My brother used to give my sister and I the best board games when we were young. It wasn’t until we were adults that we discovered that the playing pieces in board games were sold in packages. He must have played every game he gave us first. I understand completely.

I’m not including card games, customizable card games, or dice games here. For some reason I decided to allow a living card game.

Board games of my childhood

I don’t list here games like Password and Concentration, but I probably should. I liked both of them, but don’t think we owned them. There was also a game that had ghosts that glowed in the dark, I think. No one liked to play it with me.

Marbles – I think other people know this as Aggravation. Daddy made the board. Everyone in the family would play. We jumped the corners after a direct corner landing, and moved backward on every throw of a 4. I loved this game. *****

Battleship – I played this game most as a child, but I used to make an old girlfriend laugh by pretending to play “air battleship” where you just shout out random numbers and letters. I played the real game with a great-nephew who just liked to make designs with the pegs; he didn’t care if he hit anything or not. ***

Chess – I love many chess sets but play without skill. **

Masterpiece – Featured paintings from the Art Institute of Chicago. Daddy would play this game sometimes and he always bought the forgery. Mom always bought the Mary Cassatt. The artwork was great and the game play moved at a good pace. I didn’t really get into the role of an art dealer, however. *****

Clue – I never owned this game, but I usually won when I played. I liked the movie and I liked the game, but not enough to own. ***

Crazy Clock – Most kids grew up with Mouse Trap. I had Crazy Clock instead where you kicked the man out of bed. Much more fun. ****

Mystery Date – I think this was the name of the game. I played it at one slumber party. It had a door you opened to see what your date looked like. Boring and the door didn’t seem to ever work right. Doesn’t deserve even one star.

Risk – I thought this was the best game ever until I played it a third time. It takes so very long to play. The artwork is nothing. **

Stock Market Game – I remember that taking the career of deep sea diving seemed to be our favorite choice. You could buy stocks from Alcoa, International Shoe, J. I. Case, Western Publishing. We played this a lot. *****

Stratego – I remember the TV ads for this. It was strategic and had fun playing pieces. ****

Big Business – The neighbor kids and I found this game in one of their closets and gave up on the instructions and made up our own rules. I’m going to withhold a rating, but we did play it more than once and even used a few of the written rules.

Monopoly – Protect me from this game. I love it that my husband also hates it. *

Parcheesi – Maybe if I had just fought in the Civil War, it would have seemed exotic and  I would have liked it more. *

Rock-O – Maybe shouldn’t count because it’s played with cards, but the cards have special holders and stand vertically, so I’m calling it a board game. The original game got boring, but then came Super Rack-O. ***

Tripoli – More of a card game, but ours came with a container for chips so I’m counting it anyway. It’s a card game so that gives it its stars. ***

Board games of my adult years

Apples to Apples – Only played this once with good friends. It made us laugh. That’s good enough for me. The only limitation I can see is the need to buy new cards after you learn how your friends and family think. ****

Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer – Deck building games don’t really have to have great back story, but this one suggests the existence of one without providing even a few paragraphs of flavor text. My husband sold this game; he should have asked me first. I might want to kill the cultist again one day. ***

Battles of Westeros – This should be the best game ever, but it’s not. You have to spend too much time fiddling with game pieces. It’s such a great concept, but just isn’t fun. *

Cavetroll – It’s a quick playing strategic game. I like the hero and monster figures. ****

Chaos in the Old World – The artwork is great: it feels seedy and nasty.  Four races have different ways of winning the game. It’s challenging and competitive. *****

Chez Geek – Not as fun a Munchkin. You need to play with the right people who are willing to act silly. ***

Citadels – Easy to learn and quick to play. The artwork isn’t special but I do like how your characters can change each turn and you can temporarily kill another player. There’s some strategy, but no pondering or planning moves ahead required. ****

Cosmic Encounter – One of the alien races is a whiner—it can whine for power. Who wouldn’t want to play that character? I seem to win at this without actually trying, so I love it. You can pick on other players even though the game randomly decides who you attack. There are plenty of races so each game is different. This game’s strategy might not work for the next game. *****

Cranium – I could do without the cards that require you to hum. I haven’t played a game yet when I didn’t laugh at someone. I approve of that in game play. ****

Cyclades – You bid for the favor of the gods. That’s pretty cool and I usually get nervous and don’t enjoy bidding. The map and artwork are fun. It seems well balanced. You can hold a conversation while playing, but it does require long and short term strategy. ****

Dark Tower – This almost fits into my childhood when I look back at the technology involved. The game was monitored by a small computer inside the black plastic shell of the tower and suddenly brigands would attack. I still remember the sound for that. It was a lot of fun one summer, but it went out with the trash eventually. **

Descent: Journeys in the Dark –I don’t have much experience with this type of dungeon crawling game. Lots of pieces to manage. I’m reserving judgment for now.

