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After my short break (10 days
), I'm back and ready to post. We can all use a break once in a while, right? 
Anyway, I've been really busy with school work recently. Speaking of which, I wanted to let you know that I won the Spelling Bee for our county! Here's the article featured in our local newspaper:
I was surprised by how easy the words were!26 students battle for Rowan County spelling championship
By Shelley Smith
Salisbury Post
Lyndsey **** either watches a lot of "Dancing With the Stars," or she really studied her vocabulary.
Lyndsey nervously started the Rowan County Elementary and Middle School 2007 District Spelling Bee by correctly spelling the word "waltz."
A total of 26 elementary and middle school students shared the stage in the teaching auditorium at Rowan-Cabarrus Community College's North Campus Thursday night.
There was a major change in the rules from years before: Contestants were not asked to spell a word that the student before them got wrong. They were given their own new word to spell.
Dr. Karl Hales welcomed the students, parents, principals, faculty and friends, saying, "We have a stage full of winners tonight."
The contestants seemed to handle some words with North Carolina connections easily: cotton, gospel, hurricane and denim.
Some others, however, students found difficult: castanets, burglar, origami and seltzer.
Some words seemed to fit the contestants. A girl spelled "manicure," a girl in a cheerleading uniform spelled "captain" and the eventual winner spit out "forfeit."
In the end, last year's winner  Jessica **** of West Middle  and Joel **** of China Grove Middle had to battle for the winner's crown, just the two of them from round 13 through the final, round 29.
In round 28, Hales asked Jessica to spell "crevice." She missed, spelling "crevise."
Then, Hales threw Joel "fidgeted," and, with the appropriate nervousness, he got it right. Under the rules, Joel had to spell the next word correctly to win.
If he missed, Jessica got another chance.
But Joel proved up to the challenge, knocking out "interfere."
His vocabulary victory came with some cool prizes: a $500 academic scholarship from the Rowan Business Alliance Association, a $1,050 Dell Laptop computer complete with Windows XP, a $50 gift certificate from Ralph Baker's Shoes, a one-year membership to a Rowan County YMCA, $75 cash and China Grove Middle's media center received $25.
Every student who participated received a trophy, Chick-fil-A savings coupons, a free miniature golf pass from Dan Nicholas Park and, saving the best for last, a case of Cheerwine, which everyone in the audience was eying as they filed out of the auditorium.
When asked what he did to prepare for the spelling bee, Joel credited help from his father and his practice of typing each word over and over again on his computer.
Joel will participate in the regional spelling bee in Winston-Salem on March 25.
Judging the competition were Dr. Rebecca Smith, assistant superintendent of curriculum; Amy Pruitt, elementary school curriculum coordinator; and Linda Sufficool, middle and high school facilitator.
Tina Mashburn, director of middle grades education, served as the contest coordinator.
Dr. Hales closed the spelling bee by saying that society has "gotten too used to spellcheck," which made the crowd laugh.
Obviously, I've edited the article for privacy reasons.
Anyway, I'm glad to be back!
Joel
