1103 – Spelling Bee

Notable Language:

• Broth-Based Bouillabaisse (BBB)
• Phlegm
• Wight-wright

Notable Culture:

• Scripps Spelling Bee
• Barbara Broccoli
• Reader’s Digest

Notable Talking Points:

• Welcome to the Scoots Scriptless Spelling Bee
• The Clean, Watery Flavor of a Zucchini
• I’m grateful when I’m gratin’ this hard cheese

Episode 1103 – Spelling Bee

 

[START OF RECORDING]

 

SCOOTER:    Friends beyond the binary, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, it’s time for the podcaster who wants you to know you deserve a good night’s sleep.  That’s one of the reasons I make the show, is you deserve a bedtime you could look forward to, a bedtime you don’t dread.  The other reason I make the show…and tons of other people listening right now, we know what it feels like in the deep, dark night.  We might not know exactly what you’re going through, but we can relate.  This podcast doesn’t work for everybody.  It doesn’t barely work for anybody on the first try.  Give it a few tries, see how it goes.  But it’s time for the podcast that’s recorded on an SD card, and I would hope SD stands for sleepy delight, but it…I think it stands…I don’t even know what it stands for, to be…holy cow, the first time…today I learned I have no idea what SD card stands for.  Small disk?  Soon one of you will be letting me know, and I appreciate it, ‘cause it’s time for Sleep With Me, the podcast that puts you to sleep.  Thanks for making it possible, my patron peeps.

 

INTRO:    [INTRO MUSIC] Hey, are you up all night tossing, turning, mind racing?  Trouble getting to sleep?  Trouble staying asleep?  Well, welcome.  This is Sleep With Me, the podcast that puts you to sleep.  We do it with a bedtime story.  Alls you need to do is get in bed, turn out the lights, and press play.  We’re gonna do the rest.  What we’re going to attempt to do is create a safe place where you could set aside whatever’s keeping you awake.  It could be thoughts that you’re thinking about, things on your mind.  So thoughts, thinking thoughts, I don’t know, confused thoughts, thoughts about the past, present, future.  I don’t know.  I don’t want…I hate to…the word fantasy gets misused so much, but so many of my thoughts are of a future that is unreal…of painting a picture; not always…I say, how come I can’t paint a picture like that during the day?

 

But I lie my head down and it’s painting a picture, oh boy.  Sometimes that picture’s unrealistically good, and sometimes it’s the other end.  Pictures of unreality, stuff I think…stuff that seems real that’s…I don’t know, but that’s something that’s…oh, so thoughts, it could be feelings, anything coming up for you emotionally about those thoughts or that are just there.  I’ll be honest, I just keep rolling with that.  When I do take the time to be kind of a loving presence, I say…I said from Ruth King, I see you, dear one.  Don’t be afraid; I’m here to help.  Tell me…or where are these thoughts coming from or whatever?  I do seem…a lot of times they come from feelings or senses, like a sense of lack, as I talk about sometimes on the…in other places or on the podcast.  I say okay, okay, and I can actually have some compassion and empathy.

 

I don’t know if that’s super useful, because at bedtime that is…that’s during the day that happens.  Bedtime’s a little bit tougher.  That’s why I’m here.  So it could be thoughts, feelings, physical sensations, changes in time, temperature, routine, somebody visiting, you’re going somewhere, you got something coming up, you got something going on.  Whatever it is, I’m here to help, to keep you company, and that’s kinda the thing; when you’re tired…like, during the day I can kinda be more empathetic and compassionate sometimes and see that choice, but they say when you’re hungry, irritated…what is it?  I don’t know.  Tired is the last one.  But whatever it is…I don’t know what the…there’s another one, but whatever.

 

If you’re tired, it’s a little bit harder to resist those thoughts, and they can be…feel irresistible at bedtime and loop us in.  So that’s what I’m here to do, is to keep you company and take your mind off of stuff so that you can fall asleep, because your sleep is important, you deserve a good night’s sleep, you deserve a place you can rest, and I hope I can be a part of that for you, and I’ll talk more about that.  But what I’ll do is I’ll send my voice across the deep, dark night here.  I’m gonna use lulling, soothing, creaky, dulcet tones.  Oh, so creaky are my tones, like a door opening to a sleepy room.  But you say that’s an older door.  I know it’ll be good for dampening sound later.  That’s great once it’s closed.  So, creaky, dulcet tones, pointless meanders, superfluous tangents.  You’ve already seen a few of those.

 

That’s where I go off-topic, I get mixed up, I backtrack, then I say wait a second, then I say…I forgot what I was gonna say.  That kinda stuff.  Those are pointless meanders, super…and superfluous tangents when I say oh, let’s go on and on and on about that.  So, those are a couple ways I do it.  Now if you’re new, a few things to know, very important stuff.  Most people arrive at this podcast doubtful, skeptical, ambivalent, or just even more…you say, what is this?  Somebody told me about this.  It doesn’t…it’s not going how I expected.  I’m tired and I’ve tried a bunch of stuff, and that’s how most listeners get here, because of course you’re tired.  Of course you’re skeptical if you’ve tried a lot of different stuff, and of course you’re even more skeptical ‘cause…I mean, what do you mean you care about me and my sleep, or what is this…?

 

I say don’t worry; I’m gonna try to explain it to you because I’m here to earn your trust, to be your bore-friend so you can lie down and get comfortable and drift off, or listen to me barely.  So if you’re feeling any of those feelings, those are normal ways to get here.  The show does take two or three tries to get used to, and when I say get used to it, it’s like going from a relationship where you’re unsure to being like okay, yep, I’m…now I’m comfortable just being myself.  After two or three tries, you say oh, I don’t need to listen to this podcast; I just barely pay attention.  Oh, listening’s kinda passive.  So just see how it goes.  If you already know the show is not for you, I got a ton of great stuff, other sleep podcasts, other sleepy stuff listed at sleepwithmepodcast.com/nothankyou that you could always check out.

