Tag: games

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Word Out

The final count: 423 words in a row.

I stared at the screen for a few seconds in disbelief. Nothing lasts forever, of course. But my year-plus run of beating Wordle had started to feel pretty close.  The game’s six steps had always been enough to solve the five-letter word of the day, even if it was sometimes by the skin of my teeth.

But not this time.

“Current streak: 0.”

The word on the screen was CREDO, as in a core statement of belief. The word from my mouth … um, may not have had five letters in it.

The worst part? I’d done it to myself. My guesses had uncovered all five letters of the answer, but I’d read too quickly to notice and only used four.The information was there. The brain was not.

And if that sounds way too familiar, I’m not surprised.

Sherlock Holmes used to warn about the dangers of reasoning from incomplete data. But in this information-soaked age, the more common problem is likely to be the reverse: complete data, incomplete reasoning. We get tired. Or distracted. Or even overwhelmed as we try to handle “everything, everywhere, all at once,” which these days is not just a movie, it’s a way of life.

Whatever the reason, it creates a brain wreck. Sometimes it’s just annoying, like spotting an error in an email you sent just give minutes ago. Other times, it’s bigger – maybe even on the level of national news. (“BREAKING: GOVERNMENT FAILED TO ACT ON WARNINGS.”)

But in a weird way, it’s also hopeful. It means learning is possible.

If you visit here regularly, you may know that I’m also a tabletop roleplayer who runs Dungeons & Dragons games for his nephews. (If you didn’t know that, yes, I’m even geekier than you realized.) I bring it up because a lot of modern games now include the concept of “failing forward.” In a roleplaying game, it means that a failure should always advance the story in some way, even while making things harder.

In real life, it’s an even simpler concept: that a failure you can learn from is not a total failure. It’s the beginning of a future success.

It hurts. No question. It’s frustrating beyond belief. And even when you know what needs to improve, it’s often not easy. It often means retraining habits,  pushing beyond old expectations, even asking for help. Learning’s not a comfortable thing.

But it’s a possible thing. It can be done. And that’s what matters.

The story can move forward.

And despite what the world tells you, it doesn’t have to move forward at a rush. Take the time you need. Examine the situation. Learn the pieces you have and be ready to look for new ways they might fit.

It doesn’t guarantee a win. But it keeps you in the game. And with enough struggle and awareness and growth, it can eventually spell something pretty G-R-E-A-T.

At least, that’s my credo.

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Ever a -dle Moment

I feel a little sorry for anyone trying to eavesdrop on the conversations of Chez Rochat these days.

“So did you get today’s flag yet?”

“Yeah, but I was totally in the wrong place for the country. You’ll see. And I have no idea on the music.”

‘Really? Play it a couple more times, you’ll know the guitar.”

“Ok …”

If it sounds puzzling … you’re absolutely right.

A few months back, I wrote about getting caught up in the Wordle craze, the ubiquitous puzzle game where you have to guess a five-letter word in six tries. I’m still there (and currently with a streak of over 260 wins). But these days, it’s got a lot of company.

Like Warbl, where you guess a song after hearing 30 seconds of it played backward.

Or Flagdle, where you have to recognize … well, national flags.

Or Quordle, the Wordle spin-off where you figure out four words in nine tries.

Not to mention Worldle (recognizing the shape of a country), Emovi (guess a film from a few emojis describing it), Yeardle (find the right year that an event happened in), and much, much more.

Heather discovered most of the games. I found a couple. A reader of this column even recommended one to us. It’s a little like finding dandelions in spring; every time you spot a new one, five more are nearby.

So what’s the point?

I’m not under the illusion that it makes me any smarter. Even the best brain games mostly teach you how to play brain games, a limited field unless you’re applying to become the New York Times crossword editor. (Know of any openings?) But that’s not to say that it’s useless, either.

Heather does them in part to sharpen her memory against the “brain fog” that multiple sclerosis can cause.  The moment where a reversed 30-second “Smoke on the Water” falls into place can be very reassuring.

