Dangnabit

I went 2-2 tonight at Scrabble club. And if I just sucked a little less, I could have gone 4-0. The two games I lost were by a combined less than twenty points. I have really got to learn some five letter words. Oh and hooks for things. If I knew what went after Haen or Hame I would have been rolling in victories. Oh, crazy words I learned today: Ginep and brith. Yeah, not birth - brith. Fortunately, both were in this game against this guy who I used to beat all the time before my stupid six month hiatus and now he plays the insanest words just to get me to challenge. But I don't cause I know he wants me to. Although, he bingoed on me with renoted and I should have challenged because it's no good. I bingoed on him THREE TIMES and ended up losing by the stupid tiles on my rack. Stupid c. Arrgh. Oh, but one of my victories was against a woman I have never beaten before. Apparently she found out her aunt died during the tournament and had a bad night. Now, before you judge me, as I sat down across from her she was "oh, good! I'm playing you." And she broke into a huge grin. And then when I beat her, and by a lot, it was all "Dead aunt." My other victory was against a young woman from Korea who just didn't know how to play. She played toast using an s and a blank for ten points. Dude. So I basically played all manner of phonies and try to run up the score against her to protect against the dreaded negative spread. There's a tournament in Queens this Sunday. I may play in it...at least it'll motivate me to study for the next two days.

HAHAHA

I will confess that the two times I had to play "dirty words" (cunt, titties) I counted the points up before I did it, cringed, put them down really fast, closed my eyes and drew new tiles superfast.

via petitedov

How to play the game

Woody, a guy at my Scrabble club, played "assholes" on a triple/triple! He scored like a bagillion points and won the "lipstick on a pig" award for word that most reminds Joel (our club director) of Sarah Palin.
It was my first time back at the club, it's such a different place than the one I left in April. I managed my usual 2-2 record...although I beat a woman I have NEVER beaten before and got beat by a guy I always used to beat. What's that phrase about winning some and losing some? I learned a bunch of new words: kiva, odin, curr. Don't ask me what they mean, although in the case of "curr," it means you challenge and then he comes back at you with "colinear" on the triple word score, which you also challenge, only to find out that his "last girlfriend was named Caroline." Dammit.
I bingoed with gestate though, which was a cool non-blank using find. I also played salined and got away with it! (Only real bingoes in the rack are denials and snailed.) I'm gearing up for my next tournament in a couple of weeks...I need my rating to go up by twenty points, so we're back in insane practicing mode. The other thing I'm trying to do is less fishing and more five letter word playing...unfortunately I don't know that many fives, but I found prawn today with the p on the triple word square and the w on the double letter, for a boatload of points. I also played quins twice on a double word score with the q on a oduble letter...so that's progress.

On the inside

I finally got an invite to the private monthly Scrabble tournaments! I had been hearing rumors about this game for about a year. It’s held in a posh UES apartment with posh people…one woman is Colin Powell’s cousin! I was far and away the worst player there…although, now that I know that I am exactly the 132nd best Scrabble player in New York, there was one woman ranked below me. My first game was against this jerky brash dude. He likes to needle and mind game you into making bad challenges/letting phonies go. I mostly try to ignore his antics and play my own game…a strategy which was working. I bingoed on him twice early and ignored a lot of words I know he was playing just to bait me…I wish I had taken a picture, so I could remember them. It was all going swimmingly until he played doux for 52 points, with the x on some power square going two ways. Now, I had recently studied all the short x words and I just couldn’t remember ever seeing it. Never. The guy was also really quiet instead of his usual “blah blah blah blahing” when he knows he’s played a valid word, so after about a minute I challenged. It was good. But he wasn’t sure about it, which is why he was quiet. I lost my turn and the sad part is that I could have played through his x on the triple word score line with “roux.” Anyway, I came back to play your under his fur to hit the other triple word square, with the y on the double letter square going three ways, so I made back some ground. But then I hit three racks in a row with no vowels (I played Brrr…tried to play cwm…”) but nothing materialized and I lost the game by 12 points. He said that he had a rack of all vowels he ended up playing animi through the m I was looking at for my cwm. Oh, I bingoed with megatons--- that was a cool find. Anyway, one loss.
I then played a woman that crushed me and sent me home to mama during the Big Apple tournament. It was a very close game. We were playing a lot of tightly packed three and four letter words and the board was very closed down. I ended up bingoing with aidless (fast becoming my favorite Scrabble stem…the words are so crazy, that they mostly get challenged every time.) The both of us were having terrible clock management problems and as we dumped off our last tiles, she maybe had 20 seconds left with four tiles, I had like a minute. So I just kept playing off tiles as fast as I could without much attention to points, hoping to get her to go over. Sure enough, she went over by 1 second. And I managed to win the game by nine points thanks to her ten point penalty!
I also won my next game. This woman was brutal with fives and sixes. She didn’t bingo once, but she would play like “seizes with the z on a double letter and then hitting the triple word box to make me cry. I thought I was going to lose, EVEN THOUGH I BINGOED THREE TIMES, that’s how good she was, but instead, I managed a one point victory because I went out before her and got the two points for her last tile! Whew.
I also won my next game against the host. She is super competitive and it’s her house, so I tried to be on my best behavior while playing her…even though her oft-times nasty comments made that difficult at times. But whatever, I sooth my pride with the knowledge that I won.
I dropped by last two games in bad crushing fashion. I mean hundreds of points, giving up midgame, not even keeping score anymore crushing. But, I finished with a winning record, albeit a negative spread, so hopefully I’ll be invited back.

My rating went up!

I'm almost at a 1000. Woot.

Not so random question (Dawn)

I have played in four Scrabble tournaments over eight days, why do they choose the one day I have overslept and show up to the game looking like crap to take my official NSA photo?

The End

First off, hahahahaha. Hi, Karol. HAHHAAHHA.

Today was the last day of the tournament and I learned a new lesson that is not often imparted to new Scrabble tournament players. Here is that lesson: You cannot win a game if you are sleeping. Literally. Game one of day three started at 9:30. I opened my eyes in my bed in Brooklyn and the clock said 9:41. Well, it actually probably said 10:02, but that’s because all my clocks are fast by some arbitrary number so I freak myself out by 1) having to do math and 2) thinking I’m late. Sadly, no amount of subtraction was going to make me not late today. I pulled on jeans, brushed my teeth and ran to my car. I then made it from Brooklyn to Manhattan is seven minutes, for some idea on how fast I was going…well…fast. Anyway, by the time I made it to the Midtown loft where the games were being held, the director told me I missed my match by 1 minute and they had to call it a forfeit. I was sad, but didn't fight, it was totally my fault. I played the beneficiary of my exhaustion in a fifteen minute game for "fun," before my next match. She seemed easily flustered and I probably could have beaten her...made all the more painful by the fact that I did beat my next three opponents, for a final record of 9-6. I think I came in seventh or eighth. My ranking should probably hold though, which was my biggest concern going into this tournament as unprepared as I was. Unfortunately, I didn't do my rating any favors...which leads me now to my latest obsession with playing the Lake George tournament at the end of October...if only I could guarantee that I would study...