The Scribble on Scrabble | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

welcome to stuff you should know a. production of iHeart. [Music]. Radio hey and welcome to the podcast I'm. Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here. too and this is stuff you should know. good oldfashioned pop culture Games. edition yeah uh and yeah here we are. finally talking about Scrabble I've been. asking for you to do this with me for at.

least a decade and you kept refusing I I. still don't know why even Jerry chimed. in and was like will you guys please do. Scrabble and finally you relented I. think just because you wanted me and. Jerry to stop bothering you about it no. it's probably it a big thanks to Laura. for her help on this. one uh what what was your nickname for. her Dr claw Dr. claw uh do you play Scrabble are you a. scrabbler I just kind of wanted to get. that out of the way you know I wish I.

were I'm I'm not and it's not like I. have an aversion to it or anything like. that it's just not part of my world I. guess you know yeah same I mean we own. it and I have played Scrabble here and. there if somebody's like hey let's play. Scrabble uh I won't go like no sorry not. going to do it right uh but you know. I'll play very occasionally but I've. never been a regular scrabbler um nor am. I very good at it at all especially if. I'm playing against somebody who you. know cuz there's a lot more to it than.

just like knowing words well I feel like. based on stuff you should know history. our best episodes are ones where we. explain games that we don't actually. play soccer chess yeah I mean the list. just keeps going on it feels like we're. about to add to it yeah surfing yeah. surfing I mean we should probably just. say that Scrabble if you don't know it's. a board game uh in which two to four. players use letters little tiles uh to. spell out words on a board right and a. cross like fashion uh wow that was a.

good description Chuck in other words. you know the the words have to. intersect uh each other uh you can't. just throw a random word out there in. the corner if you if you feel like it uh. they have to touch and use a letter uh. or I guess a blank space from another. word yeah and by the way I I just want. to go ahead and because Scrabble people. are probably going to get mad at us but. I'm going to go ahead and throw out a. suggested rule change okay that there is. a Word Scrabble and that means to to as.

a verb to scratch or grope to try and. collect something or as a noun the act. of doing that uh and I propose that if. you play that eight-letter word that not. only do you get your bingo bonus for. playing a seven-letter word I think you. should if you play the word Scrabble you. should get an extra bonus on top of that. of how many points million whatever's. fair that's where I just step back and. say you guys handle it okay you like to. kick the Hornets Nest and then watch him. go I just think I don't know if you play. the words Scrabble give it a little just.

a little bump I agree I think you're. right all right that's my only. suggestion my only note um a little more. about it the the Scrabble board is 15x. 15 squares 25 225 total squares and. because it's 15 by 15 you're limited to. no more than 15L words sure um and just. the I guess just a quick summary of the. rules so when you play that first word. um you have to play it in the center. Square mhm that's where you start um and.

you can build off of other people's. words you get up to 15L words by. building onto other words U because you. could never spell more than a. seven-letter word because at no point in. time do you ever have more than seven. tiles right and as I said that seven uh. tiles played at once is called the Bingo. uh you you add up your score at the end. and Tack on 50 points at that point. right uh or however many you get. apparently experts can play like you.

know three four or five of those in a. game sometimes yeah oh yeah that's a. great way to run up scores from what I. can tell and then across the board. there's um triple word scores double. word scores double letter scores and. triple letter scores and basically when. you lay a tile over that depending on. whether it's a letter or a word you get. bonus points for it so when you're like. like if you play a bingo across like a. triple word score you got a bunch of. point you basically just dusted your.

opponent in that one move essentially. yeah I mean if you're just sort of. amateur funsies Scrabble people MH one. big Bingo like that can seal the game. for you yeah it's it's called sending. and packing With Tears in their eyes I. think uh in France by the way the Bingo. is called a Scrabble oh uh just other. nuts and bolts um you know the the ties. come in a little they're little wooden. tiles little wooden square tiles and on. the tile is a letter and then a point. value sort of as a subscript uh and then.

you keep your letters on a little wooden. tile rack and you uh ideally your your. opponent does not see those um right. like you know it's they're facing away. from you if you're opposite your. opponent and that's a big part of like. an expert or at least an accomplished or. experienced Scrabble is dummies like me. and I guess you if you and I played we'. just sit down and try and spell fart. every chance we got uh if you're an.

experienced scrab blist you're almost. like counting cards like you know how. many letters right are in the bag of. like how many of each letter in the bag. and you see them being played you know. how many are on your rack you know how. many are still in the pile so you're. sort of trying to figure out. mathematical possibilities of what's. still out there and what can be played. like that's the next level stuff yeah. for sure and it's not like evenly. distributed for example there's 12 e but. there's only one J K QX and z um and. then the other letters are just kind of.

