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Board to Death: How Scrabble Blew Its Big Moment

Kenneth Rubin was ill. Nausea. Indigestion. Pretty much every symptom on a Pepto Bismol bottle, induced by the noxious combination of bad coffee and a rattling charter bus. Alas, with neither medicine nor a way to teleport to his destination, the New York City–based health care educator diagnosed that his best treatment on the night of Friday, Feb. 14, was to sprawl across his row and pray. Let me get to the hotel. Let me get to the boards.

“I barely made it, but I didn’t mind the craziness,” says Rubin, having arrived (mercifully, sans gastric incident) at a Residence Inn 160 miles east of Toronto.