Those 6 letter word posts

By the way, here's the thing with my "6-letter-word" and "7-letter-word" posts.

You're to take a look at the letters, without opening the post itself. Turn over an egg time to give you 3 minutes to make as many words as possible out of those letters.

At the end of 3 minutes, open the post and see how many words you found as opposed to how many there are.

6 LETTER WORD: L H T S U E

6 letter words:
SLEUTH
HUSTLE

5 letter word:
LUTES

4 Letter words:
TUSH
THUS
SUET
SLUE
SHUT
LUTE
LUST
LUSH
LETS
LEST
HUTS
HUES

3 letter words:
USE
THE
SUE
SHE
SET
LET
HUT
HUE
HES

Word Building: AA

If anyone spells AA - a form of lava, you can build onto that with

aah
aal
aas

and of course baa

If you've got aal, put a b in front for Baal (or, in Scrabble parlance, baal!).

Definitions
aal - dictionary.com has no meaning for this word except as an abbreviation (anterior auxilariy line).

The Scrabble dictionary says its an Indian mulbery

aas - another word not in the dictionary as a word, although it is a village in France. Of course what it really is is a plural of the lava, aa.

But what about baal? According to dictionary.com, baal is "a false god", or "any of numerous local dieties among the ancient Semitic peoples, typifying the productive forces of nature and worshiped with much sensuality.

3 New definitions: AI and AL, CEE

3 New definitions: AI and AL, CEE

AI - a 3-toed sloth inhaviting forests of southern Venezuela. It's diet is apparently restricted to the leaves of the trumpet tree, and sounding a high-pitched cry when disturbed.

AL - an Indian mulberry (and a variety of abbreviations.)

CEE - the letter C, shaped for formed like the letter C.

10 Jan, 2010, Word wars: A few gaming alternatives can boost your vocabulary

Chron.com: Word wars: A few gaming alternatives can boost your vocabulary

We're not here to knock Scrabble. Honest, we appreciate triple-word scores as much as the next competitive logophile. But sometimes we crave wordplay at times and places that don't favor cumbersome game boards. Besides, what if we just want to play a word a day (or a week) instead of a full game at one sitting?

Thanks to some clever alternatives, we can satisfy that appetite for more convenient, portable Scrabble combat and boost our word power to boot.

Here are a few options perfect for dueling wordsmiths short on time, space or attention span:

Puzzle apps
Lexulous (www.lexulous.com)
Before FarmVille turned everyday Facebook users into compulsive virtual agriculturists, the Scrabble clone Scrabulous ruled Facebook as the site's hottest game. Legal strong-arming by Hasbro (which owns the North American rights to Scrabble) forced Scrabulous to shut down in 2008, but it relaunched as the less-derivative-sounding Lexulous. More than 1 million Lexulous users plant words at lexulous.com, by e-mail and with a mobile version.

Scrabble app (prices vary, free versions available)
Scrabble has its own mighty app for various platforms. The iPhone app, which is compatible with the iPad and iPod touch, handles up to 50 simultaneous games, has a built-in dictionary and includes a Teacher feature to show you the best word choice from your previous move. There's also Scrabble for BlackBerry and Palm as well as the Kindle.

Words with Friends (99 cents or free with ads for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad)
For those who don't take their wordplay too seriously, Words with Friends makes a more casual and, yes, friendlier alternative. Its game board is easier on the eyes than Scrabble's, plus it lets you invite players via Twitter as well as Facebook. And to keep the wordplay close-knit, WWF caps simultaneous games at a more manageable 20.

Wordfeud (free)
Android users get their own clash of verbiage with Wordfeud, a free multiplayer app that pits you against friends and random opponents in up to 30 simultaneous games.

Portable puzzles
Scrabble Flash ($29.99)
This electronic version of Scrabble encourages small words but not small vocabularies. Scrabble Flash has five interactive SmartLink letter tiles you connect for words and points. The tiles know when you make a word and change letters on every turn; they also time your turns, keep score and include batteries so you can slide, swap and spell right out of the box. For one or more players.

Bananagrams ($14.99)
For this portable anagram game, players just need the banana-shaped pouch full of letters and a tabletop — no game board, paper or pencil required. Players make their own individual crossword puzzles at the same time, plucking from their own letter pile and the center "bunch." The first player with no more letters shouts "Bananas!" and wins the hand. Also available for Facebook as well as iPhone, iPod touch and iPad.

