…with Gary Moss

Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

Actually, when you think about it, how could anyone begin anything in a place other than where they are.

And yet, many impatient ‘wannabe champions’ come to me and want me to tell them everything at once so they can sign up for and win their first tournament a few weeks from today. I’d be wrong to take their money on that basis.

For the last year I have encountered one up and coming scrabble competitor and repeatedly told her that in order to become a better player she would do better by studying more, and not count the time playing as her study time. She resisted that advice. She played endless games at clubs and online. She either couldn’t or wouldn’t acknowledge my coaching. Last week I met her again at a tournament. She began the tournament with 3 consecutive wins against some highly ranked opponents. During the lunch break I ask her what she was doing differently. She admitted, “I’ve finally see the value of study over just playing a lot.” I guess that she had to discover the difference for herself. I expect that if she keeps it up she will become an awesome player.

Another player who recently began playing at clubs had noticed that the seasoned players own the skills to play bingos during most games. He want to jump right to playing bingos and bypass the somewhat boring task of memorizing the 2s and the 3s. He doesn’t get how the 2s in particular permit seasoned players from getting their bingos down on the board by using those useful and necessary ‘hooks’, in order to fit. Until he ‘gets it’ he will struggle and be frustrated.

One can rarely do calculus if they have not mastered algebra. Politicians who are not students of history will tend to make the same mistakes of the past over and over and over again.

These two scrabble lessons are also useful life lessons. A steeple is less than impressive without the church. Frosting is nothing without a cake. Without a strong foundation a mighty skyscraper will tumble.

Begin Where You Are. Choose a good teacher. Create a strong plan. Utilized tested tools and materials. Invest your time wisely and efficiently. Keep an alert eye on your goals. Measure your steady progress. Celebrate your incremental achievements.

Become a better scrabble player in 2012. CLICK

Who’s fault was it? Once the damage is done, does ‘fault’ really matter that much anyway?

When learning to drive a car, we are taught the rules of the road and then we are cautioned to ‘drive defensively’. Those are wise words. The smart driver learns to develop a 6th Sense that reads potential dangers from the other drivers and pedestrians in the vicinity.

As hard as driverS try to avert accidents, even the most cautious of drivers are vulnerable to the recklessness and misjudgment of others.

A woman is trying to park in a COSCO parking lot. She positions her car in waiting for a spot about to be vacated by another car. All of a sudden the exiting car accellerateS in reverse and sideswipes the bedazzled woman waiting to park. In spite of being in the right, the woman’s car is damaged and she is emotionally shaken. The man in the exiting car apologizes profusely, but the damage is done. He offers up his driver’s license to exchange information. The woman looks down to copy the information and notices the man’s date of birth. He is 99 years old. Do you think that he has full control of his reflexes?

Two players are battling with words over a scrabble board. The game is a cat and mouse game with the lead changing back and forth. It is mid-game when player A places the word ‘strainer’ down on the board. Player A counts the score, announces the score, hits the clock, records the score, and replenishes his rack with 7 tiles. Player B is wrapped in thought. Her eyes and full attention are on her own rack of tiles, looking for some comeback play of her own. She never realizes that Player A played 8 tiles when he played his bingo. Was that cheating? It all depends. Knowing the player, it most likely was an innocent oversight. The point is that Player B owns an equal share of the responsibility to know the rules and to hold Player A to the rules.

Two players are playing in a tournament game. (The results of every game in a tournament has consequences for all of the other players in that tournament. So, if one player quits during the tournament or if one player allows an opponent to score at will, all the other players in other games will suffer when the dust settles and the focus is on the bottom line.) In this instance, Player A was a new tournament player and therefore somewhat trusting that others wouldn’t cheat. Player B was a seasoned player and his ego was subject to being devastated by losing to some novice. This game was very competitive in spite of the players’ very different previous experiences. I was the director and standing nearby, watching the game. It was down to the end of the game when Player B placed all 7 of his tiles down on the board, counted the score, announced the score, hit the clock, and recorded the score. (He had not yet replenished his tiles.) Player A turned the board. Player B uttered, “Aw shit.” Player B turned the board back. Player B rearranged the tiles. (He had misplaced the tiles when he first placed them down.) Player A’s jaw dropped but sat silently and watched. Player B cheated but his opponent never called, “DIRECTOR”. Due to this occurrence, Player B went on to win the game, win the tournament, and had his name etched onto the trophy. Without being summoned by Plater A, I could only watch in horror.