Dungeons & Dragons: Wrath of Ashardalon – Just started playing this cooperative adventure game. Aside from the nasty rolling boulder that follows you around like a puppy, it’s been fun. The odds of winning or losing seem pretty even. The artwork is OK. ***

Five Straight – My parents introduced me to this game. We played it often. ****

Fury of Dracula – Who doesn’t want to chase Dracula around Europe? I’d give it another star if it was more fun to play without five players. It feels a bit like clue, but with more strategy and one person gets to be Dracula. ****

Game of Thrones – We played the board game once and were not hooked. The LCG is much better. **

A Game of Thrones: The Card Game – This living card game is too complicated to just play for a lark, but it’s very interesting and challenging. I need to spend some time with it, build my own deck, and then learn how to win with it. But I’m not going to go play with the game designers like Alex has. I’m a graceful loser, but I don’t enjoy getting my teeth kicked in repeatedly.

Huggermugger – Very good word games. The board element of it wasn’t quite as good. ***

Ingenious – I suck at this game because I really just want to make pretty patterns. I also suck using the iPod app. But it involves strategy so I enjoy it. ***

Lord of the Rings Trivia Game – I played this two or three times. By trivia, I mean trivialities. One question asked if someone turned left or right at the top of the stairs. As much I love LoTR, I got rid of the game. *

Mancala – Yah, yah, yah. It just doesn’t have enough variation. *

Memoir ’44 – This game lets you recreate and play key battles in Europe in 1944. I assumed that meant I’d be bored by the game. But the game play is great. It involves strategy and the luck of cards. It’s so well balanced that HabMoo and I sometimes play one scenario twice in a row. We just switch roles. The map is a simple game board, but you build upon that with extra squares so it is easily customized. Except for my issue with not being able to easily distinguish the gray figures from the green figures, I love this game. The expansions are just as good. *****

Munchkin – The fun depends on the players. I’ve really had fun playing it and I’ve been frustrated playing it. If your players are comfortable with the game and are willing to be a bit silly, then it’s a great game. ****

Space Hulk: Death Angel – The Card Game –  An enjoyable game if the game doesn’t beat you too badly.

Ticket to Ride – The geography of this game drives me crazy. It interferes with the game. But it’s easy to play and involves secrecy and messy up the plays of other people. **

Sequence – Feels a little like a card game. It’s fun and easy to play but not something I really want to play again and again. ***

Settlers of Catan – Easy to learn, competitive, can screw with other players, and can carry on a conversation while playing. ***

Small World – I really enjoy this game. It’s not your typical world domination game because the world is just so small. It’s a fantasy setting that doesn’t take itself seriously. It never plays the same way twice. *****

Thunderstone – A deck-building game that I really enjoy. Sometimes the random draw of monsters and heroes really screws you over. But sometimes it’s fun to yell at the game.

Upwords – I do not play Scrabble and don’t care for Boggle, but this game is fine. I enjoyed playing it while watching TV.  **

Warhammer: Invasion – I’m not very good at this game. Nevertheless, it moves fairly quickly and is probably well balanced. It looks dirty and

So where did the name HabMoo come from? It’s from one of the numerous Metal Gear Solid random name generators. HabMoo is short for Habitual Moose. My name came out as Buckshot Bumblebee, in case you’re curious. But I do not answer to it. So don’t try.

More things to avoid during deployment

Yesterday on my daily walk I was listening to the podcast of “Stuff Your Mother Never Told You” and learned that there’s a new reason I could become depressed while the man is gone. Apparently semen contains anti-depressive chemicals. Or there’s some correlation between having unprotected sex and being non-depressed. The correlation between unprotected sex and unwanted pregnancy is probably higher.

