you.wish.you'd.been.here

Last night was my first bi-monthly "(not your granny's) game night." I added the (not your granny's) in there because I think that too many people think of a subdued, yet sophisticated gathering of older women when they hear "game night." While that's perfect if you're an older woman interested in playing cards, it's not exactly the type of thing any self-respecting 28 year old should be doing on a friday night. I envisioned a lively group sitting around the table with a varied assortment of game options in front of them. What games? Exactly. I grew up playing games- board games, card games, interactive games...you name it. My family was perfect for game playing since there are six of us, and all of us were similarly interested in participating. Now that we've all moved away and are spread out across the country, there is little opportunity to catch up with a quick game of rummy, or a high stakes shot at cranium turbo. While my friends are definitely game for some game playing, they're not as passionate about it as I am. So. Once I decided to host the get together, I had to purchase some games. I owned one- "would you rather" that *tm* gave me for christmas (since she knew how I felt about games), but the night I had envisioned included more than just one option. I decided against straight-up board games, and opted instead for ones that encouraged lively verbal participation, preferably amusing. I did some research. "Apples to apples" kept showing up on the top ten lists. This game looked lame, yet all the customer reviews were superb. Some even said things like, "I never would have picked this game off the shelf, but I played it with friends, and it's the best!! I bought one for everyone I know, and they all love it!!!" How can you argue with such heartfelt critiques? I picked that up along with "imaginiff" and "mad gab." Next, I called my parents, and arranged to pick up four of our family favorites from my dad's office. (I also managed to show up in time for some free indian food-mmmm...mm.) These included "catch phrase", "balderdash", "cranium turbo" and "outburst." Now that I had eight game choices, I moved on to food and drink. Game night felt like pizza and chips. Doritos in particular. At our last sibling card game, we'd tried baked doritos, and they'd received a thumbs up. Along with those, I grabbed some pretzels and a bunch of veggies to munch on. The pizza and pita/butter/cheese/garlic salt/and oregano appetizers were ready at home, so I moved on to wine. Since I'm not a wine connoisseur, I decided to find the best looking labels (without drinking tar) and came up with those you see in the picture. We only opened two- the taxi and the arrogant frog. The frog was good, the taxi- not so good. After some brief missing-the-bus trouble, everyone arrived and we started with the apple game. As promised, it was a blast. We moved on to imaginiff. This was my favorite. You use a wipe-off marker and write everyone's name in a space and roll a die to determine who would be the subject of the question. Then everyone picks an answer, and the people who pick the answer with the most votes gets a point. The highlight of this game was when *ac* was up as the subject. This is the imaginiff card:

Imaginiff... (*ac*) accidentally backed over the neighbor's cat in the driveway. Which would he/she do?

1. Bury it and say nothing.
2. Confess.
3. Buy a replacement and pretend nothing happened.
4. Place it on the road and say nothing.
5. Blame the neighbor for inadequate cat control.
6. Run over it again to make sure it was dead.

*ac* choose number 2, and everyone else picked number 5. It was one of the few times we all (except *ac* ) answered the same, which shows how right on we were. *ac* was offended, but it was so funny- especially because I could clearly picture the situation, with her reaction as #5 dead on. I laughed so hard I cried. We finished with "mad gab" which was just too rough for me. You're shown a card with a nonsense phrase on it. You then have to repeat it and figure out what it's supposed to mean. Like- "amen ask hurt" translates to "a mini-skirt." It sounds easy, but it's really rough when you're under the timer. It's good I just saw my dr and have great blood pressure and pulse. Otherwise I'd worry about my ability to play that game again!