UVSC Session Report January 29, 2018 (Session #165) (authored by BJ) On Monday afternoon I was gearing up for the usual small group of Scrabblers, when Mike F. from down Brattleboro way contacted me to say he'd like to join us and to surprise Iliana. Great! Always good to have another player! When he arrived, though, out came James and Mark as well! Quite a surprise indeed! But our good luck didn't end there, as both Johanna and Amit came later for a couple of games too! The stars were apparently in alignment! Many good games of Scrabble were had, and the best news out of it is that all involved would like to make this kind of thing happen again. Just imagine how great it would be if we could coordinate all of our out-of-town attendees (eg Jeffrey, Tim, and Don) as well as our part-time locals on the same night as a visit from Brattleboro folks -- that would be quite an event! On the boards there were many excellent words and fun plays, some high games and some upsets. I'm sure there are several interesting plays I'm not even aware of, but one that comes to mind was when James, looking to get rid of tiles toward the end of the game against Ellen, found a way to get rid of four of them by playing between the words LO and ER that were already on the board, making (LO)NELI(ER). James also had a 9-letter bingo, getting INTIMATED attached to an existing ED! Johanna got down the new (relatively) plural bingo EROTICAS, Margaret found a nice 46-point play of QUIRE, and Iliana pulled MURRAIN out of the deep recesses of her memory. Mark earned some bonus points when his TRILBIED was challenged (in a CSW game), Ellen found the nice IOLITES, and Amit put down the slightly odd-sounding (to my ear) UNWISER. Of my plays, I was perhaps most happy with finding DANCIEST at a critical time near the end of a game, though I admit I wasn't sure it was valid in TWL (it is). Mike took a well-educated guess at playing LORDOTIC, which is valid and means, as he guessed, "pertaining to lordosis". The rest of the bingo pile: ARAISED#, NOILIER#, AIRTHED, NONUSER, OUTLIES, THERETO, DERANGE, CAUDATE, REAPPEAR, DAINTIER, APTNESS, LEISTER, TURGIDER#, ELATERIN, CUISINE, ENCLOSE, TORSION, TRAINED, TANSIES, INFECTED, THRONES, GENDERS, WITNESS, YEAREND, UNBEATEN, TRAVAIL, MURRAIN, UNSHADED, FALCONS, EASTING, LEASING, AURATES#, NEIGHED, IRISATE#, ENGAGED, TEMPERA, ELAPSING, ENTERING, POURABLE, WESTERED, LUTEINS, NOMADIC, SULLYING, LATRIAS, ARSENATE, VARIATES, AIRSOME, LOUNGED, INOSITE, REMOUNT, ZOONITES#, BANTERS, PAINTERS, TOLERANT, PINNATE, STEADILY, FILMIEST, ELUSIVE, GRANDEST, POLICIES, UNERRING.