Bananagramarama

One evening during the California trip some students introduced me to Bananagrams, a word game using letter tiles as in Scrabble but with no board or points or turn-taking. Five of us sat on the floor grabbing tiles and assembling words, and in the end we spontaneously began telling stories using the words we'd formed.

"I must own this game!" I told myself, but fortunately I told my daughter too so now I have Bananagrams at home. It's not as cut-throat and competitive as Scrabble, and I like the way it allows players to rearrange letters and cannibalize previously formed words to assemble new combinations. The other evening I ended up with a solitary Q near the end of the game, but I shifted some other words to open up access to a U and allow me to play the Q. Of course, then I ended the game with an unplayable J, but you can't win 'em all. On the other hand, there are no real losers in Bananagrams.

I took the game to campus and played a few rounds with a colleague, wishing more people were around to play. Wouldn't it be great to have word games available in the Writing Center so students and faculty members could grab a game between classes? Or we could designate a weekly word game time, or hold a Bananagramathon to raise money for some worthy cause.

Would students step away from their online games to mess with words face to face? If not, I fear I'll end up sitting alone in the Writing Center wishing for a worthy opponent while grasping a lone unplayable J.