I won all three last night, to take my record to 49-8:
396-289 against Richard. Richard is a new player who has come to the Club three times and I used this game to acquaint him with the rules and protocols of play. We played a full and legitimate game. He had the lead at the start, outscoring me 70-27 because my tiles were so awful. I exchanged on my third turn. He kept up with me even after my bingo, VALUInG (73) but it wasn’t till the second half of the game that I ran away with it.
596-381 against Max Panitch. This was a dream game, where I drew JQSSSSZ?? and Max only drew the X. After Max opened with OORIE (12) I played OPeRCULA (92) down to the centre TWS. Max’s second play was AERO (6) and then I played BLAZONER (128) through the L in OPeRCULA, where the Z landed on the TLS with the whole word doubled. I see that my rack ABENORZ made a bingo itself: ZEBRANO. I did know the word but saw BLAZONER screaming at me for 128, so didn’t even bother to shuffle my tiles, however I should have nevertheless in case Max blocked the L I needed. Would I have seen ZEBRANO even if there was a place for it? I got down two more bingos, SEDITION (60) and ESSaYER (102). Max played THRIVED (86) and BUNTING (69).
445-334 against John D. I played DURATION (61), DIABaSES (61) and EXACT (73) and John played FALtERS (79).