I placed 11th at the 2013 AARP Cheyenne Spelling Bee

Scored 85 out of 100 in the written rounds (4 rounds of 25 words each), and got 1 word right out of 3 during the oral rounds, being bumped out in round 3.

11th place wouldn't be bad...except there were only 25 participants in the bee - down 15 from last  year (when I did not make the oral rounds, by 3 words). 16 of us were on stage for the oral round. If you missed 2 words you were done.

First word I got was NESS, a rocky promontory, which I spelled NESSE.

Second word I got was some kind of a fish, and I got that right by guessing, TOGUE.

Can't remember the 3rd word, some Chinese thing.

Considering the fact that I had only studied for 2 weeks (way back after last year's spelling bee ended) I did pretty well. Though, again, I don't think it really counts because I could always spell better than 16 out of 25 people.... 16 out of 40 might have been a different story!

My enthusiasm is rekindled to try again next year...I hope they'll have it again next year...but with only 25 participants...someone heard they might not have it again or might move it to a different state. (One indication is normally the oral rounds are webcast - this year they weren't, which seems to show not a lot of people are interested in it anymore.)

Well...if it is moved to a different state I can put on my travelling shoes, I suppose.

But it is rather sad that in a city of 50,000 people (which is how many folks Cheyenne had) only 3 people over the age of 50 from Cheyenne bothered to participate.

But then I don't think there was a lot of publicity for it.  Of course I haven't had a chance to pay attention to the media much these days, as I've been working very hard for a client of mine for the past several months...but a couple of the other Cheyenne-ites I talked to said they hadn't seen anything about it, either.

Anyway, it was a lot of fun. Lunch was good and I sat next to some interesting people, so that was fun.

I intend to start studying - really, I do - and make it past more than the 3rd round of the orals next year.  If they have it next year.