Scruble Cube ($24.95)
Slap Scrabble-like letters and bonuses on a 4-by-4 Rubik's Cube and you have Scruble Cube, a 3-D word game where you create words horizontally, vertically, even around multiple faces of the cube. Every letter peg on Scruble Cube has a point value and rotates for easier word crafting. If you'd rather go the Rubik's route, you can play Scruble Cube as a puzzle and return it to its original configuration. Includes a sand timer, score pad and instructions.

6 LETTER WORD: G T R E E S

6 LETTER WORD
GREETS

5 LETTER WORD
EGRETS
TREES
TERSE
STEER
SERGE
RESET
GREET
ESTER
EGRET

4 LETTER WORDS
TREE
TEEs
SERE
SEER
REST
GETS
GEES
ERST
ERGS

3 LETTER WORDS
TEE
SET
SEE
GET
GEE
ERG
ERE

What's erst mean?
Archaic .
before the present time; formerly.

I've heard of erstwhile, but never just erst on its own!

More than that, I guess I'd never looked up the definition of erstwhile. I had always assumed, from context, that it meant, "good friends", not "former friends." Ya learn something new every day.

6-LETTER WORD: N S M O A L

6 LETTER WORD
SALMON

5 LETTER WORD
SALON
MOANS
MASON
LOANS

4 LETTER WORDS
SLAM
MOAN
MANS
LOAN
LOAM
LAMS
ALSO
ALMS

3 LETTER WORDS
SON
SOL
OMS
NOS
MAS
MAN
LAM

7-LETTER WORD: E S R R E V E

7 LETTER WORDS
RESERVE
REVERES
REVERSE
SEVERER

6 LETTER WORDS
SEVERE
SERVER
REVERS
REVERE
REEVES

5 LETTER WORDS
VERSE
VEERS
SEVER
SERVE
SERER
REEVE

4 LETTER WORDS
VEER
SERE
SEER
REVS
EVES
EVER
ERRS

3 LETTER WORDS
SEE
REV
EVE
ERR
ERE

And a few definitions
reeve - an administrative officer of a town or district, to pass (a rope or the like) through a hole, ring, or the like.

revers -
a part of a garment turned back to show the lining or facing, as a lapel.
2. a trimming simulating such a part.
3. the facing used.

serer - more sere (arid, parched, dessicated, wizened)

6-LETTER WORD: S V L C A O

6 LETTER WORD
VOCALS

5 LETTER WORDS
VOCAL
SALVO
OVALS
COLAS

4 LETTER WORDS
VACS
OVAL
LAVS
COLS
COLA
COAL
ALSO

3 LETTER WORDS
VAC
SOL
SAC
OVA
LAV
LAC
COS
COL

And here's a few definitions:

vac - a vacuum cleaner. Truth to tell, I've never heard anyone call it that...in the states of course a vac is a vacation.

lav - in England it would be a lavatory.

lac - a resinous substance deposited on the twigs of various trees in souther Asia by the female of the lac insect. Also the sum of 100,000 esp of rupees.

cos - a variety of abbreviations, but also romaine lettuce

col - a pass or depression in a mountain range or ridge, or in meteorology, the region of relatively low pressure between two anticyclones!

Scrabble Word Building Book #1

I picked up a Scrabble Word Building book today.

It has a list of every word in the dictionary, and then shows what letters can be placed in front of and/or behind it, to spell new words.

I'll share a few words in the course of these blog entries.

I won't do the ones that are merely pluralized with the "s", those are easy!

If some clever clogs plays "aa" - a type of lava, you can build on that from the front with baa, and from the back with aah, aal, and aas.

And of coures I have no idea what "aal" or "aas" mean!

aal - dictionary.com doens't have it, except as an abbreviation. (anterior axillary line). In the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary, it is an east Indian shrub!

aas - plural of aa, rough, cindery lava.

6 LETTER WORD: S E P S I 0

6 LETTER WORD:
POSIES
POISES

5 LETTER WORDS:
SPIES
POSSE
POSES
POISE
PESOS

4 LETTER WORDS:
SOPS
SIPS
PSIS
POSE
PIES
PESO
OPES

3 LETTER WORDS:
SOP
SIS
SIP
PSI
POI
PIS
PIE
OPS
OPE

and just what do ope, pis, and sop mean??