For me, many of them play to my strengths: word play and weird bits of trivia.

And for both of us, the games hold the same appeal as a great mystery novel: pattern recognition from limited clues. As I pointed out last time, that’s a survival skill these days.

But there’s another quality that may be as valuable: tenaciousness. In particular, the awareness that an answer can be found, even if it’s not obvious or easy, and the will to keep trying for it.

I’m not naïve. I know that most of the issues we face in this world require a lot more thought than simply recognizing the shape of Belgium. But either way, persistence matters. No problem, simple or difficult, gets solved if people give up trying.

There’s a lot of temptation to do just that. As 2021 ended, an Axios poll found that more Americans were fearful than hopeful about the year to come. Ten months later, I suspect the proportions haven’t changed much.  Now, fear for the future isn’t necessarily unhelpful … but it depends on what you do with it. Does it drive you to despair and surrender? Or does it push you to struggle and try, to preserve something or even improve it?

If you’re struggling, if you’re tying, then there’s still hope in the midst of the dread. Hope sees a possible answer and then sweats to make it happen. It may take a lot of failed attempts. But hope keeps pushing for one more, to stay in the game a little longer.

So play on.  Hold your flag high.

And speaking of flags, have you seen today’s …?

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On Beyond Candy Land

The queen of Candy Land has found new realms to conquer.

This is no small statement. You see, our ward Missy is a passionate Candy Land player. She opens up the board with gusto. She draws her cards with undisguised glee. And she wins. And wins. And then goes on to win some more.

At one point, Missy had won nine games in a row, and her overall record still looks like it belongs to the Los Angeles Dodgers. This is no small accomplishment when you remember that Candy Land has no choices – you draw one card at a time and move down a single path, an exercise in predestination. It’s like Lotto, only with less chance to influence the victory.

And she wins. And wins. And wins some more.

So did she get bored? Quit while she was ahead? Pfft. Please. This is Missy we’re talking about – the lady who can play Christmas music with relentless cheer through to July 4, only stopping when the disc wears out.

No, only one thing could seduce her onward. The addition of sheer unmitigated chaos.

You see, we recently got something called Magic Maze as part of a Christmas present. It’s a wonderfully silly idea: down-on-their-luck fantasy heroes raid a shopping mall for equipment and then try to get away before security catches them. The board’s discovered in sections, so it’s different every time.

In the simplest version of the game, the mechanics are exactly what Missy’s used to: draw and move and draw again. But now you’re racing a timer. You’re working together. And you’re going a little crazy trying to get everyone where they need to go.

She. Loves. It.

And as the smile grows wider, Missy’s world gets a little bigger.

I’ve been lucky enough to see Missy’s enthusiasms catch fire several times since my wife and I began caring for her … has it really been almost 11 years now? Each new piece gets added with a fierce joy. We’ve watched her become enchanted with Harry Potter, awestruck by Darth Vader, eager to throw a basketball or start up a Face Vocal Band video.

But the really exciting thing is that she rarely abandons an old love. She still dances, still loves familiar faces and places, and when the pandemic eases up enough, I know she’ll be hitting the bowling alley without hesitation. It’s not like fireworks, flashing and burning out at high speed, but more like a bonfire, growing just a little bigger as more fuel is added.

Her capabilities are what they are. Her physical and developmental disabilities are no less real. But within what she can do, she finds new opportunities to discover and grow.

That’s a prize I think all of us would reach for.

Granted, it’s a challenging prize to win these days. Even before the pandemic, it was always tempting to build a bubble, staying with the safe, familiar and comfortable. Now, in a time of constant vigilance, it’s easier than ever to draw in and hold back.

But the fire doesn’t have to die.

The times are what they are. The need to stay safe is no less real. But within those limits, we still have opportunities of our own. We can still open new pieces of our world, find new joys and become a little more than we were before.

It can be an amazing experience.

And speaking of a-Maze-ing, I think Missy’s ready to set up the pieces again.

The game is afoot.  

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Riddle Me This

Silence had reigned for a while.  For a moment, I wondered if I’d made things too difficult this time.

