games

As I've read blogs posted by classmates, I've had the opportunity to rethink my gaming experience. My original post regarding gaming exprience was that I had none. If "gaming" is an all inclusive term, then I will confess to being a gaming nut. Growing up, we played a lot of board games. My sister is quite a bit older than me, so board games seemed to be the only way for us to play together and not be bored out of our guts. There were a couple of very strict gaming rules in our house - absolutely NO video games of any kind (probably why I am not very experienced and even a little afraid of them) and NO card games of any kind (when I came home from a friend excited about my first game of Old Maid, my dad flipped!) At one time we did have an Atari (sp?), but my mom felt like my sister became too much of a zombie when she played, so the Atari didn't last long in our house. Sorry was our favorite game for my sister and I to play together. During the summer, while my sister baby-sat me we played Sorry for hours. On family nights we would play Monopoly and Taboo. I can remember playing Family Feud and Oregon Trail for hours on the computer. My sister found those games rather boring, so I never had to worry about fussing with her for my turn. We played Scrabble occassionally, but my family tended to bore easily with that. When I went to college, I found a new love for Scrabble. I went to college in the same town where my mom's brother's family lived. Our family was always close, so naturally, I spent every weekend at their home. Their boys (my cousins) were quite a bit older than me. Both were married and would come with their kids to visit on the weekends also. We would have a HUGE family Scrabble tournament. It was fantastic! There were so many of us that we played in teams and we made up our own variations of the games. Hillbilly Scrabble was the best. The rules of Hillbilly Scrabble were that any word was fair game and you had to spell the word exactly the way you said it, and no matter what the word (or non-word) it counted. We were serious players. We played strategically for points, and we played to win. Since then my uncle has passed away, and my cousins and I are now scattered across the country. On the holidays when we do get together, we still try our harderst to set aside time for a Scrabble game though it doesn't always work out. I have tried to spread my excitement for Scrabble to my sister, brother-in-law, and husband. It must not be contagious enough because none of them like it. My husband swears I'm way too competetive. Since my husband prefers games that require slightly less thinking, we've resorted to Battleship, Scene It, and Are you Smarter than a Fifth Grader. So I am a gamer, just a more traditional one.