Scrabble and me

"Scrabble tricks smart people into thinking they should play the biggest words, instead of looking for the most points." -pearatty

I was not always the nationally ranked Scrabble professional that I am now. In fact, here is the first publicly available picture of my early Scrabble play:



Now, I did win this game, like I won all my Scrabble games in those days. Threw a tantrum until it was declared that whoever had the least points was the winner.

Or as Rick so kindly wrote:

For those of you who are interested, according to Dawn a “jif” is a “hurry”; “bonrelaxer” is “a very good relaxer”; and “zariy” is an adjective that refers to something that makes the Baby Jesus cry (for example, the word “bonrelaxer"). Apparently, “Zariy” is also a popular name in the world of pre-pubescent cartoon fan-fiction. I have no idea what a “codet” is, but I think it was featured in the DaVinci Code.

Needless to say Dawn won (as per our prior agreement), and a good time was had by all.

We can’t wait to have Dawn back, and I only hope that the next time she comes out this way she won’t be lured by strangers with Bavarian candy. After all, the doors on a Bimmer all open the same way.


** I meant “OK, we’ll play”. Dawn heard, “OK, you’ll win”.

I miss people blogging about me. I would probably have at least three less blogs if other people would pick up the slack.

Anyway, Scrabble. Yeah, so I was a creative Scrabble back then...I'm still a creative Scrabble player now (ahem: sinulae), but you know what I mean, I had no idea what I was doing then, as opposed to knowing now, just not doing it. But I hated losing and playing would always frustrate me. Even as I started to play more frequently this past Winter, if I'd have a sucky night of crap tiles and brain freeze, I'd want to throw things. Leading to the infamous "I'm never going to let you win, Dawn, so if you can't deal with losing, maybe we shouldn't play," night of a hundred lost dollars and a million broken dreams.

I thought of those days on Sunday night, when a few friends were over to play and one guy was pretty much talking to himself after he hung a T and I opened with the bingo toothier through it. Then when he played har and I challenged it, he totally lost it -- first refusing to honor the challenge and choosing new letters anyway, then knocking the tiles off the board when (I assume) his new tiles were equally sucky.



And then he in turn, blamed me for challenging such a low point play, just because I could and then Scrabble for its arbitrariness in what are words. Non: No. Hae: Yes.

I see that look in the eyes of a lot of the people I play live now, except for Alceste's, because he is dead inside, and I know that look stares back at the many of the people I play with at the club. Stupid Old Fischwoman. The combination of dammit, if that u was just an e, I would...or if that damn c wasn't in the way, I could! And ultimately, I think that's what ends up separating the casual livingroom player from the people that end up becoming really good players. One doesn't care that they've used an blank and opened up a triple line for a mere 14 points, the other one will smash your face in, if you block the spot for him to play the j on the TLS going two ways.