Exploding head syndrome

Yah, it sounds crazy but it exists and I’m thankful to the guys at “Stuff You Should Know” for giving me a name for the startling, but thankfully, rare noise that will wake me up. The American Sleep Association’s definition:

Exploding head syndrome is a rare and relatively undocumented parasomnia event in which the subject experiences a loud bang in their head similar to a bomb exploding, a gun going off, a clash of cymbals or any other form of loud, indecipherable noise that seems to originate from inside the head. Contrary to the name, exploding head syndrome has no elements of pain, swelling or any other physical trait associated with it. They may be perceived as having bright flashes of light accompanying them, or result in shortness of breath, though this is likely caused by the increased heart rate of the subject after experiencing it. It most often occurs just before deep sleep, and sometimes upon coming out of deep sleep.

For me the sound is one of the following: rotary dial phone ringing once, childhood doorbell chime, knocking at a wooden door (terrifying if it sounds like an interior door), and maybe a dog bark. Last month I had my best one which was HabMoo’s voice saying a single word. It woke me up, but this time my heart wasn’t racing in fear. I was really impressed that it sounded so realistic since I can’t just call that sound to mind at will. The syndrome is supposedly connected to stress, but hearing HabMoo’s voice was actually quite calming. I hope his voice becomes to new de facto explosion.

Thursday Next

She will have to be the title character for the deployment warm-up. Since Alex has gone to AT (annual training) this year, I have listened to three Jasper Fforde novels. I’m not sure that I would have devoured them in print, but I do so love having a woman with a British accent read to me. It’s very comforting.

Disgusting things I’ve experienced or thought about recently and just thought I’d share. You’re welcome.

I was picking flower only to find a spittle bug on the stem. I’m sure that spit is a great place to house your eggs. Who would want to chew through the spit to get to them?

Have you seen video of the flying fish depositing their eggs? It’s disgusting. A couple of months ago I thought of that video footage while I was taking a bubble bath. I had to get out of the tub. And then shower off.

Many animals pee on themselves to cool off. I’m glad it’s been a cool summer so far. It’s not something I really want to try, but once I know something like this I feel the need to try it out.

I said something the other day to a friend about how I once witnessed a drake basically rape a female duck. The duck got pulled under the water by a snapping turtle, struggled, and then was gone. Beware of Lake Calhoun, if you’re a mating duck. That got me thinking about duck rape and I found this. If you decide to click, don’t blame me for any shudders.

Speaking of birds, how do woodpeckers stand having their tongues wrapped around their heads?

Urban turkeys

Are they getting too smart? I’ve seen them outside the Ace Hardware on Como Avenue, crossing the street to a local park, in the bank parking lot, and in the crosswalk on Broadway. They worry me. How can we be sure they aren’t aliens in disguise collecting intelligence on us? I love seeing bald eagles and falcons in the city, but I draw the line at poultry. It’s just wrong. I’d be happier without the geese and turkeys. The blue-winged teals and wood ducks can stay.

Worst tag line

“Rock Solid. Heart touching.” Not a bad tagline for a family readiness group, but a terrible one for my PC. I see it come up every time I start my computer. And since it’s been locking up a lot lately, I keep wondering it it’s had heart attacks or landslides or something.

Why is dog sled racing is a better sport than golf even though it receives so much less attention from the press?

First off is the strongest argument, I think. I know nothing about Lance Machey’s sex life and could I bet I can find out more details about his dog breeding than about his own. That is as it should be. A search on Google for “Tiger Woods sex” and “Lance Mackey sex” return 16,100,000 and 37,800 results respectively. The first page listed for the Mackey search is a sports news page that mentions Tiger. The second one is about his dogs. So I was right. Dog breeding is news worthy since it affects the strength of upcoming teams; human breeding attempts are not news.

Women compete directly with men. There’s no separate league for women. Alaska’s motto used to be “Where men are men and women win the Iditarod.” The sport always has several top female competitors from Libby Riddles, to Susan Butcher, Dee Dee Jonrowe, Jessie Royer, and so many others. There are even husbands and wives who compete in the same race.

