Nearly 350 word lovers from 40 states and several foreign countries are wrapping up the National Scrabble Championship on Wednesday in Addison.
M-O-N-E-Y: The winner gets $10,000 from Hasbro, which makes Scrabble. The defending champion is Nigel Richards of Malaysia. He’s back this week and doing well.
YOUTH MOVEMENT: More youngsters are competing at the championship, which started Saturday at the Hotel Intercontinental Dallas. This year, the tournament has attracted 18 players under age 20. Players range from 12 to 81 years old.
WORD POWER: Some of the more unusual words played include: bortz (a low-quality diamond), ganof (a thief), uvea (a layer of the eye), yaff (to bark), auk (a diving seabird) and urial (a wild Asian sheep).
ONLINE: To learn more, go to www.scrabbleplayers.org.