Welcome to the Jerusalem Scrabble Club

COME PLAY WITH US … VISITORS ALWAYS WELCOME!

*** NEW PLAYERS: CLICK HERE FOR INFORMATION ***

 Director: Elana Simons, 054 220 6238, elanalibby@gmail.com

 THIS WEEK AT THE CLUB

Season 82,  Week 06 of 25 – September 03, 2024

Members were pleased to return to a cleaner, brighter, renovated Himmelfarb Library, their customary playing venue. Also greeting them was a colorful kiddush arranged by Susan in honor of her mother’s ninth yahrzeit. The club welcomed first-timer Trevor Goldman, brought along by Wendy, and we were glad to see the return of Pauline, ElanaS and of Neil.

We’ve all had games in which the best thing we could wish for was that it should be over soon. “In my game with Pamela,” said Shirley, “the board was so blocked that by the three-quarter mark we were either passing, or putting down single tiles. I had two blanks and any number of bingos – but there was absolutely no place to put one down. At the end I played the J with the 2 blanks for a mere 16 points. The highest-scoring move in the game was 28. It was miserable.”  

S’s are good, we can all agree. But suppose you pull three at once – like a couple rejoicing over their child’s birth… then seeing a second… and then a third appear? Wrote Jonathan last week: “My opening rack in the last game was HHOVSSS, and I didn’t know what to do to start the game. I didn’t want to throw back S’s, and didn’t know what to change. After much deliberation, I played a phony, HOH, which wasn’t challenged, and eventually lost the game by a large margin. An opening rack like that can really throw you off.”Approached with Jonathan’s problem, a few expert players generally concurred that the best thing in that situation would be to play SH or SHH or SOH and keep or trade the other letters. 

DavidS: “Dahlia played TSOORIS against Peta on Tuesday. When I saw her writing it down on the WOW list, I told her a little story. Many moons ago, I played that same bingo, and it was challenged. In those days of yore, we asked someone to grab the current dictionary and look it up. The person I asked – who shall remain nameless – looked it up and said it wasn’t good. I couldn’t believe it, but what could I do? So off it went. Afterwards, I looked it up and saw it was good.

What was Dahlia’s response to my story? She was my opponent who originally challenged TSOORIS! Dahlia: “That’s why, on Tuesday, I knew it was good.”

Chani responded to the question of why last week’s bingo SABINE, referring to a woman of the ancient Italian Sabine people, was acceptable. After all, shouldn’t the S be capitalized? “The dictionary,” she said, [also] defines SABINE as SAVIN, an evergreen shrub.” Live and learn.

If you missed the opportunity to communicate your hilite in person at the club you can email it to judymo@netvision.net.il or WhatsApp it (054-5552355) up until noon the following day. If you wish to mark any occasion by bringing refreshments to the club, please check with Susan up to a week in advance.

WWWW: Dahlia

WWW: DavidS, Roger, Shirley, JonathanB

WOW:  ARIOSOS (DavidS), TSOORIS (Dahlia), AMBIENT (Bernard)

PHOW: DAWNLESS (ElanaS), FELONED  (JudyM),  LOQUATES (Shirley)

High Win, High Loss, High Triple:

A: 520 (Dahlia), 392 (Yaakov),  1343 (Dahlia)

B1: 520 (Pamela), 402 (Elana), 1245  (JonathanB)

Scores over 500: 520 (Dahlia and Pamela), 516 (Steve)

100-pt play:

Attendance: 29