Sunday, February 15, 2009

Lunch is my kryptonite

I dropped two games after lunch yesterday.
I dropped two games after lunch today.
One of those was totally fucking Barbara Epstein's fault. She likes to walk around telling everyone about the crazy bingoes she has learned. One day she comes around saying she played "murrine" And then she adds "and it doesn't take an ess. But there's another word murine, that does take an ess for murines." She has a very distinctive voice so I usually hear her and remember. So I'm playing this guy I beat yesterday (Nancy Pelosi eyes) and we have a sick opening sequence. I get the ex going two ways on a DLS, he comes back with the zee two ways on DLS (damn zax) I come right back with the j going two ways on TLS, with jo/jet he comes back with a bingo mureins with the blank as an ess.
I hold the play.
Mureins makes jetes, I count the squares and figure out that murines wouldn't have fit. So I decide he knows murines, assumes I don't and figures he can BS me with this play.
Challenge.
Nope, mureins is a fracking anagram. I lose a turn, he plays through his n and makes knob with the k on DLS and b on the TWS. Fuuuucckkk. ALL stupid Barbara's FAULT!!!! And her incomplete information.
I battled him hard, bingoed through his b on the triple with blasters using the blank as an ess...but it wasn't enough. I lost.
I lost to the top seed too. This guy plays twice as fast as I do...and you all know how fast I play. I think we finished our whole game in 12 minutes. He basically did to me what I did to Michael B. I would bingo, but then he'd take the power squares with the powertiles and make me cry.
I did manage to beat this other woman, who I beat yesterday in her worst beating of the tournament. I drew a natural bingo to open the game "triaged" Then I bingoed again with something else that I can't remember. I saw she fishing, so I looked at the score and decided to shutdown the board. Wouldn't you know as soon as I stuck vees and cees in all sorts of nasty places, I drew the blank and satire. Dammit!!! So I won, but it was a squeaker and made me question the strategy of shutting down the board early in a game even when I'm ahead. I know that in those situations I should make my opponents work to get open lanes to catch up to me, but I'm pretty good at finding 7 letter words, so maybe I need to trust that (tiles permitting) I'll be able to outbingo them. I dunno.
My last game matched me with the top seed AGAIN!! Ugh.
I was nervous because a loss to him would knock me out of contention and he was good. But what I learned after looking up words from the first game I played with him is that he plays phonies "cofit" my ass. But he also knows weird words "gutty" so I decided to pay much more attention to his body language. This served me well. I mean, I also drew like a girl with a horseshoe up her bum. I drew ?eniorm out of the bag to start the game. He was supposed to go first, but exchanged four. I bingoed with merinos (blank was ess). He then played sage on top, I bingo again with cristae/sager. Then he played punko/pid, hit his clock and reached for the tiles sooo fast! "Hold!" I obviously didn't know punko, but I forshizzle knew pid was garbage. I challenged it off. I made a mistake and played "up" next, he put down punk hanging right over a DWS. (Doofus! You saw his pee! Why give him up!!!) I thought he might have the y or an ess, so I tried to block by playing avo. Didn't work he played an a and an o making punka/avo. For 45 points. I held the play and watched him. I figured punko/punka must be good...otherwise why play it twice...THEN I saw the sickest play! Next to Ka and above the o in avo was a DLS I had a y, so I could get some points that way...I looked at my rack and saw I also had a dee and an aitch, so I could make YODH with the Aitch hitting the TRIPLE WORD Square!!! With the y on the DLS, aitch on the TWS, plus the y two ways for Kay, I came back with a 63 point play!!! (I owe my knowledge of yodh to Adam, who taught it to me painfully in Albany. Cry!)


Anyway, he just couldn't do anything after that. I bingoed again and that was all she wrote. I beat him by 146.
I checked the tournament blog last night and it said that guy was in second...but when I made an inquiry, the director realized he had inverted our scores. So I'm in second, leader is Nancy Pelosi eyes by one game and we have five games tomorrow...
Wish me luck! And if you leave comments I'll tell you all about how I beat three experts tonight in the Nite Bird "open" tournament and won the performance prize by coming in 6th out of 24, when I was seeded 21st. Ah, who am I kidding, I'll tell y'all anyway, just not now. Now I must sleep because I have five games to win tomorrow and I don't know aiders plus c.

6 comments:

Adam said...

Awesome going Dawn!!!!
More posts...please

Dawn Summers said...

Thanks!

Adam said...

in your upcoming game take your time, find the RIGHT play.

WAY TO GO DAWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dawn Summers said...

I hate Scrabble. I blame Nancy!

Adam said...

are you SURE yodh was 63 points?
i count 58 points?!

Adam said...

oops 62 points