applicants to show up with lots of ideas, and she had never been short on those.
Like a librarian
She showed up in a skirt and a man's vest hoping to project a certain image: "I guess that would be of a librarian," she says, "with a sense of humor. Knowledgeable but fun."
Standing ready to interview applicants was Philip Stanton, co-owner with wife Stephanie of the Mississippi Pizza Pub and a man who adds: "I'm a horrible, horrible speller." He admires those who are good. He had talked with four applicants, each of them fine, then in walked Katherine with a K.
He says from the moment he saw her -- poised and professional yet graced by a face that gently reddened -- he figured she could be the one.
"She's an attractive woman, and there was something librarian-ish about her," Stanton recalls. "And the combination for this particular venue was perfect."
A couple of days later, he asked her whether she wanted the job.
"Yes! More than anything!" K says she replied, and she called together a focus group to test ways to run the thing. Ideas went from how to configure contestants' chairs to how to respect the nature of Monday nights so as not to keep workaday patrons up too late. They also considered whether to ask contestants to reveal their favorite letter and why.
"We dispensed with that," she says. "We decided to just spell."
The pub displayed a slogan, "Finally, a way to prove you really are smarter than everyone else!" The next Monday, Jan. 8, she finished another financial-business workday, clipped out words on slips of paper and headed to the pub on North Mississippi. She was too anxious to eat.
Rules from the stage
The owner announced her presence, and she arose to announce the rules: The judge will select and pronounce a random word from the pitcher. The contestant shall repeat it, spell it and say it again.
As some might say, the audience was spellbound, and things wrapped up to the sound of cheers.
"There was a huge sense of relief," she says. "And then there was -- 'Wow, that was really fun!' Public speaking is a thing that a lot of people fear more than death. I thought, 'Am I crazy to like this? I mean, am I wrong?' "
She decided she was right, and each Monday since has likewise spritzed the pub with bits of drama and joy. Moments have ranged from the unveiling of grand trains of syllables (two of her favorites have been "pandowdy" and "Panglossian," a glissando that sounds so great that it barely matters what it means), to the tension of contestants making saves on words they have no normal right to know. With limited time and maybe a beer, they dig through linguistic roots -- just as contestant No. 7 did the other night as one of the final survivors.
K ran him through words from "rued" to "usufructuary" -- and eventually, to "viga."
Two syllables.
He asks her to say it again.
Viga.
From the Spanish. Refers to a type of heavy ceiling rafter.
No. 7 takes a moment to think it through. He is Sam Dahan, 52, a local software engineer who was born in Morocco. His native language is French. He ended up in this -- his first spelling bee, he later says, in any language -- simply as the fortunate friend of some parents and kids in the crowd.
"Viga," he replies. "V-I-G-A. Viga."
That is correct, the judge proclaims, and the crowd tilts into applause.
He has ridden from out of nowhere to big news within these walls.
She presents him with a championship shirt.
"I called my cousin," he exclaims a few days later. "And my wife called the whole family."
As for K, who had launched herself from the everyday to the rarefied air of pub-stage usufructuary (from the Latin), she reflects on what she seeks from this higher plane of hope.
"To leave the audience happy," she says, "after a moment of intellectual stimulation."
Spencer Heinz: 503-221-8072; spencerheinz@news.oregonian.com
©2007 The Oregonian
Katherine's with a K, but spelling's with a bee
Thursday, May 24, 2007
By Spencer Heinz The Oregonian
The judge rises. She carries a plastic pitcher of words, and she rapidly gets to the point.
"Hello, I'm Katherine with a K," she tells the crowd, "and welcome to the Portland Spelling Bee."
She wears half-frame glasses and stands before a microphone in the Mississippi Pizza Pub. Sixteen contestants on folding chairs, with numbered cards on their chests, spell words she pulls from the pitcher.
She starts with easier ones, "writhed" and "velveteen" and the like, then enunciates her way through harder terrain from, say, "opsimath" to "saxifrage."
Her name is Katherine Woods-Eliot. She says she employs no word she cannot pronounce. A business card describes her as a "Bon Vivant, Dilettante," and what follows is the arc of a woman who went from simply loving words to an action figure with few peers -- at least in local pizza pubs.