Pis
the 16th letter of the Greek alphabet (II, π).
2. the consonant sound represented by this letter.
3. Mathematics .
a. the letter π, used as the symbol for the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter.
b. the ratio itself: 3.141592+.

Ah...I'd been thinking of the French phrase, tant pis. Didn't even think of pi.

Ope
an archaic or poetic word for open

Sop
a piece of solid food, as bread, for dipping in liquid food.
2. anything thoroughly soaked.
3. something given to pacify or quiet, or as a bribe: The political boss gave him some cash as a sop.

Argh! Of course I knew "sop"! But I guess being in the midst of the military with their SOP - standard operating procedure, I'd just forgotten about it!

7 LETTER WORD: A K N N D M I

if you write with a German accent, it could be "damnink" I suppose... (damning, get it?)

7 LETTER WORD: MANKIND

4 LETTER WORDS:
MINK
MIND
MAIN
MAID
KIND
DANK
DAMN
AMID
AKIN

3 LETTER WORDS
NAN
MID
MAN
MAD
KIN
KID
INN
INK
DIN
DIM
DAM
ANI
AND
AIM
AID

And now let's define ANI and NAN.

ANI - any of several black, tropical American cuckoos of the genus Crotophaga, having a compressed, bladelike bill.

NAN- a word formerly used in communications to represent the letter N.
aslo an leavened, often tear-shaped flatbread of India, baked in a tandoor, normally called naan, but nan will work, according to dictionary.com.

Boggle - A history

Was playing in my Scrabble club yesterday, and someone told an amusing story about Boggle, so I thought I'd share the history of the game here.

Boggle is a word game designed by Allan Turoff and trademarked by Parker Brothers, a division of Hasbro. The game is played using a plastic grid of lettered dice, in which players attempt to find words in sequences of adjacent letters.

Well...I thought I'd share the histoyr of the invention of Boggle, but its Wikipedia entry writer didn't see fit to include it.

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about Boggle.

RulesThe game begins by shaking a covered tray of sixteen cubic dice, each with a different letter printed on each of its sides. The dice settle into a 4x4 tray so that only the top letter of each cube is visible. After they have settled into the grid, a three-minute timer is started and all players simultaneously begin the main phase of play.

Each player searches for words that can be constructed from the letters of sequentially adjacent cubes, where "adjacent" cubes are those horizontally, vertically or diagonally neighboring. Words must be at least three letters long, may include singular and plural (or other derived forms) separately, but may not use the same letter cube more than once per word. Each player records all the words he or she finds by writing on a private sheet of paper. After three minutes have elapsed, all players must immediately stop writing and the game enters the scoring phase.

In the scoring phase, each player reads off his or her list of discovered words. If two or more players wrote the same word, it is removed from all players' lists. Any player may challenge the validity of a word, in which case a previously nominated dictionary is used to verify or refute it. For all words remaining after duplicates have been eliminated, points are awarded based on the length of the word. The winner is the player whose point total is highest, with any ties typically broken by count of long words.

One cube is printed with Qu. This is because Q is nearly always followed by U in English words, and if there were a Q in Boggle, it would be unusable if a U did not, by chance, appear next to it. For the purposes of scoring Qu counts as two letters: squid would score two points (for a five-letter word) despite being formed from a chain of only four cubes.

The North American National Scrabble Association publishes the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary (OSPD), which is also suitable for Boggle. This dictionary includes all variant forms of words up to eight letters in length. A puzzle book entitled 100 Boggle Puzzles (Improve Your Game) offering 100 game positions was published in the UK in 2003 but is no longer in print.

Word Length Points
3 1
4 1
5 2
6 3
7 5
8+ 11

Different versions of Boggle have varying distributions of letters. For example, a more modern version (with a blue box) in the UK has easier letters, such as only one "K", but an older version (with a yellow box, from 1986) has two "K"s and a generally more awkward letter distribution.

Using the sixteen cubes in a standard Boggle set, the list of longest words that can be formed includes Inconsequentially, Quadricentennials, and Sesquicentennials, all seventeen letter words made possible by q and u appearing on the same face of one cube.[1]

Words within words are also allowed, for example: "Master", the two separate words being "Mast" and "aster." Neither the cubes nor the board may be touched while the timer is running.

