Visual Thesaurus spelling bee

I'm usually not much for word games for some reason, but I might have a new addiction: Visual Thesaurus has an on-line spelling bee, here. Ben Zimmer — now executive producer for VT — alerted me to this a few days ago and I finally stole a minute yesterday to try it.

Part of the deal is that it automatically adjusts to your spelling ability. This morning, I just played it some and found that it adjusted up pretty quick — to the point that I didn't have to really try to make an error. I was typing as quick as I could, and completely blew cerumen 'ear wax'. It has to start with a 'c' (Latin cera 'wax'), but I just automatically tried 's'. Pretty fun, and free to play.



The actual Visual Thesaurus itself is obviously a serious tool, and I hope to post on that after I have explored it in more depth. Probably just as addictive. And on a Sunday morning, it beats fretting over Safire!