If you really want to get to know someone play a game of Scrabble with them

Seriously, everything you want to know about a person you can learn in the time it takes to play a game of Scrabble. Including yourself.

I don't mean an online game. I mean a real, sit down with the board and people, game.

The last game I played was about two weeks ago while visiting west coast friends and it seemed harmless enough. "Yes, sure, why not?" I said. There were four of us.

I should have known I was headed for trouble when one of my friends started off by saying that she likes to modify the rules to allow the use of proper nouns. We all agreed since it seemed like a harmless change.

I suggested we get the dictionary. How do you play Scrabble (check challenges, etc) without a dictionary? Our friends didn't own a dictionary but decided that between the four of us we could determine a word's fair play. Sounded like trouble, but what the heck, I agreed to play what I perceived to be a casual, fun, anything goes game of Scrabble.

What was I thinking?

Suddenly the one rule change had sub rules. (OJ could not be used as a proper name since 'everyone knows it really stands for orange juice' or at the very most Orenthal James which still makes it an abbreviation and abbreviations aren't allowed) "Seriously?" I asked. I defended my position by saying no one would argue Tony wasn't a proper name even though it was a nickname for Anthony, so why didn't OJ count as a nickname for Orenthal James? And suddenly the anything goes crowd turned into cut throat competitors. I sheepishly retreated my O and J back onto my wooden rack. (I think I would have been allowed to use OJ if it weren't for the fact that in using OJ I was also able to make another word in another direction that would have granted me about 30 odd points for the play. I think that was the real issue.)

The next controversial word came about when the most vocal critic of OJ spelled out 'AX.' I recalled the last game of Scrabble that I had played (again with people who did not own a dictionary) and I had spelled AX only to be shot down because I was told AX had an e at the end. (And damnit I should have checked the spelling after that last game but I hadn't.) So undoubtedly to bust the chops of my OJ nemesis, I recalled that memory and claimed, "Ax ends with an e." She correctly claimed it could be spelled either way like blonde and blond and I honestly suspected she was right and I let it go. But she did not like being challenged and refused to use the word ax because she didn't want controversy and she spelled another word.

But the claws came out and for the rest of the game insults were disguised as jokes. When the rest of us took longer than 10 seconds to spell a word she and her husband hummed the theme music for final Jeopardy which precluded us being able to concentrate. We looked at each other and realized that all we could do was just ignore the behavior and do what we could to end the game as quickly as possible.

Our friend won, but disappeared immediately thereafter. We thought it odd but said our goodnights to her husband and went on our merry way.

The next morning our friend posted a full dictionary page of the word AX and its nine dictionary entries onto each of our facebook profiles. Wow.

My Southern California, hip and trendy, easy going friend is just as uptight as my own east coast self. Who woulda thunk it?

Here's what I've learned: 1) Always play Scrabble following the game rules without exception, and 2) always use a dictionary!