Boggle game variants
Numerous computer versions and variants of the game are available for play on the web and for download. (For instance, see Facebook's "Scramble" & "Prolific" applications.) Additionally, Parker Brothers has introduced several licensed variations on the game. As of 2006[update], only Boggle Junior and Travel Boggle (also marketed as Boggle Folio), continue to be manufactured and marketed in North America alongside the standard Boggle game, apart from a licensed keychain miniature version. Boggle Junior is a much simplified version intended for young children. Boggle Travel is a car-friendly version of the standard 4×4 set. The compact, zippered case includes pencils and small pads of paper, as well as an electronic timer, and notably, a cover made from a soft plastic that produces much less noise when the board is shaken.

Big Boggle, later marketed as Boggle Master and Boggle Deluxe, featured a 5×5 tray, and disallowed 3-letter words. Some editions of the Big Boggle set included an adapter which could convert the larger grid into a standard 4×4 Boggle grid. In the United Kingdom, Hasbro UK currently markets Super Boggle, which features both the 4×4 and 5×5 grid and an electronic timer which flashes to indicate the start and finish.[2] Despite the game's popularity in North America, no version of Boggle offering a 5×5 grid is currently marketed outside Europe.

In 2008, Parker Brothers released a self-contained version of the game with the dice sealed inside a plastic unit, and featuring an integrated timer. Although the older version has been discontinued, some retailers refer to the newer one as "Boggle Reinvention" to avoid confusion.

Other obsolete Boggle variants include:
A version of the standard 4×4 set that included a special red "Boggle challenge cube", featuring six relatively uncommon letters. Bonus points are awarded for all words making use of the red cube.

Boggle CDROM, a version for Windows, produced and marketed by Hasbro Interactive, including both 4×4 and 5×5 versions, several 3-D versions, and facilities allowing up to four players to compete directly over the Internet.

Body Boggle, which is more akin to Twister than it is to standard Boggle. Two players work together as a team, using their hands and feet to spell words on a large floor mat containing pre-printed Boggle letters.

Boggle Bowl, which is somewhat similar to Scrabble in that players must form words by placing letter tiles onto a (bowl-shaped) playing area.

Boggle was once an interactive TV game show hosted by game show veteran Wink Martindale, that aired on The Family Channel (now ABC Family) replacing the interactive version of Trivial Pursuit.

Coggle, which functions in a similar manner to Boggle but involves creating a word to fit a particular theme. Was mainly aimed at the French and Canadian market.
Boggle Flash. An electronic version of Boggle, but consistes of 5 tiles in which 1-10 players make words by swapping tiles.

In the Philippines, a similar game which was first distributed in 1978 and is still in circulation up to the present is the game "Word Factory." The game was first patented in the Philippines, and is currently being manufactured and distributed to selected retailers by the Philippines-based game manufacturer, 13 P.M. Enterprises. Word Factory was a variation on the version of Boggle as it existed in 1978: using a 5×5 grid instead of a 4×4 one, and using plastic dice instead of wooden ones. At present, the game is being marketed to other countries, targeting mostly migrant Filipino families.

A variant of the standard Boggle rules is periodic boundary conditions (PBC) Boggle, in which the borders of the board are effectively expanded by being repeated periodically. The letters on the edges of the board behave as if adjacent to those on the opposite side, allowing for words to continue on another part of the board. This is known as "crossing-over." Crossing-over can take place at either an edge or a corner. In the figure, block 15 can cross-over to blocks 2, 3, or 4 while block 16 can cross-over to blocks 1, 3, 4, 9, or 13. There is no limit to the number of times a word can cross-over, however each letter can still be used only once. Since this setup greatly increases the potential word count, 3-letter words should be disallowed.

Club and tournament play
While not as widely institutionally established as Scrabble, several clubs have been established for the purpose of organizing Boggle play. Official Boggle clubs exist at a number of educational institutions, including the Dartmouth Union of Bogglers at Dartmouth College, the Western Oregon University Boggle Club, the University of Michigan Boggle Club, University of Delaware Boggle Club, Berkeley Boggle Club at the University of California, Berkeley, and Grinnell College Boggle Club.

Unlike Scrabble, there is no national or international governing or rule-making body for Boggle competition and no official tournament regulations exist.

