It's hard to get excited about venturing outdoors when the promise of
dry skies does not last for more than 10 minutes. Sure, you can head for
the hills to get lost in all the snow that's piling up this year, but
sometimes fussing with tire chains and slow-moving ski mobiles just isn't
worth the trip. What's an outdoor enthusiast to do in a state that rather
falsely touts its year-round compatibility with such adventurous souls?
Stay inside for once. Instead of submitting to a wet weekend, cozy up
to some classic rainy day activities.
Bridge clubs and Friday-night poker rallies have long been mainstays
of American recreation, but parlor games have suffered with the onslaught
of isolationist, boring computer solitaire and Nintendo. Fortunately,
classics like Scrabble and backgammon have survived in spite of their
graphics-savvy competitors--but perhaps you've forgotten how to play.
Let us help you get your feet wet. What follows is an exaltation of
a card game all game-players should learn, an introduction to a war
of minds that befits parties and a revisitation of the rules of a classic.
Euchre
Hailing from the Midwest, euchre is a four-person contest
that necessitates and nurtures player interaction. Euchre, like golden
retrievers, inspires immense passion among certain circles--grown-ups
go crazy over this game in the same way preteens squeal at the
prospect of spin the bottle. Just about every euchre Web site I churned
up in a Metacrawler search made bold statements declaring this game,
the baby cousin of bridge and half-sister to pinochle, to be the greatest
and most wonderful diversion ever--the pinnacle of card games. And when
you've got four people who know how to play, it is. My best match was
with my boyfriend (who is from Michigan and introduced me to this lovely
contest) against two hard-core, euchre-bred Ohioans in a Baltimore bar.
We won the tie-breaker only because they were putting away beers faster
and sloppier than the two of us. Nonetheless it was quite a victory.
After all, I'm from New Hampshire and was newly introduced to the game.
What's so exciting about euchre is its particular language and inherent
intimacy. Jacks are called bowers, and teams get "euchred." The game
requires you to anticipate your partner's risk-taking level, and makes
you want to play smart to save his ass as well as your own. Above all
else you must take care not to trump your partner's ace. Euchre is played
with a truncated deck of cards nine through ace, and the object is for
a team to reach 10 points. Game-related communication between partners
is not allowed. There is not sufficient space here to fully explain
the game. In lieu of finding a teacher, consult the Web: http://www.clarkson.edu/~guildda/euchretw.html
offers easy directions.
Botticelli
A diversion I recently learned is an alternative to
the quarters and caps of college. No props are needed, and it's not
the sort of drinking game that requires participants to swill when they
screw up--it's simply an amusement that goes nicely with good bourbon.
Botticelli is a teaser to minds that have a hard time separating first
names from surnames. The person in command of the game picks a celebrity,
living or dead, and supplies the crowd with the first initial of the
famed person's last name. Say that initial is P. Contestants try to
get clues about the elusive personality by stumping the gamekeeper with
questions about other famous people with the same last initial: "If
I was a the golden-haired starlet daughter of the man who produced St.
Elsewhere, I'd be...." If the clue-holder does not reply "Gwyneth
Paltrow," the contestant gets to ask a yes or no query to garner basic
information about the mysterious miz or mister. This routine can get
maddening, but this game is a great camaraderie-builder.
Scrabble
Lots of people play this champion among word games,
they just don't play it correctly. Scrabble is at its best when played
by four people--there's a better chance that the tiles will spread evenly
across the board rather than just the lower half, and things move along
faster. However, having more than two people playing the game makes
it more difficult to intertwine varying interpretations of the rules.
It's important to lay down rules agreeable to all parties before play
commences; when in doubt consult the directions. Some players (read:
cheaters) will try to get away with anything. They'll offer free exchanges
for four of a kind (i.e. no need to sacrifice your turn in order to
swap a few letters); they'll claim blanks from the board by substituting
them with the intended lettered tiles; they'll freely consult the dictionary
and issue loose rulings on proper nouns. Some of these house rules are
acceptable to facilitate play for adolescents, but adults who allow
these customs of convenience should scratch Scrabble altogether and
engage in Upwords or Boggle, or be forced to stand out in the rain.
It should be noted that tile tracking--making notes on which letters
have been used and how many duplicates remain adrift in the alphabet
soup--counts as fair play. Check the tournament laws if you don't believe
me.
While I'm not suggesting that hibernation till June is the key to winter
survival, you might as well seize the opportunity to give your body
a break and exercise your mind. When the sun finally comes through strong
and clear, you won't be messing with Scrabble at the beach.
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Willamette Week | originally
published February 10,
1999
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