Even when cheating occurs, the opponent is responsible for calling FOUL. Yes, we are our brother’s keepers.

How big is the memory bank in your brain?

My first computer (1974) had a capacity of 64K. That seemed huge at that time. Who could possibly need more, I thought.

But then people wanted to do more functions and multiple floppy disks helped fill the bill. Today it is common to have multiple terabytes of memory. When did the word ‘terabyte’ surface? And the computers of the future will store even greater chunks of information as some other kind of bytes.

When we play competitive scrabble the conventional way, one to one, face to face, we are totally reliant upon that personal memory chip lodged somewhere between our ears. Even though dedicated scrabble enthusiasts study and review the entries in their respective dictionaries day after day, the processes of dilution and escape are ongoing simultaneously.

Our mothers have long known about the occurrence in nature called ‘In One Ear and Out The Other’. This maddening reality frustrates mosts scrabble students and saps the energy from some. The memory is somewhat like a muscle. It must be used consistently to remain strong. Without regular use it will atrophy. Even the player who devotes 40+ hours a week to study doesn’t dare go off on a hiatus without their study lists and a working version of Zyzzyva. If and when they take time off from reviewing and inputting more data, their memories dwindle too, just like yours and mine.

The first thing I ask of prospective student for my online class, SCRABBLE 101, is for their total commitment to the class: a portion of every day for 5 weeks (35 consecutive days). People who think that they can become good-great scrabble players by playing 4 games a week are self delusional. How good do you really want to become?

Part of the fun of the game for me are the regular ‘AHAs’ that occur. Sometimes I can stump an ‘expert’ with a simple 3-letter-word that they have forgotten: ‘shh’; ‘cru’; ‘oud’.

There are 1,015 3-letter-words in the OWL2. How long would it take you to learn all of them?

There are 13,015 legal words in the OWL2 + the LWL that end with ‘….ing’. How many of those words ending with ‘ing’ will take an ‘s’ after the ‘ing’? (ans. 1,235) Having this information, what new strategy does this suggest?

After playing serious, competitive scrabble for nearly 25 years, I am continually amazed that I continue to learn new words and new strategies at every session. That’s why this game is always so fresh and alive for its enthusiasts.

If you choose to become a better scrabble player in 2012, allow me to be your coach and mentor.

Gary
(949) 510-1673
letter.man.moss@gmail.com

I remember being 8 years old, in 1950. I had mastered addition and subtraction. I received an ‘H’ in Arithmetic on my report card. ‘H’ was for ‘honors’. I remember sitting with my brother and trying to impress him with my math skills. I would tell him, “In the year 1960 I will be eighteen, you will be fourteen, mom will be forty, and dad will be forty-three”. Then I’d go on, “In the year 2000 I will be fifty-eight, you will be fifty-four, mom will be eighty, dad will be eighty-three, and auntie Annie will be eighty-seven. I felt sooooo smart and I was verrrry proud of myself.

This was all at a time before the transistor radio and the hand-held calculator. Most people didn’t have a TV set. The few who did have TV only received reception a few hours each day for a limited number of hours. At other times there was only a test pattern and a droning static noise.

People ate at home most of the time and only ate out on special occasions. A big treat was buying ice cream from the Good Humor man who drove up and down neighborhood streets peddling ‘toasted almond bars’, ‘dixie cups’, and ‘creamsicles’. On Saturday afternoons our babysitter would walk with us to The West Town Movie Theater where admission was a quarter and popcorn was a dime. We’d watch the likes of Roy Rogers along with a Newsreel, a few cartoons, and a serial chapter of Flash Gordon.

For fun we’d play sandlot baseball on the empty lot at the corner of our block, we’d have gin rummy or monopoly tournaments with friends and neighbors, and we’d play ‘baseball on the stairs’ (bouncing a tennis ball off the front stoop).