distributed in weird random ways um so. that like you could I guess easily count. that stuff if you play Scrabble enough. you're just going to pick up on how many. yeah are out there at any given point. yeah you've also got your blank tiles. which are worth zero points um but that. it those really help out in making words. possible that you couldn't get. ordinarily uh and then you've got your. onep pointers AE i l n o r s t. and you um and also just real quick I.

did some poking around Chuck and I found. that there's some pneumonic devices that. like Tournament level players use to. remember how many points a particular. letter gets you should say that after I. list them all well I was I was going to. just do it by by group if that's okay. with you sure so the first group one. point uh they use astronauts eat in. limbo no right silly tiger umbrella all.

right uh the two-pointers are D&G Dave. Gary okay I would say dog on uh three. points are BCM and p uh that is be. chewing and masticating. Pizza does someone really suggest like. hey use these and don't make of your own. no I'm making this up I got you this is. all a bit okay Four Points we got FH V. andw and why right so for heaven's vake.

why. you okay I get it now you should have. told me this was a bit five pointers you. get your k k okay eight pointers jnx. Jackson loves XX. okay uh Jackson. loves yeah you just have to ignore the. the L. okay then your tinp pointer Josh what do. we going to end up with Q andz uh quartz.

and. quartz that's great I think I got it you. got it yeah give me a quiz at the end I. I'll put this away and then you can just. quiz me yeah once you learn that you'll. never forget. it uh there is a statistics Professor. Carnegie melon Andrew Thomas um who says. if you go first you have an advantage of. 14 points if you have that blank tile. ever in the game that's an advantage of. 30 points if you're good at Scrabble not.

like me right um there's also like if. you have S tiles there's a 10-point. advantage and the reason why I was like. that doesn't make any sense because S as. you remember from your pneumonic device. is only a onepoint tile you throw that. on the end though right yeah that's the. thing so like if you add if you like I. said you can add on to other words that. are already on the board even ones. another player wrote out and whatever. word score they got for that word if you. add had an S you get that same word.

score plus one point for the S so um. that's a really easy way to rack up some. quick points and totally I think also. probably annoy other players uh I wonder. about that I'd like to hear from from. scrabbler I mean if it's fair game it's. fair game yes and there's but there's. plenty of rules that are fair game that. are also like you're a jackass yeah. that's a good point uh let me see here. what else do we have we have uh x and z. give you a three to five point advantage. um even though they're you know tougher.

to use and the Q is a fivepoint. disadvantage because I mean I was about. to say you always have to have that U. but I'm sure there are weird Scrabble. words that don't have a Q there's two. that I know of one is key Qi yeah I. think I heard that Qi or no sorry that's. Chi life force I think okay uh and you. get 11 points for that one and then I. can't remember there's one more that's. like a a q word that does not require a.

u that oh no Qi is in here because. that's the highest scoring two-letter. word along with Z is that what you said. yeah and I looked up Za Z yeah and it's. slang for pizza I'm not certain that. that usage is allowed but it's also a. archaic um word for a B flat notation. yeah I wonder if cuz I did the same. thing you did every time they gave an um. Laura found an example of a word that's. unusual or high scoring I always look. looked it up cuz I was curious I I.

wonder if that's part of the love of. Scrabble is actually learning what these. words mean or if they're like I really. don't care I just care how much it's. work well from what I can tell scrabbled. players don't care what a word means. they they don't think of them like that. and I mean that'll come up later with. those controversial words oh sure yeah. good point yeah it's just us we're. curious types Scrabble players are not. uh that's that's true uh the highest. scoring three-letter word is Zach 19. pointer and Z is 16 uh quiz is a.

four-letter word worth the most at 22. that means like a test of sorts okay and. then Zippy what does that mean the the. pin head Zippy the pin head what's that. oh it's a really weird 80s comic strip. you know the clown with the Zippy the. pin head no I don't know it oh you. should look it up it's it's weird it's a. weird comic strip okay I don't know it. but it couldn't be that sorry I have to. I have to correct myself before all of. the Scrabble players email in it.

couldn't be Zippy the Pinhead because. Zippy the pin head would be a proper. noun ah okay good point thanks you can't. use proper nouns no you can't might as. well go ahead and say that they're. really serious about that stuff too oh I. bet uh see I'm a house rules guy so I. can you know as long as everyone's on. board I think you can uh you can have. your own house rules for stuff oh I. agree don't bring that into a tournament. no get that mess out of here is what. they'll tell you yeah but like if I were. to play with Ruby she'd and I'd probably.

say like hey we can use prop pronounce. because she'll want to put our dog's. name or. something or maybe I would right uh I. did look up the highest scoring. um Bingo and that is uh musix muu ZJ I. KS which is a Russian peasant wow well. that probably it's probably M mu muik or. something yeah I like it both ways. though. mus look at all them mus toiling in the.

fields yeah I like that um so I was. confused because there's a lot like one. of the rules is no proper nouns no words. that end an apostrophe or require an. apostrophe yeah um and then also no. foreign words but clearly some foreign. words are allowed in because they're so. common in English that they've just. basically been adopted into the language. I get that but a musix is not a common. word in English so it must mean that.