In popular culture
--Boggle was featured prominently in an episode of King of The Hill entitled "Peggy The Boggle Champ" (Season 1, Episode 9). It also appeared as a cheap Bar Mitzvah gift Elaine gave to her boss's son in an episode of Seinfeld (Season 9 Episode 3 - "The Serenity Now").
--Klingon Boggle appeared in The Big Bang Theory (Season 2, Episode 7), although it was referred to much earlier, in the pilot episode.
--Appeared in an episode of Felicity entitled "Boggled" (Season 1, Episode 4)
--It is the game of choice for the foxes Nelson and Vince in the BBC 3 sitcom Mongrels, though Nelson has admitted to bending the rules in the first episode.
--In Family Game Night (tv series), a variation of this game was called "Bounce N Boogie Boggle".

6 LETTER WORD: M B S L P U

i love it when the word has only one vowel, usually pretty easy to get that 6 letter word. The other letters, not so much so!

6 LETTER WORD: PLUMBS

5 LETTER WORDS
SLUMP
PLUMS
PLUMB
LUMPS
BUMPS

4 LETTER WORDS
UMPS
SUMP
SLUM
PUBS
PLUS
PLUM
LUMP
BUMS
BUMP

3 LETTER WORDS
UPS
UMP
SUP
SUM
SUB
PUS
PUB
MUS
BUS
BUM

What the heck does "mus" mean?

1. the 12th letter of the Greek alphabet (M, μ).
2. the consonant sound represented by this letter.
3. a genus of rodents that is the type of the family Muridae and includes the house mouse ( M. musculus ) and a few related small forms distinguished by the square-notched tip of the upper incisors as seen in profile
3.

Use those Us - BUBU

Also boubou

a long, loose-fitting, brightly colored garment worn by both sexes in parts of Africa.

2-word definitions - AG and AH

AG - agriculture: ag courses; to major in ag.

AH - –interjection
(used as an exclamation of pain, surprise, pity, complaint, dislike, joy, etc., according to the manner of utterance.)

Use those Us - Ulu

A ulu is a knife used by eskimo women.

Reader Digest's Word Power

i got the Fb 2011 issue of REader's Digest a couple of days ago, and just now goat around to doing the Vocabulary Builder/Word Power quiz.

And there wee two words in their that not only did I not know the meaning of, but that I'd also never heard of. That doesn't often happen to me. (I may on occasion have the definition of a word wrong, if I read it and try to figure it out in context instead of looking up, but at least I've read it somewhere. Reading the mysteries of Edmund Crispin will do that to ya!

Here they are:

tabby - knew it as a cat, othwerwise, never knew it was a "type of silk taffeta" (fabric first made in Al-Attabiya, Baghdad)
Boeotiian - to be dull (Greek Boeotians were labeled bores by Athenians)
fescennine - to be obscene. (after an ancient Italian town noted for offensive verse)

What's an Ambo?

The Scrabble World is divided by 2 dictionaries. The US and, I believe, Isreal, uses one dictioanary, Europe uses another one that adds about 100,000 words to those available with which to play scrabble. The words are British English, most of which are not used by the US.

This was brought to my mind today as I was reading an article in an online Australian newspaper, and noticed in their sidebar, where they list other headlines, "Cairns Ambos Best in the Business."

I wanted to know what an ambo was, so I clicked on the link. An ambo is an ambulance. And curb is of course spelled kerb.

I think Australia has more Australianisms that Americans couldn't understand, than Brits have Britishisms...nevertheless, it does make the world if international scrabble playing interesting...

Scrabble Club, meeting 1

Any person who has only played their immediate family really has no idea how good they are at scrabble until they go out into the wide world and meet other players.

I've recently moved to Cheyenne, and since there was no scrabble club at the library (they've got a chess clb, funnily enough, but no scrabble) I started one. Only 3 people, besides myself, showed up to the first meeting, but I think, and hope, it went well.

2 of the people were beginners and I had them play together, and I played a guy who destroyed me by 200 points, 300-something to 100-something.

