Gary Roberts

Beautiful day today. The sun was shining through the windows with a suggestion that spring was just around the corner. I'm so looking forward to relaxing on a terrace at our local pub once the nice weather gets here. We were in our local a few weeks ago on a Saturday afternoon, sat next to a couple who were playing Scrabble on a small travel version of the board game. They looked so absorbed in the game, just sitting there in companionable silence, focused on the words.

Being a bit of a Scrabble fan myself, as well as a crossword aficionado, I remember thinking that this was an interesting and stimulating way to pass ones time while having a pint or two. El Franco and I got talking to the couple, who told us how much they loved coming to the pub with their Scrabble board, so we were super-geeky this week and bought one for ourselves, complete with dictionary to fend off any challenges to our cleverly placed, highminded words. We've already had a couple of games at our pub and it's surprising to see how many people are interested in the game, once they see what we're playing. It's a bit embarrassing, but we've already acquired a local infamy; when we went for a pint last night, board and dictionary under arms, we were greeted with a "Hey, it's the Scrabble Boys!" from one of the barflies. It's not quite the same as "Norm!", granted, but it's kind of heartwarming to have our very own version of Cheers just around the corner.

We've been to the pub three times since purchasing the game on Thursday and have played two complete games.

"The scores, so far?" I hear you ask:

El Franco = 1. Me = 1.

I have a feeling there'll be a Sunday tiebreaker tonight.

Labels: pub, scrabble