that does appear in some English. dictionary somewhere because that's kind. of the great ruler Arbiter but I just. don't see how it could be that's just. weird to me well what's weird is your. college band I know for a fact was Jay. Clark and the. musics yes but we were trying to be. exotic you know and we should also say. that the Scrabble I think is now up to. 30 languages all over the world and uh. apparently that can be problematic like. in in France you can add an e and an S.

to many many words so it can kind of get. out of hand with the the score totals. there and and our beloved Germany uh and. I never really thought about this but. German words are long so there's not a. lot of I mean there sure sure there are. obviously words shorter than seven words. in Germany but a lot less than a lot of. other languages yeah it's true so it. must just be Bingo City or whatever. Bingo city is in German there's there's. also um bingo I don't know what city. bingo. uh maybe.

Bingo sure um there's a so in some other. countries too in foreign language. versions of Scrabble um there are some. adjustments with the tiles like some. have more than 100 tiles oh right. because of weird little letters yeah. there's like Double L and Double R in. the Spanish language version there's. also the N with the tild day over it. that that's also a tile yeah spice it up. a little yeah I think that's where with. eight.

points nice yeah but you have to to. remember that that's eight points you. have to say nice right should we take a. break I like how this is headed yeah all. right we'll be right back to learn about. a terror call to take a. about the the LI Mur and the canun. explain everything to your. brain word up Jerry.

[Music]. all right we're back and if you're going. to talk about Scrabble you got to talk. about Alfred Mosher butts because he is. the gentleman who invented this game uh. this is in 1938 he was an unemployed. architect at the time and and just into. games he's from pipy but I believe the. game was actually invented actually I. know this for a fact in Jackson Heights. Queens mhm because at 81st Street and.

35th Avenue I believe is a Scrabble. style uh street sign I think it's um I. think it's 35th Avenue has below each of. the letters just the little number value. subscript which is kind of just a little. nice fun cute nod are you sure it's just. that that community in particular isn't. big Scrabble fans yeah I'm positive okay. so he uh did you say he was an. unemployed architect yeah at at the time. and he was just into gaming and wanted.

to invent a game that was part chance. part skill yeah so he um did not have a. great success with it out of the gate he. initially tried to call it lexico and. Criss crosswords and he took it around. to game manufacturers and they're like. nah I'm not really feeling this yeah and. that was the the way it went for a good. decade before a man named James brunau. uh bought the rights he saw something in. it that I guess other people didn't he. renamed it scrap grabble uh he changed.

the gameplay a little bit one of the. biggest changes he made was that uh the. way that mojer buts had come up with is. that you just thought the word uh in. like a kind of a mental version of the. the board and the other player hopefully. was able to pick up on the word you were. thinking and so B brunau was like maybe. we should just replace with an actual. board in tiles and that really kind of. helped move things along a bunch yeah. you know I looked up uh this James. brunau and you know we get a lot of.

great information a lot of times from. New York Times. obituaries and he was a friend of butts. and so they used to play Scrabble. together um on occasion like their. homemade version and once this guy took. it over he and his wife Helen like. operated out of their house and he was. like at at a certain point like all that. was in our house was boxes of tiles and. racks and boards and we couldn't move. around so they had to uh they moved to. an abandoned School school house um uh.

and then eventually a a converted wood. working shop and they had 35 employees. working two shifts producing 6,000. Scrabble sets uh sets a week wow by 53. by 1953 So within five years of him. buying the. rights that is correct sir okay so that. that the year before that I've seen it. um told as a legend or a widely told. story Laura put it. I don't know why no one's like yeah.

that's what happened but right. supposedly the president of Macy's came. across the um the game I'm not sure how. uh played it liked it ordered a bunch to. stock up of course that meant gimbal's. immediately followed suit and so um the. the game took off from there so this. would have been. 1952 when that supposedly happened yeah. that makes sense yeah and Bruno was like. we can't possibly keep up with this. demand like this is just skyrocketed.

which is great but they turned to a. company a game maker called celo and. Ryder and they took over making the game. um and they did so for decades they were. the people who made Scrabble for a. really long time and within two years. two years of that great Macy's president. story uh happening four and a half. million copies were sold like it just. hit America like you know a a. a giant packet of pop rocks and Diet.

Coke for Mentos yeah or like a t o n NE. of bricks which is worth more than T. nice uh so that's selling pretty good I. think they've sold uh they estimate. about 150 million total sets as of you. know kind of now yeah uh even though. it's hard to get a a real firm number on. that uh but they uh bought that. trademark celo and Ryder uh I want to. say RoR there but it is writer mhm um. bought that trademark from them in.