No cell phones, no iPads, no computers. When mom wanted me to come home for dinner she simply stuck her head out the window and shouted my name. I was always within shouting distance and I came along within a few minutes. After dinner we might all listen to the radio: Jack Benny; Fred Waring; The Lone Ranger; The Shadow. We all had great imaginations back then. As we listened to the stories on the radio we would imagine our own brand of scenes and the action.

It was a time before Interstate Highways and Jet Planes. A simple drive of 70 miles, from Detroit, Michigan to Toledo, Ohio might take more than 2 hours. I once went on a train trip from Detroit to Washington, D.C. that took more than 13 hours. People speculated that travel would be so much faster in the future. (If today in 2011, you choose the wrong time of day to travel the 50 miles, from Laguna to L.A., it could still take you 3 hours.)

But as you know, the whole world has shifted and use accelerated gears. Everyone is in a hurry. Everyone seems to feel entitled. Nobody wants to wait; nobody wants to get there last. If you are in someone’s way you may get pushed aside and pepper sprayed. If you grab the last pair of ‘Air Jordans’ off the shelf someone might even shoot you to get them away from you.

In some ways, the world of scrabble has been speeding up too. In the last 60 years the game has expanded from solely a kitchen-table, family game, into an association of competitive scrabble players, world wide. A number of different word sources serve different geographic designations. The home players still far outnumber the competitive mavins. The online players of scrabble and simpler versions like ‘Words With Friends’ captivate millions of players every day after day after day.

At times the speed of it all and the loudness of it all becomes overwhelming to me. Maybe it is just a sign that I’m getting older. I prefer the way that it was. Why did they have to change the taste of vanilla ice cream, from the way it tasted at Zukins on 12th Street? Why did Kellogg’s stop producing ‘Corn Soya’ breakfast cereal? Why did they eliminate the entries ‘da’ and ‘emf’ from the official scrabble dictionary?

SLOW DOWN ALREADY! YOU’RE KILLING ME, COLLINS.

In recent years, when I’ve shopped at Grower’s Direct (a produce market), I often see a fruit or vegetable that appears new to me. Many of these are hybrid varieties. The names of many of them haven’t yet been added into the OWL2. Names like ‘aprium’, ‘yuzu’, ‘tangor’, ‘dekopon’, or ‘pomato’. The ‘grapple fruit’ is a combination of both grapes and apple.
Grape + apple= grapple. The fruit tastes like grapes and looks like apple. It is a brand name for Fuji or gala apple and it has been specially treated to make the taste of the fruit flesh like a grape.
Not every ‘word’ has found it’s way into the OWL2. That is why the competitive version of scrabble is really a memory game. When playing the game one has to distinguish words as being included as entries in the OWL2. Other words may well be real words, but if not in the Official list, they are NOT ‘legal‘ to play in a scrabble game.

There is another subtle version of cross-pollination that occurs, more directly related to scrabble players. When I began my scrabble career in earnest, I lived in the northwestern suburbs of Detroit, Michigan. Detroit happens to be just south of Windsor, Ontario, Canada. As a result of the approximation of the neighboring countries, many scrabble players on both sides of the border would travel to and from US and Canadian scrabble tournaments without hesitation.

Would you imagine that the day to day word usage and language of the two regions are different? Most people would think ‘No’. We all speak English. However, I found that there are many words used by Canadians that are used less frequently in the US. The differences are even greater between the US and the Brits or the Australians or the South Africans . . . and we all speak English.

Scrabble players learn words from one another as they play and the words which they learn are replayed in other games in other locales. Hence, scrabble players are responsible for cross pollinating words and language around the country and around the globe.

Introducing language to others is nothing new. It has happened for as long as people traveled beyond their local communities. Why is Portuguese spoken in Brazil? Why is Spanish a major language in California?

The scrabble dictionary includes the entries found in as many as 7 other world dictionaries. A ‘word committee‘ designed by NASPA (North American Scrabble Players Association) is responsible for additions, and deletions to the OWL2.

Sometimes observers look at games being played by scrabblers in-the-know and question, “Are those real words? Isn’t that a foreign word?” The rule is: if a word exists as an entry in the OWL2, then it is ‘legal’. Hence the word ‘xu’ (a monetary unit of Viet Nam) is legal; the Yiddish word ‘kvetch’ (to complain) is legal; the Gaelic word ‘crwth’ (an ancient stringed musical instrument) is a legal word.

