Larynx vs Larnyx

This morning I stopped by the kids' school to watch the school Spelling Bee.  Emma was a contender.  If Abby hadn't been sick, she would've been too, but she had to stay home.

Anyway, I got there and poor Emma, who struggles with spelling in the first place, was given the word

Preferable

She asked for the word in a sentence and proceeded to spell.  Unfortunately, the bell dinged for her and she had to sit in the audience because she didn't get it right.

Ah, the memories!!

I was in the school Spelling Bee in 5th grade.  I won our class spelling bee and when the top few of us reported for the school's bee, one boy in my class came up to me and told me that HE was going to kick my behind when HE won.  Since he was a big jerk, I silently rooted against him.  Hey, not only was I 11, but he was always mean to me (one of the kids that called me names because of my birthmark).  I tried not to smirk when he misspelled one of his words.  (I still smirk at the memory.)

I spelled a few words right but then I got the word "Larynx".  The presenter said the word and I repeated it.  She said to me, "No.  Larynx."  I repeated it again and again she told me that I pronounced it incorrectly.  So then I tried to pronounce it larnyx.  Again, I was told I said it wrong.  What the heck?  I was pretty sure I knew how to spell it, but all this argument was confusing me.

Needless to say, I spelled the stupid word wrong.  Every so often I have the tendency to drawl words.  Maybe I did it that day and that's why the lady was convinced that I was saying the word wrong.  But seriously!  How many ways are there to say it???

So, my hopes of winning the school Spelling Bee were crushed.  And so were Emma's.  I did find it funny, however, when she smirked when she told me that Landon (the "smartest" boy in her class) got third place instead of first. 

Like mother, like daughter.