 

That’s tons of cool podcasts and stuff like that that you could fall asleep to, ‘cause like I said, your sleep’s important.  You’re important.  That’s why I make the show, because the world will be a better place if your world’s a better place, if it’s more manageable.  I also know how it feels in the deep, dark night.  That’s why I make the show.  Trouble getting to…I have all that stuff.  What else do you need to know?  Oh, this is a podcast you don’t really listen to.  I kinda talked about that.  You just kinda barely pay attention.  It’s like a TV on in the other room or a party going on down the street, but far enough down the street that you don’t mind.  You can just barely hear it.  It’s a party you don’t want to be at, so you’re like huh, it sounds like a nice party, just far enough off…that doesn’t really very often happen, but when it’s happened, you remember it, right?

 

Or yeah, you say okay…so, there’s that.  Oh, so you don’t really listen to me.  I also am not here to put you to sleep.  I’m here to keep you company and take your mind off of stuff while you drift off.  If you can’t sleep, I’m gonna be here to the very end for you to keep you company.  That is my job whether you’re awake or asleep.  Listening to the show is optional, but when you need to listen, you can ‘cause I’ll be here just barely making sense.  So, tonight we’ll have…we’re gonna do a spelling…not a spelling bee, but a Sleep With Me version of a spelling bee, I guess, where we just spell words and I guess I pontificate.  I don’t know how to spell that, either.  So that’s…what…oh, so yeah, you don’t really listen to me, I’m not really here to put you to sleep.

 

Yeah, I’m here to be your bore-friend, your bore-bae, your bore-sib, your bore-cuz, your bore-bestie, your bore-bor, your neigh-bore, your bore-friend in the deep, dark night to keep you company, or whatever you’re comfortable with.  I could be across town, even, calling you, or I could be across the world sending something across short waves, ‘cause I’m short a few waves, you know?  A couple of my waves are too long and a couple of them are too short, though I do find waving to be a powerful technique for a introvert.  So, yeah.  So, just kinda see how it goes.  I’m here to keep you company and take your mind off of stuff.  The other thing that throws people off is the structure of the show.  The show is designed in a very deliberate way, and as you become a regular listener, you can repurpose or kinda redesign the show to suit your needs, but let me explain to you why we make the show the way we do.

 

It starts off with a greeting.  That’s kinda the most important part; friends beyond the binary, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, then I say something silly so hopefully you feel seen and welcomed in.  ‘Cause when I talk about that lack, that’s one of the things I feel.  I say oh, that’s the opposite of that.  So, I really want to try to do that, even though it’s this digital thing, to say oh, okay, I could go over there and check that out, maybe.  That person’s a little bit silly, so it’s not gonna be too serious.  So, that’s the greeting.  Then there’s support for the show because…kinda similar to the greeting, I would like the show to come out for free twice a week on any podcast platform, and that everybody who works on the show gets compensated.

 

So, that’s what the sponsors and the listener support do for the show, make it sustainable to come out for free.  So, that’s important to me, and so that’s the sponsors and the support stuff.  Then there’s support for listeners who are having a tough time right now, and support for communities around the show.  Again, that’s what makes the show sustainable, is staying engaged with everybody involved.  Yeah, so that’s that part.  Then there’s a intro.  Now, if some people that don’t like the support stuff…they project it onto the intro or assume that the whole intro is about supporting the show.  No, the intro is a show within a show, lasts about twelve to twenty minutes, comes after the support stuff.  It’s what we’re in now.  The whole goal of the intro is it’s a familiar friend.

 

So if you’re a regular listener, you go oh, Scoots is back.  Who knows what he’s gonna talk about?  Will it make any sense?  Who knows?  So, there’s that, and then there’s…and then there’s…oh, so that’s for a regular listener.  But for a new listener, it’s introducing the podcast to you in a inefficient way, of course, because that’s kinda the style of the show.  But for everyone, the intro is a chance to get ready for bed or to start your wind-down routine.  My wind-down routine’s about a hour, so I don’t know if the intro is gonna be a start of your wind-down routine or in the middle or at the end.  But the…all the stuff I’ve ever read about sleep and practice that has worked is having a wind-down routine, having a buffer between your day, your evening, and falling asleep.

 

I’ve rarely ever been able to just fall asleep, and when I do that, it’s like, yeah, in the middle of a presentation or something or I’m supposed to be listening and it’s a warm room or whatever.  Those are the only times I just fall asleep.  Otherwise I need a wind-down routine.  I need a landing strip, and ideally that’s what the intro can do for you.  Some listeners are in bed, some listeners are asleep.  We’re so happy for them, ha, ha.  2% of listeners start the show at twenty or thirty minutes.  A few thousand people pay to just listen to story-only episodes.  So, those are a couple different ways you use it, but at first you just listen, ‘cause the intro…I don’t know.  There’s also…there’s more people that listen to only intros than listen to story-only episodes.  It’s pretty close.  So, kinda just see how it goes and what’s gonna work for you, but that’s the intro.

 

Then there’s support again between the intro and the show, again because…so the podcast can be sustainable and come out for free versus only being on one platform or something like that, or being a part of a company, like a premium-only.  I want the show to come out twice a week for free.  Then there will be our story.  Tonight it’ll be some sort of…don’t worry, if you have a spelling…if you don’t like spelling, don’t worry, because it’ll be…yeah, don’t worry.  So, there will be spelling…there will be…talking about words; that’s what we’ll be doing.  Then there’s thank-yous at the end.  So, that’s the structure of the show, that’s why I make the show.  I’m really glad you’re here.  I really appreciate your time.  I couldn’t do it without all of you, and yeah.  I’m glad you’re here and I really hope I can help you fall asleep.  Thanks again for coming by, and here’s a couple of ways I’m able to do this for you for free twice a week.

