Rounds: Here.
Disclaimer: While I have not seen this episode before, I did play
through the blue book (episodes 1 to 50) around ten months ago when I
was scheduled to be a contestant on the show. Additionally, I did a
quick flick through it a few months back to collect words for my posts about word validity.
Angus Kidman gets his turn in the champion's chair tonight. He gets paid to test drive the latest in technical toys; Richard asks whether Angus is more interested in the things that can be done, or the miniaturisation. Angus responds that the miniaturisation is the important thing for him; devices can do all sorts of interesting things, but it's getting them into a small form factor so that they can always be at hand to use that has him excited.
Tonight's challenger is Esther Perrins, a former British Scrabble champion. This continues the show's early run of strong tournament Scrabble players; in fact, Esther appears in the 1986 edition of the Guinness Book of Records for having won the British Scrabble championship with the highest three-game total there had ever been (1782 points, an extremely impressive average of 594 points per game).
Esther struck form early with a good eight-letter word, but then Angus demonstrated that the competition was very much alive by outdoing her in the second round. The numbers round went to Angus, then Esther took the next letters round and the scores were tied at the halfway mark. Four shared rounds followed, and for the first time two contestants were on equal scores going into the conundrum. Esther was the one who solved it first, getting the win by 55 points to 45.
I had mostly good results throughout, but faltered in the middle third. I was a bit too slow to see the best option in one letters round, and spent too long writing down a backup plan in a numbers round instead of checking for an actual solution. I was beaten to the conundrum by a reasonable margin, but had fortunately done enough before that to take the win.
Showing posts with label Angus Kidman. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Angus Kidman. Show all posts
Saturday, 8 September 2012
Friday, 7 September 2012
Ep 44: James Weatherhead, Angus Kidman (September 6, 2012; originally aired September 30, 2010)
Rounds: Here.
Disclaimer: While I have not seen this episode before, I did play through the blue book (episodes 1 to 50) around ten months ago when I was scheduled to be a contestant on the show. Additionally, I did a quick flick through it a few months back to collect words for my posts about word validity.
James Weatherhead is back in the champion's seat, hoping to get his third win. James plays a certain amount of golf, and Richard points out that the last time James played he got a birdie. That might not seem that worthy of note (although it's certainly vastly better than I could do, I'm sure), but it's not the traditional golf meaning at work here. James explains that he was walking down the fairway of the eighteenth hole and a budgerigar landed on his golf bag and would not leave them alone. It was obviously already domesticated so they took it home and named it Flog ("golf" backwards).
Tonight's challenger is Angus Kidman, a freelance technical writer with a degree in linguistics and a penchant for gadgetry. Happily, then, he managed to find a job combining both interests. As Angus puts it, he has always loved writing and playing with computers but did not study either of them at university. He walked out of university and "fell into" a job writing about computers, and has done it ever since. Richard asks what kinds of gadgets Angus likes, and Angus responds that he likes most gadgets, pretty much, but particularly likes portable ones -- he wants them to be small. He continues by saying that the whole history of computing is about stuff getting smaller, and neater, and sometimes weirder.
More information about his writing endeavours can be found at his web site.
Angus showed some solid letters play today, getting off to a good start there. James missed a couple of chances to get ground back, and Angus was guaranteed the win going into the final numbers round. James got the consolation prize of a quick solution to the conundrum, but Angus got the win, 58 to 47.
I had a decent game again, and I was particularly pleased with my first and final letters rounds. I did miss two maximums, one in the letters and one in the numbers. I'd certainly have liked to do better on those -- the numbers round in particular -- but it was at least acceptable. There was a full monty going that I found (although it was perhaps the most high-probability one in the game) and that is always nice, and I rounded it out with a quick solve on the conundrum for a score in the 80's.
Disclaimer: While I have not seen this episode before, I did play through the blue book (episodes 1 to 50) around ten months ago when I was scheduled to be a contestant on the show. Additionally, I did a quick flick through it a few months back to collect words for my posts about word validity.
James Weatherhead is back in the champion's seat, hoping to get his third win. James plays a certain amount of golf, and Richard points out that the last time James played he got a birdie. That might not seem that worthy of note (although it's certainly vastly better than I could do, I'm sure), but it's not the traditional golf meaning at work here. James explains that he was walking down the fairway of the eighteenth hole and a budgerigar landed on his golf bag and would not leave them alone. It was obviously already domesticated so they took it home and named it Flog ("golf" backwards).
Tonight's challenger is Angus Kidman, a freelance technical writer with a degree in linguistics and a penchant for gadgetry. Happily, then, he managed to find a job combining both interests. As Angus puts it, he has always loved writing and playing with computers but did not study either of them at university. He walked out of university and "fell into" a job writing about computers, and has done it ever since. Richard asks what kinds of gadgets Angus likes, and Angus responds that he likes most gadgets, pretty much, but particularly likes portable ones -- he wants them to be small. He continues by saying that the whole history of computing is about stuff getting smaller, and neater, and sometimes weirder.
More information about his writing endeavours can be found at his web site.
Angus showed some solid letters play today, getting off to a good start there. James missed a couple of chances to get ground back, and Angus was guaranteed the win going into the final numbers round. James got the consolation prize of a quick solution to the conundrum, but Angus got the win, 58 to 47.
I had a decent game again, and I was particularly pleased with my first and final letters rounds. I did miss two maximums, one in the letters and one in the numbers. I'd certainly have liked to do better on those -- the numbers round in particular -- but it was at least acceptable. There was a full monty going that I found (although it was perhaps the most high-probability one in the game) and that is always nice, and I rounded it out with a quick solve on the conundrum for a score in the 80's.
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