Unbelievably, all the planets must be aligned because I'm going to Chicago for the Arden Cup. Ridiculously cheap flight ($128.00 round trip from Buffalo), a place to stay (thanks etheridge2!), and got the time off work. What more could I ask for?!

This will now mark the furthest from Toronto I've ever travelled to go to a Scrabble tournament (replacing Lake George, NY) and the first time that I'll fly to a tournament. It also ties as the longest tournament I've ever played in (20 games - same as Albany in July 2005).

Some of the Scrabble studying I've been doing, I've bumped it up for the next two weeks so that I get a specific list of words completed before the Arden Cup, instead of planning on finishing it by mid-June.

So I'll be studying like a madman over the next two week.

This is going to be "my tournament"... Division 2 cuts at 1550, with play up at 1450. They will use your "peak" rating from January 1, 2008 to present. That's 1458 for me. There are presently 22 people in that division. Adding me, I would be seeded 21st of 23... projected needing to win only 5.5 games out of 20.

My griping and bitching about consistently being seeded high... this is the tourney I've been waiting for...

It'll prove either that either:

1. I *CAN* play against 1500 and 1600 players and win, or

2. The Dunlop quote of the last two years is right... "You don't deserve your rating!"

I have to confess that I never really understood (and still don’t fully) what Type II and Type III sevens and eights were but...

I pulled out my Mike Baron’s Wordbook® today. I wanted to find out what percentage of the Type II and Type III sevens I knew (or would know) having learned (or will learn) all the sevens in DG-ORIENTALS+? along with all the top 5,000 sevens. It’s at least 2/3 of the Type III’s, but much less so the Type II’s.

Then, for fun, I glanced at the lists of the Type II and Type III eights. MAN! Just based on what I know in the eights now (the top 2,000 eights and the five-vowel-eights...) I know at least 90% of the Type III eights, and again, much fewer of the Type II’s. But again, I only know the top 2,000 eights, whereas I’ve now made flashcards for the top 5,000 sevens.

Some time ago, I remember saganist telling me that someone from his club in Salt Lake City saying to him, “You can’t know all the words.” He told me that his response was, “I’m planning on it.”

Our joke used to be that I would do my imitation of Don Music from Sesame Street (the Muppet who played the piano and sang twisted versions of nursery rhymes). If he got frustrated, he’d shout at the top of his lungs:

“OH! I’ll never get it! NEVER! NEVER!”

And then bash his head into the piano keys. OK, fess up people, who else remembers Don Music from Sesame Street?

That’s how I feel about studying right now.

It was exactly one year ago today that I started using the Leitner Cardbox study method to start studying Scrabble words.

On November 22, 2006, spherulitic sent me an e-mail describing in great detail how he studied his own flashcards, with small "tweaks" here and there for studying hooks and extensions (like words that end with Y, do they take -IER, -IEST, -ILY, -ISH...)


It took me a couple days to get organized, but it was a year ago today, November 25, 2006 that I put either a "1" or a "0" at the bottom of a flash card and started studying.

Now, 20,000 flashcards, and several tournaments later, I wonder... is it worth it? I certainly have a much larger word knowledge (especially bingos)... but, as I pointed out to both spherulitic and andysaunders my rating hasn't budged an inch in the last 12 months.

As I mentioned in a posting some months ago, studying was totally taking over my life. I was spending three, four, five hours a day studying...

It's now a little more manageable (but it's still close to three hours a day). What used to be 1,000 to 1,200 cards a day, is now in the neighbourhood of 500 to 700 cards a day.

I couldn't imagine doing it any other way, though...

Damn you, spherulitic. A pox on you! Look what you've done to me!

:-)

Another good day on Jumble Time today.

4s = 100% 53 seconds left
5s = 95%

Missed three:

EEGNR (the one that isn't a colour - and a common word too)
ANIPT (missed one of four)
LAMRU (got MURAL but missed the other)

Not too shabby! If I can stay above 90% on the fives that'll be pretty good.

I said to someone in a private e-mail last week that I felt it in my bones that I was going to kick some major Scrabble butt this past weekend in Lake George. Well, I “almost” did just that.

In a division of 28 people, I was seeded 13th, meaning I needed to win approximately eight games to keep my rating of 1438.

In a 15-game tourney with divisions of 28, we were split into two groups of 14. The first 13 rounds were a straight round robin in the sub group. In game 14, the first place person in “Group A” played the first place person in “Group B”, the two second place players would play, and so forth, and then in game 15, it would be a straight KOTH.

At the mid-way point of the tourney, things weren’t looking all that good. I went 2-1 on Friday night, and then 1-2 on Saturday morning, and then lost my first game after lunch on Saturday (while suffering with the beginnings of a horrible headache – almost making me nauseous).

But that’s when things turned around. I won my last three on Saturday to go 6-4, going into Sunday, in 6th place. There were two players at 8-2, two at 7-3, and two at 6-4, with -- count them –- TWELVE people at 5-5.

On Sunday morning, I won my first three games (the last of the round robin games) to sit at 9-4, in 4th place (cash prizes were going to be awarded for the top four, with a merchandise prize for fifth place finisher).

In game 14, something very interesting took place. I won my game, putting me at 10-4, while two of the players ahead of me TIED their game, putting them at 9½-4½.

Ross Brown of Ottawa, Ontario was alone at 12-2, and was Gibsonized. Two of us (Matthew Tunnicliffe -– also of Ottawa) and I were at 10-4, and two others Judy Horn and Terry Kang Rau were at 9½-4½. There was NO ONE at 9-5, but several at 8-6... but none of them had any chance of winning money. It was down to the four of us (Matthew, Judy, Terry, and I) of who would place in money. Matthew had figured it out that whoever won our game would be second, and the loser would be fourth. The winning of Judy and Terry’s game would be third and the loser, fifth.

I opened with a bingo PROTEID to begin, and Matthew bingoed immediately back with SERENAD(E) to my E in PROTEID. While I continued to make good plays, Matthew drew junk after junk after junk.

With me ahead by 120 points, Matthew plays SEEINGS. I held the play... and challenged. D’oh! That was the turning point of the game. His next three plays were all 30+ plus while mine were not... He won the game by 50. If I had not challenged SEEINGS (which has two anagrams!) I likely could have kept my lead and won the game.

Second place was $300.00(US) and fourth was $75.00. So... challenging SEEINGS was a $225.00 error. I could have gone 11-5.

Actually, I should have gone 12-3... since earlier in the tournament, I had a 150-point lead against andysaunders and with two VERY late game bingos, Andy came back and won that game by less than 20 (if I remember correctly). That was the lost that hurt most.

The win that meant the most to me was against David Jones of Ottawa. I was 0-3 against him prior to this meeting, and this time I finally beat him!

So... a finish of 10-5 +500 (exactly 500), fourth place, $75.00. Not too bad at all. Rating should go up between 30-40 points (but not quite the 1500 target I’ve been hoping for! It will happen!

(another gangent)

In other Lake George News… I had a good half-dozen people congratulate me and say they were happy for me/proud of me (and hug me too) for "coming out" a week ago, including spherulitic, sophonax, and andysaunders. Thanks friends. It means a great deal to me.