Then, the messages began popping up on my phone.

“Shred, lasso, trap,” one mused over the puzzle I’d left. “Terrapin?”

I checked, the clues did indeed translate to “tear, rope, pin.”

“CORRECT!”

Another came in, deducing that “lose it, quick text” actually meant “snap, ping.” And another, turning an especially convoluted wordplay into “teenage mutant ninjas.” Before long, most of the “Turtles” category had been uncovered.

Another Riddle Night was under way.

It’s probably my most curious hobby. Lots of people read. Plenty of people act with a theatre group, or play tabletop games, or fool around with a musical instrument. But the number of folks who create riddles for a group of friends to solve … well, I won’t say it approaches zero, but it is clearly a specialty entertainment.

I inherited the title of the Riddlemaster a while ago. Like many things, it started with a Facebook group, in this case centered around the humorous and thoughtful “Callahan’s Place” stories of the writer Spider Robinson. The tavern where Robinson’s science fiction stories were set had compassion, revelry, and near-constant puns – all things we could readily duplicate in a virtual environment.

But one of the more occasional features of the stories was Riddle Night, where one of the patrons would pick an unspoken theme and then write several related riddles on the board. Each successful guess scored a point; the winner had his or her drink tab cleared and got to be Riddlemaster next time if they chose.

We obviously couldn’t do anything about the drink tab in an online “saloon.” But the rest, with some effort, was doable. We added some more time (most of a weekend rather than just one night) and the caveat that if the winner didn’t feel up to the challenge of next week’s riddles, they could “pass the microphone” back to the default Riddlemaster – which, after the first few months, became me – and we were off.

OK, we were clearly off. But a little insanity never hurts for something like this.

By now, the topics have been myriad. Poker hands. Middle-earth. Heroes and villains. If you name it, we can riddle it – and maybe even crack it.

It takes a lot of mental effort, both to forge the riddles and to solve them. But it’s worth every drop of cranial sweat. In many ways, it uses the same parts of the brain that a good pun does, but in slightly different ways.

It forces you to look at meanings and see whether there’s something you hadn’t considered.

It makes you look for patterns and connections, veering away from the unproductive ones and zeroing in when the evidence becomes clear.

At times, it encourages you to work together – someone else’s wrong guess may have the key to your own solution.

In short, it makes you think, be aware, and pay attention to others.

That’s never a bad thing. Especially these days.

We don’t spend a lot of time trying to understand any more. Maybe that too is a specialty interest. It’s always easier to mobilize the troops and concentrate the folks who think just like you, to reinforce old habits and strengthen existing beliefs, than it is to try to see where someone else is coming from. It’s harder to feel where another person hurts – or harder still, to see where you’ve hurt someone else yourself – and reach out to help them out.

Harder. But essential. For all of us.

How do we get there? That’s a riddle indeed. But one well worth the solving.

And like the turtle riddles, the first step is to come out of your shell and try.

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Rules of the Game

Look out, world. Your next dangerous mastermind has arrived.

My 8-year-old niece Ivy has discovered chess.

In case James Bond’s descendants need the data later, some family photos have captured this historic global turning point. In one, Ivy and my dad have squared off across the board in the midst of a carefully thought-out match. In another, my grinning niece is throwing herself into a solo game, complete with self-generated commentary that my mom called “a mix between a roller derby match and the Hunger Games.” (“Let’s get out there and take chances, but play smart!”)

I had to smile. And not just at the thought of the next Bobby Fischer also being the next Howard Cosell.

After all, it hasn’t been that long since I was in the same chair.

Dad taught me to play chess. He taught all of us to play, really, but I was his most frequent opponent, carefully internalizing the values of rooks and queens, the surprises that knights could pull, and why you never, ever touched a piece until you were ready to make a play.

It was absorbing. Mind you, I was grown before I finally won a game against him – Dad believed in treating us with respect by not holding back on the chessboard – but it didn’t matter. It was the game that mattered, the time together, the fun.

And just maybe, the tools I was picking up without realizing it.