72 uh Bruno got a million and a half. bucks which would be about 12 million. today and this by the way was like he. was looking for something to do in. retirement so wow he really scored um. that's a triple letter retirement gig I. would say right or triple word even uh. and then the inventor Mr buts got 265. Grand which should be about two million. bucks plus he got a a very small royalty. that he seemed to be pretty happy with. yeah he sounds like a great guy this is.

one of the more heartwarming quotes I've. come across in a while he he was. interviewed in 1984 about um about his. invention and he said people are always. asking me if I'm rich I used to get two. to three cents for each game sold one. third went to taxes I gave one third. away and the other third enabled me to. have an enjoyable life great and if. there's such a thing as Heaven I believe. that Mr butts is there right now I think. so too he would have been in his 80s. then too because I think he died in the.

early 90s in his. 90s uh okay well there you go he had a. great life apparently I love it so um. things turned kind of dark when the. Cabbage Patch Kids bought Delo and Ryder. in. 1986 you want to hear something funny. what every time I looked at that word I. said kco oh and I was like I was like. that's so weird like I grew up with kico. toys yeah and I just kept seeing it as.

kco and I was like wait a minute dummy. it's kico well you must be uh Scrabble. because that would just be like the word. construct without any kind of meaning to. it so you're in there Chuck you really. did some method research yeah maybe so. so kico yes bought celo and Ryder and. just did not really give much of a care. about Scrabble I mean it was just a. maker to them apparently they were.

already in trouble which is nuts that. they declared bankruptcy by 1989 I think. I can't remember surely we talked about. in our Cabbage Patch Kids episode why. that happened but to go. from having one of the hottest toys in. the history of toys to bankrupt in the. same decade as. breathtaking uh as far as business goes. but when kico declared bankruptcy Hasbro. stepped in and did seem to care a lot. more about Scrabble um and so under.

their ownership I think it's still owned. by Hasbro if I'm not mistaken uh it's. been fine head its ups and downs as. we'll see uh but there was also a. bidding war for the international rights. to produce Scrabble and Mattel beat them. out for that right and that I can't. imagine what a plum that is but it also. occurred to me and I know we've done an. episode on um intellectual property but. there's like there's some fictitious.

right out there that says this one. company is allowed to produce all the. games just internationally this other. company has this other fictitious right. to produce all the games just inside of. the United States and it's just so. mind-blowing to me that we've just kind. of created that that kind of madeup. structure for things and how much just. gobs of money that that legal fiction. creates for people are you pushing for. just an open source world no not.

necessarily I don't have a problem with. it I was more just astounded by it you. know yeah no it's interesting I mean I. mean have you ever dug into like uh TV. rights for professional sports leagues. oh my God is that I'll bet that's quite. a jungle yeah it is and it's gotten. really really expensive like when you. see the numbers like you know Amazon. acquires the right to air whatever. Sunday Night Football or something it's. just like oh yeah yeah astounding how. what kind of money we're talking about. for sure. uh anyway um I guess we can move on to.

competitive Scrabble because uh you know. a lot of people just play for funsies at. home um I know uh our our Bud John. Hodgman and his lovely wife Katherine. play like for decades now uh because. they're high school sweethearts so they. they're long long longterm scrabbler um. you know against each other I I kind of. wanted to find out if there was a. lifetime record that they keep up with. surely but then I just decided not to. ask uh yeah Hodgman used to live tweet.

their games oh he did yeah it was really. cute to to just kind of follow along um. I bet they're both good because. Katherine's an English teacher and John. is uh you know knows a lot of words yeah. any anybody who knows Hodgman too right. when they saw the Scrabble episode of. stuie should know knew that there was a. 100% chance that Hodgman was going to. come up at some point in time for sure. he he would have complained if we hadn't. yeah for sure he he's a SC SC scrable. guy for sure yeah uh he would smoke me.

in fact I I feel like I might have. played him once on one of these uh trips. that I used to do with him um for uh. maximum fun but I don't know if if we. did play it was not even competitive at. all I'm sure he I don't see why he would. have played I don't see why he would. have played me because I'm really just. you know I'm like Steve Carell and. Anchor Man like I'll try to spell lamp. just because I looked at. one you know hey man if it gets you some.

points who cares yeah you and I probably. be pretty good you know matchup yeah I. think so too we should play sometime. yeah okay so uh that sounded. unenthusiastic I meant hell yeah buddy. all right uh sorry you can't see me but. I'm raising the roof right now yeah. let's do it so um you mentioned. competitive Scrabble that there are. tournaments which isn't very surprising. I mean people are into Scrabble so um. when you start throwing money down for. for like prize money for tournaments. people are going to flock to them and.

for years um the the main the biggest. Scrabble tournament what they called. Nationals was the North American. Invitational Scrabble Players tournament. which uh had its inaugural championship. in. 1978 and was held every year through to. 2009 and uh uh celo and Ryder actually. formed the national Scrabble Association. which was very smart because that kind.

