Profile
|
|||
| User: | axolotl8 (12750809) |
||
| Name: | axolotl8 | ||
| Location: | Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States | ||
| Bio: | I live in Milwaukee and work as an Urban Geographic Information Systems Analyst. I analyze and/or create data, indicators, maps, and statistics on housing, health, and crime at the city and neighborhood level. This blog is mostly dedicated to my interest in Scrabble. Before starting tournament Scrabble, I always had a casual interest in Scrabble. I often played Scrabble with my family and friends growing up. I was also obsessed with statistics and puzzles at a young age. I could look at baseball statistics for hours and often played Statis-Pro Baseball. I wandered into my first Scrabble club about 10 years ago in Portland, Oregon. I soon realized I had walked into a room with some of the best Scrabble players in the world--Dave Wiegand, Steve Alexander, Gail Wolford, Chris Lennon, Lou Miller, John Hart, etc. I was bad at first, but thought I could figure out the game (tracking and using the clock were major obstacles). It still remains to be seen whether or not I've figured out the game. I enjoy the complex strategy and spatial nature of Scrabble, probably more than the words, but I like the words too. I enjoy discussing strategy with people, and don't always take the approach that there are right and wrong answers. Advanced strategy can take a long time to develop. Like most experts (besides the very elite), my Scrabble success cycles in and out. Lately, I'm simultaneously encouraged and discouraged with my tournament results. I'm encouraged that, even when I'm drawing badly, I'm able to find my mistakes. I'm finding that the majority of my games are winnable--even against good players--even if I don't get the blanks. I'm also encouraged about my endgame more lately--I'm not letting bad drawing/bad play early in the game take away from my ability to win at the end. Why am I discouraged? Because, in most tournaments, I still make a few too many mistakes. A few major mistakes spread out over a tournament can be the difference between winning or placing in the money. Also, I'm a lot faster now, but still usually too slow to track my tournament games. Another problem is that I don't get enough real game competition against opponents comparable to or better than my own playing ability. I would like to analyze an entire tournament in depth to see how I'm really playing. Maybe I'll try taking digital photos of boards at my next tournament, but I would still need to record or remember my racks. Now that I've tried playing SOWPODS, I really think the NSA should switch over to SOWPODS. I think the new lexicon would be more fun and games would be more complex. Also, players from around the world could compete against each other on equal footing. The REAL reason most people don't want to switch over is that they don't want to study the new words--which I don't think is a good reason. Other interests: I've been playing ultimate frisbee now for about 9 years. I've been practicing yoga for 1 year and enjoy this greatly. Favorite Bands/Artists: The Pixies, Son Volt, Lucinda Williams, Dinosaur Jr., X, Tom Waits, Neil Young, Cowboy Junkies, The Clash, The Pogues, U2, Ani Difranco, Flaming Lips, Mekons, Wilco, Bjork, Bob Dylan, Mazzy Star, Reverend Horton Heat, Nick Cave Favorite Sports Teams: Green Bay Packers, Milwaukee Bucks, Milwaukee Brewers, Wisconsin Badgers | ||
| Pictures: | fewer than 10 public | ||
| Interests: | 17: animals, college/nba basketball, environment/outdoors, espresso, hot yoga, microbrews, movies, music (alt-country especially), npr, politics, reading, scrabble(tm), sushi, tennis, the shield, top chef, ultimate frisbee | ||
| Friends: | |||
| Friend of: | 39: anendlessnight, ataraxy22, axolotl8, basophil, bbstenniz, cesarsalad, crosstables, dianagram, drbing, etotheipi, eurobikermcdog, ftangredi, getofftheoven, gijoel666, goldfishbw, greatscott66, hebdomad, jigsawn, key_lime_guy, listeme, lordiceman, loricae, masochistically, meldeiry, millcake16, nagekinoki, olaugh, pilgrim_eye, saganist, samhampton, scrabblek8, scrabblepolls, shirrach, sneakyofverb, squeegman, synodalhaj, tolarjev, winterene, wisemonkey | ||
| Member of: | 1: scrabbling | ||
| Account type: | Plus Account | ||
