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Charles Reinke Pulls Further Ahead in Club Standings, but within His Mind, the Phrase "Eleven Months to Go" Echoes with a Terrible Clamour

1st Charles Reinke went 4-0 +460, clearly deserving of first place on a night where every other player had at least two losses. He couldn't have asked for a better start when he opened up the evening with a 544-364 victory over Richard Lauder, playing MOIDORE (n. a former Portuguese coin), ORGANIC, and ATTAINED to Richard's PENISES and CINDERS. Later, he would defeat a seemingly-unstoppable Dave Gilligan (fresh off wins against Thomas and Andy) by a convincing margin, 454-289. Both players were limited to just one high-probability bingo apiece; BOILERS for Dave, SATINET for Charles. The clean sweep was finally swept cleanly as Charles took down his brother in the fourth and final game, 436-418. Some elite word knowledge was on display for that one, with Charles playing ENVIOUS and CARDING against Thomas' NARROWS and DESTAIN.

2nd Thomas Reinke averaged a low (for him) 399 per game in going 3-2 +88. As alluded to in the above paragraph, Dave Gilligan was able to score an upset win against the high-powered scoring fiend, 396-353, thanks to bingos of DICIEST and REPRISE (Thomas had COARSER and ATROPINS). Thomas' best game was undoubtedly his encounter with Bryan Benwitz, an encounter that ended with Thomas proudly placing a checkmark in the winners' column and scores of 427 and 353 in the appointed boxes. Bryan got just one bingo, LOAMIEST, but just one bingo isn't usually enough against Thomas, who had three of them, FASTING, PARTNERS, and URBANIZE. A game versus Peter Schmiedicke was a more closely-contested affair, with Thomas prevailing in the end, 408-391. It is interesting to note that all of the bingos played in that game (DELAINE for Thomas, HARVEST and TINWARE for Peter) all have exactly one anagram: ALIENED, THRAVES, and TAWNIER.

3rd Richard Lauder may have had the lowest spread ever to appear in the top three, as he finished with a 3-2 -330 record. His 180-point loss against Charles Reinke is documented above, but even worse than that was a 243-525 drubbing at the callous hands of one Andy Bohnsack. Andy unblinkingly hogged (or stole???) all the bingo tiles, winning the bingo battle 3-0 with finds of ORGIAST, CIGARET, and INANEST. The rest of Richard's games were wins, but not of sufficient magnitude to crawl out of the huge point spread deficit. He downed Gail Salm 398-367 despite again being outbingoed, getting just TOLLERS to Gail's SKULKER and STANINE (anagram of Andy's earlier INANEST). Richard also was victorious against Peter Schmiedicke, 420-389, playing OUTSPED and KNOTTED to counter Peter's SUNDIAL and OVERATE. Their lifetime series now stands at 40-34 in Richard's favor.

No bingos from the new dictionary were played; in fact, very few bingos that could be described as "cool" were played either. Mark Kenas' CRUCIBLE was chosen as word of the week in absence of any other suitable candidates, other than perhaps Gail Salm's low-probability, double-K SKULKER.

Charles Reinke Snags First Place Despite Not Playing Twelve Bingos in Three Games

1st Charles Reinke finished 4-1 with a sizable spread of +524. One look at his opponent's average score of 323 makes it clear how he was able to rack up so much spread. Charles cleverly tanked his first game against Peter Schmiedicke, losing 368-394, in order to play easier competition in the rest of his games. He even went so far as to allow Peter's phony DRYINGS to stay on the board so as to supplement his losing chances. Of course, in the real world, Charles has perfect knowledge of which -ING words take an S. Simultaneous to that game, Charles defeated Betty Hasselkus 490-285, playing the high-probability EULOGIST and ATONIES against Betty's DEITIES. Another 200-point margin was attained against Gail Salm, who fell 307-517. Gail managed to play INCITERS, but Charles ran away with it, playing PLIMSOLE, AREOLES, and the word of the week, OXTONGUE (n. a European herb).

2nd Aaron Bader played just three games, but thoroughly dominated in all of them, playing four bingos and scoring over 500 in each one. Thus, his record of 3-0 +619 might be the best three-game performance in club history. The massacre commenced when Aaron matched up against Barb Besadny and won easily, 531-234, playing GREEDIER (appropriate), EASIEST (also appropriate), GASEITY, and UNPAIRED. His second game, he was matched against an opponent who was also coming off a 200-point win, Gail Salm, but this fact did not cause his resolve to falter, and he cleaned up with a 512-349 victory. His four bingos in that one were GAOLERS, FLEETING, EREMITES, and TRENDERS, the last of which is not good in any human dictionary. Aaron ended his night prematurely with a 527-368 drubbing of top expert Thomas Reinke. The bearded twin got EGESTION and PUNISHES, but lost momentum with a phony BESEIGER (although he will be quick to point out that the correct spelling didn't fit). Meanwhile, Aaron's inability to draw bad tiles continued unchecked, as he played CANDELA, DROOPIER, BRUITERS, and TANTIVY.