Why are there so many Yiddish words in the OWL2? Maybe it has to do with the makeup of the committee when the original official word list was formed. And there are words included that are derived from many other ethnic sources.

The entire world scrabble community does not limit play to solely the OWL2. England, Australia, South Africa, and other countries use The Collins or SOWPODS. These lists are considerably larger that the OWL2. Players who play in both circle face an enormous challenge to compartmentalize their word (good in one or good in both). NOT AN EASY TASK.

In May, 1997 I won the Los Angeles, CA. Club CHAMPIONSHIP because my final opponent played a SOWPODS’ word in error, and lost when I successfully challenged her (Rita Norr).

You can expand and cross pollinate your word knowledge by coming out to play scrabble at one of the many local clubs sprinkled across the country and around the world. Come with an open mind for learning. You will be welcome.

Carnac the Magnificent was a recurring comedic role played by Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. One of Carson’s most well known characters, Carnac was a “mystic from the east” who could psychically “divine” unseen answers to unknown questions.

The powers of ‘Carnac the Magnificent’ have been shared by many other famous seers through the millenia. In recent times you may recall Steve Allen as ‘The Answer Man’ and Ernie Kovacs’ ‘Mr. Question Man’.

Just the other night, as my head touched my pillow, strange incarnations, compressed with magnificent wisdom, in the form of a misty cloud from a medicinal inhaler, hovered over me, then rested over my face. The knowledge seeped into each orifice, traveling through my veins and arteries to the synapses within my brain. There they settled and deposited vast sums of wisdom. And a loud booming voice instructed me to, “Share, share, share it all.”

When the voice quieted and the cloud lifted from my face I got out of bed and sped to my computer where I began to type faster than I have ever been known to type.

Duis aute irure dolor in in velit esse molestaie cillum. Tia non ea soluad incommod quae egen ium improb fugiend. Officia deserunt mollit anim id est. Et harumd dereud facilis est er expedit distinct. Nam liber te conscient to factor poen odioque civiuda et tam. Neque pecun modut est neque nonor et imper ned libidig met, consectetur adipiscing elit dolor set ahmet lorem ipsum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet.

It was if I was typing in fingers. At first, I knew not what I was typing. I had to go back to sleep in my bed in order to dream the answers to my questions. Soon I discovered that the most efficient way for me to tap into the text quickly was with a series of cat naps. And so it was.

Here are a series of answers and subsequent questions pried from within my new found wisdom.

Answer: A loaf of bread, a jug of wine and thou.
Question: Name three things that have yeast.

Answer: A, B, C, D, E, F, G.
Question: What were some of the earlier forms of Preparation H?

Answer: Shoo-be-doo-be-doo.
Question: What do you look for when you’re tracking a shoo-be-doo-be?

Answer: Kitchy-kitchy-koo.
Question: What do you call a military coup led by General Kitchy Kitchy?

Answer: Big Ben, Joe Namath, and a scrabble player’s phoney.
Question: What is a clock, a jock and a crock.

Answer: Heavy breathing then aaaaah.
Question: What sound does a scrabble player make before he/she explodes?

Answer: Donald, Benji, and Alexis Carrington.
Question: Name a duck, mutt, and a slut.

Answer: Bobby Orr, Bobby Hull, David Poder.
Question: Name two hockey players and a hockey puck.

Answer: Catch-22.
Question: What do the Los Angeles Dodgers do with 100 pop flies.

Answer: A triple and a double, catcher’s and fielder’s, and Dolly Parton.
Question: Name two big hits, two big mitts … and a famous country singer!

Answer: Five I’s and Two U’s.
Question: What do you get on your first rack for when you’re playing an Expert?

Answer: Dippity-do.
Question: What collects on your dippity in the morning?

Answer: William Safire.
Question: What’s Shakespeare’s first name, Kingfish?

Answer: Knickerbocker.
Question: What do you want to avoid doing when you shave her bocker?

There are gifts and then, there are GIFTS.

You may be the kind of gifter who chooses to give practicle items like a bottle of wine, a susbscription to Field & Stream, or a pajama-gram.

