Game Day

During our Thanksgiving dinner yesterday, Becky, Jesse, and Sarah began comparing notes on the different games that they had played and enjoyed.  These were all electronic games, of course, some of which I had heard of, none of which I really understood.  It got me to wondering on this holiday often noted for nostalgia, does anyone play board games anymore?

My parents and I played many a round of Scrabble when I was very young.  Even then, I had a definite preference for symmetry and since there were four tile holders, I insisted that four players play.  Therefore, we propped up a stuffed animal at the card table.  My father would help "Baby Bear" and my mother would help me.  As I grew older, we played rousing games of Skunk.  I still have this game, but don't remember a thing about it except that dice were rolled and on each die was a picture of a skunk.

Television shows became a big source for games and I distinctly remember The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and Combat when I was in elementary school.

Monopoly was never big at our house because it always took so long to really get going.  By the time I got to junior high, however, my neighbor and I kept a summer-long Monopoly game going.  At one point, we actually robbed the bank and then simply kept track of our finances on paper.  (Considering what happened with Fannie May and Freddie Mac, this must have been the way Barney Frank played when he was a kid.)

Avalon Hill Games were popular when I was in high school and Al and I both had a game called Tactics II.  This was a modern warfare game pitting two industrial nations with equal armies, but different assets against one another.  One night we placed the two boards together and played for 8 hours before we had a winner.

When we were first married, Martha and I frequently played Boggle until Martha started making up words that happened to be in the dictionary and I lost all the time.

I must admit that Becky and Sarah always enjoyed board games and will still play them.  I have fond memories of endless Hi-Ho Cherrio games with Sarah and Snow White and the Seven Dwarves with Becky.  I think I traumatized poor Rebecca while playing the latter, which was a race-across-the-board game, by taking a shortcut at the end and beating her after she led for almost the entire contest.  She has "fairness issues" now.

Anyway, did anyone turn off the third football game last night and break out the old-fashioned board games to go along with an old fashioned food and family gathering?

Comments

[Melissa Dodge]

We have a couple of games that we play occasionally. My favorite, Trivial Pursuit, is never played as often as I like. Charlie claims I sit up late at night reading all the cards but the truth of it is that I just possess mounds of absolutely useless information. Even though he gets almost all the sports questions right (my weak area)he has deftly pointed out you can win that pie slice only once. I've even tried to let him answer only sports questions but he seems to have "fairness issues" as well. Apples to Apples is a real crowd pleaser--you don't have to be especially gifted--just mostly lucky. Every round almost always leaves everyone out of breath with laughter. Charlie prefers Monopoly and Risk--which take way too long for me---I need instant victory gratification. So yes, some of us out here still play board games. So what shall we play when we meet again?

[Austin]

NOT Trivial Pursuit, Melissa, unless the trivia stops at about 1979. How about Strat-o-Matic baseball? Boys against the girls.