CNSC 2011 Commentary: Round 13

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Go to: Before the Tournament, Round 1, Round 2, Round 3, Round 4, Round 5, Round 6, Round 7, Round 8, Round 9, Round 10, Round 11, Round 12, Round 13, Round 14, Round 15, Round 16, Round 17, Round 18, Award Ceremony, Final Round 1, Final Round 2, Final Round 3.

Jesse Matthews (Kelowna BC) walks up to us, blushing, he says, "So, I'm playing David Boys (Dorval QC) this round and he said, 'I always wanted to play Charlie Sheen.'" That Bob's Big Boy Hair Gel do is going to get him teased a lot today! After their game is over, I walked over and gave them the "who won" look. Jesse turned back beaming and said, "Charlie Sheen won!" And then, just as quickly and dryly as he could, Dave said, "Yeah, and Danny Bonaduce just lost." Well, this got us all rolling around laughing. He can dish it out and he can take it. I see COMRADES, LIQUATED, and RETIREEs on their in-progress board. After the game was over, Dave explained how proud he was on his phoney. The annotators were perplexed, so he went on to explain. He had a bingo, but no place to put it, so he played a blatant phoney, he hooked an N onto GAZOO, making GAZOON#, which Jesse challenged off. Jesse then played TASTIER that Dave knew was coming and then Dave was able to put down his own bingo: ANTLION. This kept the score close. Dave knew he was going to lose, but he controlled by how much. That guy just plays on another plane, I'm telling you.

Will Nediger (London ON) vs. Evan Berofsky (Thornhill ON) at table 3. I see Will's vIDEtTE for 81, SASTRUGI for 68, and the fabulous ISOMETRY for 105! Evan got down RETAINER for 66 when I last took careful notes. It was a 535-322 win for Will. When I see Will later, I say, "I see you continuing your winning ways." And he dryly said, "Oh, no, I only won by 200 this time." I think there was a twinkle in his eye.

Allen Pengelly (Waterloo ON) vs. Andrew Golding (Verdun QC): CARELESS, ORBIEST, and NIDATIoN.

Allan Simon (Calgary AB) vs. Matthew Tunnicliffe (Ottawa ON): AUSPICES, TORRIDER, ENGRAIL, SEAMIER.

So, for the "I need a hearing aid badly" story. I sit down opposite John Stardom (Ottawa ON), all flashing blue eyes, long lashes, shiny teeth. He's smilng. He distracts me. There is a great game brewing next door at the table, so we are talking, if at all, in hushed tones. He whispers to me, I hear, "I like your shirt." I smile back, say thank you and then ask, "who did you play?" He looks at my two heads and rewhispers, "Michael Lancashire." Suddenly I realize, what I heard as "I like your shirt" was actually "Michael Lancashire." I turn about 17 shades of red and have a muffled series of laughs. I am still laughing, as I type, about 20 minutes later. Let's just say I'm easily entertained. The game with Michael Lancashire (Toronto ON) ended in a 428-360 win for John. I see Michael's GRANUlES for 58 and the fun nonbingo but star quality nonetheless TITANIC for 24. John played EXISTeD for 85, BLOWIEST for 65, and SAVORIES for 76.

So, before this round started, Eric Tran (Calgary AB) said, "Oh no, I have to play Adam Logan (Ottawa ON) at table 1. I had sooooooo wanted to go this whole event not playing him." He said this to Chris only. So when Chris told me, we both decided it was a not for print statement. After the game was over, I asked Eric how it went and he launched into it again, with me. I said, "may I quote you?" He said, "oh yes!" He was walking in circles, touching his scoresheet, an errant rack, running his fingers on the back of a chair, pointing at the board, etc. I said, "so.... how did it go?" He said, "I played Adam Logan? How do think? I played lousy, it was bad... it was... it was... it was... well, just bad.... " I figure since it is annotated I wouldn't make him go into it blow by blow. But he continued circling around, writing on random pieces of paper. And then I thought, poor guy, Adam has just driven him insane! :) A bit later, he walked up to Jesse and Dave and repeated the wish to not have to play Adam in this event and Dave quipped, "Yeah, good luck with that one." Eric has lost only to Joel Wapnick (Montreal QC), Gabriel Gauthier-Shalom (Montreal QC), and now Adam Logan (Ottawa ON). I'd say he's doing great so far!

Ron Hoekstra (Surrey BC) vs. Juraj Pivovarov (Calgary AB): They are just finishing, both smiling, and they tell me they both scored more than 400. It was a 464-406 win for Ron. As he told me the score, Juraj interrupted and said, "I dont' think that is right." And Ron, pointing to the clock, said, "I lost 10 on time." Juraj, seemingly surprised, said, "Thanks for your honesty." I wanted to say, "he says it every game." but decided to just smile :). Juraj played RADIATE for 89, TwINKLED for 89, and RECANED For 77. Ron got down OUREBIS for 73 and the wonderful bEECHEN for 100. This front hooked to make ERADIATE, just beautiful.

I hear John Chew talking on his cellphone in the lobby: Chris Cree is calling from SWILLLNS in New Mexico, where he is directing the event using tsh in our absence. John, busy up to his elbows in this shindig, is offering technical assistance. Hi Chris from Toronto!

Chris writes:

Sue Tremblay (Carlsbad Springs ON) has played WICKETS against Chris Bonin (Toronto ON)... one down, only 799 more to catch up to Murali! Chris has played ALOE one short of the triple word... There's SS? on the board, and sure enough, Chris has S? on his rack. Sue blocks the spot.

Dielle Saldanha (Richmond BC) has a small lead but David Wood (Thunder Bay ON) is sitting with AENRST?... and there's an open R in the triple lane. Down goes pARTNERS for 122, and then David drew the second blank straightaway. David's game 450-351.

Robin Pollock Daniel (Toronto ON) is up out of her chair, hovering over the board in her endgame with Max Panitch (Toronto ON). Max is down to 18 seconds, and Robin has about 7 minutes to burn. It looks tense... Robin makes a play and Max immediately extends GRAM to IdEOGRAM for 30. Robin plays, and sits down as Max plays out. The tense appearance was a little deceiving as Robin wins 464-362. She had SALINATE* and SHAULED (blank L), and Max had BRACELET and TETRODES. Reviewing the game afterwards, Robin exclaimed, "I missed MEGAFLOP!" as Max had floated an E as Robin held AFGLMOP.

Shan Abbasi (Mississauga ON) had the play of the game against Craig Rowland (Mississauga ON) — the lights dimmed, the bass started thumping, and down on the board went a disco nine, TWEEDLING through the L and G. He also had ALIENER, and Criag had cRATONS and AGONIzER. Late in the game, Shan was stuck holding "57" — his rack was LVII — and at the end, it was Craig's win 435-369.

I walk up to Jason Ubeika (Mississauga ON) and Glenn Mosher (Toronto ON) doing a post-mortem and point to ALIQUANTS*, ostensibly extended from QUANTS. "Who played that?" I asked, and learn that it didn't actually hit the board. That's good, because ALIQUANT is an adjective only, and each player would have challenged had the other tried the extension!

Matthew Tunnicliffe (Ottawa ON) is sitting with his rack arranged NRTY?EI. Allan Simon (Calgary AB) has just opened a bingo line emptying the bag holding a blank himself. Matthew, instead of studying by alphagrams as many players do, studies by consonant-vowel groups — if I were holding those letters they'd be arranged EINRTY? in alphabetical order. The outbingo jumps out at Matthew and down goes INERTLY (blank as an a L) leaving Allan holding TO?STED. Matthew's win, 559-290.

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