 

Alright everybody, it’s Scoots here and I…this is interesting.  I can’t believe we’ve never done a episode about this, but I can’t remember ever doing a episode about this.  So, this will be a little bit of a setup here.  But so, I just took Koa for a walk.  Well, about forty-five minutes ago, and I was listening to the intro for what’s scheduled to be Episode 1071, Spice Friends 10.  Will it be Episode 1071?  I don’t know, but I do know that I was listening and it came up…I was talking about the word bouillabaisse.  I was listening to myself expound on pointless meanders around bouillabaisse and how hard it…how that’s not a sight…that’s a sight word for me.  No chance of me spelling it.  Maybe you don’t know this and maybe I can normalize it for some people, but I have dyslexia.

 

I wasn’t…it was something I always talked about.  I never was tested for it as a child or even a young adult, and it wasn’t until adulthood that someone was practicing giving out tests as part of their education or their graduate education, and they gave me a test.  Then I said see, I knew I was dyslexic.  Not a big deal, but it just means…I don’t know what it means.  I thought I’d just share that for you in case you’ve ever felt that way.  You could feel that way about something else.  You say well, a lot of times, yeah, it gets…but for me, dyslexia is just one of those things where it’s like oh, well, why can’t you just memorize how to spell it or something?  I say well, this…my brain just doesn’t quite work that way.

 

But what I do want to do is…let’s…oh, so the idea for the episode; so, the idea for the episode was that…I said I’ve never done a episode based on the cons…the archetypal concept of a spelling test.  No, not…don’t worry if you have…if you’re like me.  ‘Cause sure, there’s all sorts of people having experience with spelling tests, right?  I totally understand that.  So, I’m gonna make this as sleepy as possible, and it won't really be about spelling.  It’ll be about pointless meanders and superfluous tangents.  So, what I’m gonna do is grab my research and then I’ll be right back.  So, without further ado, I want to welcome you to the Scoots Scriptless Spelling Bee, where I’ll be the only contestant, and I’ll be…there will be silent people, so it’ll be structurally a bit like the spelling bees of fame.

 

But oh boy, and I probably will also have to go on a tangent about where I’m getting my lists of words from, ‘cause that’ll make it fun as well, hopefully.  But this first word comes from the intro from Spice Friends 10, I think.  Bouillabaisse.  Bouillabaisse.  I’m looking at the word, so I know the correct spelling.  I actually have the definition; it’s a provincial fish stew from France.  Bouillabaisse is spelled B-O-U-I-L-L…bouilla…so, that…bouilla.  Is it bouillabaisse or bouillabaisse?  B-A-B…A-B-A-I-S-S-E.  Beautiful word.  Beautiful spelling.  I don’t eat…I’m allergic to crustaceans, so I don’t have a lot of bouillabaisse, but I love saying bouillabaisse.  Bouillabaisse has broth; broth-based bouillabaisse.  If I created my own sub-genre of EDM, it would be called bouillabaisse.  Broth…something like that.

 

So now let’s hop over to some of these words that are hard to spell.  This is from dictionary.com.  Thirty-three hard words to spell from…this was our…just January 19, 2022.  It’s necessary I start with the word necessary, because it’s spelled…necessary; N-E-C-E-S-S-A-R-Y.  Its double-consonant does not change how the word is pronounced.  That’s what makes it hard to spell, the two Ss.  This is where I actually…I’m at an advantage sometimes with necessary, because I know the length of the word because it’s a sight word for me.  So, if it was missing the S, I would…I might add two Cs, but I could add two Ss, ‘cause I know it’s necessary to be a longer word when it’s a sight word, which just means I see the word as a picture, or what you would call a picture, that is how it’s spelled.  I don’t know if that makes sense.

 

I don’t even know if it’s correct.  This is just my experience.  I’m trying to translate something that’s almost untranslatable in my mind.  But I’m pretty sure when I see necessary, I just see the whole word and I don’t…it’s the sum of its parts, but I don’t necessarily see the parts, I guess.  So when I have to break it into its component parts, that’s when it gets interesting.  A lot of people say, you taking a whole episode to make it about you?  I say oh boy, that’s my middle name, is making it about me.  I know, and it’s a bit narcissistic, right?  N-A-R-C-I-S-S-I-S-T-I-C; narcissistic, which is similar to necessary, I guess.  It’s got that double S.  CNS is narcissistic.  I guess it comes from a Greek…but yeah, narcissistic.  I do have…I’m familiar with Narcissus…Narcissus, which they just add the tick in there.

 

There’s rarely an occasion where I don’t…it’s just part of who I am.  I guess I have the…maybe the shadow side of narcissism, where I tend to make it more about me negatively a lot of times.  But also it’s about what I’ve learned from the podcast.  It’s about the occasions that we could relate to with one another, like the occasions we find ourselves strolling in the deep, dark night, trying to spell occasion.  O-C-C-A-S-I-O-N.  This features a C and a S.  They’re not making the same S sound, but it’s a hard C like a K that can make it hard with a double C.  So, that’s occasion.  You know what I finally learned, is that…but I never did it at my…one of my jobs, was to ask to be accommodated, or for…I say hey, can you accommodate me with what I’m…going on?

 

‘Cause as my job changed, my last day job, I was supposed to make some presentations and some reports, but I was always de-accommodating me because I didn’t want to ask for help.  That’s A-C-C-O-M-M-O-date…O-D-A-T-E.  So, that uses a double C and a double M, but it’s the vowels, according to this, that are tough.  Accommodate.  Sounds like it could be spelled with three Os; occommodate, or maybe a U?  But there’s no Us, and the first letter’s an A.  Now, this is a word…I would get this…a consonant and the vowel mixed up on, and…but it’s also something…one of my siblings…I consider it his hobby, is a vacuum.  V-A-C-U-U-M.  I think I would probably be tempted to do V-A-C-C-U-M, but it’s vacuum.  Instead of a double C, it’s got a rare double U.  Other words; continuum and muumuu.