As for me, I like to receive and give items that are very unique and memorable. To people who already play the game of scrabble, I prefer to shower them with scrabble related tiles, custom scrabble boards and word study lists and cards. CLICK

It is my experience that All People, avid scrabble players and non-players alike, are really pleased and impressed when they receive the Official Scrabble Name Word List, seen below.

At first they look upon it strangely, thinking to themselves, “What the hell is this?” When the then take a closer look, they discover that it is a truly personalize gift designed especially for them, with great love and care.

The presentation is made up of lists of words from only the letters in their name. And those words are some of the highest scoring words to be found in their name. Isn’t special is that?

Take a peak at the gift below, made for Judith Weatherspoon.

The presentation comes framed (8.5 x 11) with the option to hang on a wall or set upon a table or desk. It becomes a great conversation piece. Even when a group of friends may have one, the words are always different (unless your friends all have the exact same name as yours).

I can almost promise that there will be many words on your list that you never knew before. (Most people actually know less than 5% of the words in the dictionary,)

This makes a fun holiday gift. (notice how it placed Christmas theme pictures in the margins.)

I can alter the themes for any special event or season. You can request a predominant color.

From time of order via Paypal, you can receive delivery via Priority Mail within 4 Days. If you are near Laguna Woods, California you can pick up directly from me Next Day.

ORDER NOW! CLICK

Do you sometimes find that you need more? More brain power? More skill? More money?

If you are like most of the rest of us, you experience times of abundance and other times of emptiness. If you are influenced at all by the ever-present salesmen and commercials, believing half of what they tell you that you need, you most likely feel disadvantaged some of the time.

The truth is, we all generally have all that we need. (I didn’t say ‘want‘.)

Our computers can provide the opportunity for aggressive scammers and legitimate salespeople alike to flood our email boxes with tempting offers.

One can’t be too careful when doing business online.

Oftimes our ‘wants‘ can get us in trouble by allowing our ‘temptations’ to overrule our sensibility.

I have to add that sometime when we’re too cautious we can miss out on great opportunities too.

So you may learn from my mistakes of the past, I will be totally honest here by admitting that I am a dreamer and a sucker for a promise and a good sales pitch. I have a hard time saying ‘NO’ to a good salesman or a pretty girl. On more than one occasion, I have forked over hundreds of dollars to buy my way into an opportunity. Most times I have been disappointed and lost my ‘investment‘.

A little knowledge can be a very dangerous thing. My business success in the 1970′s – 1980′s, founding and operating a private school, provided an inner confidence, giving me a knowing that I can achieve anything. Many of the other projects that I’ve attempted have fallen flat, when measured by ‘dollars generated‘. Most of those projects however have lead to personal growth, learning new skills, and provided me an enjoyment through challenging times. There are only one or two projects that I regret ever attempting (selling convertible baby furniture and developing a frozen-pizza franchise in inner-city Detroit before the 1968 riots).

Yesterday I was contacted by a great sales team, they offered me an opportunity. My inner nature is like the little devil on my shoulder, talking into my ear, begging me to jump into their game. Meanwhile, the angel on my other shoulder is shouting into my other ear saying, “Gary, watch out. Don’t make the same mistake again!”

When one really likes to play the game it is so difficult not to play. It is like the gambler having the will to drive past the Casino and going straight home. It is like the alcoholic having the will to drive past the bar and going straight home. It is like the scrabble player having the will to leave the club after playing just 4 games and going straight home.

With that said, there was great value for me in being pitched by the telemarketer on my computer. It was a reminder to me that I still have much more to do in this lifetime. It reminded me that I do not have to pay any salesman a huge fee in oder for me to live my dreams. It reminded me that there is no ‘silver bullet’, ‘magic pill’, or ‘quick fix’ to get to the next level or achieve my ‘wants’.

All I have to do is make it my intention and devote myself to the project.

The same is true for you.

Have a great holiday season, beware of salespeople with thin promises and false, expensive hopes. You can do whatever it is, on your own, without putting yourself in jeopardy.

Gary
jftsoi.moss@gmail.com

There are so many horrible stories in the news. We are bombarded all day long with sensationalized accounts of murders and accidents. The media try to out do each other to grab our attention. It saps one’s energy and the belief that there isn’t any goodness in this world.

I just have to share a touching story that is enough to renew one’s faith in kindness and thoughtfulness.

