Forget Quizzo, This Is The Real Spuzz

Hipster know-it-alls geek out by competing in spelling bees:

Adult-only spelling bees, born of nostalgia and spiked with alcohol, have become increasingly popular social activities for brainy hipsters in their 20’s and 30’s at bars and community centers from Brooklyn to Spokane, Wash. Gone are the days when the sole opportunity to demonstrate one’s spelling aptitude was in school. A new kind of bee has emerged, one where participants tackle baffling words between flirty smiles and sips of Yuengling.

In a setting where skinny, pasty people flex intellectual muscle like a peacock flaunts its feathers or a housecat marks its territory, the Adult Spelling Bee provides psychological comfort and reassurance:

Some spellers, haunted by mistakes made during childhood bees, participate to settle old scores. Others, former spelling champions, wish to relive their glory days. Yet most people go for the cold drinks and the inevitable laughs derived from watching a person who is tipsy try to spell trichotillomania. (The compulsion to tear or pluck out the hair on one’s head and face.)

Karl Steel, 35, a graduate student in English and comparative literature at Columbia from the Gowanus area of Brooklyn, admitted to being a poor speller, yet he readily enters nearly all of the bees at Freddy’s. “There’s a lot of shared misery,” Mr. Steel said. “I’ve never won, and I’m never going to win. It’s taking claim of your inabilities.”

His girlfriend, Alison Kinney, 30, has proven to be a better speller. An administrator at the New York University School of Law, she has won the bee at Freddy’s more than once. “A lot of recovered high school geek behavior is coming out,” she said. “It’s appealing because it’s a kind of structured way to be with your friends that isn’t just sitting around a bar and talking.”

(It’s not worth repeating the anecdote of the 23-year-old man who decided to settle in Brooklyn because of the Pete’s Candy Store spelling bees, but should you decide to read about it, it’s there.)

Everyone who understands that spelling aptitude directly correlates to sexual prowess knows that the Adult Spelling Bee is a perfect way to reach out to potential mates:

For those in search of romance, the bees are a welcome alternative to happy hours and online dating. Mr. Guiney, a former citywide spelling bee champion in Boston, dated two young women he met at the Williamsburg bee, one of whom is Ms. Dziura. “The whole place is really dark,” he said. “It’s mood lighting. It’s dim and warm, and having just gone through a spelling bee with someone, you have something to talk about. It provides people with an in.”