TWITTERY

Uh, yeah, I'm on twitter.

Not sure if I'll do much with it, but you can follow @scrabblepodcast if you'd like to find out.

Interestingly, 'TWITTERY' is defined as 'nervously agitated' on Zyzzyva.

Less posts...

Hey there readers, you may have noticed that I've been posting less here on the blog. Well, that's because often I don't have the time to sit down and type out a well-thought-out, provocative post, like this one. Well, fear not! I've been posting much more often (in a still just slightly less-thought-out, provocative manner) on the

Facebook Fan page. 

Sign up today!

Not sure how I managed this, but...

I just scored 671 points (686 with tourney rules) in a Facebook game, without a triple-triple.

I know, it doesn't really count since it was played online,  over a number of weeks, but still pretty cool.

Not shown in the screen grab are YAUPERS for 110 and SPARiNG for 83.

Ironically I almost tried MITTING* before realizing there was an O left sitting on my rack...

ALLOOTX

Just posted this as a 'quiz' on the Facebook Fan page. Though I didn't give the anagram there, just the pic and the fact that this is a 'famous' scrabble word....

WUU

On the way down to my parents house for Easter today, I noticed a license plate with WUU on it, in that order. Don't know if you've ever heard of the 'license plate word game', but it goes like this: you have to think of a word that uses the 3 letters listed, and contains them in that order. I doubted there was a word that met those conditions, but I was wrong.

The longer one, WELTANSCHAUUNG(S) is defined as 'a comprehensive conception or image of the universe and of humanity's relation to it' - it's German, of course, and also useless as any kind of scrabble play.

The other one, however is a five letter word that I've never seen and could be useful in getting rid of a couple U's. Know it?

HAYMARKET minus T or Y

At my favorite cafe here in Northampton, MA, where I deliver the mail....Haymarket Cafe.

Just realized that there are two sevens in there.

A scrabble product that even my wife likes...

Public Service Announcement

There was much talk in the competitive scrabble world about
this game
and I thought it my duty to share it with you all. The skill and luck needed to make this happen are pretty astronomical, so check it out.

Tournament...

I realize a lot of the people who read this blog are only casual players- and to you I say, "try playing competitively! It's lots of fun, and completely addictive!"

Even if you don't have a casual club or slightly more serious NASPA sanctioned club nearby, you can still play online, live, with  someone from somewhere around the world. I really think that playing with a time clock and the possibility of phonies adds a dimension to the game that is a lot more fun than just playing on Facebook in your spare time. (Though I do that, too.)

But back to the title- I played in a tournament this weekend, which was a lot of fun. (One more, link- you can see a list of upcoming tournaments here.) The interesting thing about playing in tournaments is that you tend to remember your mistakes a lot more vividly.

So if I had to list the top highlight and lowlight of this tournament, they would be as follows:

Lowlight:
Challenged RUTILES (lustier, ruliest) in my first game, which is a pretty high probability bingo that I somehow didn't know. I was most likely going to lose the game anyways, but losing my turn caused my opponent to beat me by even more, which put a stain on my record for the rest of the tournament. (I finished 3rd out of 6, with a 4-2 record and a spread of -59. The 2nd place person was also 4-2 but had a positive spread.)

Highlight:
I didn't have any particular stellar play that stood out, but I felt like I played well in general, and a lot of the words I've studied/ learned over that last couple of years came in handy. I felt like I had an edge over most of the players as far as word knowledge (apart from the blunder above), and I hope to continue the trend next time.

Flashcard Follies

An unfortunate side effect of making your own flashcards (other than arousing jealousy amongst any passersby who see you studying them) is that you may occasionally botch one. I've had a few such incidents over the past few years, one which I chronicled here. That was the only time I managed to create a phony flashcard, though, as far as I know-  however, on a few occasions I've written one up and only later realized that I left off one of the words (almost always the more common one).
With that in mind, can you guess which word I left off the back of the FGHILNUS card?

Today's Etymology Lesson

So I hail from a middle class CT family where birdwatching is a traditional activity I grew up with (which has helped me find words such as EIDER and AVOCET), so naturally I (and my parents) want my kids to follow in my footsteps. While looking in a bird book my son got for Christmas, I noticed the Latin name for certain wrens, of the genus Troglodyte. 'Troglodyte?', I thought, 'I thought that was an insult?' It is- troglodyte means 'cave-dweller', and usually it's used to insult someone, on the same level as calling them a 'frickin' Neanderthal', as one of my friends would put it. So how is a genus of birds called this, you ask? Well, courtesy of wikipedia, here you are:
Etymology: Ancient Greek τρωγλοδύτες "cave-dwellers", from trogle (τρώγλη) "hole" + dyein (δυειν) "to enter". In reference to the tendency of these wrens to enter small crevices as they search for food.


Oh, and also, TROG means 'hooligan', according to Zyzzyva. Interestingly, it's anagram is GROT, which is a grotto, or cave.

Almost awesome.

My brother, cousin and I have an inside joke we use when we play disc golf and a shot goes nearly perfect- we say "that was almost awesome". Of course, often in disc golf, the difference between an awesome shot and an almost awesome one is the presence of a large tree.

Picture this: one of us launches a flying disc into the air, it soars in a perfect arc, heading directly towards the target... until CLUNK it slams in a large branch and drops straight to the earth. One of us dryly states, "that was almost awesome."  This reminds me a lot of scrabble.

How often do you have that near-perfect rack for a bingo, where you think to yourself 'if only that (insert letter here) was a (insert letter here), I'd be able to play (insert ultra-low probability word here)!' Now part of this, of course, is just the discipline of seeing possible plays, and is bound to happen. 

Along these lines, I thought I would take a play from club last night where I would have had such a play if my rack was one letter different. Except in the magical world of annotated games, I decided to actually give myself the correct rack. See if you can find the play here.

And while your at it, feel free to add your own almost awesome tales.

CANCUN + ??

Well since there's no 7s from CANCUN, I had to make this an 8 letter quiz. There's only one answer.

I'll be posting a few Mexico-trip-related words over the next day or two.

Pronounced with a Swedish accent, I believe, but still cool...

Scrabble sighting... at a wedding

My brother is a wedding photographer, so of course he had to share this shot with me:



Nice! Apparently, the game is a common interest between the bride and groom.

If you're near CT and want an awesome photographer, check my brother out here.

If scrabble had a superheroine:

Her name might be:


Yup, delivered a letter to this person today. I've seen her name before, but never had my camera phone on me. I wonder if she knows that her last name is 'famous' in the scrabble world? I'm sure if I stopped her on the street and started babbling about it, she'd think I was really cool.

The other half of my dashboard

Some of you may have seen the scrabble rack near the center of my dash in previous posts... I thought I'd post this shot showing my flashcard storage area. (Notice my son's 'scrabble cards' label underneath) I also may use this post when people question a word I play on Facebook scrabble. I'll say, 'it's somewhere in that pile.'

Happy Birthday Zaiah!

My youngest daughter turned three today. In her honor, I'm posting all the ZAI- words good in TWL scrabble:

ZAIBATSU
ZAIKAI(S)
ZAIRE(S)

And I thought to myself...

...As I tripped up the last step in a set of stairs today..."How many ways are there to spell DOOZIE?"

Only three.

DOOZER
DOOZIE
DOOZY

ANTISCHISM*

 

I saw this punk band name on a kid's t-shirt today...
                                            So of course, my first thought was, 'Is that good?'

It's not. But there is an anagram....