Won 2nd Prize
Fun one-day tournament experience yesterday. Pretty good concentration the whole tournament.
Brought juggling balls so I could juggle between rounds, which I did a couple times.
Sleepy because the night before the tournament I'd felt a lot of nervousness and anticipation. I think this is a good sign - other recent tournaments I didn't feel the same edge, and did much worse. I wish I could organize my preparation better though.
So I got up 15 minutes before the alarm went off. Got ready and waited at home for a while. Put the TV on and there was a funny show of seven adults acting wacky and singing the Old McDonald song. Clap-Clap-N-G-O, Clap-Clap-NGO, Clap-Clap-NGO, and Bingo was his name-O! So the claps can be seen as blanks!
I realized sometimes I use too much time between rounds. I'm the slowest player, especially this tournament since almost all my games were close. So I tried a timer app on my phone. I set it for 5 minutes, and it didn't go off, but then right before the following game it went off. Apparently it has some flaw where it doesn't understand DST.
I almost came in first.
Pat Barrett beat me twice.
The first time mostly because I was too silly to challenge a 3x3 phony "boracins" which is a nice hybrid of some valid bingoes that I know like FOLACINS, BRUCINES, BORACITE. My first reaction was to say "Nice play!" and after that I didn't feel right challenging it. This was result of my being somewhat too sleepy, and also more sociable than necessary. It was 149.
It seems like I could use a coach. I am writing this after having read an article about the Butler basketball team. I am having a good feeling about their success in the March Madness since I grew up near to that campus.
http://tourney.si.com/2011/03/27/butler-is-back-in-even-more-improbable-fashion/
If Scrabble were more important, or if I didn't want to have the full do-it-on-your-own learning experience, then I could see really looking for coaching. A professional coach could probably wring out some more wins, but it would change the experience too. It's just an excuse though. I wouldn't mind having some tips.
The last round game was against Pat. We both had 4 wins. Everyone had been waiting for me the last round so I didn't take time between rounds to investigate the standings. At the end I had a tricky situation. I had like 7 minutes to handle it, but only used 5, and it turned out my tracking was wrong. I played for good points and emptied the bag, and she bingo-ed out on me. So now I know my first priority should have been to verify the tracking. I would have had to retrack the whole board to figure out where I had missed crossing off two tiles. To use the integers would have helped. More math would have helped because I hadn't really thought about how many points I needed to win. With two in the bag I could have played PI and blocked her bingo spot, and picked one from the bag, but I didn't figure it out til this morning, the day after. So this was good experience. I recognize some players are much more experienced than I am, so I'm not kicking myself too hard.
One of my wins was against Leslie Millard (almost the same as Mallard) who told me she's getting back into it after a long absence from tournaments. She did pretty well. At one point I had blocked her bingo ?OXTROT I think it was, and then her play was OXO. Then after I had got done getting the score right and it was definitely my turn to think about my play, I noticed it had hooked XE. I said, 'That's what I get for playing VOID' (on ISC). Her next play was a valid bingo, ?UTTER? (B and S). I think I might have actually been behind. She lost two turns, one on a phony and one on a wrong challenge.)
Against Becky Dyer I allowed another phony bingo (I used to be good at challenging phony bingos). DILUTER is good, but it's a noun. So that made it harder to win. The only way I managed to win was when I had HESENMQ and she had just recently bingo-ed and opened up spots and there were 14 or maybe another one or two in the bag, I played H(O)NE for 22. Then hoped I'd still be able to exchange, and she put ZOR(I) for 26. Then I did the exchange procedure wrong. I said "Change 1" and dropped the Q into the bag and pressed my clock. Then I wanted to draw a tile out of the bag, but I had done it wrong, so I said "I did it wrong". Becky stopped the clock and called the director. Was it some underdraw procedure?? No, I just took 1 tile out of the bag that to my delight wasn't the Q (it was an S). After that I carefully Q stuck Becky, playing M(O)W through ZORI for 14 (the M was on a Blue Lagoon). I didn't want to hang an E out there and give Becky a good play with her QCEIGR. An S would have been bad to expose too because of QIS and I really needed the stick-points, having allowed too many phony bingoes in the game. The out play ERNES to (MOW)S. The rack points were QERC=30 and I won by 12, so that was a good endgame for me anyway. I guess I better try to post this one too.
