Saturday, September 20, 2008

Huntington results for September 20, 2008

Posted by Brad Mills
Just like two weeks ago, six brave souls came to Java Joint for the Huntington Scrabble club meeting on Saturday. Here are the results.

Brad Mills 3-0, +253
Martha Mills 3-0, +215
Rafael Barker 2-1, +106
Shelley Schiavone 1-2, -78
Rob Stanton 0-3, -151
Brad Smith 0-3, -345

The bingo roll was as follows:

Brad Mills: LOWERED (80), INTRANET (77), TASTIER (73), WIRIEST (69), INTERNS (66)
Martha Mills: MOTORING (80), SPORADIC (76), EERIEST (68), RETAINED (61), SHEETING (60)
Rafael Barker: ROOFERS (88), EQUATOR (88)
Rob Stanton: ORBITER (64), LOUSIER (62)
Brad Smith: SHINTER* (72) - note, HINTERS is valid here
Shelley Schiavone: SOAPING (66)

A few notes... I opened with LOWERED at 8B to capitalize on the W hitting the double letter square, knowing it could easily be hooked with an F or a G on the triple word and hoping I'd get that opportunity. Brad Smith saw this as well, but he apparently didn't know the G hook, as he played a G elsewhere. I pressed on, playing fairly long words to maximize turnover in an attempt to get one of the remaining letters for the hook, but no luck. After a few more turns, Brad Smith picked it up with FLOWERED and FRY for 72 points.

We were entertained (?) throughout the meeting by a gentleman who was clearly quite intoxicated. He kibbitzed our plays and the games in general, mostly with comments like, "Damn, you guys are too serious," and, "I can't even fucking spell. What's that word mean?" He'd convinced himself that Shelley had become angry with him at some point and spent the rest of his time with us apologizing to her and trying to make nice. Drunk people are funny.

(Edit: Just want to clarify that this gentleman's drunken stupor did not occur at Java Joint. He was inebriated when he arrived.)

Martha had RESITES and was convinced there was a bingo in those letters, but couldn't find it. Oddly enough, the only bingo in those letters is - well, RESITES. Having two Ss at once can be a curse at times, a plethora of goodness.

Having phonied YEHU* to squeak out a win against Rob at our last meeting, he didn't quite trust my play of ENOW this time and challenged the word. Shelley, who is an English professor, advised him he should read more Shakespeare. (ENOW is a Middle English variant of enough.)

I also noticed Rob has redesigned my score sheet a bit, mixing my letter tracking chart with a tally sheet of his own design - a "large print edition," as he called it. Just yesterday, I rereleased my score sheets with a Creative Commons license so people can feel free to mix them up in any way they see fit. I suspect Rob's remix was coincidental and not directly related to my relicensing, but I found it interesting nonetheless.

Club tournament... two weeks. Be there!

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Huntington results for September 6, 2008

Posted by Brad Mills
Six people came out to Java Joint for the Huntington Scrabble club meeting held on Saturday. Here are the results....

Brad Mills 3-0, +172
Rob Stanton 2-1, +177
Shelley Schiavone 2-1, -18
Leah Gingerich 1-2, +9
Tina Totten King 1-2, -57
Mark Gingerich 0-3, -283

Bingos played were:

Tina Totten King: OUTDOES (70), FOLIAGE (63), RADIONS* (68), SCARIEST (86)
Brad Mills: ENTAILS (64), RECODES (79), LINTERS (63)
Rob Stanton: TRAUMAS (86), MOONING (78)
Leah Gingerich: STATION (68), RAINING (71)
Shelley Schiavone: QUIVERS (100)

Shelley was quite pleased with her QUIVERS bingo, as you can probably see by the picture above. She wanted to make sure it got a mention here, so not only am I going to mention it, I'll include a picture of the board it was played on.

I missed a fantastic out play in my game against Leah. It was one of those "There's my play, hit the clock, damn, I missed a bingo" situations. The board and position is shown below. Leah held AGIINR?, so she had several choices to go out - all using an -ING hook onto RAN to make GRAN - and she found one with ease. I had a significant lead at the end, so while Leah's play gave her some spread points, I still got the win.

My rack was AABELTU, and I ended up making BEL at C13. Can you find the play I should have made instead?

Monday, September 1, 2008

Pontiac, Michigan results

Posted by Brad Mills
Breaking news... Tina went 7-13, -711 in the Pontiac, Michigan tournament held this holiday weekend. She finished in 8th place (one spot above her seed) and gained 60 rating points. Quite a healthy bump!

I have no doubt she'll have her own post about this with more complete commentary.