More Monday Mundanities

Another Monday evening - another round of WORD games at the Collegians Club.
 
First up for me was Keith who started with READIER. I had a slow start where I try to clear my rack of undesirables. KINDA, UMIAK, JUN, VAC and GI finally led to REENLIST. I still couldn't catch Keith until I risked FOLLY for 38 points with my only vowel and the F sitting in the left triple word square column. I remarked that I hope that this didn't prove to be a folly and was relieved to see FORT played for just 21 points. However, this relief was shortlived when Keith unsettled my calm by playing sETTLING next turn with one of the two unseen blanks. Fortunately for me, I managed to pick up the second blank but had to wait until the last turn to play SEEkING in one of the two bingo openings I was preserving for the occasion. Trapping Keith with the Z and X helped boost my winning margin.
 
Next up was Val. I must say that I was to experience the unluckiest sequence of pickups for a very long time. Suffice to say that I suffered Monday-I-tis in picking 8 of the 9 I's with nearly every rack containing at least two of them. I also picked 7 of 8 A's, 3 of 4 U's but strangely only 2 of 8 O's. I got away to a false start with *HESSION left unchallenged but could only muster a score of 30 or more twice - for RAVINE and the new JIRRE. My final rack was the barren LUNTIER so I played LUNIER, explaining that it derives from the French word LUNE for moon which of course causes one to act LUNY or LOONY. A heavy loss resulted that catapulted Val into an undefeated run to eventually win the night. Interestingly, LUNIER is a word I chickened out of against Peter Kougi in the 2007 State Challenge which cost me a win.
 
My final opponent was regular adversary and club president Natalie. Naturally, I played PREZ to begin while Natalie struggled to build a lead. It took a brace of bingos on the 7th and 8th turn to overtake her with PORGIES and SCAILED (both challenged). NIXE (53) and VASTiEsT regained Natalie the lead  and she ought to have won when I gambled on picking the last Y to hook on the end of my FILM for a possible 35 score. She picked the Y but played *EY instead of YE to relinquish her certain win which was lost by me hooking my last tile C in front of HAW to spell CHAW. This word brings back vivid memories for me because it was a word I chickened out of in the last turn of a match against Rod Talbot. Had I played it I would have won the match and also Arie's 2007 tournament at the Dutch Club!