 

1. U-U-M-U-U.  Oh yeah, muumuu.  Okay.  Continuum also is C-O-N-T-I-N-U-U-M.  UUM; I love saying…there’s something we already found we could love.  Very sleepy; UUM.  UUM, that could be a character somewhere, old UUM.  It could be E-U-E-U.  Not a ewe, ewe.  I mean E…well, isn’t there an emu?  An emu named Eueu, or an emu named YuuYuu.  UUM.  I’m an emu in…from Enu named UUM.  That word comes from vacuous, which means empty, which also is a double U in Latin.  You know what I like to do…if I was gonna vacuum and enjoy it, maybe I would use…not only use the accessory on the vacuum, but maybe wear a few accessories, ‘cause accessory is another word that’s supposedly hard to spell.  A-C-C-E-S-S-O-R-Y.

 

Now, that one I might have a dyslexic advantage because there’s double-double consonants, which is kind of a…again, that has the…accessory has a certain length and…it’s almost like when you see one of those pictures and they’re like, what’s different on this picture and the other picture?  I say okay, accessory’s missing something.  Unlike accommodate, where the double C makes a single K sound, accessory, the first C makes a K sound and the second C makes an S sound.  Accessory.  Accessory.  So, it’s accessory.  I’m learning stuff.  Throw in a double S and it’s a real challenge.  Now, there’s a lot of…when it comes to UK-based espionage, there’s a lot of broccoli.  But you know who loves broccoli in this house?  My dog, Koa.

 

If you’re new to the show or you just want a cute reminder, Koa, my dog, loves broccoli.  She loves it like…I’ve never done a test ‘cause I don’t think it would be nice for her to choose between a dog biscuit or a dog treat and broccoli, just because she loves broccoli so much.  I’d just…now, does she get broccoli every day?  No.  That’s one of those things that’s been on my to-do list for twenty or thirty years, is to have broccoli every day.  I never hit that, but twice a week is pretty good.  Koa also likes broccoli stems.  She’s big into Cruciferous vegetables.  I don’t know how much cauliflower I’ve given her, but if you’re breaking kale down, she’ll eat the kale stems or she’ll have kale.  I think broccoli’s her preferred thing.  Cooked broccoli; a little bit easier to consume, a little bit less…gasserific or something.

 

I don’t know if that’s gonna be on the spelling word.  Oh, but broccoli, how do you spell it?  For the love of Barbara Broccoli, it’s B-R-O-C-C-O-L-I.  It’s from the Italian…it features a double C to make a K sound, and you might want to wire an EE to make that -li sound, but it’s just an L-I.  That one’s not quite as hard for me, I guess, but I probably…I don’t know, I haven’t spelled it in a while.  Speaking of vegetables and foods, zucchini’s up next.  Z-U-C-C-H-I-N-I.  Here’s something I learned the hard way; I like zucchini, but I over…this was before the podcast, but I overcooked…I burned my daughter out of zucchini, because I…especially…now, in the East Coast, zucchini…summer zucchini, summer squashes you could get bigger and you cut them up and you can grill them or fry them or bake them.

 

In the West Coast, I’ve found — especially in the supermarket — you get more hot dog-sized zucchini, but you can cut them into medallions and fry them.  They don’t have…when you fry them, a little flash fry.  They tend to have a little bit of a tannic, bitter flavor that I don’t necessarily associate with my childhood, which was that clean, watery flavour of a zucchini.  I think that was what did it for my daughter, is that bitterness, which I could still overcome, ‘cause if you get the right al dente zucchini cook, it has a wonderful mouthfeel that is its own reward.  ‘Cause you say, how could this be so watery?  It’s like a watermelon, almost.  It’s also a word that apparently is from…Italian and hard to spell.  It’s got an I to make a ‘ee’ sound, a double C to make a K sound.  Oh, and UK, which comes from France, courgette.

 

Thank you for writing that out for me.  That’s spelled like cougar, though.  C-O-U-R-G-E-T-T-E.  Courgette.  Never knew how to pronounce that ‘til today.  I’m not even sure.  How about spaghetti, while we’re talking about stuff?  I think I should be able to reliably spell that one, again, as a sight word.  S-P-A-G…maybe not, though.  The S-P-A-G…H-E-T-T-I I can probably get.  That’s an Italian…origins.  Letter I at the end of a word.  In Italian, indicates that’s plural.  Single of spaghetti is spaghetto.  Silent H could throw you off, yeah.  I’m more worried about the spag, I guess, ‘cause I don’t say spaghetti.  Spa…oh, ‘cause it’s…that’s another way to pronounce A, apparently, that I probably should have learned in second grade.

 

Someone laughed not that long ago when I told them I threw…I actually do throw spaghetti against the wall to see if it’s done.  But I don’t eat a lot of pasta.  I mean, nowadays most of the pasta I’m eating is a whole grain or a quinoa or brown rice pasta, which I should probably eat some more of, ‘cause my daughter likes it, too.  Embarrass; now this one I guess at first glance would be easy, but it’s not.  E-M-B-A-R-R-A double S.  I didn’t realize there was an…I’m not kidding…I mean, I knew…I probably knew it, but that there’s an ass inside of embarrass.  It’s like…for me, you could say anytime I’m going anywhere, I’m embarking on being asinine, so I do put…you know what comes first?  Embarking.  I mean, I’m at home, but then when I leave home, I’m embarrassing myself.