I'm not sure - after just one game - if he is a level higher than I am, or what. I kept pulling lousy tiles... I pulled the J, but other than that was gettings Is, Os and Us, and a lot of them. Whereas he had the Q, the Z and the X - and scored really well on the X in an excellent play, so much so that I wished I'd thought to bring my camera along to record such brilliances. The tiles were aligned just right for him to spell axed twice at the same time, so it was a whole aquare of 4 tiles. He made a lot of points on that!

Anyway, supposedly - from what I've read of other scrabble clubs - members often show up for one meeting and then never come again. I'm reasonably sure that my opponent and one of the two beginners will come again, and hopefully the second beginner will also. We will see.

But I want a rematch! A match of 2 out of 3 is really the only way to judge someone's scrabble abilities. So my competitive juices are fired up!

6 LETTER WORD: O E T C I N

Look for the suffixes and prefixes to anagram words. Here, it was "ice." Other choices were "oce" or "ect" or "oct"

6 LETTER WORD - NOTICE

5 LETTER WORD
TONIC

4 LETTER WORD
TONE
TINE
ONCE
NOTE
NITE
NICE
INTO
ICON
COTE
CONE
COIN
CITE
CINE
CENT

3 LETTER WORDS
TON
TOE
TIN
TIE
TIC
TEN
ONE
NOT
NIT
NET
ION
ICE
EON
COT
CON

6 LETTER WORD: E D A T P T

6 LETTER WORD: PATTED

5 LETTER WORDS
ADEPT
TAPED

4 LETTER WORDS
TEAT
TAPE
PEAT
PATE
DATE
APED

3 LETTER WORDS
TED
TEA
TAT
TAP
TAD
PET
PEA
PAT
PAD
ETA
EAT
EAT
ATE
APT
APE

Word origins

From Miriam Webster's Dictionary site.

#1: Eavesdrop

Originally this word had nothing to do with snooping.

Eavesdrop started off literally: first it referred to the water that fell from the eaves of a house, then it came to mean the ground where that water fell.

Eventually, eavesdropper described someone who stood within the eavesdrop of a house to overhear a conversation inside.

Over time, the word obtained its current meaning: "to listen secretly to what is said in private."

2-letter word definitions, AD and AE

AD - advertisement

AE - one, in Scot(tish!)


These definitions are from www.dictionary.com. Lots of other definitions there, as all of these two letter words are abbreviations for a variety of things, as well.

2-letter word definitions, AA and AB

Tournament level scrabble players treat words as "playing pieces" - they don't care what they mean, they just need to know how to spell them.

My own thought is that all scrabble player should know the meanings of the words they play. To that end, I shall provide definitions of them here.

2 words a day, starting with 2 letter word definitions.

AA - basaltic lava having a rough surface

AB - a noun, the single of one's abdomen (abs), the 11th month of the Jewish calendar (also AV).

These definitions are from Dictionary.com

2 Fun - and Free - Kindle Games

There are two free Kindle games that word enthusiasts might enjoy.

They are free, and you can download them from Amazon.com and begin playing them immediately.

One is called Shuffled Row. A series of 8 letters appear on the screen, and you can make any words out of them that you can. When you make a word, those letters disappear from the screen and you are given points. (If you type something that isn't a word, you lose those letters.) The longer the word you spell, the more points you make.

Letters are added to the right, and after a couple of seconds, after the rack is filled with 8 letters, the first letter on your left disappears. After 60 letters have passed by, the game ends and you get your high score.

The other is called Every Word. In that, you get a 6 or 7 letter jumble of letters, and you need to make as many 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 word out of it as you can. The game ends if you can't find the "longest" word. If you do find the longest word, you advance to the next level. There are 3 levels where you start with 3 letter words and up, then the rest of the levels are 4 letter words and up. After 10 levels the game ends and you get your high schore.

For free games, they can't be beat, and they are addictive! And educational too, as they are excellent tools for learning how to anagram.

Letterati, by Paul McCarthy

Letterati: An Unauthorized Look at Scrabble and the People Who Play It, by Paul McCarthy
ECW Press, 2008
285 pages, plus glossary. A few b&w photos. No index.

Where did the Scrabble game originate? How has it developed? Who are the most sophisticated players and what motivates them to travel to tournaments for which there is little financial reward?

From the hustlers of the 1960s New York game rooms to the ultra-devoted tile pushers of today, Letterati spans the history of competitive Scrabble. Along the way, you will find out about the official Scrabble dictionaries, the techniques that expert players use, and how the Scrabble trademark has been defended by the game's current owner, Hasbro. Examining the origins, strategies, changes, and the business behind it all, this is a comprehensive look behind the world's favorite word game.