of thing generates a lot of interest. enthusiasm newspapers cover oh it's so. crazy there's a Scrabble Championship. right now and um like it just helps keep. the thing topical you know instead of. just letting people buy it and crossing. your fingers that kind of thing it was a. pretty smart business um Venture and. then like I said kico came along they. did nothing for it apparently the. Players Association had to shame kico. into chipping in $5,000 for prize money.

for the national tournament and then. when Hasbro came along they started. funding it a lot more lavishly but then. they kind of said you know we're we're. this isn't actually worth it anymore you. guys are you know maybe a few hundred. people coming to these tournaments and. you you all have all of the Scrabble. boards that you're ever going to need. you're not going to buy anymore so they. stopped funding those and they actually. shut down the um the national Scrabble.

Association so an independent version. came up the North American Scrabble. Players Association I think back in 2009. is when it was formed yeah and before. anyone writes in technically they didn't. completely shut down the NSA they just. stopped there uh they weren't in charge. of the tournaments anymore they just. they moved them over to another program. called School Scrabble yes because those. kids have a long life of buying Scrabble. boards ahead of them that's right. uh you mentioned ups and downs over the.

years uh you know I guess all board. games go through kind of Boom periods. and bus periods or or at least low. periods and Scrabble is no different uh. there was an early 2000s boom um there. were T televised tournaments uh it's. interesting what drives the stuff uh I. don't know if they know on the inside. but I couldn't figure out why it would. have had a boom in the 2000s early. 2000s oh uh a um a documentary called. freaks I believe oh is that what did it.

it introduced it to a whole new. generation of and yeah and it took off. like it like like um Hasbro has a lot to. be thankful for from that documentary. from what I understand oh I bet the New. York Times crossword documentary too. kick that up a notch yeah for sure that. was a great one um but we're not talking. crosswords again so don't worry I just. busted out in sweat you got a flop sweat. happening uh there were 75,000 rated. scrabbled tournament games in 2004 and.

that number by 2019 was cut almost in. half that went down to. 40,000 uh and the Nationals went from. 837 players to 280 over that same span. so it just seems like that documentary. really caused a Resurgence I guess and. then it kind of went back to level set. maybe yeah for sure um there was also a. lot of internal strife too the North. American Scrabble Players Association. didn't make a lot of friends they um. established a real top- down hierarchy.

of how that that Association was run so. some other players associations were. developed splintered off um there was a. lot. of fracture I guess in the Scrabble. Community um that just kind of came. around that time that surely affected. attracting new people like I hate to use. the word toxic cuz I feel like it's. definitely overused but it feels like. that Community got a lot more toxic uh. around that time and and you know that.

doesn't exactly attract people like hey. I want to join that toxic subculture. really mix it up yeah well some people. are into that yeah those aren't the. people you want to attract to your toxic. subculture though yeah or place gravel. with right um if you're in a tournament. you're going to see some big scores uh. they have you know scores over 800. points at times in tournaments um the. highest scoring legal word I don't think. it's ever been played officially uh but. that would be a.

1,784. point score if it that was across three. different triple word scores that word. is oxy oxyen basone yeah it's a now. banned um nid pain reliever that's right. and since I know you looked it up. because I did too I'll let you give the. definition of Kazi uh which is the. highest score ever for a word played in. a tournament 392 points point for kazik. so yeah so that one from what I could.

tell I found that as a Spanish word for. an indigenous Chieftain usually in um. among Caribbean tribes yeah I saw that. the tyo people like the indigenous. bahamians right and that was actually. played amazing yeah I mean that's so. that's one word for 392 points to put. that into perspective a good you know. average person's Scrabble score from. what tells couple to a few hundred.

points this is like a Scrabble score. with just a high Scrabble score with. just one one word this is like the level. that these people are playing at and. Chuck I I say we take another break and. we'll come back and we'll poke around in. the brains of those highlevel Scrabble. players and see what neurologists have. found out recently let's do it want to. learn about a ter and call itoda how to. take a perfect all. abouta the the LI Mur run going explain. everything to your brain.

exp should. know word up. [Music]. Jerry okay Chuck so we've kind of made. mention a couple of times that people. who play Scrabble like think of words. differently than normies to and um there. have been studies using the Wonder.

machine in particular by neurologists of. the brains of people who play Scrabble. because there's a lot of um. long-standing discussions rival theories. and hypotheses about how we process. words and information associated with. words and by studying Scrabble players. like high Lev Scrabble players they. found that their brains literally work. different when it comes to words yeah uh. take it away well one of the studies um. I can't remember what year it was I.

actually failed to look now that I think. about it they found that um when you uh. put the uh put a Scrabble player through. the What's called the lexical decision. task mhm which is um showing people very. quickly jumbles of words and saying is. there a word in there too late is there. a word here too late um and they have to. answer really quick and there's always. some BLB assistant shouting too late and. really just mix things up a little bit. um Scrabble players use Reg of their. brains that most people wouldn't use.

