Blog

Hail Mary

1st Mary Becker went 3-0 +194, notching her first undefeated night in over a year, and was rewarded for her efforts with first place and all the glory associated with it. She started her night off with with a bang, decisively beating Thomas 400-303. She played ROADIES and EXTOLLS (I think EXTOL is the usual spelling but in Scrabble it doesn't matter!) to get her third consecutive win against him. A nice streak to counter the 14 straight he had previously won against her. In the second round she faced Helen, and despite getting out-bingoed 2-1, she won 435-353. Helen's high-scoring bingo pair of FILTERER and FAINTEST was no match for Mary's REVISERS and... presumably some potent power-tile plays? The next round featured a battle of the undefeateds, Mary and Gail, with Mary edging out a close 349-334 win. Her late-game double-blank rack didn't yield any bingos on a closed board (probably because it also had a Q on it), but sometimes the best part about having a blank is that it means your opponent doesn't have it. How's that for profundity? Mary sealed her undefeated night by walking (more like strutting) out the door before the final round.

2nd Thomas Reinke came in second at 3-1 +435, recovering well from his 1-4 performance the previous week. The recovery took a while to get going as he was crushed by Mary in the first round, getting held bingoless. Aaron was the recipient of his misplaced revenge in the next game, as Thomas won 539-316, playing MISBIAS (v. to bias wrongly, tell me, does that make any sense at all?????), INTONATE, and the triple-triple RESTROOM. The bingoing continued in his third-round 504-306 win against Richard, as he got down AGITATES, TITLIST (n. a sports champion, if you're having trouble figuring out the pronunciation), AREOLAR, and EIDOLONS (n. EIDOLON, a phantom, it also pluralizes EIDOLA). For the finale, he faced a familiar (get it? FAMILIAR! hahaha...) opponent in Charles. He started off with a bingo-bongo of RADIANS and RETINOLS, and that was enough to propel him to a 470-359 win. Charles did play the nice EVERYMEN (n. EVERYMAN, a typical or ordinary man) to win word-of-the-week, an award that counts for approximately a thousandth of a real win.

3rd Gail Salm went 3-1 +274, averaged 436 per game, and edged out Charles for third place. Her big game came in the first round, as she beat Dave 537-358, playing RECITED and GREETING. Dave, for his part, did get down two bingos, CLAIMER and REUNITE. After that, she managed to win a close one against Richard, 402-392. She successfully challenged off his attempt of MINIFIER* (n. the opposite of a magnifier), which probably made a big difference in such a tight game. Other difference-makers in that game included her bingo of RAINIER, and her other bingo of UNCAGES. Just like everyone else who played her tonight, Gail lost to Mary, 334-349, but she didn't let that get her down, and she responded with a 470-370 win against Helen. Gail played ENQUIRE, GRAINERS (which drew a challenge from a vocally disbelieving Helen) and LENITES in that game, giving her 8 total bingos for the night, slightly above her average.

Cleanup in Aisle Four

1st Charles Reinke ran away with first place thanks to a perfect 4-0 +380 performance. The beginning of his perfection was a 433-325 win over Mary Becker, wherein he played REDUCES and ARTIEST. Mary later avenged that loss by taking down Thomas Reinke 353-342, but the checkmark in the "W" column of Charles' scoresheet was immutable. Charles followed up that win with his highest score of the night, a 514-347 win against Bryan Benwitz. Charles had four bingos in that contest: PAROLED, MONADES (plural of MONAS, so don't play MONADE), MAHONIAS, and the 122-point word-of-the-week QUOTABLY. A matchup against Lynda Finn was less successful in the "scoring points" department, but was equally successful in the "win the game" department, as Charles prevailed 389-308. Both bingos on the board were high-probability sevens: Charles' DOURINE and Lynda's ATONERS. Charles wrapped up his undefeated evening by duking it out with his brother Thomas in a high-scoring affair that ended 490-466 in Charles' favor. Thomas got down ATONERS (where have we seen that one before?), BANDIEST, and a 113-point PROVERS, but Charles outdid him with four bingos (AROUSED, RELINES, ELONGATE, and MATRIXES).

2nd Bryan Benwitz went 3-1 +195, his one loss appropriately being given to him by the person in first place. However, no amount of later misfortune could dampen Bryan's good mood after he completely pummelled Thomas Reinke in the first round, scoring an astounding 652 (to Thomas' 424). Bryan's 652 is the fourth 600-point game this year, but it's the highest of those, and the players' combined score of 1076 is the second-highest ever since we started keeping track in 2011. Bryan's bingos in that game were BUNTERS, ETIOLATE, MARAUDS, and a 131-point triple-triple of ENTREPOT. Thomas contributed THAIRMS, GASALIER, and UNPILING to the bingo collection. Coincidentally, Gail Salm also had a triple-triple in the first round, playing a 122-point TROLLIES in a winning effort against Helen Flores. The rest of Bryan's night passed without further incident; after the loss to Charles, he defeated Gail Salm 462-331 despite getting outbingoed two to one (ENDORSEE and TAENIAS vs. CASERNES). He then finished up with an anxiety-inducing 380-377 win over Lynda Finn where he got down TANGIEST and RETIRING.

