Word Freaks

If you've never read the book Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis, you really should check it out sometime.  He follows the world of competitive Scrabble players, and let me just say that "freak" is an appropriate word (meant with all sorts of admiration).  These people are crazy dedicated!  I love Scrabble but there's no way I would devote as much energy to it as those who attend tournaments on a regular basis.  However, Unalaska's public library hosted our own local tournament yesterday and I couldn't stay away.  Our little group assembled and we were just as happy about the snacks as we were about the game, if that tells you anything about our level of expertise.   Our first partner was assigned randomly and I was lucky enough to get the lovely sweetheart Suzi, above.  She's one of the nicest people in town, not to mention a local bird and plant expert.  We were pretty evenly matched and had a lot of fun playing.  In fact, we had the top two scores for that round--yippee!  For the second round,  we were supposed to be matched with the person with the next closest score so Suzi and I were going to get to play each other again, but she had to leave early.

 Tammy and Lori

Lani and Dan above

Because Suzi had to leave, Lia and I were matched up. We had a good time despite a lot of crappy letters and a very tight board that gave both of us fits.  For my last game, I was matched up with Lani, above.   Well, let me tell you, the woman knows her Scrabble. She schooled me big time!  I had the worst letters and couldn't do squat.  Or maybe she was just that good!

Lia and Kris-Ann below

Kris-Ann and I play online and she regularly whips me.  She was last year's champ! 

Despite my poor showing in Game #3, I ended up with the highest total score of the day.  Woohoo! With an even 1000 points in 3 games, I was pretty proud,  but I know it's really nothing in the world of the true word freak.  Read this article to see what I mean.