The Date: Spring of 1969
The Place: A.D. Eisenhower High School Auditorium, Norristown, PA
The Event: the Montgomery County Spelling Bee
I was representing my school, St. Augustine, at the competition. There were close to 100 competitors, and I had successfully spelled my first few words.
Then it happened.
It was my turn again, so I got out of my seat and walked to the microphone in the middle of the stage, staring out an audience of probably 200-300 people (I’m sure not all of them were thrilled to be spending their Friday night at a spelling bee).
The emcee gave me my word, and I didn’t hesitate. After all, it was just a five-letter word.
I knew the drill. You say the word, you spell it, and then you say the word again.
“ALIBI. A-L-A-B-I. ALIBI”
DING! The bell went off, indicating I had spelled it wrong. Seriously? Where did I go wrong?
I still remember that night as if it were yesterday. I’ve often wondered if I’d ever have a chance to make up for that mistake, to prove that I now knew how to spell ALIBI.
Well, today it finally happened, 52 years later, thanks to my latest obsession – crossword puzzles.
The clue was “Proof you weren’t anywhere near the murder.”
Once again, without hesitation, I began to spell the word. A-L-I-B-I.
And this time there was no DING.
I just wish I had been doing crossword puzzles when I was 11 years old…
Congratulations! Said the person who still can’t spell words she couldn’t spell 50 years. And sometimes those she could.
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thanks, Jennifer. for some reason, spelling came quite easily to me. Fixing anything around the house – forget about it…
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Yay! I hope you celebrated on finally spelling it right. 🙂
Oh I remember being booted out of the spelling bee as well and being so upset for I had studied soooo hard! The winner was going to go compete at the state level. The word was grammarian. The person before me got the word church! Now, where is the fairness in that? LOL!
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How ironic that you misspelled grammarian and now you are a writer!
I can’t believe the word church was in a spelling bee – not many ways to spell that incorrectly…
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Wasn’t me!
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I’m still looking for that cookie thief…
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At least this proves you’ve learned something.
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one thing every 52 years; not too bad. but that likely means that’s it for me…
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Maybe you should have “Alibi” carved on your headstone.
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if I did, I’d prefer to spell it ALABI… see if anyone catches it…
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Some prim and proper elementary school teacher probably would.
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you just described all my elemntary school teachers – they were nuns…
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So funny how one simple word will stay with you forever. You probably still remember the disappointment, but you finally redeemed yourself!
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I remember all the words I misspelled in those spelling bees! Now I just need to find a way to prove I now know how to spell those words too!
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Use those words in your blog
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I wrote about it once before, being very careful to spell those words correctly 🙂
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I’d be a first round loser today in any spelling bee. Spell check is a godsend yet I still manage to get words wrong. It is great you are doing the crosswords.
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Spell check is the best. And I am enjoying the crossword puzzles…
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I only ever experienced speling bees in junyer skool clases. I wos nevver much good at them. 🙃
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🙂
and despite that, you’ve earned your doctorate!
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A mirakel! 😂😂😂 Good post Jim, I couldn’t resist the mis-spelling
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I always enjoy the humorous comments!
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Now, this is where we get tangled up between US and English spellings 🤦♂️🤦♂️
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I like seeing such differences…
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That sounds like something that would have happened to me.
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I got to accompany the school representative to the county spelling bee. I’m pretty sure my student could tell you what word she went out on, but I can’t. She lasted nine rounds and missed the word because it was a proper noun that started with a capital letter. I felt so sad for her.
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wow – that is picky…
that’s a lot of rounds to last through though…
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redemption! redemshun? )
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try either one, see which one fits in a crossword puzzle…
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Hahahaha
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Just a reminder, it is more important to have an alibi than to know how to spell it.
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words to live by! 🙂
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I used to be an excellent speller. Then computers came along. I rely on spellcheck so much, I’ve lost the ability to spell well on my own. There have been a few times I butchered a word so badly, no alternatives matched what I wanted to say. I had to rely on asking Siri how to spell those to figure it out. And Siri doesn’t always understand my Pittsburgh accent. There was one occasion where I just revised the sentence to avoid the word. It’s embarrassing.
Glad you finally learned your lesson!
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yes, spellcheck has probably lowered our ability so spell words correctly. But I do like your perseverance in trying to find the right way to spell a word, and if that fails, your creative ability to work around it.
Sorry to hear about Big Ben’s retirement plans…
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Thanks. I’m in mourning. Our offense is going to suck for the foreseeable future. Not that we did so great this year. But still… Our backups are weak. Unless we trade or draft well (and we’ve proven we don’t), I’m not optimistic.
