February 2010 - The Last Word Newsletter

R E D E Y E 2 0 1 0before signing up for the late bird, and we expected maybe a dozen or so might brave this ratherbizarre event.Left: Mark Kenas plays CALCTUFA (a soft porous rock consisting of calcium carbonate deposited from springs richin lime). Right: A seven-bingo game by Tim Adamson and Rob Robinksy. Robinsky won the game, which totaledalmost 1,000 points. Can you spot the phony that was played?To our amazement, 36 players signed up, including only five non-Redeye participants. Nearly halfof the players who had just finished playing 30 games over the last two days decided to add fivemore games in the early morning hours before making flights or sleeping or whatever else they hadto do that day.The late bird was one open division, paired by NAST pairings, which easily adapt last minute to anynumber of players. After the four even-strength round-robin games, six undefeated players wereSwiss-paired for the top prize, which was won by Eric Harshbarger (AL), followed by Rob Robinsky(MN), and Winter (car) in second and third place, respectively.Main event winners were Tim Adamson, Div 1; Ruchie Gupta, Div 2; Phyllis Koselke, Div 3; and RobSiegel, Div 4.Anecdote 1, the I’m-Glad-This-Wasn’t-Televised Game. Midway through the tournament, a playerconsidered playing DENAZIFY for a 356-point TWS-TWS, but rejected it and settled for 93 pointswith NAZIFY. His opponent immediately extended it with his own DE.Anecdote 2, the Always-Check-Your-Tile-Distribution Game. Veryfew of us do this, but it proved critical in the tournament’s first roundwhen two players were playing a tight end game and both ended uptracking and retracking for several minutes, only to end up scratchingtheir heads. After concurring that they both seemed to be missing atile, a search was made of table, chairs, floor, clothing, etc., only toturn up empty. The game was finished, whereupon furtherinvestigation revealed that it had been played with three Ws and oneV. A play of AW had been inconclusively tracked by both players.Steve Pellinen often plays, sometimes directs, and always wonders about this game we play. 31