Movie review and a cool word: ABFJORSU

Ok, I know you didn't come here for a movie recommendation, but I found 'Bad Words' starring (and directed by) Jason Bateman to be pretty hilarious. As a bonus: I discovered a new low probability 8 letter word! It means 'splendid'. Oh and the film is rated R, btw. 

Sneaky second: (5 letter edition) LEFTY

Five letter words are often far along the study list, but the right one can sure get you out of a bind. I didn't know FLYTE, and it would've scored more points and balance my rack better than the play I made. It's an alternate spelling of FLITE, and means 'to quarrel'. 

New Q without U words

Everyone usually learns words like QI, QAT, QADI and QAID pretty quickly when playing competitive scrabble, and with good reason- they get played a lot! The new dictionary has several new additions that will be useful- here are a few you will be most likely to play first: 

CINQ(S) cinque (the number five) 

NIQAB/NIQAAB(S) a veil worn by Muslim women

QIBLA(S) kibla/kiblah the direction Muslims face while praying 

TAJINES+

A word you'll likely see played a bit when the OSPD5 is enacted is TAJINES. The + symbol indicates that it's been added to the new TWL; words that are still only acceptable in CSW- international scrabble lexicon- are indicated with a # I.e. JANTIES#)

Also new to the OSPD5 is TAGINES (alternate spelling and even higher probability)

While JANTIES# isn't in it, JANTY was already in the last version. (Alternate spelling of JAUNTY)

Low Probability Bingo OTD: ACEHKLPR

KREPLACH: dumplings filled with ground meat or cheese (also KREPLECH)

It's plural, so no -S, either. 

Fun front hooks: _RATTLING

Although it didn't come into play this game, it would've been fun to play B(RATTLING) or P(RATTLING), especially given the board placement. Do you have a favorite surprise front hook?

Found Word OTD: ABERTY

Also a sneaky second. Interestingly, BETRAYER has been featured as a sneaky second before as well. 

The best place to learn about OSPD5 errata/ omissions, etc

The folks who run the Seattle Scrabble Club are on top of things. Check this link out for what is probably the best place on the web to find lists of newly added words, which ones are omitted from the OSPD (but are valid in tournament play), etc. 

http://www.seattlescrabble.org/owl3.php

Dear Scrabble app teacher...

I hate you. Sincerely, Jeff

Scrabble, distilled, and different levels of frustration

If I had to break scrabble play down to its essential elements, I think it would end up being these three things: 

1. Knowing the words. 

2. Finding the aforementioned words on your rack. 

3. Finding the best place on the board to play them. 

The first one is easy to amend; you just study more words. If I miss playing a word that I didn't know, well, I can't get too mad at myself. 

Number two is a little trickier. It involves the letters on your rack as well as playing through letters on the board. When I miss seeing a word that I know, because I fail to anagram it, then I get a little mad at myself. 

The last one is the toughest, and for me, can be the most aggravating. Say for example, I have the word CALX among the letters on my rack; but I don see anywhere on the board I can play it. I end up making a subpar play of AX, only to realize that I forgot I could add an X to the end of JIN. Well, 'forgot' is the wrong word. I just missed it. And that makes me really mad at myself. 

EVENTED#

So two times in the past week I've found DEEENTV on my rack- but it's only playable in the international scrabble lexicon (hence the # symbol). There is, however, one 8 letter word you can make in TWL by adding an I. Know it?

Missed bingo OTD: AEISTTU

Sometimes a perfectly normal word will still stump me, either because I keep trying to put one letter in the same spot (S at the end), or because it's just enough out of my probability range as far as studying (two Ts and a U will do that). On the bright side, it wasn't playable. But I knew I was missing something. 

Things I learned at club

1. Remember to double your opening play. Yeah. That happened. (And the game ended up being a tie)

2. INOORZ? contains a bingo. Plus two 8s! Darn it. 

3. PENCE takes an S front hook

Finding front extensions using Zyzzyva

Just one reason why Zyzzyva is so great: say, someone plays WIGS and you're wondering, what could I have put in front of that? Well, by using the @ sign along with a pattern search, Voila! You realize you had PERI on your rack. Darn it. 

Missed Bingo OTD: AAIILNZR

Thanks once a again, FB Scrabble teacher, for making me feel stupid. 

Definition: a red dye.

Back hooks: E and S 

New podcast episode!

With all the excitement of Nationals and the new dictionary, I forgot to mention that there's a new episode out! Find it on iTunes. 

Helpful OSPD5 search

So it looks like Merriam Webster has a feature on this page that allows you to search words that are in the new dictionary! The downside is, you can only use two blanks- but I've already found a few three letter words I'd missed this way. Try it out:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/scrabble/finder/

Found word OTD

I think I actually had this one in an old podcast. 