From an early age, I had petit mal epilepsy. After a couple of years, it was readily controlled with medication, but there were still some related neurological issues that needed to be addressed, ranging from physical coordination and balance to simple concentration. Among other things, this meant spending some time in the “resource room” at school each week, playing games.

That always sounded cool to my friends – and to me, come to think of it – but it was only later that I thought about what the teacher and I were doing. Sometimes it was card games like Concentration, building up memory. A few times, it was a noisy parachute game called Bombs Away, helping me with my timing and hand-eye coordination. And a lot of times, maybe most times, it was chess.

Chess requires planning. Memory. The ability to weigh choices. And most of all, situational awareness – the ability to be in the moment, thoroughly aware of what’s coming at you and what you have available to meet it.

Invaluable skills. Then and now.

I’ve thought a lot about those unspoken lessons. But it’s only recently that I started thinking about the other lessons that were being taught – by that teacher, by family, by the other professionals that worked with me. Not by a game or exercise, but by example.

Things like patience. Persistence. Taking the time with someone who needs it, no matter how small, no matter how much time they may need. Learning to value each person you encounter, to see not just what they are but what they could be someday … and to help encourage that, if you can.

Invaluable skills. Then and now.

For all of us.

It starts with pieces on a board. Then grows to people in a life. None of it comes easy. (Thanks, Dad.) But if we learn the real rules of the game, all of us can win. Not by storming our way to checkmate, but by being willing to sit down with the other players in the first place.

So good luck, Ivy. Take chances. Play smart.

And have fun storming the castles.

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Joy in the Net

At five minutes, the World Cup final stopped being an ordinary game.

At a little over fifteen, it became a legend.

I don’t use the word lightly. But what else can you say when a U.S. player kicks the ball from midfield – from 50 yards out, the sort of kick that nobody’s tried since junior high school – and it lands in the net? When it’s not just a fluke goal, but the capstone to a barrage, the fourth goal to strike home in less time than it takes to order a pizza?

That’s when you know you’re in unmarked territory. And oh, man, did it feel good.

Not just because the game was a rout. After all, I’m a Denver Broncos fan. I know all about routs in championship games, usually from the wrong side. There’s a point where every additional score becomes a physical blow, where it starts to feel like the age-old nightmare of going to school in your underwear – exposed before the world with nowhere to hide and no way to escape until that final whistle blows.

Even when you’re on the right side of that, it can start to feel cruel.

But this one didn’t have the same harsh aftertaste. Not to me, anyway.

It’s hard to say exactly why.

Maybe it was the Japanese. In blowouts, we talk all the time about having nothing left to play for but pride. On a night where no one could have blamed them for surrendering – had the rules and the refs allowed it – the women of Japan refused to just mark time. They fought. They rallied. On a wildly uneven stage, they even allowed a moment’s worry that maybe, just maybe, patience could undo the American lightning strike.

Maybe it was the sheer unlikelihood of it all. In the U.S., everyone knows soccer as a low-scoring game, too low-scoring for the tastes of many. To see the early shots go in, and in, and in like a video game or an NBA matchup (is there a difference?) added a level of wonder, almost awe.

But mostly, I think it was the joy.

You could see it in the U.S. players. You could see it in the U.S. crowds. This had become … fun. A pleasure in its own right. You know, like it was a game or something.

For 90 minutes, a simple joy had taken over the grass.

I’m not sure we appreciate how rare that is.

It’s not easy to get unalloyed joy into the spotlight anymore. Too many of us know the backstories or have learned to wait for the other shoe to drop. The steroid use that makes a record a mockery. The dark history behind a famous name. It creates a weariness, a reluctance to trust or let go. A certainty that if we do, we’ll get burned once again.

And the worst burns come from the greatest trust. The ones that seemed to personify the joy of a child in a grown-up’s body (never mind any names). Those are the ones that can make you wonder if any pleasure is as innocent as it truly seems.

So when something like this comes along, can anyone be blamed for grabbing on with both hands?

