Last night was perhaps my favorite TV event of the year: the 2007 Scripps National Spelling Bee. If you've never watched, then you are missing out. What could be better than watching the culmination of years of parents breeding their middle school children into talking dictionaries? Obviously nothing. My favorite contestant this year was Joseph Henares. He walked up to the microphone and was read his word: punaise, meaning bed bug. After a few, "oh my gosh"es under his breath, he then asked if he could spell bed bug instead. It was the only sign of a real kid within all of these little spelling machines. The best part was that the parents are just as in to it as the kids. Their eyes are shut tight with anticipation as the kids frantically search their brains for any recollection of the most obscure words in the English Dictionary. I'm thinking this competition is right up my alley. Maybe I should save money and instead of buying children's books, I'll just let my kids read the dictionary.
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