 

Embarrassing myself…what’s that…embarrassing myself.  I don’t know what that accent is.  It just popped up in my brain.  But it’s E-M-B-A-R-R-A-S-S.  Did I already say that?  I may have embarrassed myself again.  One thing that might help you is the ending.  It sounds like us, but it’s spelled, well, ass.  The double R and the double S…yeah, it’s bar ass.  It’s adopted from Portuguese; embarka…embara…embaracar, yeah, via French embarrass…embarrasser.  Bourbon; I know how to spell that, even though it wasn’t my thing.  But now when I see it…I mean, there’s a lot of fake, imitation bourbon or whatever in…or bourbon flavoring now in stuff like ice cream and stuff.  B-O-U-R-B-O-N.  Bourbon.  That’s a French word.  Speaking of French; charcuterie, right?  Charcuterie; that’s C-H-A-R-C-U-T-E-R-I-E.

 

Or char-cut-erie if you’re a big…if you’ve been in Lake Erie or the Erie Canal.  That’s what I’m familiar with.  Charcuterie…charcuterie.  The French have a different system of spelling which can make it confusing.  In French, the letters C-H-A-R are pronounced shahere?  I don’t know what that means.  Shar…char…shar…sha har…charcuterie, charcuterie.  I think I just got it right; charcuterie.  Cooked…this is cheese and…charcuterie, charcuterie, would be the meats with the…on a meat plate, I think.  Meat and cheese plate.  I accidentally got one of those one time when I was ordering lunch somewhere, and they gave me the char…they gave me that thing.  I said I didn’t order this, and they said yeah, you did.  I said, but I didn’t pay for it.  They said, it’s on your order.

 

Not like…I don’t know, maybe…that never happens to me, but…it didn’t happen to me in this case, but I think that would be pretty sly, especially for someone sober like me, if I was to send a cheese plate to some…what if…be like, I don’t eat dairy.  That’s what would happen to me; I don’t eat meat or dairy, thank you.  I’d say well, I was gonna send you a drink, but I know we both don’t drink, so…and I say yeah, but I also don’t eat dairy or meat or cheese or…also, you’re…then you…even if it went well, they’d say your breath smells like salami and…whatever.  Charcuterie breath is not romantic.  There’s a piece of…that’s probably the biggest piece of wisdom you’ll ever get; charcuterie is not…I think I went on a date…this was before I got sober, too, and it was…I think it was the second date when I was like okay, where is this going?

 

I hadn’t even…I was…the person had let me know they…she was like oh, let’s go on another date, ‘cause I was like, I don’t know how that went.  Wonderful person, but it was like…I was like, I don’t know how that went.  Then they said hey, are we gonna go out again?  I said yeah, oh yeah.  It was someone I found…it was one of those times where you’re like, somebody’s cool and you’re attracted to them, but there wasn’t a connection, probably ‘cause I was still out there exploring my…was…I was not boyfriend material, we’ll say.  But this is probably another example of that, is like…this was…we stopped at some place to get just a drink ‘cause we were hiking or something.  After the hike, I got a kombucha.  Another word hard to spell, probably.  Yeah, let’s look that up, ‘cause I have no idea how to spell it.

 

It’s another beverage never…the only thing worse would be if you had a kombucha with a charcuterie and a cheese plate, and then that was…and then you had hot dogs or something.  If I could get this stuff imprinted in my brain to remember…kombucha is K-O-M-B-U-C-H-A.  Stuff never to drink or eat on dates.  Or you know you’re married when…but probably don’t have those when you’re…you can have those when you’re married, but not on date night or anything within three hours of when you think there’s gonna be love in the air.  I mean, my advice from somebody that…whose advice is…well, I’m a expert at making these mistakes, so you don’t have to make them.  Some people would say I’m a entrepreneur in bad decision-making, and that’s E-N-T-R-E-P-R-E-N-E-U-R.

 

I knew this was French ‘cause of the entre…entrepreneur.  It starts with an ‘ah’ sound.  You may think it includes an A, but that’s not the case.  That one I definitely can’t spell because it’s just…I think the E-U-R at the end…entre-pre-neur.  I’d have…yeah, I can’t separate that out for some reason.  I can do it while I’m looking at it and we’re talking about it, but then when I close my eyes, I can’t do it.  Liaison.  I need a spelling liaison.  L-I-A-I-S-O-N.  This is fun.  I didn’t realize…I can’t believe it took us, whatever, a thousand and…almost 1,100 episodes to do this.  Thank you.  Liaison is L-I-A-I-S-O-N.  Another French word.  You may be tempted to spell it phonetically; lee-ay-zahn, but much like the I at the end of Italian words, the I in French can make the ‘ee’ sound.  Remember, liaison has two Is.

 

That makes sense, ‘cause if you’re having a…seriously, that’s…they…dictionary.com; you could hire me for these quips.  Probably price you out, but you need two Is to have a liaison in more than…’cause even…or four Is, but you need two Is in quotes.  But two Is would help start a liaison, ‘cause oh boy, there’s a liaison I’d like to have.  Or when I see a spelling, I say, could use a spelling liaison.  My two Is aren’t gonna cut it, so I need…then I need another metaphor to spell liaison, but I know I see…oh, you just say I see liaison with two Is.  That’s easy.  Yeah, so we could just change that to…I need two eyes to see liaison.  Connecticut is on here.  C-O-N-N-E-C-T-I-C-U-T.  I could see that’s hard to spell.  Connect-I-cut is how it’s spelled.  It comes from the Mohegan-Pequot language.  It means ‘upon the long river’.  C-O-N-N-E-C-T-I-C-U-T.

