When I was in junior high, it was perfectly acceptable to be outside all day long with no adult supervision. In fact, most parents expected it. I would often get on my 10-speed bike and go for epic bike rides around the city. It was Sioux Falls, SD, in the 80’s, so it was the safest place in the world at the time. My mom even insisted on not locking our doors, because she trusted people so much.

Back in those carefree summers, my brother and I liked to get fireworks around the fourth of July. We invested a vast amount of time and money in fireworks and lighting them off. I learned a lot of lessons in those firework sessions. It was where I figured out what a gross was. Not the kind of gross like onions on a burger. In mathmatical terms, it meant 144.

I also learned the best way to flush money down the toilet. We would go through the gross of bottle rockets in less than an hour and then have to use our well-earned money to buy a gross more. By the time Independence Day rolled around, we used all our money and had nothing to show for it.

Fireworks can be a dangerous game, which is not the reason I don’t get them anymore. I don’t get them because they cost so much money. I love dangerous games…when I’m digital and the world I inhabit is digital as well, IE video games.

What I don’t love is board games. Games like Monopoly, Settlers of Catan, or Clue. I know exactly why they call them board games. Because I am so board when I play them.

It fascinates me how many fanatic board game players there are. I thought I hit the jackpot when my son and I got to go to PAX (Penny Arcade Expo), which I thought was a video game conference. I was stoked to see some awesome Video Game booths, attend some panels or discussions, and see some wild cosplay outfits (when we went, cosplay was just starting to get big.)

There was a fair amount of all those things, but more than anything, there was arena-sized rooms of full of board game nerds. I couldn’t fathom why these people paid all this money and came all this way, just to sit in a room and play board games that they could have done at home.

Sadly, both sides of my family love board games and will play them whenever we get together. They always try to get me to play, but they know I hate board games. Which is why they always insist I play.

My favorite part of the whole board game culture is the person who says, “I tried a new game I think we should play.” They rant and rave about it, and then spend 30-60 minutes reading all the rules and instructions. Then, half the people need the instructions read again for another 30 minutes, while the other half just want to start playing.

Then, the one who’s played it before starts using advanced techniques to destroy the competition over a 6-hour marathon boring game session. Then someone else starts talking about another game that is really fun, and I’m in the other room, going nope, nope, nope, just hoping I can find a charger for my phone, because I’m dying of board game boardom.

The problem with board games is that everyone plays games differently. Some are big rules people, some are just there to spend time with people, others are there to feel it out, and by the time the game is over, no one is happy about the results.

Everyone thinks the winner cheated, the winner knows they cheated and people like me don’t even try or care when I’m forced into playing. I just want to go home and play the GOAT games, IE video games, which are much more stimulating. The best part about video games is that we don’t have to play with a bunch of people we know and don’t like. We can play with people we don’t know and don’t like, which is way better, because we can just delete them. It’s not as easy to delete our families because they aren’t digital (allegedly).

A game I do like to play is Bitter Friday Giftures, which starts right now…

Spent my summers growing up…

Whenever we got a chance and some money…

I even learned what the word gross meant…

The mathematical term gross…

Come on people…

Fireworks are a dangerous game…

But not as dangerous as board games…

I went to PAX (Penny Arcade Expo) fully expecting…

Maybe even see some wild cosplay…

What I didn’t expect…

The problem with board games is that there’s always one person…

And there’s always at least one…

And that is how we end up with one winner who cheated, and everyone else, who accuses the winner of cheating, and we wasted 6 hours of our lives to understand what we all knew. That no one ever wins without cheating.

ARRRGGGHHHHHHHH

Bitter Board Games Ben