Against Paul Thornton I allowed a phony bingo. FENNING. I don't know why I thought it was good - I just decided it was an obscure verb I'd forgotten. It was 80+ points. The easiest way to decide on these a little bit better is to have confidence that I know them, and challenge them if they look wrong. Even better if they're wrong in a way I can double-check with some of my studying. To come out ahead after this I needed even MORE luck, involving drawing the last blank and playing TRAn(Q) for 26 on a pretty much closed-up board, enabling me to go out in 2 and catch a few points from his rack. The last tile he kept was a U and I won by 2, which turned out to be 5 after the recount. I had mis-scored one of my plays, or somehow we had both added wrong at the same time. (One time before I had a player try to verify the score by saying the sum before I had added it, and being highly suggestible I just write down what they said without managing to actually add... it's easier than adding ... they distracted my adding when they said the number! It's somewhat ADD.)
Ugliest win I had was against John Dalton. We both went over time, me by 10 points and him by 40 points. I had pretty much succeeded in blocking up the board, except there is at least one front hook to LEAVE that I completely failed to consider. Fortunately for me the best he had was SIC (and then pretended to be surprised the bag was empty, so I would let down my guard, and then!...) play EX over SIC for 38. But it wasn't enough. With ABNS? on my rack I did not find an out play hooking over _ES, so I just put NAB and BES and it was enough to win by 30 anyway. During the whole game I expected a bingo to go down but he never found one despite some pretty obvious fishing plays.
Jean McArthur directed - her first time directing a real tournament, and it went very smoothly.
Bye now! Have fun with your Scrabblin', Scrabble ppl!
Brought juggling balls so I could juggle between rounds, which I did a couple times.
Sleepy because the night before the tournament I'd felt a lot of nervousness and anticipation. I think this is a good sign - other recent tournaments I didn't feel the same edge, and did much worse. I wish I could organize my preparation better though.
So I got up 15 minutes before the alarm went off. Got ready and waited at home for a while. Put the TV on and there was a funny show of seven adults acting wacky and singing the Old McDonald song. Clap-Clap-N-G-O, Clap-Clap-NGO, Clap-Clap-NGO, and Bingo was his name-O! So the claps can be seen as blanks!
I realized sometimes I use too much time between rounds. I'm the slowest player, especially this tournament since almost all my games were close. So I tried a timer app on my phone. I set it for 5 minutes, and it didn't go off, but then right before the following game it went off. Apparently it has some flaw where it doesn't understand DST.
I almost came in first.
Pat Barrett beat me twice.
The first time mostly because I was too silly to challenge a 3x3 phony "boracins" which is a nice hybrid of some valid bingoes that I know like FOLACINS, BRUCINES, BORACITE. My first reaction was to say "Nice play!" and after that I didn't feel right challenging it. This was result of my being somewhat too sleepy, and also more sociable than necessary. It was 149.
It seems like I could use a coach. I am writing this after having read an article about the Butler basketball team. I am having a good feeling about their success in the March Madness since I grew up near to that campus.
http://tourney.si.com/2011/03/27/butler-is-back-in-even-more-improbable-fashion/
If Scrabble were more important, or if I didn't want to have the full do-it-on-your-own learning experience, then I could see really looking for coaching. A professional coach could probably wring out some more wins, but it would change the experience too. It's just an excuse though. I wouldn't mind having some tips.
