Holly Himmerlin, 11
St. Percival School for the Academically Inclined
"Neanderthals! Philistines! The temerity of these illiterate louts! I intend to file a formal complaint against the judging committee. I was informed that this was to be an open-book examination! The boorish swines evidently took umbrage at my use of a petite, innocuous pocket dictionary. I was only using it to double-check my work! To repair my wounded pride, I shall take solace at Great Books, a gargantuan compendium of immortal works, from Plato to Joyce. And I will also eat several Chunky Monkey Pudding Pops.
Blythe Bergman, 10
PS #12
"How do I feel? Back when I was 9, my dad sat me down and showed me two web sites--the Great Books site that Holly mentioned and Mission: Hang It Up, a site about two guys who travel to the Mojave Desert to hang up a pay phone. Dad said there are two types of people in the world--those who read books and those who travel to the desert to hang up phones. Well, I read all those books and learned words like 'phillumenist' and 'bildungsroman.' But now I've lost in the National Spelling Bee. The word 'chaparral' wasn't in any of those books, Dad. Thanks for nothing."
Jacob Spatafor, 14
Mount Bunyan Middle School
"Okay, first of all I just want to say that I think this competition is a complete sham. Did you see that Britney Spears lookalike I was sitting next to? How's a guy supposed to concentrate? I mean, she was such a babe. And then they want me to spell 'tinnitus'? This probably shatters my dream of becoming the center square on the Hollywood Squares just like my hero, the late Paul Lynde. I guess I can't complain too much--the guy on the other side of her had to spell 'orofacial.'"
Kyle Sanderson, 12
Filbert Preparatory Academy
"Sure, I'm disappointed. I felt pretty confident coming out of the early rounds. Obsequious. Zeppelin. Misdemeanor. But that last round was different. I knew there was trouble when Timmy Williams from Akron got hit with 'ochlophobia.' The battle was like Titanic vs. The Phantom Menace, but in the end, Timmy went down faster than Leonardo DiCaprio handcuffed to a deck chair. After that, I didn't stand a chance. When I got up and heard the judge say 'pancreaticoduodenostomy,' I thought I was going to throw up."
Inagatta Davita, 13
Sword of Damocles Middle School
"I was hoodwinked! Just because I read magazines from England, like Preview, which covers current and upcoming films, I shouldn't be punished. Right-o, sometimes I'll use British spellings. They say I misspelled 'jam,' but I know that m-a-r-m-a-l-a-d-e is a spot-on alternative. In fact, I was going to spell out 'Penrose Raspberry Peach Marmalade,' which is aces. Mmmm. Now where's my barrister? I'm going to sue!"
Rosario Sanchez, 7
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
"Spelling isn't really my strong suit, so I'm just happy to be here. I'm really much better at math. Last year, I won the Princeton Freestyle Theorem Invitational. Now, I'm focusing on history. I particularly enjoy perusing web sites like the BBC's My Century, which offers audio reflections of the past 100 years, each week centering on a different cultural theme. Next, I think I'll tackle quantum physics. That whole search for a unified field theory seems like it might be nifty."
Samuel "Tex" Gettysburg III, 9
Norman Shwarzkopf Military Academy
"It was ugly out there, no doubt about it. I came, I fought, and I fell. After defending myself honorably during the opening salvos like saturnine, caduceus, florilegium, I was eventually sunk by a vicious smart bomb--baht. The baht is the official currency of Thailand, FYI. Darn. Still, I battled bravely. Now I'm off to find courage, fortitude, and inspiration in The Long Walk of Nelson Mandela, a multimedia biography of one of this century's greatest leaders."