3rd Dennis Lloyd went 3-1 +120 and improved his yearly record to an even 6-6. He got off to a good start by defeating Helen Flores on her home turf, 408-348. PRETEND and MILIEUS (MILIEUX also being acceptable) were his bingos; Helen played ROMANCE and lamented at the fact that it never got extended to the new word, BROMANCE. Against Richard Lauder, Dennis won cleanly, 403-309. Richard had an early two-blank CARRIES, but Dennis pulled ahead for good with his play of ROUSING. Richard was also punished for playing DOLMA thinking that it didn't take an S, as he only knew the "real" plural of the word, which is DOLMADES. Peter Schmiedicke was the only one to hand Dennis a loss, and he did it in convincing fashion, winning 489-356. Despite the gulf between their scores, the two players matched each other bingo-for-bingo: Peter had DRONGOS and TOWERED to Dennis' AILERON and DEVIATE.

Two new bingos were played this week, both by Charles: IONISER and BLEAREST. The club also reached a milestone, having played its 10,000th unique bingo. However, there are still some 46,000 left to be played, and most of the low-hanging fruit (in the form of high-probability words) has been plucked off the tree and consumed, so even 20,000 is probably a decade off.

After a period of inactivity, the club's Facebook page is being resurrected: https://www.facebook.com/Madison-Scrabble-Club-388301582736 . We will try to feature photos of cool plays or other notable things, so if a cool or notable thing happens in your game, snap a picture of it or get one of the twins to do it.

Peter Schmiedicke Should Start Charging for the Scrabble Lessons He Gives to People

1st Peter Schmiedicke snagged the first place spot despite a blemished 3-1 +414 record, beating out four other players who had the same win-loss record. To do this, he had to rally out of a 90-point hole dug for him by Lynda Finn, who beat him in the first game 463-370. Lynda won the ever-important bingo battle, playing RAMBLED, PTERINS, and RETINOLS, while Peter got WINTERS and COOTIES. Peter followed up that disappointing loss with a pair of 200-point victories, 471-257 against Helen Flores and 531-278 against a certain Dave Gilligan who had just set a new high-water mark for himself with a 544 game. Against Helen, Peter had INSTARS and AILERON, while Dave was forced to spectate as Peter laid down ODORANT, LIPREAD, and MAUNDERS against him. As the 2-1 player with the highest point spread, Peter was matched against the undefeated Thomas Reinke in the last round, and he rose to the challenge, winning a close one, 444-424. Thomas played SPRITZED for 110, but Peter was able to bingo consistently throughout the game, getting down GRODIEST, DREARIES, and COMBINES.

2nd Charles Reinke went 3-1 +397, but, in averaging just 445 points per game, he allowed his yearly game average to fall below 500, perhaps never to return. He took down the always-tough Bryan Benwitz with relative ease, winning 469-345. Bryan found the odd-looking KEENERS, but Charles outdid that with POINTED, FIREHOSE, and the Word of the Week, SCABLAND. Lynda Finn, fresh from kicking butts in Portland, had similar luck or worse against Charles, losing 269-523. While she was forced to stare at unworkable letters the whole game, Charles got down ANNULET and MEDDLES. Not in every game could the tiles be so favorable for Charles; a matchup against archfoe Thomas Reinke ended 404-346 in Thomas' favor. Thomas' sole bingo of MURALIST (anagrams: ULTRAISM and ALTRUISM) was enough to overcome Charles' STRIPED and HANGOUT.

3rd Aaron Bader finished at 3-1 +321, beating out fourth-place finisher Thomas Reinke by seventeen spread points. Aaron started out the evening having somehow secured the favor of the tile gods, as he walloped Gail Salm 627-293. In tribute to those same gods, he played four bingos: VIBRATOR, VERITIES, POUNCES and the phony ORCHELLA (ORCHILLA is new in our dictionary; the one Aaron played is Collins-only). Gail, for her part, played AWAITER and STAINERS. The rest of Aaron's games were not quite as impressive as the first, leading one to wonder what transgression he had committed in order to anger the gods. He did take down Andy Bohnsack, 391-309, thanks to finds of ALANINES and INDITES. Andy managed just a single bingo of BEATINGS [Ed. Note: there has to be way to fit that word into the narrative...nah]. Aaron's loss came against, who else, Thomas Reinke, who showed no mercy in delivering a sound 484-365 defeat.

We had a fair amount of new bingos played this week: FIREHOSE (Charles), LORNEST (Charles again), SUETIER (Gail), DREADER (Barb), and CODINGS (Sue).