they and they don't use regions of their. brains that people normally do use say. so like when you think of a word you. think of the meaning usually that's how. you grasp a word when and you're really. kind of processing what the word is. there's a meaning attached to it there's. a symbolism attached to it with the. Scrabble player they do not think like. that they think of words as physical. constructs of letters there's meanings. aren't attached to them it that takes.

too long they process them much more. quickly because it's just a bunch of. letters that you put together it doesn't. matter what it means it just matters. that you can get this number of points. on a Scrabble board one of the other. things they found is that they also use. more spatial um reasoning than the. average person does when they're um. recognizing and processing words and. letters because they have to figure out. how to orient them on the board and how. they would intersect with other other. words on the board so they their brains.

change and the way they approach words. change the more Scrabble you play yeah I. think it's they it's almost like. tetris-like in their brains at a certain. point like they might as well just be. Tetris blocks that are trying to fit in. uh obviously not Tetris because you. can't make you know your own size and. shaped things but you know what I mean. sure I know what you mean I think that's. I think it's a good analogy uh there's. some other cool studies that there or. you know kind of findings they found. from different studies uh the setup of. this one is basically that if you have a.

college degree U they have found that. you're less likely than those without uh. with you know less education to get uh. age related memory loss in Alzheimer's. but uh in terms of Scrabble they found. that that Gap can be closed a lot if you. uh don't have that college degree and. you play a lot of Scrabble um you can. close that Gap to where uh it's almost. the same as people with higher levels of. Education as far as acquiring that. memory loss in Alzheimer's pretty great. take that college boy what about the.

ruskies that was interesting too I. thought yeah they studied Russian. engineering students and by they I mean. the people who conducted this study um. and they said here Russian engineering. students we're going to teach you. Scrabble and you're going to play it for. a year and then we're going to test you. we're going to have you play um teachers. who teach English as a foreign language. so they're Russian but they know a lot. of English and we're going to play the. English language Scrabble by the by the. way so there's all the pieces on the. board right there and what they found is. that the engineering students who didn't.

speak that much English were able to um. I think in the words of the study smoke. the English as a foreign language. teachers in Scrabble that's incredible. yeah even though they the the teachers. knew more English than the the. engineering students did yeah that's. super cool uh they've also found that. for tournament play uh men dominate T. tournament Scrabble uh tournaments. generally speaking uh but they've done. um studies of this and they're like hey.

it's not uh because men have big brains. and women have little tiny brains yeah. it's not because guys can can learn. words better than women has nothing to. do with any of that it has to do with. the fact that in general uh overall um. Men start younger than women do uh boys. I guess start younger than girls when it. comes to Scrabble and women generally. and and girls play more Scrabble but. they say that's not necessarily how to. get better at Scrabble. um they're playing for fun and just. having a good time whereas to get better.

at Scrabble what these boys and men seem. to be doing more of is like anagramming. stuff and analyzing everything and. instead of just like hey let's just play. some Scrabble and have some fun like let. me research and analyze this stuff so I. can dominate in a tournament exactly but. I mean that's how you get better at. apparently anagramming is a huge um. thing to do if you want to get better at. Scrabble because when you look at the. you know there's seven tiles on your. tile holder it's just a jumble of. letters and you have to find the words.

in those letters um that's part of the. game so if you go practice that yeah. you're going to get a lot better but I. saw that among just the population in. general just people who play Scrabble. for fun it's much more closely divided. it's more like 6040 men to women yeah. yeah and I think it's changed a lot over. the past couple of decades too yeah I. think that um documentary probably. helped quite a bit yeah um when it comes. to like all right what words like what. dictionary do you use there is a. Scrabble dictionary it's called the.

official Scrabble players dictionary uh. it was released in 1978 uh Again by. selchow and Ryder even though they. worked with Mariam Webster um to produce. the game because you know they're. dictionary people and that this has. caused a lot of controversy over the. years because words have been added. words have been taken away and every. time that happens uh the Scrabble. Community um you know some people are. like great great change and some people. are like no I hate that. yeah because to them they're just words.

the meaning has no purpose or Point. whatsoever in the game it doesn't matter. um so why would you take any words out. that we could potentially use and score. with some of the worst and the worst. racial slur out there have been in the. Scrabble dictionary yeah do you want to. tell some people well I mean I'm not. going to say those but uh there is a. list um I think there was a woman named. Judith grad in the '90s who kind of uh.

got on her um I don't know to say got on. her Soap Box because that indicates a. bad thing she she got a campaign going. to have these slurs removed um the. Anti-Defamation League got involved. Hasbro eventually said all right we're. going to remove uh these words from the. next edition of the dictionary uh booby. Gringo farted. honky Whitey pissed fatzo redneck and. wazo and Jerry best of luck beeping all. those out it should be pretty easy so uh.

