First off, a real congratulations to the Not a Spelling Bee Word (appropriately for October renamed to Not a Spelling “Boo” Word) twitter account for making it into the New York Times today. Rarely do I get to know about something fun before it becomes a well-known and loved thing (The Room, etc.), but this is something I’ve gotten to enjoy awhile, which is along the lines of all three seasons of Arrested Development. I’m glad the readers of the NYT will know to share in the enjoyment!

Now to what I missed yesterday:

First off, WOW! I didn’t get the pangram? Worse! I didn’t know I didn’t get the pangram. Holy smokes.

TRAUMATIC: Nothing could be more appropriate at this moment as I find this out.
CITRIC: The one above burns more.
RAITA: OK so HORCHATA is no good, but this Indian side dish I only just now learned exists is?
TACT: No surprise I missed this.
TATAMI: Straw matting used as like a rug on the floor of a Japanese home.
TRACT: Didn’t stick the LAND-ing here.
TRAMCAR: Yeah, OK.
TUTTI: Missing this makes me almost as bummed as missing the pangram. I’ve written in the past specifically about TUTTI.

But I guess it wasn’t so bad that I got to genius level without getting a nine-letter pangram.

Today I had a bunch of stuff to do and spent not so long on the spelling bee. I made it to genius level with the minimum amount and then got one more for good measure.

I made sure to get the pangram today, assuming there only was one.

Final score: 35 words for 153 points. Genius minimum was 152.
First word: IMPALA.

Look out for an off-topic post on Saturday that’s a follow-up to yesterday’s Spelling Bee post. It drops at 10am PT, but you can read it later, too.