Dogs are infinitely more interesting than golf clubs. I don’t think any golfer has ever had anyone ask permission to pet his or her clubs. Nor are there many fans out there taking photos of clubs. They are famous in their own right. Dogs even get their own awards. For the Iditarod they can win the Golden Harness Award, for example. Clubs don’t bark and jump around and show their own excitement for the sport. Now I will admit that no golfer has had to walk miles to track down a loose club nor has to scoop up gallons of golf club excrement every week.

Locations are more interesting. Mushers, even in local races, travel trails not often seen by others. Augusta, Georgia or the Yukon River, which is more fascinating and has a richer history? Do any golf tournaments commemorate anything historic, let alone something like the 1925 serum run to Nome?

Competitors wear better clothing. Many will argue with me over this one. But I think parkas patched with duck tape are more fun to look at than plaid pants. I prefer the Taco Bell logo plastered over Dee Dee’s butt to the Nike swish on a cap.

The action is more exciting. Watching excited dogs and exhausted mushers or watching people follow a ball around, which would you choose any day of the week?

The fans are more fascinating. Does anyone wear eccentric clothing to golf tournaments? I mean fun and eccentric clothing. Mushing fans stand around for hours waiting in the freezing cold and have been known to be served donuts cooked in bear fat (at the Beargrease). They serve as volunteers and suffer with freezing temperatures, long drives, boredom, smelly dog booties, hungry mushers, and tired vets. Golf fans might only stand in the rain, drinking espresso.

The competitors have better stories. I mean this year there was a Jamaican, Newton Marshall, racing the Iditarod. And you can’t just enter that race without finishing other races to qualify. He may have trained in Jamaica on a wheeled sled pulled by stray dogs from a local shelter, but he managed to finish the Yukon Quest. Remember when Colonel Norman Vaughn was racing in his 80s? How about mushing families with multiple generations of competitors and winners? Dick, Rick, and Lance Mackey have all been winners. Martin Buser named his son Rohn after an Iditarod checkpoint and the son is also a musher. And who can resist someone like Herbie Nayokpuk, “The Shishmaref Cannonball.”

An seven course meal cooked by a famous chef on a cook stove is a lot more tantalizing than another silver cup. And the winner hasn’t even had to finish the race yet. In fact, the winner might not be the ultimate winner of the race. Now that keeps things interesting. There are also almost always awards for sportsmanship and for dog care.

I rest my case. But I’d love to hear your opinions.

There’s now a manga version of the Bible. It had to happen, but I was hoping I wouldn’t notice. HabMoo spotted one at Barnes and Noble. If you look online there’s more than just this one. From a New York Times review of an edition published by Doubleday: “The Sermon on the Mount did not make the book, though, because there was not enough action to it.”

From the Chronicle of Higher Education article “Ordinary Ugliness“:
“according to data collected by the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, 30 percent of cosmetic surgery is performed on people who earn less than $30,000 a year, and 71 percent on those who earn less than $60,000 a year.” Well I guess I should get me some. But I’d really prefer to take a loan out for some land. It’ll last longer than my face and probably pay out better, too.

I had breakfast with a friend and we were talking about our mothers. I realized that when speaking to them we both addressed them as “Mama.” We realized that we started calling them that once we started taking on more responsibility for them. We both went from Mommy to Mother (in adolescence) to Mom to Mama.

I’m ashamed that I couldn’t name the nine most popular Web sites. I hadn’t even heard of live.com. Or it I had, I dismissed it because of their cashback offers.

I’m wondering about the things we become beholden to. This week for me it is the cats. I opened the front and side doors for them a half dozen times yesterday to prove that it was too cold to go outside. I yell at them and warn them about the windchill. I claim to have no control over the weather. Then I open the door. I started on the routine again today before breakfast. OK, I confess, I’m always beholden to my pets.
     For my mother its everyone who spends money on postage to send her something. She feels like she must read ever piece of mail that comes to her. It looks like she’s hoarding junk mail because she won’t just toss anything with printing on it. I confess to stealing her mail when I’m there. Just so she won’t have to read it all.

Did you know there are only 56 reasons to have sex? Number 23 won’t do it for me. And it’s harder if you’re gay or lesbian. And I’m not built for number 49. Or maybe I’m just too noisy. Either way it’s not going to happen.