 

That goes right into Massachusetts.  M-A-S-S-A-C-H-U-S-E-T-T-S.  That’s Al…Al-go-on-quin.  That’s from Algonquin at the large hill.  This one’s challenging for everybody or for a lot of people, and a lot of times, people get made fun of ‘cause they pronounce this the wrong way; epitome or epitome, right?  I’ve said it…I’m sure I’ve said epitome on the podcast before, ‘cause it does…I mean, that’s a…epitome.  When I say epitome, that’s what I feel like inside.  Epitome, or please pity me.  No, I don’t want pity, though.  I just say I feel like I’m epitome.  That’s where I feel like I am.  E-P-I-T-O-M-E.  That’s from the Greek.  Epitome…I-H…how do you say that?  Pit-o-me.  One reason is similar to Italian; all the vowels from Greek words are pronounced.  No silent Es here.  Epitome.  Epitome…epitome.  Epitome.

 

Indict…yeah, you’ll indict my spelling.  I don’t…I-N-D-I-C-T.  I guess ‘cause it doesn’t have…you don’t pronounce the letter C in this word.  Really?  Oh, dict.  I guess it depends on how you pronounce your Cs.  It’s related to dictate, D-I-C…did I say I-N-D-I-C-T?  D-I-C-T-A…D-I-C-T-A-T-E is dictate.  Oh boy, we’re getting into some good ones, here.  Gnaw.  Gnaw has a G; G-N-A-W.  We’ve seen T-H and silent C.  Gnaw; I love that word.  That sounds…gnaw.  Gnaw.  It just sounds good to say, and it depends on what you’re gnawing, but if it’s a metaphorical or figurative word, it’s like yeah, I gotta gnaw on that or…I don’t know.  Phlegm.  Holy…what a gorgeous word.  Gorgeous word, in my opinion.  P-H-L-E-G-M.  Phlegm.

 

Phlegm…lovely to say, lovely to look…if I could have an affair with a word, non-figuratively…you say no, no, no, no meaning.  It’s gonna be a meaningless romance because I don’t want the meaning behind you.  It would be phlegm.  I would choose…I choose to love phlegm, but not real…not…the word phlegm.  I’m in love with the word phlegm; I’ll tell you.  It’s a meaningless affair, please.  But I’m in love with you phlegm.  Phlegm, I love you, ‘cause…I don’t know.  Just looking at you…P-H-L-E-G-M.  Phlegm.  Silent Gs do not only appear at the beginning of words; they can show up in the endings as well.  Phlegm; F-L-E-M is how it’s said.  It uses the letters PH to make a ‘ff’ sound, and comes from the Greek; phlegm and phone.  But yeah, I’m in…I’m having a meaningless romance with phlegm.

 

Paradigm; I shifted the paradigm.  I said…you said, can you do that?  I said, in my mind I can do it.  I mean, don’t ask any more questions than that.  I just meant be in love with phlegm and have loving, meaningless…I have a longing for phlegm.  Let’s just say that, but not…a meaningless longing for…yeah, I have a meaningless longing for phlegm.  So, I shifted the paradigm.  P-A-R-A-D-I-G-M.  So don’t spell it dime, even though it’s said dime.  It’s D-I-G-M, from the Greek, paradeigma, maybe.  D-E-I-G-M-A.  Island; the letter S is silent.  I-S-L-A-N-D.  It’s from isle, I-S-L-E.  You know what’s gonna get you?  I think it was Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine, but it could have just been Gloria Estefan, which we should look up right now.  Gloria is G-L-O-R-I-A, but Estefan is E-S-T-E-F-A-N.

 

I’m surprised; people…that’s a pretty cool name to have if you have fans, ‘cause you say…or you could say…’cause este is this.  It’s the masculine this, right?  I wonder what fomosa…I don’t know what fan is, but you could say I’m a fan of…yeah, I’m this fan of Gloria Estefan, but…is the correct pronunciation.  But the rhythm would get you tonight…is R-H-Y-T-H-M.  There’s two Hs.  One is silent and the other is used in a diphthong, T-H.  It sounds like it should have a U.  Oh, it doesn’t have a U.  Oh, interesting…rhythum, but it doesn’t.  It comes from the Greek, rhythmos.  But I think…let’s see if we could figure out a way to help spell this one.  Rhythm…it’s six letters.  G-L-O-R-I-A has seven letters, so that doesn’t help us.  Estefan has seven letters.  Rhythm…one less letter than the letters in either…G-L-O-R-I-A…is that…?

 

I don’t know.  Now I’m…G-L-O-R-I-A.  That’s six, dude.  Oh, thanks.  Sorry, my…I was counting on my fingers and I did it wrong.  For thirty-five minutes…this is…this could be one of the loosest episodes we’ve ever done.  So, Gloria and rhythm have the…I don’t know if that’ll be helpful.  There’s a song, G-L-O-R-I-A, that you…I don’t know.  There’s also another song about Gloria, ‘cause I had a crush on a teacher named Gloria, kind of, when I was a little kid, pre-pubescence, so…’cause she was also just nice to me.  Wednesday…this is a tough one.  I never get this one.  Wesday…Wednesday…W-E-D-N-E-S-day.  Wednesday.  Okay, ‘cause I always think…I mix up the E and the N.  Wodensday, the Old English.  Keeping Woden or Odin in mind is a good way to remember those…that pesky D.  Wednesday.

 

That’s how I…I don’t know how I’ll remember it.  Eight is a homophome of the past participle of ete.  Eight; E-I-G-H-T.  But that’s not the only thing confusing.  I-G-H-T is normally for bright and tight, but it’s got that eight.  How about acquiesce?  That’s another word with some letters.  Acquiesce; A-C-Q-U-I-E-S-C-E.  Let’s see what else…conscious…conscience?  I’m trying to get through this list.  I thought it only had twenty words, but it seems like it has more.  It said thirty.  Maybe it said thirty-three.  Conscience…C-O-N-S-C-I-O-U-S.  Grateful; G-R-A-T-E-ful.  Grateful.  So just…that one’s easy.  Go back to charcuterie.  Charcuterie.  When I grate my cheese, I’m grateful…I won't be kissing anyone when I’m grating this hard cheese.  I’m grateful.  Yeah, so there.  That’s how I could find my gratitude for…say, I’m grateful.

