2 posts tagged “scrabble”

I guess there's a little sub-genre these days in "Why are we so stupid?" books, which I've largely encountered by

accident. A few months ago, I read Stumbling on Happiness, which was chock-a-block full of psychological studies on how we are constantly making choices opposed to our personal self-interest, and have no creativity to imagine how things might be in the future, but are firmly rooted in the present despite all attempts to extrapolate to different situations. Like, for instance, you might refuse a restaurant gift certificate because you just ate some potato chips and aren't really hungry. This might be actually the "Why Does the Reptile Brain Rule Us"  subgenre.

Now I'm in the midst of Predictably Irrational, which somehow is the exact same book. I mean, same psychological experiments, same conclusions, same kinda informal "I don't know about you, but I ..." author tone. Different and better title, though! And great Mets colors! Anyway, both titles briefly inspired me to try to outsmart my own brain, but alas, to no avail.

Instead, I've enjoyed some brain candy lately, including Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follett (because I heard you had to in order to get your tax relief check) and most recently the totally inappropriate YA gem  Boy Toy, which I read expecting to acquire for my library but now of course cannot. Why? Well, it's the heartwarming tale of a young teacher who has a torrid sexual affair with her middle school student! With some steamy teacher-on-student sex scenes! Really, how could I possibly recommend this to *any* of MY middle school students? I mean, I love all my Scrabble boys, I really do ... but Not In That Way.

Speaking of Scrabble, we are deep into Scrabble March Madness -- we have a whole elaborate tournament bracket, with "byes" and all, and it is just awesome. They are getting so good, and so hyper-competitive! Anytime some takes a little long over one of their plays, the cry of "Rain delay!" goes up all over the room and the guilty party is shamed into playing. In other elective news, the damn yearbook that has dried my soul to a desiccated husk has just gone to print and Scrabble got three shout-outs in the graduating eighth graders' farewell writeups. I'm so proud.

In honor of Black History Month, I've been reading some overdue middle-grade novels

dealing with the African-American Experience: The Watsons Go To Birmingham -1963 (which I'm embarrassed I haven't read yet, and only because Christopher Paul Curtis just now won a Newbery Award? Honor? I don't know for Elijah of Buxton, which now I also have to read) and Feathers, by Jacqueline Woodson. Feathers was more interesting than I expected, leaving more questions unanswered than kidslit usually does. For instance, the main kid, who moves from the white side of town, is hazed for being a "white boy", but he is adamant that he is not any whiter than any of the lighter-skinned black kids. And when we meet his parents, they are indeed "authentic black" people, but THEN we find out he's adopted, so ... what's the deal ? Is he white? Is he  just light-skinned, a la Cory Booker, Mayor of Newark? Or even my man Barack Obama, for whom I am canvassing tomorrow? And what makes people authentically anything? Pretty interesting things to consider these days.

In other news, my Scrabble elective started today and is filled with serious Scrabblers who are going to rock the house. I can't wait to start competition. Favorite word of all 8th grade boys: FAQIR -- used as in "What the FAQIR are you doing, blocking my triple word score?"

Another fun end-run around the F-word: "fuh-kidding." As in "Are you fuh-kidding me?" Have to bust them, but laughing secretly on the inside. LOVE middle schoolers.