Daily Prompt: The Perfect Game

You’re set to play poker( or Scrabble or something else…) with a group of four. Write a story set during the game, or describe the ideal match: the players, relationships,__ and the hidden rivalries.

Ideal Match– four players are:

Evelyn – my friend

Valerie- neighbor

Ranu- me

Selina – daughter

The tiles are taken by each of us.We are allowed seven tiles, they should be face down, so no one knows what the letters are. Each player should always have seven tiles, when some of the tiles are used they are allowed to get more  to  have seven at a time.

I start the game, out of the seven tiles I could only use three. Since I have used up three of my tiles, I had to pick four more tiles to make sure I always have seven tiles to work with.

I see Evelyn with a meaningful smile, oh no I thought, probably she can use all of her tiles at once. No she has used six of her tiles. It means she must pick up six more to make sure she has seven.

Valerie is deep in thought, an English prof. I bet she’d make an  unbelievable word, but she must have the right tile. She has placed five out of seven of her tiles on the board. The value of her tiles are higher than mine or Evelyn’s. Valerie has more points than us.

Next is Selina’s turn, she has a  crooked smile on her face. Wow! She used all her tiles. She picked up seven more tiles.

The first two rounds went well. The game was getting serious, I was getting tiles with less value and had the least points.

Valerie ,Selina and Evelyn were way ahead of me. The competition was among the three of them. This was the third round. Evelyn and I fell behind. Our points were way lower than Selina and Valerie’s.

After the third round, it was obvious that either Selina or Valerie had a chance to win.  Tiles with letters Q, X and Z were picked up by Valerie. She was able to make the word Quiz, she had the letters U and I. She was stuck with the letter X.

It was Selina’s turn, she was able to place her letters on the Quadruple word score. Her score was a bit higher than Valerie. Valerie was unable to use the  letter Z and ended up losing ten points from her total score. Selina was able to use all her letters on the board.

She was declared the winner!

…………………….. 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

365 Writing Prompts: The perfect game

You’re set to play poker( or scrabble or something else—-) with a group of four. Write a story set during this game.Or describe the ideal match, the players, the relationships— and the hidden rivalries.

I’ll go for Scrabble, this is a game I’m familiar with, or Monopoly, I’ve played both these games with my siblings many times and my children as well.

The only problem I face is one of my children does not like losing. Ideally we play games because it’s a source of entertainment, if there are players who’d like to win all the time, the game is stressful.

My ideal team would be: me, my daughter Seeta, my neighbor Jackie and my friend Joan. This to my knowledge will be an ideal team. None of us are worried about winning or losing.

We’d have our seven tiles, the tiles are always face down to avoid cheating. It is a good idea to be able to use all seven tiles at once, if I start the game. It all depends on what the letters are, if I get the letter “Q” and someone else gets “U” I won’t be able to use all the letters. there is a lot of strategy required to play the game well.

Concentration is one of the keys to win or come close to winning, also vocabulary is very important, dictionaries are not allowed.

If all the players get reasonably good letters the game is exciting, otherwise if you can tell from the very start who has a better chance it’s not that encouraging.

https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/11/10/365-writing-pr…e-perfect-game/

365 Writing Prompts: Toy Story

What was your favorite plaything as a child? Do you see any connection between your life now , and your favorite childhood toy.

I grew up in a large family, I didn’t have a plaything which solely belonged to me. We played with a variety of things, one of these was we’d stack up seven  flat stones one on top of the other   and with a tennis ball we tried to hit the stack and scatter the pieces of stones, we continued to play until all the stones were scattered if we missed a shot it would be the turn  of the next sibling.

Our best plaything was the board games,  Monopoly, Scrabble and one other  which I cannot remember.

We had a lot of fun playing , in the game of Monopoly, my eldest brother was always the banker, when he needed money to  keep playing, he’d take some when he thought we were not looking, but I caught him each time. We were very noisy  my mom said I was the loudest, I had to stop playing and help her with some chores.

I cannot see any connection with our game of Monopoly and my life now. I have the board games, I don’t play at all, I miss playing with my brothers. I’m not the noisy one even if we play once in a while. So there is no connection between life then and now.

: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/09/12/365-writing-prompts-toy-story

Writing Prompt: History Of Language

Write a piece of fiction describing the incident that gave rise to the phrase, “third time’s the charm.”

Amy and Bruce were playing scrabble. The first time they played they were close,Bruce was ahead by only a few points. Amy was disgusted, she thought she’d win because she had a larger vocabulary than Bruce.

