My son, Simon, was in the Sixth Grade Spelling Bee Finals at his school with 8 other contenders. He did well in the first few rounds and then he got handed this doozy of a word.

He admitted that when he knew he wasn't going to get it right he thought he might just spout out some random nonsensical letters like Q-T-Z-X-L-O-P which I thought would have been awesome, but he went down swinging.

I was really impressed with the contestants. For sixth graders they were all clearly very well read, intelligent, and good sports about the whole thing. No one had to be reminded of the rules and everyone acted maturely, even when losing.

I do think it's poetic that my son was taken down by bureaucracy, though. That was always my Achilles' heel.