 

Separate is separate; S-E-P-A-R-A-T-E.  The second vowel sound is spelled with an A and not a U or an E even though in…it does sound like that sometimes.  Then finally, their last word is lightning.  L-I-G-H-T-N-I-N-G.  L-I-G-H-T-N-I-N-G.  The unusual combination of T-N may throw you off, however, adding an E would make it lightening, which is a different word; to lighten.  Okay, so that’s those words there.  I got tons of research, so let’s see what else we can get through here.  Okay, this one is from staffordhouse.com.  Stafford House International Blog.  Alex Levantis.  May 16, 2020.  Ten common English words with weird spellings.  This is tough one…this is a good one; thorough.  T-H-R…or through.  Oh no, that’s through, maybe.  I don’t know.  Through…yeah, T-H…T-H-rough.  T-H-R-O-U-G-H.

 

Can be an adjective; the hallway ran through the room, or preposition; the printer is through the blue door.  But when you look at the phonetics, through forth row it could be, but it’s through.  In the US, some people spell it T-H-R-U.  I mispronounced it thorough, but I say if if you know who the New Kids on the Block are, you say the-rough.  I don’t know.  I don’t know why I thought of New Kids on the Block, ‘cause it’s the right stuff, baby, they sing.  Why did I think of thorough?  Oh, rough.  I think they say something…maybe that’s just the right stuff.  So, I have no idea what I’m…I have totally…that’s funny.  Okay, these are good ones; queue.  That’s a hard one.  Like, you might think it’s K-E-W, which is an area in London, but how do you say it…spelled Q-U-E-U-E.

 

I mean, that’s important for theme parks ‘cause you gotta get in line.  They call it a queue.  You’re queuing up or you’re in a queue.  Q-U…wait, Q-U-E-U-E.  Queue.  Occurred.  O-C-C-U-R-R-E-D.  Mortgage; M-O-R-T-gage.  That’s a sight word, I think.  I see it so many times.  Mortgage.  So, just think of someone named Mort gauging your interest rate.  Mortgage.  Jeopardy; G…these again are sight words in the US, I guess.  G-E-O-P-A-R-D-Y.  I lost…I just think of Weird Al.  I lost on Jeopardy, baby.  Colonel; C-O-L-O-N-E-L.  I guess again in the US, we see that on advertisements.  But colonel; that definitely doesn’t sound like…K-E-R-N-E-L.  Knead is a tricky one.  K-N-E-A-D…is a homophome as with need, N-E-E-D.  Like sea and see, pea and pee, night and knight, sure and shore.  Shore and shore, depending on pronunciation.

 

Indict…did we do that one?  I-N-D-I-C-T.  Yeah, we did.  Handkerchief; that’s a good one.  Or handkerchief.  Hand…wow, this is a tough one.  Handkerchief.  So, I guess that one, you have to think of…if you…if your sneeze is a kerchief, then you say I’m gonna hand you a kerchief for your sneeze.  H-A-N-D-K-E-R-C-H-I-E-F.  Handkerchief.  Silent D; handkerchief.  So, they say who’s got that…?  So, that was from Stafford House.  That was good.  Okay, this one is from readersdigest.com…rd.com…Megan Jones, January 20, 2022.  Dilate.  There’s a good one.  Only six letters; D-I-L-A-T-E.  People dial a late.  Huh.  I don’t know.  Dilate…oh, here’s a beautiful…this is a word…not quite as gorgeous as that other word I fell in love with, which is…whose name I forgot.

 

I know it was a word that stood for something you wouldn’t want to be…like gaseous, but it wasn’t gaseous.  This is liquefy.  Not quite as gorgeous as that other word that I had yearned for so much…so mindlessly that…liquefy.  L-I-Q-U-E-F-Y.  Liquefy.  Last three letters throw people off, E-F-Y, ‘cause it sounds like pacify, clarify, specify, or rectify.  But no, it’s L-I-Q-U-E-F-Y, meaning to become liquid.  Wednesday…we got sherbert.  Here’s another one we haven’t gotten yet.  Sherbert…H…S-A…sorry, I already mispronounced it, or misspelled it.  S-H-E-R-B-E-T.  Sherbet.  Sherbert.  Sherbert, sometimes I say.  Sherbret.  So, that’s hard to say ‘cause it’s an Americanization of sorbet.  Sherbert.  Let’s see, both come from the Turkish word serbet, S-E-R-B-E-T.

 

You can read a lot more, but…sherbert is how people pronounce it in the…in different regions of the US.  Sherbert…yeah, sherbert is how they said it in Syracuse.  Sherbert.  Sherbet.  Bolo…you know what they say about me a lot of the times, is bologna.  B-O-L-O-G-N-A.  I think for like, twenty or thirty years in the US, people would spell out that word.  So in the US…but it’s from Bologna, right?  Bologna is how you say the place in Italy.  I don’t think I’ve had any…that was one of the things I never ate, though I know it’s popular.  That’s very similar to some other things where I could taste other ingredients in there or something.  Playwright’s on here.  Used to go to this bar called The Playwright to drink when I was…not all the time, but especially if I was meeting people from out of town.  I think it closed, too.