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he has been an icon for the city. I feel the same way about my Eagles. Even though we have a new quarterback, I don’t think he is Super Bowl material…
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So disappointing. Pennsylvania needs help!
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👍
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Way to go. Although with crosswords you have a second chance if you do them in pencil.
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good point, plus there’s no one sitting there waiting to ding me…
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I think we all have that moment in childhood that we fixated on, and then at some point as a adult get our moment of glory. Congratulations! A small word bringing back memories is a win for the day!
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so well said, Rose. thanks; it was a good feeling!
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I am not a good speller, Jim, I never have been so I’ve never even had the opportunity to spell a word wrong in a spelling bee.
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so you are undefeated!
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Haha reminds me of the many times while playing scrabble with my husband that I was so sure of how a word was spelt only to be challenged…. Lol Hehe also, I love spelling bees ☺️
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I should start playing Scrabble again – it’s been so long.
and speaking of spelling bees, I thought one of the funniest movies I ever saw was Bad Words, with Jason Bateman…
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I’ll need to check this out!
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Least you’ll never forget how to spell it!
Also sort of on topic do you ever find yourself in a situation where you develop a mental block on words you’ve been able to spell fine for years?
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yes, come to think of it, that has happened. but what happens much more frequently is trying to remember the word I want to say in a sentence, and I can’t think of it…
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So glad you had the chance to redeem yourself! I love crossword puzzles, about the only thing I don’t have spell check on!!
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yes, the errors tend to be self-correcting 🙂
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Good to know that lessons learned in childhood can eventually be useful! Funnily enough, A-L-A-B-I rang bells with me, as it is the surname of a footballer who has played for two of my teams – Dover Athletic and Leyton Orient. Utterly useless, and he doesn’t have an alibi for his performances…
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loved your closing line… the poor guy…
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He’s a striker, i.e. supposedly a goal scorer. 1 goal in 11 games for Dover, 3 in 36 for the Os. I rest my case.
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maybe it’s time for alabi to say bye bye…
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No longer our problem! I forgot to include cup competitions in the stats, which make it 1 in 13 for Dover and 3 in 45 for the Os. The general view is that a successful striker scores in 1 out of every 2 games, not 1 in 13 or 15! He’s upped his rate to 1 in every 4.5 for his current team, but his career is full of club moves. Looks like a lot have said bye bye to him!
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gotta love sports analytics, unless you’re Alabi…
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I wouldn’t worry on his account, he probably can’t count that far anyway…
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🙂
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Vicktory! … Sorry Victory
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🙂
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Sometimes the things we find easy aren’t necessarily so. 🙂
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apparently not 🙂
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Glad you only needed the word in a crossword puzzle.
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This post just taught me how to spell alibi 😂
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my job is done here… 🙂
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That’s quite a story! Enjoyed reading it and thanks for sharing this experience. Since school I have always wondered about the origin of certain English words and especially those starting on al-. Few have an Arabic origin, of course, but I have actually been fascinated with those having Latin roots, like alibi does – meaning “elsewhere” but many other starting on al- also mean “beyond” “other” or “different”, like allergy (“something abnormal”) and alien.
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that is interesting that alibi means elsewhere – makes sense…
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…and I bet that’s a word you NEVER misspelled again!!
When I was a kid I always wanted to do a spelling bee, but I went the crossword puzzles route instead 😁 More relaxing for sure.
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I did like competing in the spelling bee, but today they seem to be a whole other level…
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That’s true. It reminds me of chess competitions, the kids have to train daily to do well..
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it is pretty intense…
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Better late than never. I had the reverse, somehow correctly spelling ACHE in fifth grade.
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you were a prodigy!
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Haha!
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🙂
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😃
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This reminds me of a story about the devil child. I talk about her in one of my future scheduled posts. One of the stories we both remember, and goes to her personality, is that she missed a very easy word in her spelling bee (I think it was 3rd or 4th grade) because she was in such a hurry to get past it that she didn’t take a minute to get control over what was coming out of her mouth! Another story comes from when she was taking the eye test for depth perception before getting her driver’s license. She was in such a hurry to get past that that she didn’t take the time to position her eye correctly on the site. When the examiner pointed out that fact to her, she slapped herself upside the head and said “I’m an idiot.” Her sister, mini-me, and both laughed and have never let her live that down. Her usual MO would have been to blame something or someone else but she took responsibility for this as well as missing the easy word in the spelling bee. That’s probably why we clearly recall both those incidents!
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some people just get so excited that they start doing things without fully thinking them through. thanks for the preview!
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Oh, man. The worst for me was the stress of being up there in front of everyone. I know the words; honest!!
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for some reason, as geeky as I was, that part didn’t bother me…
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