Tuesday, May 02, 2006

What's embarrassing for me about the hundred word game is how easy it is to play it.

The game is to take an English dictionary and write down a hundred words with their definitions that I don't know the word or it's a word I know that has a whole other definition I never heard of.

I write down the word and the shortest possible definition to help me remember, as I'm a zillion time more likely to remember things I write down.

I don't write down things like Latin words for medical conditions or plants, but rather real words (what I call real words) that I might possibly read or write.

It is so easy to find a hundred words I don't know. I blush at how easy it is.

It's easy to again and again find a hundred words I don't know.

It feels more useful to play the game with a smaller, college-size dictionary because it makes it more likely that I might run across the words again.

Learn words and humility in one. Not bad.

It's not like I remember all hundred words, but some stick and then when I read them, I know what they mean, instead of making a guess fuzzy or wrong, and instead of skipping them without thinking about it.