Round 7

Of the many people hanging around this weekend, one face is 
getting to be quite familiar. David Hayes is here covering the event 
for Canadian Airlines' inflight magazine. He tells me that in the 
last round, David Boys lost a heartbreaker to Joel Wapnick. Details 
are sketchy, but it came down to the last four tiles in the bag and 
Joel won, 414-377. There were two 8-letter words, one 7-letter 
word, and basically David took a gamble and blocked the wrong 
spot. Joel then played PRAECIPE and won the game. David 
blocked in what he thought was the most logical spot, but it turned 
out to not be so. For not having all the details, David Hayes did a 
pretty good job, eh?

Today's PR staff, Donna Garber and Pascale LeBlanc, are doing a 
great job. They are greeting all members of the press and giving 
them packets of information. In addition, they are assisting the 
tournament helpers by getting them drinks and supplies. 
Yesterday, understandably, the PR staff was a bit larger. 
Fortunately for Donna Piasentini and Sherry Cooke, they get a day 
off today.

We all know James Cherry is an exceptional and growing expert 
SCRABBLE player, but I want to demonstrate just how good he 
really is. In this round, on a very open board against Tim Anglin, 
after about 3 plays each, he held AEIPRT?.  He sat there for a full 3 
minutes. I wandered around the room and couldn't understand 
why he didn't slap down PARTIEs or some such. Eventually, he 
played a beautiful 8-letter bingo down from the triple that ended in 
an open E. I will type the bingo at the bottom of this commentary: 
see if you can find it. AEIPRT? ending in another E.*

John Chew's cell phone has been good for a laugh every so often as 
the event has unfolded. For every member of his family and for 
each of his friends, he has programmed in a "special" ring. So, in 
the middle of a quiet round or even during the calling out of 
pairings, a very distinctive sound of "Ode to Joy" or some such 
rings out in the great hall. And everyone giggles. 

Everyone who attends a national SCRABBLE event has 
encountered this problem: You sign in, get your bag full of goodies, 
put them down to shake a hand or take a drink and suddenly 
you've got NO idea which bag is yours. Well, the organizers of this 
event have figured a way out of this dilemma. They attached (with 
a tight, knotted string) a name tag and address to every single bag. 
That way, contestants aren't getting their goods confused with 
anothers. I heartily approve. 

In the "we all got a good laugh" department, a funny challenge 
came in this round: BAGLADY. Needless to say, it isn't acceptable. 
I found out that the person who tried this play, Steve MacNeil, won 
the game afterall against Marilyn Murray, 372-345.

This round had many people entering at 5-1: Jim Nanavati, Libero 
Paolella, James Cherry, and Linda Espallardo. 

At board 2 this round, Jim Nanavati won by 60 points over Linda 
Espallardo, 399-339. She got down PLEdGERS and he played 
BiRCHES.

At another table, I spot a game between Sary Karanofsky and Jakob 
Teitelbaum, 419-313. Sary won. I then ran into Jakob and he told 
me that he played ROOTLESs and Sary played MAnDATED. In an 
earlier game today, against Christina O'Sullivan, Jakob played 
BEaTNIK.  What a find, krusty! 

Poor Linda Gomes. She is having a less-than stellar day. She hasn't 
garnered a win yet. She just lost this one to Ian Bell, 290-490. With a 
cume of -800 or so, she is going to be working for awhile to climb 
out of the hole. However, most importantly, she is still smiling and 
positive that she will win a game.

Andrew Golding stops by to give me a nice bit of trivia. He has the 
second highest positive cume of the tournament, just behind Albert 
Hahn. He is 4-3 +430ish and Albert is 7-0 +600ish. Andrew's two 
losses were by only 10 points total. So, should he hit a string of 
good games, he'll easily be up with the top players.

John points out a great final score: Fern Lindzon 426 to Adam 
Logan 338.

*James Cherry found the lovely PEARlITE(the blank is an L) for 80.