 

It was called The Playwright.  Playwright is P-L-A-Y-W-R-I-G-H-T.  Playwright.  In the 1660s, people who produced plays were workers who wrought plays, W-R-O-U-G-H-T.  That’s a nice word; wrought.  Holy cow…rather than the people that wrote them.  So if you wrought something, you were considered a wright.  This is beautiful stuff.  This is why…this is why I love this.  So if you wrought something, W-R-O-U-G-H-T, you were considered a wright, W-R-I-G-H-T.  What if you wrought…you know that thing that’s not Casper but there’s another word for it?  Wight?  I think that’s a G-H…like what if you wrought a…you wright…you wrought a wight?  So you’re a wight wright.  Wight wright.  That’s a character in DnD.  Also wright, W-R-I-G-H-T, is another homophome for write, W-R-I-T-E.  Fuchsia.

 

Oh boy, holy mackerel, that’s a good-looking word.  Fuchsia; F-U-C-H-S-I-A.  Man, that’s beautiful.  It’s as beautiful…that’s a beautiful color, beautiful word.  Fuchsia.  Just lovely to say, too.  Fuchsia.  What was the word, though, that I was in love with?  I can’t believe it was ten minutes ago.  Was it polyglot?  P-O-L-Y-G-L-O-T.  No, I guess not.  But I guess I’ve gone polyglot on my word romances.  I really wish…I’ll look it up.  Minuscule.  Wow, did I spell fuchsia F-U-C-H-S-I-A…minuscule.  There’s another…man, I’m not trying to be…but minuscule’s nice, too.  M-I-N-U-S-C-U-L-E.  It comes from Latin, minus or minus, meaning less, but it bears no linguistic relation to mini or miniature.  Minuscule…it’s not miniscule, no matter how much logic would suggest.  Oh, they have the actual F-U-C-H…huh.

 

Oh, they have the misspelling and the correct…minuscule…oh, there’s a U where people will put an I.  Okay.  Okay, ingenious.  It has an O, so…ingenious, but add an O.  ‘Cause if you’re around a genius, you’re probably saying oh, you’re a genius, eh?  There you go.  I-N-G-E-N-I-O-U-S.  It’s so similar in sound and meaning that people…and I guess it is hard if you’re looking at it and you’re dyslexic.  You say ingenious…ingenious.  But I think maybe that’s…per…sacrilegious.  My spelling has been considered sacrilegious.  No change in Planet Earth I would ever spell this word right.  I wouldn’t even get the incorrect spelling.  But it’s S-A-C-R-I-L-E-G-I-O-U-S.  Oh, ‘cause people would put sacrilegious, which totally makes sense.  But it comes from sacrilege, not religious.  Oh, beautiful, beautiful writing, Readers Digest.  I like this.

 

Came from Latin of sacred and legerie…accommodate…put a extra C up in there.  ‘Cause, you know, extra comfort.  Accommodate.  Extra comfort; A-C-C-O-M-M-O-date.  Accommodate.  We did that one already, though.  Oh boy, here’s another good one; orangutan.  Orangutan.  O-R-A-N-G-U-T-A-N.  Beautiful.  That’s another one.  Bornean primates…it’s from Malay O-R-A-N-G…for man or forest, but it’s been Anglicized.  Orangutan.  Oh, hutan for forest.  Orang for man and hutan for forest.  I just want to thank all you for allowing me to be so mischievous and keep you company.  Mischievous.  So, this one, it…no chance of me spelling this one, either.  M-I-S-C-H-I-E-V-O-U-S.  Makes me think of sous vide for some reason.  Have you pronounced this world mischievous…whole bit?

 

Even maybe you pronounced it that way.  It’s incorrect.  It’s mischievous.  Chiveous or something.  I don’t know.  Mischief…but that’s hard…gubernatorial.  So, people usually do it with governor, but I say guber anyway.  So, guber and guber…I can’t even say it.  G-U-B-E-R-N-A-T-O-R-I-N…no, that’s not correct.  G-U-B…I was reading it off the thing mis…G-U-B-E-R-N-A-T-O-R-I-A-L.  So, the word governor, but no U, B, or T in it.  So where do we get this wacky thing?  It’s closer to governor than the origin of the word.  Both words come from the Latin gubernator, or governor.  Acquiesce?  I think we did acquiesce, but let’s spell it one more time.  Is that…?  I’d acquiesce…A-C-Q-U-I-E-S-C-E.  I wish I was more conscientious about the words I fall in love with.  C-O-N-S-C-I-E-N-T-I-O-U-S.

 

Maybe I could even put it together…some paraphernalia to give as a gift.  P-A-R-A-P-H-E-R-N-A-L-I-A.  Paraphernalia.  Sounds like the end of…a come-on line for words; paraphernalia.  Sorry.  Onomam…onomatopoeia.  O-N-O-M-A-T-O-P-O-E-I-A.  O-N-O-M-A-T-O-P-O-E-I-A.  That’s a technique where a word mimics the sound, like in a comic book or when Antonio Banderas is on the show and he says swoosh, I think.  Between eight vowels and the fact you only need half the letters to make the ‘poeia’ sound…I’m gonna onomatopoeia.

 

So, let me just…that’s everything.  I do want to apologize; I guess I gotta make an apology to one word, which I’ll…I’ve embarrassed myself as a entrepreneur.  Charcuterie?  That’s not who I was in love with though, was it?  It wasn’t epitome.  It’s gnawing at me.  Oh, phlegm.  I’m sorry, phlegm.  It was gnawing at me, though, phlegm, that I couldn’t remember you.  But it’s because…just your meaning is so contradictory to your…the way you sound and look.  So, I’m sorry I forgot you, phlegm.  I’m sure I won't…I’m sure I’ll be paid back with extra phlegm soon.  But thanks so much, everybody.  Thanks for letting me make an experimental episode.  I think this went pretty well.  So maybe we’ll do more spelling soon.  Thanks, and goodnight.

 

[END OF RECORDING]

(Transcribed by Leah Hervoly)