B*g G*me B*nf*re Fu*l

A true blue Cal grad, Peter Roizen, will be bringing some alternative bonfire fuel to the Axe Rally on the eve of the Big Game...the Official Scrabble Dictionary!?!

Roizen is the inventor of the WildWords Crossword Game. Unlike Scrabble(r), WildWords permits any word in English, no matter how long, to be played. The game relies on wild asterisk tiles and wild squares that can represent any series of one or more letters. Thus the play of "INF*TORY" could be the word "INFLAMMATORY" with the asterisk representing "LAMMA." Roizen claims the game promotes functional English and creative skills.

"I personally took Bonehead English twice as a freshman," says Roizen. "I can't say for sure that playing Scrabble(R) and relying on the Official Scrabble Dictionary in high school was the root cause, but it didn't help any. It's not easy writing a thoughtful essay relying on short, odd, foreign words like 'SOUK' and 'AALII'."

"WildWords must be played with a bona fide reference dictionary," states Roizen. "You will play and learn useful words." Roizen says he will be bringing his copy of the Official Scrabble Dictionary to the Cal Big Game rally. He invites other Golden Bears, and college students and alumni across the country to do the same at their rallies.

"Everyone from every school is invited to participate and join the cause," he says, "except Stanford."

Um...yeah. I can hear the chanting now..."Freshmen more dictionaries!" Does Rally Committee know about this? Hopefully the dictionary is red. Check out the full press release.