It appears ....

that "common" courtesy isn't any more common than common sense these days.

One of our local Scrabble players, an elderly lady who walks with a cane, returned to her home by taxi at 4:30 in the morning after taking her husband to the hospital. The house, the walk and the street were all dark. She asked the driver to stay until she was in the house. She did not ask him to get out of his cab and accompany her to the door, just remain in the street for the few minutes it took for her to get safely inside.

He couldn't be bothered, he drove off and left her in the dark. Fortunately, she made it into the house without any problems.

I do wonder how he would react if someone treated one of his elderly relatives that way.

Plotzed

Zyzzyva defines it as "to be overwhelmed by an emotion."

I would suggest it means being overwhelmed by the tile gods.

Yeah, Dayton was like that. My opponents were laying down bingos like PLOTZED and ANOREXIA, and I was looking at racks like AIEUUUV and AAIIUUY.

Oh, I had some good games, and made some nice finds. Managed to play 31 straight games over 300 in spite of some astonishingly bad racks, and snatch a tie out of the jaws of defeat.

But I'm still wondering why the tiles gods decided to deliver one of those streaks of clunky tiles at Nationals?

Ah well, the company was good.

Flowers for Deadpan Alley

 

Sending lots of virtual hugs your way, lady friend.

Gone South :(

 

The "Larson original" Smackdown trophy resides for the time being in Charleston, West Virginia. The WPA team will be highly motivated to bring it back where it belongs next year, (after all, it was born here.)

Particular congratulations are in order to Martha, who made a clean sweep of the entire WPA team, gained eighty rating points, and lost her only game to a fellow WVA player in the King of the Hill round.

It certainly looked like everyone had fun, though the team results for WPA were somewhat painful. I had a good day, finished in the money, picked up a couple of rating points, and got to deliver a thorough spanking to two of my favorite WVA opponents.

On to Dayton ....

And sometimes you hit paydirt

A new player showed up at the club Wednesday night, as they do from time to time.

I gave her the cheat sheet and the tips for beginners, explained the perks she would get as a new player, and set her up with a game.

It happened that I played her in the second round, and what a treat that turned out to be. She was using the cheat sheet, wasn't making any of the obvious beginner's mistakes, and kept saying she was having a grand time.

Looks like she's a keeper, it's so nice when one shows up.

Growing pains

Found this half grown robin on the patio this afternoon. It's not quite ready to fly yet, but it hops, scrambles, and glides pretty well. The distraught parents are hanging about making more of a fuss than junior.

 

Critical mass?

Last year we had a tournament for 48 players. Nobody (except the Scrabble community) noticed.

Then the economy went into a tailspin.

This year we had a tourney for 61 players at a larger venue. Now folks are calling us to bid on hosting the 2010 event.

Looks like leverage to me. Heh