I practice naming the fifty states as fast as I can on days when I feel like I've gone too far into Canadian mental territory. I can usually nail 47-49 states without a map in front of me in less than five minutes (there's a lot of 'wait, wait, I already said that' among the M states and the I states).
I did it twice though, because the first time I kept spelling things wrong, and that took up time, and I couldn't remember Mississippi. (and then I attempted the English Counties one.)
This reminds me of a Friends episode where Chandler tells them a game where you have to write down all 50 states in 2 minutes or something and Ross thinks that's too easy, and spends the rest of the episode not being able to do it.
4m 41s
(http://quizzes-online.com/map/fiftystates.html)
Click here to try the quiz. (http://quizzes-online.com/map/fiftystates.html)
It seems like mostly a challenge in typing fast and being able to spell? The hard part for me was that I couldn't remember how to spell Massachusetts and temporarily blanked on the name of that state in between Louisiana and Alabama.
1:31 on this attempt, wide awake and using my ergonomic keyboard. I got faster when I realized that a) it doesn't demand that you press enter - as soon as you spell the state correctly, it moves on - and b) it cares about spelling, but not about capitalization.
I also do it geographically, rather than alphabetically - start with Maine, work my way down the eastern seaboard, up through the "near midwest" (=from Ohio to the Mississippi river), Minnesota on down to Texas, back up to the Dakotas, then the western plains states, down through the southwest and up the pacific coast, then Alaska and Hawaii to finish.
The Europe and Asia ones were harder (I couldn't spell Liechtenstein, or remember Uzbekistan or Qatar), and I was completely hopeless at Counties of England without cheating with "View Source".
Wow, I got down to the last five and had to cheat. I am aware that they exist, but I'll be fucked if I can tell most of the midwest apart, and I never learned them via any catchy songs or anything.
It was Mississippi that got me. I was looking at it, then meandering over the map looking for other blank spots, got Maryland and Delaware, saw that there were still two remaining, finally noticed Massachusetts, and then spent a good twenty seconds just trying to remember Mississippi.
Me - 1m 56s. But I'm NOT resident of U.S.A.
Date: 2007-10-16 04:54 pm (UTC)Re: Me - 1m 56s. But I'm NOT resident of U.S.A.
Date: 2007-10-16 04:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 04:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 05:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 05:11 pm (UTC)This reminds me of a Friends episode where Chandler tells them a game where you have to write down all 50 states in 2 minutes or something and Ross thinks that's too easy, and spends the rest of the episode not being able to do it.
Click here to try the quiz. (http://quizzes-online.com/map/fiftystates.html)
no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 05:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 06:57 pm (UTC)I also do it geographically, rather than alphabetically - start with Maine, work my way down the eastern seaboard, up through the "near midwest" (=from Ohio to the Mississippi river), Minnesota on down to Texas, back up to the Dakotas, then the western plains states, down through the southwest and up the pacific coast, then Alaska and Hawaii to finish.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 07:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 07:33 pm (UTC)The Europe and Asia ones were harder (I couldn't spell Liechtenstein, or remember Uzbekistan or Qatar), and I was completely hopeless at Counties of England without cheating with "View Source".
no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 07:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 04:08 am (UTC)It was Mississippi that got me. I was looking at it, then meandering over the map looking for other blank spots, got Maryland and Delaware, saw that there were still two remaining, finally noticed Massachusetts, and then spent a good twenty seconds just trying to remember Mississippi.