{"id":3640,"date":"2024-05-09T07:31:10","date_gmt":"2024-05-09T11:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=3640"},"modified":"2024-05-09T07:31:10","modified_gmt":"2024-05-09T11:31:10","slug":"a-difficult-spell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/09\/a-difficult-spell\/","title":{"rendered":"A Difficult Spell"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0<\/em>click here<\/a>

Every spring the month of May brings us not only the Greatest Spectacle in Racing \u2013 the Indianapolis \u201c500\u201d \u2013 but the Greatest Spectacle in Spelling, also known as the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

This year 245 contestants will gather in Maryland on May 28-30 to write another chapter in what Scripps calls \u201cthe largest and longest-running education program in America\u201d \u2013 a white-knuckle-hold-your-breath competition that\u2019s been happening since 1925.\u00a0

Last year\u2019s champion was 14-year-old Dev Shah from Largo, Florida, seen above.\u00a0 He correctly spelled \u201cpsammophile\u201d to grab the $50,000 first prize.\u00a0 A psammophile, as is commonly known (not<\/u><\/em>), is an organism that thrives in sandy soil.\u00a0

The words that Dev had to spell correctly in order to reach the finals were also not for the faint of heart.\u00a0 They included schistorrhachis, aegagrus, rommack, and tolsester.\u00a0

Google, meanwhile, regularly uses its search engine data to determine the most troublesome words for the rest of us \u2013 we who will not be participating in a spelling contest any time soon.\u00a0 By tallying all the queries that begin with \u201chow do you spell,\u201d they\u2019re able to identify the most-misspelled words for each of the 50 states.

Dev seems to be in no danger of losing his crown.

Three years ago, the most misspelled word in 11 states was \u201cquarantine\u201d \u2013 certainly not surprising in light of the pandemic.\u00a0 Residents of Texas were uncertain how to spell \u201cconfident,\u201d which seems counterintuitive in a state that claims to represent the biggest and best of everything.\u00a0

Three Great Plains states \u2013 North Dakota, South Dakota, and Nebraska, situated from north to south \u2013 all have difficulty spelling the word \u201cbelieve.\u201d My fellow Hoosiers struggle with \u201cdesert.\u201d\u00a0 Presumably we don\u2019t want to confuse the deserts we don\u2019t have with the desserts that we have in abundance.\u00a0

Florida may be home to Disney World\u2019s Tomorrowland, but \u201ctomorrow\u201d appears to be a beast for Floridians.

A few years ago, Colorado residents yearned for the correct spelling of \u201cbeautiful,\u201d perhaps because they have good reason to use it.\u00a0 Ohio is perplexed by \u201cbanana.\u201d\u00a0

The residents of Arizona and New Hampshire struggle with \u201cdiarrhea.\u201d It is genuinely difficult to imagine what else those two states might have in common.\u00a0 \u00a0

Back in 2016, people who in lived in Arkansas and Utah were, for unstated reasons, interested in the correct spelling of \u201cleprechaun,\u201d while the citizens of Minnesota were impassioned by \u201cbroccoli.\u201d \u00a0Wyoming residents were pursuing a state-wide quest to spell \u201cornery.\u201d\u00a0

People who live in Hawaii want to know \u201cboutonniere,\u201d which is no gimme even for spelling bee contestants.\u00a0 And the residents of Alaska?\u00a0 They\u2019re fixated on the spelling of \u201cHawaii,\u201d perhaps especially during the winter. \u00a0Residents of Maine would like to know how to spell \u201cwatch,\u201d while Kentucky is all about \u201cmaintenance.\u201d\u00a0

Back in the fifth grade, I was the stellar speller in my class.\u00a0

Going into our annual school spelling bee I felt confident because of my growing mastery of long, obscure words.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t wait to strut my stuff.

Then came the second round of the competition, where easy words routinely eliminate students who haven\u2019t sufficiently prepared. My school principal asked me to spell the word \u201cobedient.\u201d\u00a0 O-B-E-D-I-A-N-T<\/em>, I answered.\u00a0 A instead of E.\u00a0

And just like that, my dreams of a trip to the National Spelling Bee were dashed.

There\u2019s not much use in knowing what is esoteric if you haven\u2019t mastered the basics.

The more I look back on that embarrassing moment, missing that word turned out to be a gift from God.\u00a0 That\u2019s because I\u2019ve spent my whole life thinking about how to spell \u201cobedient.\u201d\u00a0

Whenever I\u2019m tempted to believe I\u2019m starting to get pretty good at this spirituality stuff, I\u2019m reminded that first I have to master the basics.\u00a0 Like obedience.

All of us are in the Slow Learners Group when it comes to the things of God \u2013 a reminder that the basics should always receive our full attention.

For which we can be truly G-R-A-T-E-F-U-L<\/em>.\u00a0

Your obedient friend and partner in the kingdom, Glenn.\u00a0
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here Every spring the month of May brings us not only the Greatest Spectacle in Racing \u2013 the Indianapolis \u201c500\u201d \u2013 but the Greatest Spectacle in Spelling, also known as the Scripps National Spelling Bee. This year 245 contestants will gather in Maryland on May 28-30 to write another chapter in what… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3641,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[730,370],"class_list":["post-3640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-basics","tag-obedience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3640"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3640\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3642,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3640\/revisions\/3642"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}