Most times the ones who are singled out for gifts are those who have lost the most. No doubt that they are deserving of our care. And yet it says that one has to suffer a great loss or tragedy in order to earn appreciation.

Last week my daughter, a struggling artist, was on her way home from a job. She is currently painting murals on the walls in an elementary school (CLICK). After a typical day at work she is covered with paint from head to toe. On one day last week she stopped to purchase groceries on her way home.

While waiting in line at the supermarket, a lady standing behind her noticed Stacy’s disheveled look and the paint on her face and hair. The lady inquired about what Stacy was all about. Stacy shared her story. The lady shared that her mother had been a muralist and she well understood the feast or famine nature of being an artist. At this point the lady said to Stacy, “I’d like to pay for your groceries.” It amounted to more than $80. Stacy’s jaw dropped. The lady explained that she had begun the day with the intention of gifting a total stranger. Amazing! How delicious.

This weekend I will be hosting two separate scrabble events in Laguna Woods, California. The Tallulah Blankheads (22 players) will be playing on December 17th. More than 20 players from the general scrabble community will be playing on Sunday, December, 18th. We scrabble players gift one another all the time, just by showing up to provide each other with competition and a good game. At the Sunday event, players will each bring a Toy For Tots, to be given to less fortunate children. Scrabble players are big hearted.

Sometimes we get so caught up in all the busy activities of the holiday season that we overlook sharing with others outside our circle. Let this be a little reminder to do something this season to make a difference for another. It does not even have to cost a cent. Visit a senior. Give a sincere compliment. Show your appreciation of others.

I wish to show my appreciation for you who have taken time to read my blog. If you send me an email at ( letter.man.moss@gmail.com ) and request the ‘Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanza list’, I will send it to you as a PDF file.

Happy Holidays,

Gary

Today in the USA we measure and rate nearly everything. Books are filled with lists of the ‘biggest’, the ‘smallest’, the ‘fattest’, the ‘tallest’. We are often impressed by the ‘first’, the ‘last’, the ‘newest’, or the ‘oldest.

Someone or something is always ‘the-king-of-the-hill’.

Sometimes when an achievement is surpassed we dismiss the previous record holder: “the KING is dead, long live the KING.”

Why the shallowness? Why the dismissive attitude?

New inventions usually occur on the shoulders of some earlier discovery. What would cars be like without ‘the wheel’? Sure, it is possible that if not for the wheel the first cars may have worked like hover-craft.

During the Big Depression in the 1930s Alfred Butts, a laid-off architect, while amusing himself with word games, came up with an idea for a word game which he called Crisscross Words. He developed the game and tried to take it to market.

Many of us have achieved this level with our own ideas. But that is where most of us have stopped.

Alfred Butts, however, stumbled upon James Brunot, an entrepreneur, who understood the ways of mass production and marketing. Soon (after months-to-years) the name of the game was changed to ‘Scrabble’ and the evolution of our game began in earnest.

If it weren’t for Alfred Butts, would there have been some other special word game sweeping the world today? Probably yes.

Look at hamburger chains. Why are there so many different brands? Does anyone remember which one was first? McDonalds? Burger King? Wendy’s? They all taste different and yet they are all the same. When something becomes a success, observant people want to replicate it without infringing on existing trademarks. People tweak products and offer their new improved versions.

The Trademark holders also work at improving their products in order to expand their user base.

It was in the late 1970s when an astute scrabble player noticed certain patterns on the scrabble board and how the the 7 tiles on a rack, in certain combinations, can create countless high-scoring words. His thoughts and ideas about high probability circumstances led him to write a pamphlet and instruction on how to play ‘better’ scrabble. That man was Mark Landsberg.
Landsberg not only wrote the book on how to win the game, he went on to become one of the premier players on the NSA tournament scene. In the mid 1990s, Landsberg set the NSA record for the highest single game score in sanctioned tournament history with his ’770′. For the next 15+ years he owned that crown.

And like every other king-of-the-hill, Landsberg was the one that every other scrabble mavin wanted to surpass. Just this week, former National and World Champion, Joel Sherman player an ’803′ game (link to board) to become the newest king-of-the-hill.

And as I give accolades and congratulation to Joel Sherman, I always tip my hat to Mark Landsberg.