Ep 373: Alice Wheeler, Paul de Boer (February 1, 2012)

Tonight we learn that Alice came to Australia (from England) at the age of eighteen, having decided to go to university here (more specifically in Fremantle, so presumably it was the University of Notre Dame).  That's quite a big decision, really, given that she has stayed since.

Challenging Alice tonight is Paul de Boer, an account manager.  The theme of discussing countries of origin continues; Paul was born in the Netherlands and came over to Australia when he was eight.  Somewhat stereotypically (he says "ironically"), he grew up on a tulip farm.


There wasn't that much to choose between the contestants on the letters today -- they were equal except for one instance where Alice declared an invalid word.  They were a little off the pace there, with mostly sixes where sevens or eights were available, but not overly so.  Neither solved the conundrum, and the real difference came from the numbers where Paul failed to score -- each time being just a little bit further away than Alice (or in one case, having an invalid answer).  Alice never got closer than three, but that was enough.  If Paul's invalid answer had been correct then the scores would have ended up tied, but as it was Alice won the game, 42 to 30.

I had a mixed and ultimately unsatisfactory game.  I ended up with seven points from all but one of the main rounds, which was passable in some of the letters rounds but not so good in the numbers.  Against that I did solve the conundrum in what felt like decent time for a change.  The net result was that I almost kept the contestants scoreless, but failed to find some better-scoring options that I should have seen.

As usual, details after the break.