There are many ways to play Scrabble; ignoring official rules can result in more interesting (and more educational) variations.

In our home, the "house rules" are that Scrabble will be the "open book, double bag, triple return, blank start and recycle" version. This means that each player starts with a blank, and after it is played as a given letter, anyone with that letter in their rack can play the letter and pick the blank up for reuse (that's the "recycle" part).

The "double bag" refers to the fact that we keep consonants and vowels in separate bags. When you draw your letters you can do so from either bag in whatever proportion best balances your rack. If you get three of something, you can exchange one of them for a different letter. This prevents winding up with the dreaded IUIUCIW-type rack.

The "open book" part is fairly common among recreational Scrabblers. We have not only several dictionaries available, but also a variety of word building books, and sometimes a laptop logged on to an anagramming website.

And finally we spin our racks around to ask the other person for advice/suggestions.

Using these rules, an inlaw and I had a game with 2000+ combined points, including 14 "bingoes." I suppose it's not really "Scrabble" - it's more of a mutual word-puzzle game. But it's fun - especially when the players are also lubricated with their favorite beverages.

Fascinating. Thanx for posting this.

This month's Smithsonian has an extended article discussing Charles Lutwidge Dodgson's relationship with Alice and other children:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/Lewis-Carrolls-Shifting-Reputation.html

Chance, I don't mind pedantry (which is quite common in comment threads here). In this case, the man giving the presentation said he was scratched by the bird, but he didn't experience toxicity at the wound site - it was not after he put his finger in his mouth (to lick the wound) and his mouth began to tingle and burn; another researcher experienced the same phenomenon.

Since the adverse effects occurred after the toxin entered the mouth, I would define it as a poison. And the toxin is identical to the one in poison dart frogs, which are clearly poisonous.

Foreigner1, I got the $1,625 from the link to their site, and when I put the shirt in their cyber shopping basket, the total comes to $1,637.50 with shipping.

Tara, you're quite correct. Post fixed.

Cola, note the Guinness judge is holding a stopwatch; I didn't specify in the post that the record involved # chilis eaten in two minutes. The BBC report has a brief video: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7993925.stm

The video and the link are both outstanding! Thanks.

Coldfish, it's not masochism unless there is pain or some unpleasantness associated with the experience; if you read the article, she indicates that she enjoys eating these chilis, and has since childhood. It seems obvious that she simply is not sensitive to them, as Snappy Fish suggested. She may lack a receptor or some mediating pathway component.

An attachment for one of the feet of a machine that enables it to get a better grip on an icy surface in the winter.

No shirt needed.

What the sorting equipment at the Royal Mail reads is probably a fluorescent tag applied to the stamps, rather than the color pigments per se.

This art project probably wouldn't pass official scrutiny is this country because there one could just as easily use previously cancelled stamps, cut so that the cancel was not apparent.

You guys missed out on the educational value of the game, as depicted in this classic art work -

http://benjaminhilts.tumblr.com/post/436037835/via-snuh

I probably should let this thread just die. A not-surprisingly-similar discussion went on for ages at the original math blog; I counted 18 PAGES of comments - and that was just for the first DAY - until the comment section was closed. Let me offer an attempt at closure.

It's true that .33 is not the same as 1/3, but .333... (with the ellipsis) IS the same. [[It's awkward to use the ellipsis because the proper conventional mathematical symbol is a vinculum above the repeating decimals, as is shown in the figure, but that isn't available in the character set of the font I'm using here, so I'll continue to use the ellipsis to designating a repeating string of digits.]]

But back to the argument. .333... IS the same as 1/3 because that's the way 1/3 is expressed in decimals. One-third could be expressed in other ways in other base systems, but in a base10 system the only choice is .333... (or with the vinculum).

Understanding that, just say to yourself .333... is a way to REPRESENT 1/3. And .666... is a way to REPRESENT 2/3. Then .999... is equally a way in the decimal system to REPRESENT the number 1. [You can also represent 1 as 1.0 or 1.00. Other ways to represent it are 7/7 or 10 to the power 0.]

.999... IS the number one.

And it's not correct to say that "an infinitely repeating number can not be applied to the finite things we deal with on a regular basis." To prove it, tonight I will eat .333... of a pizza.

eNonsense, some of the explanations in the link you cite may be valid for some incidents, but I hope you understand that the location of this incident was in the middle of a desert:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=lajamanu&sll=43.006956,-89.447995&sspn=0.012224,0.02223&ie=UTF8&hq=lajamanu&hnear=&radius=15000&ll=-18.354526,130.649414&spn=0.253842,0.355682&t=h&z=12

It certainly could be real. See this post and its link.

http://tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com/2008/11/norwegian-prisons.html