Challenging Words

Despite my plays of "slake" and "qua" (go ahead, look 'em up!), and getting rid of both the "Z" and "Q" tiles, I (right) still lost to Mom (left) 150-143. Yume held her own with a strong 134, but ran out of plays late. We used the basic free-for-all rules, though we finally played with challenge rules intact (generally forgoing these for Yume's sake). I endured challenges against both "treetop" and "slake", forcing Yume and Mom to lose respective turns. Still, Mom's plays of "odious", "mule", "fix", and "vents" kept her close, the difference being my lone tile (a "V") left at the end of the game. (Truth be told, I had been bluffing with "qua", explaining to the others that it was "quay", though neither of them were brave enough to challenge me on it. Imagine my surprise when we looked it up after to find it was a word! Still lost, though. I find it a refreshing slap in the face when you can play well and still lose. Touché, Scrabble!)