Games we play
I should mention that Kid-2 brought home two C's on her report card and was, for a time, beside herself, and really took it out on Kid-1. Now honestly, I don't pay a lot of attention to report cards. I've tried to do that "stern parent" thing with them and I just can't. They seem really superfluous. I know what my kids are smart in and what they need to be trained or taught in; I've done that from the beginning, and having the school say something about it is only marginally helpful. It's a very nice school system, but I know that Kid-1's intelligence lines up perfectly with what schools expect and Kid-2's doesn't, and that's why they don't bring home the same grades. Anyway, DW helped with Kid-2, and I think all is well now, though we might need to put some extra effort into making sure her math and English are raised up to A's or B's - if that's what she wants.
The kids have taken to playing Diplomacy with me while DW is out for her Friday night gaming jaunts. We split up the countries as France/Austria, Germany/Turkey, and Russia/Italy, and we each take turns submitting orders for England. Generally we can knock out four turns or so. It's not exactly the most strategic game play - last time, K2 wanted to take over Greece because she was starring in Grease - but I think it's more about doing something neat with Dad. K1 has said she doesn't want to play with anyone else, because it might be "too mean"...rather like the game two weeks ago where I knifed her in the back by having the Turks take Sevastopol, the Germans take Warsaw, and the English take St. Petersburg, all in Fall of '02. I'm still hearing about that...but it was just too yummy of a move to pass up.
I think somewhere along the line I'll invent a three-person board game that's somewhat similar, just so we don't have to jimmy around with the rules so much. I still have my four-person game, tentatively called "Warlords", which turned out to be a bit too long and involved for the kids...I should take that to game night at nosebeepbear's sometime. Of course, having a game of Diplomacy or Machiavelli or something similar there would be good, too. (My fish-around for an online game drew two interested folks, both novices.)
Or Wiz-War! Man, I haven't played that in eons, and have no clue where my old set might be. As it turns out, Chessex has the rights and have literally been diddling on making a new edition for five years...however, all the cards and such are online, so a new set could be made given enough cardboard and ink and paper for the color printer. Heck, I think I even have my old ideas for new Wiz-War cards that I wrote about, oh, nine years ago.
In other news, I've used Google Earth to figure out exactly how long walks to nearby destinations around my home and workplace would actually be. No Black Riders sighted yet, however.
The kids have taken to playing Diplomacy with me while DW is out for her Friday night gaming jaunts. We split up the countries as France/Austria, Germany/Turkey, and Russia/Italy, and we each take turns submitting orders for England. Generally we can knock out four turns or so. It's not exactly the most strategic game play - last time, K2 wanted to take over Greece because she was starring in Grease - but I think it's more about doing something neat with Dad. K1 has said she doesn't want to play with anyone else, because it might be "too mean"...rather like the game two weeks ago where I knifed her in the back by having the Turks take Sevastopol, the Germans take Warsaw, and the English take St. Petersburg, all in Fall of '02. I'm still hearing about that...but it was just too yummy of a move to pass up.
I think somewhere along the line I'll invent a three-person board game that's somewhat similar, just so we don't have to jimmy around with the rules so much. I still have my four-person game, tentatively called "Warlords", which turned out to be a bit too long and involved for the kids...I should take that to game night at nosebeepbear's sometime. Of course, having a game of Diplomacy or Machiavelli or something similar there would be good, too. (My fish-around for an online game drew two interested folks, both novices.)
Or Wiz-War! Man, I haven't played that in eons, and have no clue where my old set might be. As it turns out, Chessex has the rights and have literally been diddling on making a new edition for five years...however, all the cards and such are online, so a new set could be made given enough cardboard and ink and paper for the color printer. Heck, I think I even have my old ideas for new Wiz-War cards that I wrote about, oh, nine years ago.
In other news, I've used Google Earth to figure out exactly how long walks to nearby destinations around my home and workplace would actually be. No Black Riders sighted yet, however.