HALVA, too! 

Find the bingo quiz

Taken from round 25 at the NSC, Joel Sherman holds EINOST? on this turn. There are 25 anagrams but only one that will score across the double-double spot. How long will it take you to find it?

The entire game can be found here: http://event.scrabbleplayers.org/games//nsc2014/25/000.html

NSC 2014

Unless you're living in a hole, you must know that the National Scrabble Championships have been taking place in Buffalo, NY. Well, that, or you're just not a scrabble fan. But if you weren't, you wouldn't be on this page, right? 

Well aside from checking to see how my personal friends are faring, as well as checking to see who is leading Division 1 (gasp! The top seed is currently not even in the top 10- but I wouldn't count him out just yet), my favorite thing to do is to visit the live annotated games. It's great to follow along top players in action, and to see if I can properly guess what their next move will be. 

If you'd like to try it, visit here: http://event.scrabbleplayers.org/games///nsc2014/

I got it!

Now begins the sifting through and highlighting new words of interest. Who's with me? 

New 3 letter scrabble words in the OSPD5/ OWL14

You've all likely heard of the four new 2 letter words: DA, GI, PO and TE- but I haven't seen a list of the new three letter words anywhere. Well fear not, dear readers: I've scrolled through the OSPD and made an attempt to glean all the new 3 letter words. My friend has verified that these are all in the new TWL- some I have had to guess at the definitions.  Thanks to those who have helped add ones I was missing! 

New 3 letter scrabble words:

AJI a type of chili pepper 

CAF a cafeteria or cafe 

CAL small calorie

CUZ a cousin  

DAS plural of da

DEP a convenience store

DOH do

DUM cooked with steam

ECO ecology 

EEW eeew, used to express disgust 

EMO emo rock 

EST a group technique for raising self awareness 

FAH fa

FOO a name for temporary computer files

GIF a computer file 

GIS plural of gi

GRR interj used to express annoyance 

HOM a sacred plant of the ancient Persians 

HOO expresses suprise (interj)

LAH la

LOR variant of lord

LUD a form of address to a judge in a court 

LUN a lee

MAM a mother 

MEH interj boring 

MES ???

MMM mm

MOI me- interj

MUX to transmit several messages simultaneously along a single channel 

NAV navigation

NUG a chunk of wood sawn from a log 

OCH used to express surprise or regret

OIK a very rude or stupid person

OMA grandmother 

OOF interj used to express discomfort 

OPA grandfather 

ORG organization 

OWT anything 

PAK pack

PHO Vietnamese soup

POS plural of po

REZ reservation (area of land)

ROO kangaroo 

RYU school of japanese martial arts

SAN a sanatorium 

SEV an Indian food of deep fried strands of flour 

SEZ ???

SHO former monetary unit of Tibet 

SIG an email signature 

SOC a sociology course

SOH sol

SUS to suss (figure out)

TEC tech 

TES plural of te

TIX tickets

TIZ tizzy 

TUM stomach 

UMS to pause in speaking 

UNI uniform/ university 

VIN French wine

VOG air pollution caused by volcano

XED to mark with an X

YAS an Asian pear

YER ??? (found on naspa website)

YEZ you 

WUZ ???

WALK this way

Recently had a game where WALK was on the board, which made me wonder what front extensions there are for the word. There are 16...

BOARD

CAT

CAKE

CAT

CROSS

DUCK

JAY

MOON

OUT

RACE

ROPE

SHEEP

SIDE

SKY

SLEEP

SPACE

I find SHEEPWALK the most intriguing... It's a apparently what they call a sheep farm. 

Fun words and advice!

The NASPA (North American Scrabble Players Association) group on Facebook has a thread going via the link below- it's for an upcoming article in Time magazine, but the answers are fun to read, as everyone lists their favorite words, as well as a piece of advice! 

https://m.facebook.com/groups/72742393367?view=permalink&id=10153003520868368

Things I learned from a casual game this week

Well, no scrabble club this week, but I did meet up with a friend who is attending Nationals and was looking for extra practice.. 

1) OUTWEAR is good. And it takes and S and a Y! I was skeptical when I played it but decided to take the chance. The Y hook even crossed my mind but seemed even more implausible at the time. 

2) Getting both blanks is good, but if you get them at the same time and can only a play a low scoring bingo (and your opponent bingos twice naturally), then it's not so good. (Luckily this happened to him, not me) 

3) Always play the less common bingo! If the scoring isn't different. TETANOID drew a challenge. Know the anagram?