3rd Dave Gilligan averaged 408 per game, sixty higher than his season average, on his way to a 3-1 -26 finish. His nine bingos also tied his highest-ever bingo total in a session. He started off right with a close win over Thomas Reinke, 428-425, and proved the eons-old adage "two bingos are better than one" by getting down ELASTIC and OPEROSE to Thomas' singular REALEST. In the second round, he faced off against the man who would stick him with a negative spread that was never recovered from, Aaron Bader. Their game ended with a final score of 329-503, but Dave did find two bingos of TRITONS and DESALTED to ease the mild discomfort that losing tends to induce (Aaron had PRESONG, OCCURRED, and RAREFIED). Dave resumed his winning ways by holding Helen Flores bingoless in a 421-339 victory spurred by bingos of OUTAGES and STANDER (don't forget the new anagram, DARNEST!). The evening ended on a high note as he got his high game of the night against Gail Salm, 453-390. This time around, he played THREE bingos: INVADER, BUNGEES, and TALLIERS (after a failed attempt at STALLER [it's only STELLAR <nested parentheses are easy to get carried away with>]).

No Snow to Ruin Our Fun On This Night

1st Aaron Bader cruised through his allotted four games of Scrabble, winning them all and ending up with a 4-0 +306 record. He came out 37 points ahead in a high-scoring game with Lynda, the final being 453-416. He played RECORDS and ACADEMY in that one, but let Lynda get away with the not-even-good-in-Collins BRIDGERS* (n. one that bridges, not that unreasonable in my opinion). ABRIDGER is acceptable, which makes way less sense. In the second round, he upped his point total by 1 point, scoring 454 against Dave, with bingos were PROSIER, KETAMINE, and RELEASE. Remember that last one, because it's going to come up later. After beating Dave, he faced Thomas, and won a close one, 402-378, playing... RELEASE! Wow! Twice in a row! Hopefully he put an E on it for the odd-looking RELEASEE in at least one of the cases. To cap off his perfect night, he held Bryan bingoless in the final round, winning 439-341. The win marks 8 straight for him against that particular opponent; Bryan can probably look forward to better luck in other areas of his life given his unluckiness in this area. If you win the lottery, Bryan, don't forget to make a generous donation to the club!

2nd Gail Salm bingoed 11 times on the night, and was rewarded for her rack-clearing skills with a 3-1 +208 record. She outbingoed her first opponent, Charles, 2-to-1, but lost 358-412. What's the point of holding the reigning club champion to only one bingo if he's just going to win anyway? Things got better for her in the second game, as she beat Lynda 491-363. Lynda was facing two opponents in that round, but even her full attention wouldn't have stopped Gail from dropping four bingos on her: RANCOUR, LIONIZER, BLOATERS, and SALTIRE (n. a heraldic design, often called St. Andrew's Cross, also SALTIER, SAUTOIR, or SAUTOIRE). Against Betty, she bingoed three more times, with SOLVERS, PILSNER, and ROOMIES, to win 404-348. Betty herself didn't bingo, but she must have been doing some other things to keep the score that close. In the final round, she faced the similarly 2-1 Dave in a battle to see who would get the coveted "paragraph in the writeup" award. Gail's desire for the paragraph led her to a 428-350 victory, and now the award is being presented.

3rd Lynda Finn went 3-2 +139, her two losses coming to the first and second place finishers of the night. After her opening loss to Aaron, 416-453, she faced Helen and Gail in a two-on-one. One of the games was, I would guess, more enjoyable for her, and it was probably the one where she won by 150 points, while playing COGNIZE and NOONTIDE. In the third round, she faced the still-stunned-from-a-club-cancelling-amount-of-snow Richard, and won 441-376. She played LETTERER (RELETTER is also good), MARTINET, and SLEEVING in that game. All this led to a final-round game against Thomas, which she won decisively, 471-385. Thomas played ANNULOSE and TEASELS, while Lynda played BARMIEST and SLEAVED, the second of which drew a challenge from her doubtful/sad/confused/hurt opponent. Any reasonable person would know that SLEAVE means "to separate into filaments" and would definitely take the D. Lynda is now 5-5 in her last 10 against Thomas, slowly coming back from a rough start in their overall head-to-head matchup.

Helen played the word-of-the-week, SAVARIN. After much disagreement and deliberation, it was determined that it means "a yeast cake baked in a ring mold". Helen even claims that she made one, once upon a time. I'm looking at pictures of them right and they look pretty good now, to be honest.