yeah so there were a lot of Scrabble. players who were like this is outrageous. who cares about offensiveness and other. people are like this is kind of society. evolving in real time right here um so I. guess. Hasbro made a compromise and they said. well how about this for Tournament level. we'll keep the or we won't take these. words out we'll have a separate book. called the official word list among. players it's called twl 998 that's when. it came out was 1998 but for everybody.

else and that that by the way the twl. 199 or 98 is just available to Players. Association. members um so it's not like available. the general public and then the other. one the the uh the toned down version. that's the one that the public will be. able to get their hands on yeah and that. was in the early 2000s and then in 2020. the official tournament removed a lot of. those slurs that they previously allowed.

for tournament play right and I also. mentioned you know adding words uh over. the past few years they've added. hundreds of words um Jedi uh sub tweet. vax have been added uh bira as in biria. tacos has been added oh and I discovered. a new dish from this too Chu. cumber um usually spelled with a K but. apparently it's also okay to spell with. a c it's a Indian dish featuring. cucumber cumbers oh it's like a fresh. tomato cucumber salad and actually I.

should correct myself I think it could. be Indian but it's also possibly like. Anatolian I'm not 100% sure but it. sounds delicious I'll send you the. recipe all right do it uh they also had. slang from time to time apparently uh. IMA ma as in I'm going to like I'm about. to do something and also you can play. that but it's also possibly like. Anatolian I'm not 100% sure but sounds. delicious I'll send you the recipe all. right do it uh they also had slang from.

time to time apparently uh IMA mhm MMA. as in I'm going to like I'm about to do. something then also you can play that. yeah you could you could also play Yeet. which what is that I don't know. man you know I really feel like I've. outed myself in the last couple episodes. is skib toilet buddy not the edge Lord. that people assume that I am Edge. Lord uh there has been some cheating. over the years uh we'll talk about a. couple of these incidentes.

incidents uh in 2011 um there was a. world Scrabble championship between um a. tie player named chapot ET and a British. guy named Ed Martin because it was a. missing G tile and uh there's a lot of. versions of this story um apparently. Time Magazine uh and some Scrabble. websit say that uh ET called for Martin. to be strip searched for that G and the. tournament officials are like no we're. not going to do that we don't want to.

see that in Mental Floss they said that. you know they asked them to turn their. pockets inside out and that eventually. just escalated to like hey maybe they. hit it in their pants they should be. stripped searched maybe it's in their. Chad. yeah that's why you strip. search yeah is that is that on in the. Scrabble dictionary there's no way that. it's not as a matter of fact you keep. talking you tell the story and I'm going. to look it. up uh and then what they eventually. found out was that the missing G was in.

the pocket of another player from a. previous game and what I want to know is. like who who's running these tournaments. like how are you not counting the. letters before the game or cracking open. a brand new Scrabble seal Factory sealed. Scrabble like you got to count those. letters you got to make sure that's like. playing chess without like a pawn and. just being like oh looks good to me yeah. it's nuts it's also nuts just how how. many players do cheat in like highlevel.

tournaments like that kid yeah there was. a kid he was 13 so he's unnamed what. blank tiles are good for but they well. they can stand they're like a wild card. they stand in for any letter that you. want yeah so they can really come in. handy when you have like a bunch of. letters but you just can't quite connect. them that blank tile comes in there and. you say thanks blank tile so if you have. that you have a huge Advantage so. finally this kid was caught cheating but. this was on the heels of a year before.

when he won the $22,000 prize for. winning even though apparently. statistically the percentage of blank. tiles that he came up with across the. game or the games that he played. throughout that tournament where it just. doesn't add up but they let that win. stand but for 2012 he got booted yeah. they should have made that kid pay that. money back with interest yeah they. should have like the Players Association. president would make a point of. um escorting women who went up to Canam.

maty's hotel room to pick up equipment. that they bought from her were buying. from him like you just didn't go alone. like it was an Open Secret and then. finally like he just groped the wrong. woman and me too came along and I think. at least 15 named women came forward and. put their story on the record about him. and the the response from The Players. Association was essentially like okay. don't do it again yeah and he had.

already been banned for cheating he. palmed tiles too he was a national. champion he palmed tiles too he got. suspended for four years for cheating. but for the allegations of sexual. misconduct nothing just a warning. essentially so that really ticked off a. lot of people especially high level. women players too who are like you know. what we H we hold our own tournaments. and he's not invited any longer so he's. kind of been ostracized but I have the. impression that he's still very much. around still making those uh those.

custom racks yeah from what I can tell. uh by the way we uh live update we uh. did text John Hodgman just to find out I. was kind of curious about a couple of. things and about his highest Scrabble. total ever and if he and Katherine have. a running record between them and he. says uh we have old notebooks full of. score sheets but we never go back and. look at them uh because as we know John. hodman only looks forward time does not. go backward no Nostalgia is a toxic.