The last round game was against Pat. We both had 4 wins. Everyone had been waiting for me the last round so I didn't take time between rounds to investigate the standings. At the end I had a tricky situation. I had like 7 minutes to handle it, but only used 5, and it turned out my tracking was wrong. I played for good points and emptied the bag, and she bingo-ed out on me. So now I know my first priority should have been to verify the tracking. I would have had to retrack the whole board to figure out where I had missed crossing off two tiles. To use the integers would have helped. More math would have helped because I hadn't really thought about how many points I needed to win. With two in the bag I could have played PI and blocked her bingo spot, and picked one from the bag, but I didn't figure it out til this morning, the day after. So this was good experience. I recognize some players are much more experienced than I am, so I'm not kicking myself too hard.
One of my wins was against Leslie Millard (almost the same as Mallard) who told me she's getting back into it after a long absence from tournaments. She did pretty well. At one point I had blocked her bingo ?OXTROT I think it was, and then her play was OXO. Then after I had got done getting the score right and it was definitely my turn to think about my play, I noticed it had hooked XE. I said, 'That's what I get for playing VOID' (on ISC). Her next play was a valid bingo, ?UTTER? (B and S). I think I might have actually been behind. She lost two turns, one on a phony and one on a wrong challenge.)
Against Becky Dyer I allowed another phony bingo (I used to be good at challenging phony bingos). DILUTER is good, but it's a noun. So that made it harder to win. The only way I managed to win was when I had HESENMQ and she had just recently bingo-ed and opened up spots and there were 14 or maybe another one or two in the bag, I played H(O)NE for 22. Then hoped I'd still be able to exchange, and she put ZOR(I) for 26. Then I did the exchange procedure wrong. I said "Change 1" and dropped the Q into the bag and pressed my clock. Then I wanted to draw a tile out of the bag, but I had done it wrong, so I said "I did it wrong". Becky stopped the clock and called the director. Was it some underdraw procedure?? No, I just took 1 tile out of the bag that to my delight wasn't the Q (it was an S). After that I carefully Q stuck Becky, playing M(O)W through ZORI for 14 (the M was on a Blue Lagoon). I didn't want to hang an E out there and give Becky a good play with her QCEIGR. An S would have been bad to expose too because of QIS and I really needed the stick-points, having allowed too many phony bingoes in the game. The out play ERNES to (MOW)S. The rack points were QERC=30 and I won by 12, so that was a good endgame for me anyway. I guess I better try to post this one too.
Against Paul Thornton I allowed a phony bingo. FENNING. I don't know why I thought it was good - I just decided it was an obscure verb I'd forgotten. It was 80+ points. The easiest way to decide on these a little bit better is to have confidence that I know them, and challenge them if they look wrong. Even better if they're wrong in a way I can double-check with some of my studying. To come out ahead after this I needed even MORE luck, involving drawing the last blank and playing TRAn(Q) for 26 on a pretty much closed-up board, enabling me to go out in 2 and catch a few points from his rack. The last tile he kept was a U and I won by 2, which turned out to be 5 after the recount. I had mis-scored one of my plays, or somehow we had both added wrong at the same time. (One time before I had a player try to verify the score by saying the sum before I had added it, and being highly suggestible I just write down what they said without managing to actually add... it's easier than adding ... they distracted my adding when they said the number! It's somewhat ADD.)
Ugliest win I had was against John Dalton. We both went over time, me by 10 points and him by 40 points. I had pretty much succeeded in blocking up the board, except there is at least one front hook to LEAVE that I completely failed to consider. Fortunately for me the best he had was SIC (and then pretended to be surprised the bag was empty, so I would let down my guard, and then!...) play EX over SIC for 38. But it wasn't enough. With ABNS? on my rack I did not find an out play hooking over _ES, so I just put NAB and BES and it was enough to win by 30 anyway. During the whole game I expected a bingo to go down but he never found one despite some pretty obvious fishing plays.
Jean McArthur directed - her first time directing a real tournament, and it went very smoothly.
Bye now! Have fun with your Scrabblin', Scrabble ppl!