Over the holidays, we always head to London, Ontario, where our extended family lives. While there, I try to make a night where I can head over to my best friend Sue's house so we can catch up, exchange our Christmas gifts, and gab. This past Christmas, we were in the "gab" part of our evening when I noticed she had the game Scattergories under her tree. I asked her if someone had given it to her and she said yes, she's always loved the game. I told her I'd never played it. Her jaw dropped and she said, "Well then we MUST play it now!" She bounced off the couch, unwrapped it, and I played it for the first time. It's REALLY fun, but considering lately my brain feels like it's filled with molasses, it's not good for someone who takes as long as I do to answer (before Christmas we had friends over who have been engaged in a years-long Trivial Pursuit battle with us -- husbands vs wives -- and when the other woman and I were faced with the question, "What snack item introduced a 7-centimetre thick version called the Right Stuff in 1988?" I KNEW I knew the answer, and it took me about 10 minutes before I finally said, "Oh my god OREOS!!" to which the other husband, who was already beating his head against the table out of frustration, said, "That's it! We're using a timer from this point on." Hahahaha!)
Anyway, if you've never played Scattergories, you're given a card with 12 categories on it, like "Kind of gemstone" or "Brand of car" and there's a line you have to fill out beside each line (everyone has the same card of categories). Then someone rolls the die and it lands on one letter of the alphabet, and your answer has to begin with that letter.
OK. So. I had a bad habit of beginning to answer right at the top, and not scanning my eyes down the card to see what was to come, and then by the time I got to the end, I was almost out of time and couldn't think of anything. So the letter was F (not awesome) and I'm moving through these categories, drawing one blank after another (Nickname? Ugh... Four-eyes?) and I get to the last one, Book title. Oh my god, I can't skip this one. I have 2000 books at home, SOMETHING must begin with F. Finn. Huck Finn. Can I write "Finn, Huckleberry?" Quick glance at the rules and... no. What the hell begins with F? F. Scott Fitzgerald. That's a writer, you idiot. F... F... Finn. Finn. Suddenly that's all I could think of, and suddenly, "ENH!" Buzzer went off, I was out of time.
Now you compare your answers to your opponent's. Nickname: "Four-eyes?" Sue said, "I put Freckles." Oh come ON how did I not think of that??? She laughed and laughed. And then we got to the end. "I've got nuthin," I said. She looked up.
"Seriously?"
"Seriously. Did you come up with something?"
"I did," she said. "And it happens to be sitting in this room... it's a little book called... Finding Lost?"
Sigh. I need to check my head for signs of the lobotomy surgery I seem to have forgotten about.
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8 comments:
that is sooooooo funny !!!:-)
must be a sign of early aging :-)
Your friends are very patient playing Trivial Pursuit giving you 10 minutes to answer.
Oh Nikki, don't be so hard on yourself. This is the course of things that happen when you become a parent. And even though I can't think of ANYTHING anymore, I might have been able to come up with Finding Lost.
Here's my story. The other day we were putting my kitchen back together after having had some new appliances put in and my husband started putting the fire extinguisher in the cabinet under the cooktop and I said to him: "What are you doing, isn't that flammable?" He just looked at me incredulously and kept about his business. Then I said..."Oh...duh." "L" on my forehead for sure.
That's fantastic! Thanks for the laugh this afternoon. And at least noone can say you're too much of a showoff. :)
OMG, I played Scattergories on New Years, and I got F for that exact same category card!
And yes, I put "Freckles" under Nicknames. but I didn't put "Finding LOST", because I was playing with a lot of fans of the show & I thought they would write that, too. So I put Fireman Sam, the kids' book...and so did someone else.
LoL
From a Great Height also slipped your mind. :(
Finnegans Wake Need more be said? I know you'll slap the side of your head, as you had written such a great review of Joyce's other work. Uhm, starts with a "U".
To add insult to injury, so sorry, sorry, but Flashforward. Of course, having said this I feel like Faust. But thinking of these things at Four Past Midnight is kinda like a Firestarter to one's Ficciones (okay, that's sitting on the shelf next to the all important books, written by a true scholar and fan of LOST, namely yourself).
Trivial Pursuit, Scrabble and all the rest of these board games are the reason we have cellphones with internet access.
It's the time limit with Scattergories. The buzzer winding down is just way to much pressure! I do the same thing in my head -- "OMG! What begins with F? Why can't I think of anything? I don't have enough time!"
I played with my parents recently and my dad and I both put "Wyatt" for a boy's name while my mom got a point for "William." Weirdly, my dad and I also both chose baklava for the category of "dessert" when we had the letter "B."
Oh, man I LOVE Scattegories. It's one of my all time favorite games, and I have fond recollections of arguments amongst friends over whether an answer was valid or not (such as whether or not 'worms' are something you can be afraid of).
I still have a friend who insists it's possible for "asshole" to be a term of endearment, simply in defense of his one-time Scattegories answer (he didn't get the point for it...).
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