games Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

Penpals: Sunday Stealing

Mike Post

The Sunday Stealing prompt this week is Penpals, Part 1, which, for some reason, reminded me of Reasons To Be Cheerful, Part 3 by Ian Dury and The Blockheads.

1. What are your plans for March?

My birthday is this week, and my wife is taking me out to dinner. We’re meeting with our financial advisor. I’m seeing my cardiologist. We’re picking up our daughter from college and returning her a week later. I’m getting my teeth cleaned. We’re going to see a play. Plus the usual – choir rehearsal, church, ZOOM with my sisters, book reviews, and blogging.

2. Did you ever have or go to sleepovers as a kid?

Not that I can specifically recall. It’s possible.

3. Which books would you pick for a book binge?

Any number of the ones I’ve purchased but have not read. We Who Believe in Freedom- Alice Green. Caste – Isabel Wilkerson. The Mask Is Off – Dr. Mildred Smoth-Chang. I’ve got tons of them.

4. What features do you love most about your home?

The built-in bookcases in the room I am presently sitting in.

5. Favorite songs from tv, movies, and video games

I like story songs for TV themes, from The Beverly Hillbillies to Cheers. Mike Post created a lot of instrumental themes for shows I watched, such as The Rockford Files, Hill Street Blues, and Law and Order. I also liked the Earle Hagen themes such as The Dick Van Dyke Show and the Andy Griffith Show.

I have over 100 soundtracks, some from movies I’ve never seen. Often a song’s power comes from where it happens in the film; the first that came to mind was the title song from the movie Philadelphia by Neil Young, which plays near the end.

I have no idea about video game songs.

Games People Play

6. What group games do you like to play with others

Cards: pinochle, hearts, spades. Scrabble, Monopoly, Uno, Boggle, and probably others.

7. How often do you try something new?

Every day is something new.

8. What type of sushi is your favorite?

California rolls, I guess.

9. Do you prefer to relax or go on adventures during vacation?

I like to sightsee.

10. How do you prevent burnout?

Turn off my phone.

11. Which colors look best on you?

I look marvelous in everything, dahlink. Actually, I have no idea, but my wife often says, “That shirt looks nice on you,” and it can be a variety of shades.

12. Do you like brunch?

What’s not to like?

13. Trends you showed up late for

Just about everything. I am a late adapter to virtually every technological innovation. My first iPhone I got in 2020 or 2021. I seldom watch streaming services. My landline still exists.

14. What’s your favorite drink order?

My first drink was a Tom Collins. In general, I drink white wine if I’m consuming alcohol.

15. Which clothes or accessories make you feel most confident?

A hat keeps me warm in the winter and protects me from sunstroke the rest of the year.

Lydster: Boggling Boggle play

competitive

On our recent vacation in the Berkshires, we brought along the word game Boggle. I described it four years ago here.

We played twice in three days. The first time my wife won. She ALWAYS wins. It’s not that she knows more words as much as she can SEE more combinations. I’ve told her for years that, if luck allowed, she’d kill me on the TV game show Wheel of Fortune.

As I noted, a few years ago, we used to give our daughter an advantage. The parents wouldn’t count any of the three-letter words we found, only the longer ones. We have revoked that accommodation.

And still, she’d regularly beat me, coming in second to her mother. After coming second last time, she started studying the letters. I don’t know how this would help her, since the dice land randomly.

Yet, in the next game, she started with more than a 10-point lead, finding words that were obvious in retrospect, but which her parents just didn’t see. And ultimately, she won the game.

She’s Got Game

I’ve always tried to play games with her competitively at the point when she had a fair chance of beating me. Whether it be Connect Four or another game, she plays to win.

When we play the board/card game Sorry, her strategy hanging around the starting point, hoping for a back 4, and or two 10s that she could use as back 1s, has occasionally been adopted by her parents.

No hearts

But I’ve not yet gotten her to regularly play any of the card games I know. Sure, hearts, spades, pinochle, and the like require more than two players. But I still haven’t shown her the joy of cribbage.

I may try to teach her backgammon this summer. Since I’ve retired, I’ve become rusty, and playing on the tablet is not an adequate substitute.

It’s also true that if/when she goes off to college, this might put her in good stead. Do college kids still play board games and cards? How about Yahtzee online?

E is for entertainment for the whole family

In the 1980s, I ROCKED at Trivial Pursuit

Uno In November 2018, Slate came up with The 40 Greatest Family Games, entertainment for the whole family. There are five things games should be: the right length, fair, action-packed, helping you learn something, and encouraging spontaneity. “Not every good game follows all these commandments, but the best ones balance them well.”

I will only note the ones I have actually played.

Sorry! – wrote about its greatness here eight and a half years ago
Concentration – I’ve always been notoriously bad at this. By the time my daughter was eight, she could beat me. I used to watch a TV version with Hugh Downs as the host.
Uno – I am a harsh competitor. Even when she was much younger, if the Daughter didn’t say “Uno” when she played her penultimate card, I made her take two more. I also insisted she keep her cards above the table. Slate calls it Bloodthirsty, Thrilling, and Desperate
Air Hockey – when we’re at the timeshare, the daughter, nieces and I often play. Something visceral about it.