impulse according to that's right hogman. uh we are both consistently in the 300. to 350 pretty good mode okay that's that. sounds High to me yeah same here he said. that's good enough to make me happy he. said we have both probably broken 400 a. couple of times uh I remember words. better than scores 25 years ago I added. ster to joke to make jok stir on a. triple word square while playing with. some of my with some friends of my par. and I don't remember the points but I. was really proud of myself I'll bet I'll.

bet every once in a while you can peek. in on Hodgman sleeping and he's got a. big smile on his face because he's. dreaming about that I love it I have an. a live update as well Cho is not in the. Scrabble really allowable word oh man. this is opens up a whole new world of. possibilities for the show live. updates yeah and Scrabble being the. Arbiter of what words we can and can't. use now exactly so uh Scrabble of course. has popped up in pop culture here there. Rosemary's Baby uh very famously used um.

miaoh used well Rosemary used a Scrabble. a bunch of Scrabble tiles to try to. figure out that some suspected witches. were actually Witches by using the tiles. to figure out anagrams yeah same with. sneakers I couldn't find that that um I. saw that movie I never saw the movie and. I couldn't find the clip with the. Scrabble I just saw mention of it in a. couple of places I don't remember. Scrabble it was a long time ago uh I. love this one Frank oh Frank the. chairman of the board Mr Sinatra in his.

version of the dwell Days of Christmas. added nine games of Scrabble yeah that's. right which is actually Joe Piscopo. doing Frank but do you know Seinfeld's. mom played quone qu n e and like. Seinfeld calls her out on it and it's. not actually a word but Kramer's like. yeah quone whatever but the biggest. thing that stood out to me in this scene. I watched it. today had the original dad who just did.

not work yeah and then they brought in I. can't remember his name but he was the. dad in Arthur oh was he the dad in. Arthur he was Liza manelli's father in. Arthur yeah he. was he was Morty Seinfeld yeah totally. his first name is Barney I think oh God. I used to know his name because Arthur. is you know one of my like top bever. comedies uh and then uh Kelvin and Hobbs. uh I think Calvin played zq M or zqfmgb. and said it was a type of worms from New.

Guinea oh that's funny and then lastly. Chuck we can't forget Scrabble led to. Trivial Pursuit being created because. remember they they went and got a new. Scrabble board and we're like how many. Scrabble boards have we bought over the. years we should make our own game that's. right and that's it Scrabble has not. appeared in any other part of Pop. Culture except for those things right. that's right uh you got anything else no. sir all right well that's Scrabble.

everybody thank you for finally doing it. Chuck uh and since I thank Chuck for. finally relenting and giving in on doing. an episode I've wanted to do for years. and years and years it's time for. listener. mail oh. you uh hi guys um or basically just the. voices that live in my head permanently. because I listen to you to all the time. nice uh a while back I have no idea. where the idea came from I wonder. whether everyone sees Concepts the same. way in their head as I do and started.

asking around uh cuz she's referencing. like the inner dialogue up where people. don't hear words they see images mhm and. uh Daisy says this uh and this is very. interesting I think uh I noticed that. for me the calendar months of the year. in my brain are arranged like this. January February March April May June. July December November October August. well on the line. below like uh it's very important the. way it's spaced out I think think uh and. it's not it's also indented so December.

November October August is on the line. below indented indented to about uh. mid-February uh so going from left to. right and then making a curve to. continue from right to left no need to. point out how weird this is guys because. no calendar ever was drawn this way. however uh this is how it is normal for. me in my head you can imagine the weird. faces I got when asking this question. enthusiastically to find out about other. people's head calendar uh especially. when I told them about mine uh anyway.

all this to ask when you picture a. yearly calendar in your head what does. it look like uh immediately when I read. that the only thing that popped into my. head was a uh like the back of a of a. like a wall calendar you would get as a. teenager where it had all all of them. listed that's what I picture oh nice so. what are the what are the. monthly Center folds of or pictures of I. don't know but I guess it would just be. 4 four and. four okay that's how I picture it in my. head January February March April and.

then four more then four more in order. cuz I'm not weird I I don't know I'm. trying to come up with it now and I. don't really think I keep a calendar in. my head I'm just too like in the present. you know like in the now yeah baby sorry. to let you down who is that uh that is. Daisy and Daisy is from Belgium thanks. Daisy that's the problem what that she's. from Bel there's your problem um thanks. a lot Daisy that was wonderful I feel. like also that somebody could make a.

t-shirt of like a like the visual. representation of the calendar in. Daisy's head and it would be the most. Arcane deep cut stuff you should know. t-shirt of all time totally uh yeah so. if you want to get in touch with us like. Daisy did and share your mental whatever. we would love that you can send us an. email to stuff podcast iheartradio.com. [Music]. stuff you should know is a production of. iHeart radio for more podcasts from.

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