• what's your major malfunction, numbnuts?

    Noun. 1.) A Generalized Loss Of Feeling In The Testicles 2.) Roger Clemens

    With Erin Andrews frolicking around backstage, who could blame eventual grand champion of the spelling world Sameer Mishra to let loose a little Freudian slip? How else is he supposed to sublimate that sexual energy? Rub your finger on your hand any harder and it's playing with yourself. More »

    11:55 AM on Sat May 31 2008
    By Christmas Ape
    3,920 views, 15 comments

    Latest by Barry Lutz: I was worried he was going to miss it, but fortunately he remembered the cheatsheet he had hidden on the more »

  • cultural oddsmaker

    Which Speller Will Have The Best Chance At Bagging Erin Andrews?


    In commemoration of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, A.J. Daulerio's Cultural Oddsmaker makes a brief return. Email him to let him know what you think.

    Tomorrow the Scripps National Spelling Bee will give another group of spindly kids with Akeelah-like aspirations an opportunity to make use of their freakish memorization skills. This year, the kids are more aware of the ramifications and long-term career potential that comes with the national stage. Spell the words right, become a shooting star; fail and go back to the life of being an extraordinarily bright child with lots of tuba-playing friends. (Or, if they’re a home-schooled, back to being a socially-stunted shut-in whose only friends are the mailman and a rotting salamander carcass in a mason jar.)

    Many of these kids are so absorbed and determined at developing their abnormally high IQs, they usually fall short on having a TV-ready appearance. But the more popular this event becomes, it’ll be even more crucial for producers to make sure their featured participants aren’t wearing their khakis on backwards or their glasses don’t cause potentially deadly refractions of the stage lighting. It’s the harsh reality of network ratings economics: If the final round is going to continue to garner a primetime slot, The Bee needs to get prettier in order to ensure long-term success.

    And this year, spellers have added motivation to look less mousey, now that ESPN’s all-purpose reporting princess, Erin Andrews, is sidelining the Bee. Unlike the drooling moron nation that worships her from the safe confines of the internet, these poor girl-spooked geniuses will be forced to process Ms. Andrews’ striking beauty in person. One hair-flip and they’ll quickly learn that, no, she’s nothing like the girls in Latin club.

    For male participants, this creates an even more daunting pressure-cooker atmosphere, as flubbing “quatorzain” in the first round will not only result in condescending snickers from their peers, but will also eliminate any chance of them professing their undying love to the tall, coconut-scented woman with the pretty teeth.

    Among this year’s batch of 288 nerdsworths, there are a few who have the potential to make both their etymological and wet dreams come true.

    So, today, I’m ignoring my throbbing odontalgia, taking antibiotics for my staphylococci and trying to avoid a vivisepulture as I place odds on some of the lads who have the best chance at vouchsafing the crap out of Erin Andrews this week.

    Let’s go elucubrate after this jump. (Painting by the great Jim Cooke, of course.) More »

    2:20 PM on Wed May 28 2008
    By DAULERIO
    15,787 views, 84 comments

  • cultural oddsmaker

    Who Will Win the 2007 Scripps National Spelling Bee?

    AJ Daulerio's Cultural Oddsmaker runs every Friday. Email him to let him know what you think. More »

    3:30 PM on Fri May 18 2007
    By Leitch
    5,672 views, 116 comments

  • scripps national spelling bee

    Power To The Peepl

    spellingbee2.bmpReaction continues to pour in on yesterday's spelling bee post (OK, we got one note, which was attached to a rock and thrown through our window). Toward the end of the post we noted that there are actually people who protest in front of the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C.; folks who want to simplify the more complctd complicattd conplicated difficult word spellings in the English language. But there was one thing we missed. To wit: More »

    12:45 PM on Thu Apr 6 2006
    By Rick Chandler
    55 views, 19 comments

    Latest by TheElectricZarko: As a product of the Berkeley Public Schools, I feel compelled to point out that there are still grades, dodgeball more »

  • scripps national spelling bee

    When Words Collide

    It was the mother of all spelling bees; the 1971 Chiefs-Dolphins of word competition. In case you were for some reason watching basketball on Saturday, two young contestants in the Treasure State Spelling Bee in Billings, Mont., slugged it out for four and a half hours — 25 rounds — before a champion was crowned to move on to the Scripps National Spelling Bee in May. Actually, contestants Anna Rose Wright, 13, and Tim Best, 12, endured 41 rounds of gruelling human spell-check, the first 16 serving to winnow out the other 63 contestants. Wright and Best then went mano a la mano for 25 rounds, spelling like four kinds of crazy, until young Tim finally cracked. That's him the the photo, silently spelling the words "bathroom break." We're not sure of the word he got wrong, but the word that gave Anna the upper hand was "mumpsimus." We won't comment on it further except to urge Barry Bonds apologists to look it up. More »

    1:30 PM on Wed Apr 5 2006
    By Rick Chandler
    270 views, 12 comments

    Latest by Adam B.: Step off of our turf -- this will be the fifth straight year that my blog will liveblog the Bee, more »

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