Apples to Apples – “asks players to decide which of a set of proposed nouns best fits that round’s designated adjective.” It’s often hilarious.
Boggle – My wife is MUCH better finding words than I.
Cribbage – I actually have a cribbage board and deck of cards both in my office and at home
Pictionary – I’m lousy at it because I cannot draw worth beans
Chess – I learned how the pieces move, but that is about it

Scrabble – I played this with my great aunt over 55 years ago. My college roommate painted me a Scrabble board. I’ve reviewed a book about Scrabble. I haven’t played in a while. No, I’ve seldom played Words with Friends online.
Scattergories, Stratego – I’ve played them but never owned them
Trivial Pursuit – in the 1980s, I ROCKED at Trivial Pursuit. Now, any 21st century pop culture question would ground me
Yahtzee – a dice game that I like because it requires decision-making and odds calculating

Slate also notes the 10 Worst Family Games

Candy Land – pretty lame, I thought, even as a child
Clue – I never “got” Clue
Hangman – boring
Life – I actually liked it as a kid, but quit by my teen years

Monopoly – I’ve played it enough that, at one time, I could have told you the price and rent of every property on the board. I suppose they’re right, though – “the most famous branded board game of all time can be made enjoyable — with the help of some aggressive house rules”
Operation – hated it from the start
Risk – never warmed to it
Tic-tac-toe – statistically boring

For ABC Wednesday

Co-opoly and other games people play

When we got to the dates category, I realized that not everyone knows them as well as I.

At the conference I attended in Syracuse at the end of April, we were encouraged to bring board games to play on that Tuesday evening. This was a new thing, and no one was sure if there would be any interest.

I brought backgammon, which I described here, and the word game Taboo, plus a couple decks of cards.

My group ended up playing three games. In Co-opoly. “players start a cooperative (a democratic business or organization). In order to survive as individuals and to strive for the success of their co-op, players make tough choices regarding big and small challenges while putting their teamwork to the test.”

It has elements of charades, Taboo, Monopoly, Life, and other games. Do we buy health insurance or risk going without? How about property insurance? The ending round is the most exciting. It did remind me once again that I CANNOT DRAW to save my life.

I had played Apples to Apples before, but never before was it such uproarious fun. “The object of the game is to win the most rounds by playing a ‘red apple’ card (which generally features a noun) from one’s hand to best ‘match’ that round’s communal ‘green apple’ card (which contains an adjective) as chosen by that round’s judging player.”

At one point there were nine of us, which was a great number for maximum fun. Here are some examples of how it plays out.

Balderdash was last. “One player reads out a question to the others. They each write down a made up, but believable answer and hand it to the person who read the question. This person then reads out the REAL answer and all the made up answers, in random order. The others must guess which is actually correct. You score moves on the board for each player who is conned into believing that your made up answer is the real one, as well as for choosing the real and often unbelievable answer.”

The person who has the REAL answer has to write that down too, and late at night, that sometimes didn’t happen. When we got to the dates category, I realized that not everyone knows them as well as I. For instance, someone read a date in 1946; one bluff was VJ Day, and a couple people were fooled. I had written down the Suez Canal crisis for a date in 1956, which I gather was too vague a reference. When I drew a card, it was for January 19, 1946, which I KNEW was Dolly Parton’s birthday.

Elsewhere, people were playing Cards Against Humanity, which, until it was floated on our listserv the week before, I was not familiar with and still have not played. On the other hand, no poker was played, in a break with tradition.

B is for the game Boggle (ABC W)

While this is a 4X4 Boggle cube, there are 5X5 cubes as well.

Boggle, Wikipedia says, is a “word game… using a plastic grid of lettered dice, in which players attempt to find words in sequences of adjacent letters.

“The game begins by shaking a covered tray of 16 cubic dice, each with a different letter printed on each of its six sides. The dice settle into a 4×4 tray so that only the top letter of each cube is visible.

“After they have settled into the grid, a three-minute sand timer is started and all players…” search “for words that can be constructed from the letters of sequentially adjacent cubes… -horizontally, vertically, and diagonally neighboring.

“Words must be at least three letters long, may include singular and plural (or other derived forms) separately, but may not use the same letter cube more than once per word.

“Each player records all the words he or she finds by writing on a private sheet of paper. After three minutes have elapsed, all players must immediately stop writing and the game enters the scoring phase.

“In the scoring phase, each player reads off his or her list of discovered words. If two or more players wrote the same word, it is removed from all players’ lists… For all words remaining after duplicates have been eliminated, points are awarded based on the length of the word. The winner is the player whose point total is highest.”

When the Daughter was younger, and we played at home, we let her find three-letter words (for which she would get 1 point) as well as 4 letters (2 points), et al. while her mother and I could use words only four letters (1 point) or more. Now I’m not sure I’d give her that advantage.

While this is a 4X4 cube, there are 5X5 cubes as well.

There are SCRABBLE dictionaries that can be used to ascertain the validity of a word.

You’ll find Boggle online here and here and undoubtedly, elsewhere.

From the letters above, some of the words one could find include:

bead, bear, bent, bred, bunt, darn, dead, dare, deal, dear, earn, near, lane, lard, lure, rare, read, real, rear, rent, rued, rune, teal, tear, tern, tube, tuna, tune, turn

beard, bread, brute, dread, laden, renal, tuber, tuned

ranted

bearded, breaded, dreaded

Can you find others? There is at least one more 7-letter word.

ABC Wednesday – Round 20