I won two out of three last night, to take my record to 54-6:
461-256 against Nicole. I played INFARES (77) and FOReSTS (84). Nicole’s opening play was MEAN (12) and I held the rack ILORSVY. I spent a lot of time with that rack, looking to play an 8LW. In the end I played IVORY / MEANY (32). There is only one 8LW with my rack and it would have played through Nicole’s A: SAVORILY. Prior to my first bingo an S was available on the top centre TWS. I was hoping to play SANSERIF (86) to the top right TWS but Nicole took the spot. I saw the anagram of my second bingo, FOSTeRS. I had a place to play each. FOReSTS made three overlaps with the final -STS while FOSTeRS would have been flashier as it would have made two distant words plural with each of the S’s, yet Nicole took that spot. FOSTeRS would have scored 86. I knew, but did not see, the third 7LW that my rack made: FROwSTS. It could have been played in the same place I played FOReSTS and even the blank would have landed on the same spot. I held the rack AEOOTT? and there was an open D and I didn’t even bother to look for any 8LW. I hate O’s, and the AE and double T didn’t look bingo prone, but there was an easy one that I missed: TATtOOED.
445-307 against Jean. I opened with HOAgIES (76) which is the only 7LW with that rack. I also played OVERWINd (78) and KAMIS / GRUNTS (69). I held the rack ADDEGRS and formed my tiles to make GADDERS, not realizing that it was a word (and I even had a chance to play it). The only 8LW I could see was DEGRADES, which as it turns out is the only one. Another rack I had was CDEEFRS which makes no 7LW yet I played it around an open O to make FORCE (20), keeping DES. I considered DEFORCES, which would have scored 106, yet chickened out of it because, with a score as high as that for a word that I was unsure of, I felt that Jean would surely challenge it. DEFORCES had an anagram that I definitely knew, but did not see: FRESCOED. That would have scored 78 and would have been my play over DEFORCES.
414-474 against Peter H. I played ADULTING (62), REFINES (77), cORONAE (73) and DEX (66). Peter went first but exchanged so on his second turn he made my opening play of KATION (30) plural by playing TOONIES (72). He also played PRETENDs (90) and QUESTION (104). It was hard to keep up with Peter as every time he played a bingo, I needed to respond with one of my own. When I played REFINES I opened up the right TWS column and bemoaned my replacement draw of AENOOR? Peter had just surged ahead with QUESTION and his score was 379. My score after REFINES was 309. How could I respond to QUESTION with a rack full of vowels including two dreaded O’s? I was fortunate to see cORONAE, which fit onto the TWS row to take me to 382. However Peter replied to my bingo with JIVES (57) which sealed the win. After cORONAE I picked drek: my final rack included CHWW and I struggled to find ways to score big with it, but the board was not helpful.