The Portland Spelling Bee

Monday night was supposed to be my debut. For at least two years now, I've been aware of the weekly Portland Spelling Bee at The Mississippi Pizza Pub. It's an adults-only affair with quite a reputation, helping to define Portland's casual, come-as-you-are, doesn't-matter-who-you-are culture.

Anyway, I found the nerve to say, sure, I'm ready. Sign me up, put me on stage and let me go mano a mano with who-knows-who.

Well...didn't exactly turn out the way I intended. But maybe it's for the better. Lori and I rolled up at a quarter to 7, thinking it was a simple matter of signing up. Wrong. The event organizers said 26 people -- far more than the customary 18 -- had already registered. No problem, I said. We'll just watch and I'll know what to expect when I actually do compete.

We ordered our food, beer and wine and found a table in the back. First two rounds, I thought, I can compete with these folks. Then the third round began. All of a sudden, the host, Erin Ergenbright (someone who's written for The Oregonian's Sunday Opinion section) started pulling these exotic words out of her hat -- multisyllabic terms you'd hear if you were into geology, phlebotomy or other specialized fields.

Contestants started asking for the root (Greek, Latin, French, Egyptian!) of the word or asking it to be used in a sentence -- and still they were flummoxed (love that word myself). About three rounds later, they were down to two men and two women. One guy dropped out on "boutonniere." Can't remember the word that caused the other one to take a seat.

It came down to the two women -- I honestly can't even remember the championship word -- but the winner turned out to be a thirty-something mom who was smarter than heck.

As someone who deals with words for a living, I walked into the pub feeling pretty confident of holding my own. After seeing last night's smackdown, I'm not so sure.