Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Triple Word Score



In addition to this blog, I also right for a consumer, product-driven blog and web site so I'm always on the lockout for interesting products. This morning I found this Scrabble furniture (pictured), which was designed by Stephen Reed Industrial Design for employees at the London offices of Bloomberg.

Despite the fact that I am a horrible speller (thank god for spell check) I love Scrabble. My friends and I frequently use board games to make important decisions for us. Such as, the looser of this game of Trouble has to make the next beer run.

When I was preparing to move into my first apartment after college with my best friend Heather, we had to determine who would get the larger bedroom in an apartment we found in Jersey City. It wasn't just a question of a few extra feet as the larger room was nearly twice the size of the smaller one. So we agreed to let a game of Scrabble decide the bedroom fate.

We had a heated game at my parents house with members of my family frequently checking on the status of the game. By the time the felt bag was out of tiles our scores were nearly neck and neck. I had no more possible word combinations to make, which gave Heather the last go. She plopped down the word "FAX", which put her score above mine and awarded her the larger bedroom.

I quickly contested that "FAX" was not a word as it is actually an abbreviation for "Facsimile". We asked my family members for their opinions and even made a bunch of phone calls for a greater polling audience. In the end, more people agreed with Heather than me and she moved into the larger room while I begrudgingly took the smaller.

To this day I still refuse to accept "FAX" as a word.

22 comments:

  1. My girlfriend, as avid a Scrabble player as you're likely to find, has been openly lusting after these for months. I'm pretty sure that if I don't get her at least the Scrabble-tile pillows for her birthday, we're breaking up.

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  2. Clinton, Does your girlfriend own the deluxe wangling edition of Scrabble? That's the one with the board mounted on a lazy susan so it spins.

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  3. No, she owns the one that her father gave her as a gift when she was like thirteen. It's all beat to hell, but it's got sentimental value in spades.

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  4. Anonymous1:58 PM

    Jeff- I'm with you. Fax is not a word. However, there was revenge when Pickle ate that hershey bar and died on her rug and left a stain. Ah, the good old days.

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  5. Thanks for agreeing with me Kelly. Its too bad we hadn't met before the big game - I could have used your support back then.

    As for Pickle, she was never the same after Porkchop died and I think she knew exactly what she was doing when she ate that candy bar.

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  6. 'Fax' began being used in 1978.

    It's also in a bunch of dictionaries too, and not identified as slang.

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  7. Big Daddy, How much did Heather pay you to leave that comment?

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  8. Anonymous3:18 PM

    Ben is going to flip when he sees this. He has actually memorized all the 2 letter words and words with "q" that don't require a "u". Psycho.

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  9. Jdizzle, remind me to never play Scrabble with Ben.

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  10. Anonymous3:30 PM

    You've been warned. I used to play with him and have a chance. Now i have NO chance. Even when he lets me play with the cheat sheets.

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  11. Anonymous4:13 PM

    New official scrabble words in the latest scrabble dictionary include -- za, short for pizza, qi -- alternate spelling for chi, and qwerty -- as in the layout on English keyboards. Incidently, both "ben" and "jess" are official scrabble words as well.

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  12. "Anonymous" I'll accept "ben" and "jess" but never "za"!

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  13. Anonymous4:29 PM

    Mmmmm, za.

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  14. She paid me in heroin and 'za.

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  15. Anonymous10:15 AM

    Just the FAX M'am.

    Just the fax.

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  16. [whips out red pen].

    "I also right for a consumer, product-driven blog..."

    Don't you mean you WRITE for a consumer, product-driven blog...?

    And you misspelled "LOSER".

    Spell check doesn't "catch" everything. Haha.

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  17. Lioux, maybe those misspellings were intentional, to drive home a point.

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  18. Hmmm.

    Interestink.

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  19. Rad! I love Scrabs! I need those pillows.

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  20. Who can play a whole game of Trouble when there is a beer run to be made! I opt for good ole rock, paper, scissors. Despite my love for board games.

    ~Irish

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  21. Irish, we would never play a game without enough beer to last until the game was done. the loser would have to get the next case after the game beers were gone.

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  22. Anonymous10:17 PM

    Darlin', that spellcheck feature ain't helpin you much. Please consider an editor.

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