 She challenged him to play another round, she was certain there is no way Bruce will win the second time. Both sat and play was on, Amy made careful note of her points,at one point it seemed Amy would win,she had more points than Bruce. Bruce was relaxed he didn’t care who’d win. Amy picked some letters, her face turned red when she checked the letters, they were Q,J,and X, she had used up her letter U and I. Chances of using Q,J, and X was minimal. when they deducted the points of the letters she couldn’t use, Bruce won the second time also. Amy gave up,she stood up to leave.

Bruce convinced her to play one more time, he said, “You know third time’s the charm.” Amy did not believe in these phrases, but sat down reluctantly to play one more time. 

This time it was taking longer to finish the game, Amy was tired and lost interest, but Bruce kept encouraging her. Each one picked up their last seven tiles. Amy checked hers, all her tiles were looking good, if she could use her strategy well,chances were good she could win.

It seemed Bruce was too serious,did he get letters he couldn’t use, well he had the same fate as Amy,he could not use all his tiles and ended up losing.Well he said, “Didn’t I tell you third time’s the charm.” 

Whatever, Amy said, “I’m hungry let’s  go to “Burger King” and have some spicy burgers.”

k: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/04/16/writing-prompt…ry-of-language

DP Daily Prompt:The Perfect Game Ranu’s post

Scrabble game in final stages (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We always have loads of fun playing Scrabble. Here is the scenario I am thinking about.It will be fun as well as a lot of complaints by one member.

So here is my group,the names are imaginary. Names of the players are : Carnelia, Sarnia, Alicia and Fanny.

Carnelia takes the responsibility of writing the score, Sarnia makes sure the game is played without any problem,Alicia and Fanny are happy to  play the game.

The racks are given out.Each player takes seven tiles. The most important thing is the tiles they get before the start of the game. Carnelia and Sarnia are happy,they have the perfect tiles,consonants and vowels are what they want.Alicia and Fanny are not so happy.This means,they did not get what they wanted.

Carnelia starts,she can make a word with the tiles she has, the stage is set,Carnelia gets to makes a long word.The score is counted,she is pleased.She used five tiles,she takes two more,everyone must have seven tiles.

Sarnia’s turn comes,she manages to make a word without any problem. She had Q U I E Z B R ,she is very happy,she can make the word Quiz. Tiles Q and Z are worth more points.Right away she scores more than Carnelia.

It was Alicia’s turn, her tiles were not great,she managed to link it to Carnelia’s word,but scored very few points. Fanny knew what she could make. It was quick.

They picked more tiles,to have seven in total. The game started to be competitive. No one was talking.Each one wanted to win.

The game continued for a couple of hours, Carnelia was able to use up all her tiles. Next was Sarnia. Alicia and Fanny had three tiles left.They tried to use them,they couldn’t. So the game was finished .

The scores were counted ,Sarnia scored the highest,Carnelia was second Fanny and Alicia’s scores were added,each one had tiles left, the question was who loses the most scores,unlucky for Fanny,the tiles she could not use were worth more than Alicia’s.

Well Fanny was convinced in the beginning of the game she would win hands down. She made a big fuss,tried telling everyone it was a stupid game. Their skills had nothing to do with the game. It was just a question of luck,whoever gets the better tiles will win.

I said “Its not true,you can win if you think how to use your tiles intelligently”. The game of Scrabble needs both luck and skill!

Daily Prompt: Competition posted by ranu

I am not a person who is very competitive.I went through school,college and university without competing.I was mostly happy with my performance.Competition I feel causes a lot of stress. Nothing brings out my competitive streak. Having said that there was once  I felt it brought out my competitive streak full throttle.

My daughter Fatima was visiting me for a few days.One day she came and asked me,was I going to be busy that day.I told her I didn’t think  and was curious to know what was on her mind. She wanted to play a game of scrabble and she was wondering if I would join her.This daughter of mine hated to lose,she grew up winning everything,my husband was not particularly happy if she lost.Because she created a holy fuss which amounted to slamming the doors,stamping the floor and screaming. My other two daughters were told to let her win,they were not thrilled with the idea but they hated to see the repercussion,if she lost.

I had a perfect chance to teach her about winning and losing.Immediately I made it clear to her,win or lose she will have to control herself,she promised to abide by my rule. We proceeded to play the game,my dormant competitive spirit woke up.I sat straight and concentrated on the game.I looked at every possible nook and corner to see how I could make a word and get a lot of points.Luckily I also got the letters with high points.Fatima was keeping the score and also looking at all the possible angles where she could get the triple word score.We were at it for half of the day. I managed to use out all my letters she couldn’t. I let her add the score, I won by probably about ten points.I won both ways I won the game and also taught her  a very important lesson,how to lose gracefully. Remember this I told her,”Failure is the pillar of success.”