Mark and I played three games over the weekend and I had two very interesting racks. I was going first in one game and my rack was IIMOPRX. How I wanted to go second! I only needed an E–the commonest tile in the whole bag–to play one of my dream words, MIREPOIX. I could not simply pass my turn hoping Mark would play an E. I asked Mark what he would have done if I had passed. He had garbage–six vowels and a Y–so he exchanged. (That is the correct move, unless you can score *big* yourself.) As I was still going first, I played PIX, not knowing that Mark had the only rear hook. He traded it anyway, telling me that he didn’t think PIXY was an alternate spelling of PIXIE. I then played OBE above PIX to purposely clog up the board.

In another game my rack was AEFIKW?. There are no sevens in that rack, but I saw the eights! Too bad I couldn’t play any of them. I was silently cursing that I wasn’t able to play KALEWIFe or WAKErIFE (among others including WEAKFIsH, WAIFLiKE and FAWnLIKE). What are the chances of playing an FKW bingo? Rare indeedy.