Games people play

We spent this past weekend with 12 other people in a big house on the Russian River, about two hours north of San Francisco. When I write it like that it sounds like maybe we were on a reality TV show but it was just a fun weekend with friends. As least that's what I've been led to believe.

The house backed right onto the river and had a yard that may have been originally designed as the worlds most challenging mini-golf course. We discovered this while playing Bocce ball - a new game for me and one I liked very much. For those people like me who don't get out much and so are new to Bocce it is sort of like Curling but on grass instead of ice, with balls instead of whatever those curling things are and without the funny manic sweeping.

The balls are marble and really heavy and the yard which, at a glance was more or less flat, turned out to be a nightmare for novice Bocce-ers and an unexpected challenge to the more experienced players. You would gently roll a big ball toward the white target ball and just as it got close it would suddenly change direction, pick up speed and end up under a bush. I almost think the terrain was somehow haunted the behavior of the balls was so inexplicable.*

The good news was that after we had tired of physics-defying Bocce, people were up for playing a whole bunch of other games. I personally LOVE playing games and this group of 12 other fervent game players was amazing - I learned and became obsessed with winning a bunch of new games that I hadn't even known existed. For example, a board game from Europe called Jamaica which involves pirates, treasure and small plastic ships; and Bananagrams - like Scrabble but without the board and without the agonizing waits between your turn.


*In a conversation about the supernatural at one point the idea came up that there should be a Oiuja board iPhone app. There are three. And there's also a Magic 8 Ball app that I might have to get too.