Photos
--Alfred Butts, Scrabble inventor, with Dave Schulman (1981)
--Ron Tiekert (1983)
--Roz Grossman, Steve Pfeiffer, Bernie Wishengrad and Arnie Alpert (1978
--Stu Goldman (1975)
--Mike Senkiewicz (1978)
--Roz Grossman, Ed Hepner, Mike Senkiewicz, John Ozag, Tim Maneth, Frank Khuenrich, Dan Pratt (1978)
--Al Weissman (1979)
--Mark Nyman, Stan Rubinsky, Joe Edley, Peter Morris (1992)
--Bob Felt and Bob Lipton (1991)
--Trey Wrightm Andre Ornish, Robin Daniel, Chris Xree, Joel Sherman (2004)
--Stan Rubinsky and Mike Baron (1983)
--Alan Frank (1988)
--Steve Pfeiffer and Paul Avrin (1979)
--Shazzi Felstein and Barry Patten (1978)
--Jim Houle, David Prinze, Joel Skolnick (1978)
--Ron Tiekert and Merrill Kaitz (1979)
--Joel Wapnick, Joe Edley, Milt Wertheimer, Barbara Amster (1983)
--Rita Norr (1988)
--Bob Schoenman and Lester Schonbrun (1988)
--Bob WAtson, Joel Wapnick, Joe Edley, Milt Wertheimer (1988)
--Charlie Southwell and Jan Dixon, Mike Martin, (1984)
--Robin Pollock Daniel and Luise Shafritz (1996)
--Jean Carol and Gordon Shapiro (1989)
--Lisa Odom and Robin Pollock Daniel (2004)
--Brian Cappelletto (1991)
--Ann Sanfedele and Adam Logan (1996)
--Bob Watson and Peter Morris (1988)
--Dan Pratt and Mike Weiss
--Charles Goldstein and Jognny Navarezz (1995)
--Trey Wright, Chris Cree, Marlon Hill (2004)
--David Gibson, Lester Schonbrun and Martin Weisskopf
--Joel Sherman and Matt Graham
--Adam Logan, Jason Katz-Brown and Brian Capaletto (2007)
--Jim Neuberger
--Lester Schonbrun and Eric Chaikin (2002)
--John Williams, David Wiegand, Panupol Sujjayakorn (2005)

6 LETTER WORD: S D G I E H

6 LETTER WORD: SIGHED

5 LETTER WORDS
SHIED
HIDES

4 LETTER WORDS
SIGH
SIDE
SHED
IDES
HIES
HIED
HIDE
DISH
DIGS
DIES

3 LETTER WORDS
SHE
IDS
HIS
HIE
HID
HES
DIS
DIG
DIE

Word Freak, by Stefan Fatsis

Word Freak: Heartbreak, Triumph, Genius and Obsession in the World of Competitive Scrabble, by Stefan Fatsis
Houghton Mifflin, 2001.
No index, no photos, 370 pages.
Library: 793.734 FAT

Scrabble might truly be called America's game. More than two million sets are sold every year and at least thirty million American homes have one. But the game's most talented competitors inhabit a sphere far removed from the masses of "living room players." Theirs is a surprisingly diverse subculture whose stars include a vitamin-popping stand-up comic, a former bank teller whose intestinal troubles earn him the nickname GI Joel, a burly, unemployed African American from Baltimore's inner city, the three-time national champion who plays according to Zen principles, and Fatsis himself, whom we see transformed from a curious reporter to a confirmed Scrabble nut.

He begins by haunting the gritty corner of a Greenwich Village park where pickup Scrabble games can be found whenever weather permits. His curiosity soon morphs into compulsion, as he sets about memorizing thousands of obscure words and fills his evenings with solo Scrabble played on his living room floor. Before long he finds himself in tournaments socializing - and competing - with Scrabble's elite.

But this book is about more than hardcore Scrabblers, for the game yields insights into realms as disparate as linguistics, psychology and mathematics. Word Freak extends its reach even further, pondering the light Scrabble throws on such notions as brilliance, memory, competition, failure and hope. It is a geography of obsession that celebrates the uncanny powers locked in all of us.