Slanting Games and Adjusting Glasses

Today Robin and I got newsletters from Literacy Austin (because they offered a discount at their book sale if you would put yourself on their mailing list). This included a fun article called "Scrabble Players Bribe, Cheat to Win for Literacy" about the Team Scrabble Tournament they organized to raise money. That web link is interesting, but it doesn't have the detail of the newsletter article. Let me explain. (It's not piracy, it's free advertising!)

On September 8th, 15 eight-member teams competed for a huge traveling trophy, prize bags, and the prestige of coming up with the most outrageous (and sometimes inappropriate) words imaginable. . . . Each 25-minute round began with the entire set of Scrabble letters face-up on the table, and each table teaming up to cover the board with as many winning combinations as possible. The judges (members of Austin's Scrabble Club #234) circulated, answering questions, consulting the rule book and, yes, accepting bribes ("bonut," for example, was found, for a price, to be an actual word). Other judges stationed at the front accepted cash in exchange for additional letters and peeks into the dictionary.

. . . While extra points were awarded for words such as "literacy" and "volunteer," some teams took their chances with "strategery" and "saxomophone."

. . . And the winning continued, as Literacy Austin's Team Scrabble Tournament was awarded a "nonny" for "most creative fund-raising event by a nonprofit."

. . . Nomination categories included wackiest media story, best use of a pun, silly story, or catchy title, and funniest recruitment of a board member. Winners received a statuette of a green flashlight, as befitting the sponsor of the event [Greenlights for Nonprofit Success].

In other news, we picked up our new glasses today. It is fortuitous that I had a mild headache, so I was able to see if the exciting new glasses would exacerbate a headache or not. The answer is, yes they do. Oh, well.

They come in a nice hard-shell case with a cleaning cloth inside. They also come with ear pieces way too long for my head. They stick out in the back, through my hair. I could hang small Christmas ornaments off them for very unusual jewelry. (Oh, Debbie, something's stuck in your hair. Something, uh, sparkly?)

Their best adjuster guy wasn't there, so Robin re-did everything so now the ear pieces tuck behind my ears. He also did something with the nose pieces, which seemed fine to me, but which apparently are now better. So now I am all stylish! Or at least several square inches of me are.