Born in 1973 in Tacoma and raised and schooled near Seattle, she recalls spending recess with a friend writing and doing plays. By high school's freshman year, she had immersed herself in the study of gerunds, subjunctives and related innards of grammar.
"Most kids found it really boring and punishing," she says, "but I thought it was fascinating to find out how all those cogs work."
While in and out of college, she had a daughter and a son, finished a history degree at Reed, then spent a couple of years studying accounting at Portland State before hiring on as a research associate for a local financial services firm.
Yet something was missing, as they say, and then she saw the ad. This was last December. A North Portland pizza pub would interview applicants to emcee a weekly spelling bee.
First exhilarated and then panicked, she looked inside herself. She had debated in high school but hadn't given a speech for a long time. Then again, she had been hoping to build her public speaking skills, so she focused on her strength: The pub wanted applicants to show up with lots of ideas, and she had never been short on those.
Like a librarian
She showed up in a skirt and a man's vest hoping to project a certain image: "I guess that would be of a librarian," she says, "with a sense of humor. Knowledgeable but fun."
Standing ready to interview applicants was Philip Stanton, co-owner with wife Stephanie of the Mississippi Pizza Pub and a man who adds: "I'm a horrible, horrible speller." He admires those who are good. He had talked with four applicants, each of them fine, then in walked Katherine with a K.
He says from the moment he saw her -- poised and professional yet graced by a face that gently reddened -- he figured she could be the one.
"She's an attractive woman, and there was something librarian-ish about her," Stanton recalls. "And the combination for this particular venue was perfect."
A couple of days later, he asked her whether she wanted the job.
"Yes! More than anything!" K says she replied, and she called together a focus group to test ways to run the thing. Ideas went from how to configure contestants' chairs to how to respect the nature of Monday nights so as not to keep workaday patrons up too late. They also considered whether to ask contestants to reveal their favorite letter and why.
"We dispensed with that," she says. "We decided to just spell."
The pub displayed a slogan, "Finally, a way to prove you really are smarter than everyone else!" The next Monday, Jan. 8, she finished another financial-business workday, clipped out words on slips of paper and headed to the pub on North Mississippi. She was too anxious to eat.
Rules from the stage
The owner announced her presence, and she arose to announce the rules: The judge will select and pronounce a random word from the pitcher. The contestant shall repeat it, spell it and say it again.
As some might say, the audience was spellbound, and things wrapped up to the sound of cheers.
"There was a huge sense of relief," she says. "And then there was -- 'Wow, that was really fun!' Public speaking is a thing that a lot of people fear more than death. I thought, 'Am I crazy to like this? I mean, am I wrong?' "
She decided she was right, and each Monday since has likewise spritzed the pub with bits of drama and joy. Moments have ranged from the unveiling of grand trains of syllables (two of her favorites have been "pandowdy" and "Panglossian," a glissando that sounds so great that it barely matters what it means), to the tension of contestants making saves on words they have no normal right to know. With limited time and maybe a beer, they dig through linguistic roots -- just as contestant No. 7 did the other night as one of the final survivors.
K ran him through words from "rued" to "usufructuary" -- and eventually, to "viga."
Two syllables.
He asks her to say it again.
Viga.
From the Spanish. Refers to a type of heavy ceiling rafter.
No. 7 takes a moment to think it through. He is Sam Dahan, 52, a local software engineer who was born in Morocco. His native language is French. He ended up in this -- his first spelling bee, he later says, in any language -- simply as the fortunate friend of some parents and kids in the crowd.
"Viga," he replies. "V-I-G-A. Viga."
That is correct, the judge proclaims, and the crowd tilts into applause.
He has ridden from out of nowhere to big news within these walls.
She presents him with a championship shirt.
"I called my cousin," he exclaims a few days later. "And my wife called the whole family."
As for K, who had launched herself from the everyday to the rarefied air of pub-stage usufructuary (from the Latin), she reflects on what she seeks from this higher plane of hope.
"To leave the audience happy," she says, "after a moment of intellectual stimulation."
Spencer Heinz: 503-221-8072; spencerheinz@news.oregonian.com
©2007 The Oregonian
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