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in issue eleven
Scintillations
Playing Boggle
Seduction in the Snow
Curious Rain
The Opposite of Peas
Playing in the Vertical World
Bring on Broadway
(Parents)
Snorkeling Past Fear
You Won't Get Far
In Those Shoes
Legos
Freedom From Five Feet
Chasing Shadows
Mozzarella No More!
Letters FROM
My Younger Self
Moody Girl

photography & artwork
Dandelion, Elm, &
Firefly Faeries
Dog Wearing A Cone
Apples
Sun Petals &
Sprawling Daisy
Poppy Field

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Play With Your Words
Writing Workshop
Making Friends
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Issue 12: Synchronicity
Issue 13: Danger
Issue 14: Home
Issue 15: Transitions

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Playing Boggle

Rebecca Carlisle

I am no expert on the subject of playing. I suck at playing. I am far too worried, too crabby, too tired, too distracted to do much real-live playing in my life. It seems like I should be able to play, but I don't….. Except….. I play Boggle! I love Boggle! It is my favorite game of all time. I started playing this incredibly awesome word game over 25 years ago when my friend brought it to my house one day. We played for hours and I've been addicted ever since. We didn’t know how to keep score until my Mom read the rules and eventually joined us. Then we learned that players only get points for unique words, and since we had a lot of the same words, the scores became much different with Mom in the game.

How the game works is very simple. A grid board holds cubes with one letter each. One player shakes the cubes up loudly between each round and takes off the lid, another player sets the timer and everyone hunts for words by connecting letters. What I enjoy the most about the game is finding those particularly juicy, unusual words lurking within the letter cubes that nobody else has spotted. That's also how I earn more points.

Even though I'm addicted to this game, the real Boggle fiend in my family is my Grandma. My Grandma played Boggle every single day, even if there was nobody to play with. The sound of Boggle cubes being shaken in their plastic container woke me on many occasions when I was staying with her. I adore that my Grandma wasn't that good at Boggle, even with all that practice. She just loved to play.

She is not alive any more, but I bet she’s playing Boggle right this second. I imagine that it was my Grandma who whispered the idea for the first Boggle website into the ear of the inventor/web guy/general genius so she didn't have to play by herself anymore. I think of her often while I'm playing online Boggle (at www.games.com/boggle). Sometimes when I'm playing a mild-mannered Boggler with an odd username I wonder if it's my Grandma playing discreetly from the spirit world and it makes me smile.

I am a "Red" on the Boggle game site, which means I am pretty good at Boggle. There are many hours that whiz by while I stare at my computer screen connecting letter after letter. I taught my husband to play Boggle and he is almost as good as I am. Okay, a lot of times he's better. That's when I quit playing. Luckily, we now pair up to play online Boggle against people in other time zones. My husband spots words over my shoulder and I feverishly enter them. Of course, we still manage to get our double-brained asses kicked routinely. We often wonder who these Boggle Super Geniuses are that can wind up with a huge list of words when the two of us can only come up with five or six crappy leftovers. I'm disappointed when we lose, because I forget what Grandma always knew. The point is just to PLAY!

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Now, for those of you who want to risk a new addiction, here's a little sample. (Okay, I admit that I got distracted creating the puzzle board and played more Boggle.)

E	D	R	T
I	S	E	R
W	P	L	S
F	D	O	N

Words are formed from letters that adjoin horizontally, vertically, or diagonally to the left, right, or up-and-down. However, no letter may be used more than once within a single word. Example: Start with the N in the bottom right corner, move to the right for an O, diagonally up right toward the S, then diagonally left for the E to spell NOSE. There, you just made one point! The longer the word the more points you get.

Acceptable words: Any word, including plurals (NOSES) and tenses (NOSED) as long as it can be found in a standard English dictionary. Words within words are also permissible: SLOPE, SLOP, LOP, LOPE.

For avid Scrabblers, crossworders, and word gamers, you can find at LEAST 46 words in this particular puzzle by connecting letters . Click here for a list of the ones I happened to find.