OK. A World Cup victory – even a 5-2 World Cup victory – is not going to cure cancer, end war or restore Pluto to its rightful state as a planet. But if, for just a moment, it restores some joy and happiness in this place, hasn’t it done all we could ask?

Hasn’t it done what sports are supposed to do?

So one last time, as the cheers fade into history. Thank you, ladies of the U.S. soccer team. Thank you for the thrills and the excitement and the memories that even now may be inspiring a new generation to try and try and try.

Thank you for the unapologetic fun.

For everyone watching, this was truly a net gain.

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Haiku, You Ku, We All Ku

You thought it was gone,

But you should have known better.

Haiku never dies.

 

If this feels familiar, blame Arizona.

As a lot of folks know, Arizona gets dust storms. Haboobs, if you want to use the local phrase (swiped from Arabic). People being people, Arizona also has its share of drivers who will try to drive through a haboob, even though their perception of detail is about as low as the average TV newscaster’s.

The state wanted to warn people, of course. More importantly, it wanted them to actually listen.

Enter the haiku.

 

You’re not a Jedi.

This is not Tatooine, Luke.

Pull over now, man.

 

For those who skipped English class, the haiku is a 17-syllable poem: five in the first line, seven in the second line, five in the last line. (Yes, the last part of that definition is itself a haiku.) Technically, it should be in Japanese and about nature, but most of us skip that part. After all, they’re just too much fun.

 

Mixing and matching,

Oblivious to the boss.

Syllable playtime.

 

I last wrote about haiku in 2010, when National Punctuation Day picked the form for its annual contest. Now it seems the Arizona Department of Transportation has started a contest of its own, to find the best short warning that can be tweeted to drivers across the state. The Star Wars entry is my favorite, but others are more down-to-earth, so to speak.

 

Dust storms mean danger,

Zero visibility.

Pull over and wait.

 

Whenever a story like this gets mentioned in the newsroom, by the way, the usual result is several minutes of frantic haikuing by the staff just to see if we can. (Is haikuing a verb? It is now.) Even among friends who don’t write for a living, it gets quickly addictive.

Why? Well, it’s a short attention span hobby. Once you know the rules, it doesn’t take long to join the fun. That helps.

But the real secret is in the strictness of the rules themselves. Think about it. In all the best sports, it’s the challenge that makes it interesting.

 

Who’d watch basketball

If on the court, all players

Could use a ladder?

 

Strict boundaries. And within those boundaries, total freedom. Combine that with instant gratification, and how can you lose?

Besides, once you’ve got the knack, there’s nothing that can’t be enlivened with a little haiku. Such as local government:

 

“No fracking in here!”

“No, leave our gas wells alone!”

Yes, it’s Council night.

 

Or sports controversies:

 

A Boston pitcher

Gets “not guilty” from the court,

Fans say “Can’t fool us.”

 

Or even a blazing summer:

 

Please turn off the sun,

Scorching rays make thirsty crops,

Let’s have a downpour.

 

If you feel like joining in the fun – well, I can’t stop you. I can’t pay you, either, but you knew that. Just look me up on Facebook or hit me with an email, and I’ll try your 17 syllables on for size.

Besides, it beats watching political ads. Right?

 

Most fame is fleeting,

But haiku is forever.

Come on out and play!

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The Greatest Show on Earth

Dinner was over at the Hargett house. Now it was time for the floor show.

Elizabeth and Ashleigh, my wife’s grade-school sisters, sang and danced with all their might. Lyric sheets sat before them on the living room floor, sometimes intensely studied for a second or two before the singers rejoined the song on the stereo.

“Whoo!” “All right!”

Earlier, they had been talk-show hosts with the same fervency, giving each of us the World’s Silliest Interview as a monitor-mounted camera recorded it all for posterity. (“What’s your favorite color?” “Blue.” “Wrong!!!”) Still earlier, they had been infomercial hosts, selling a torn office chair and other products for gazillions of dollars.

I smiled and laughed and cheered them on. And remembered. Oh, yes, remembered.

In a very real sense, that was my sisters and me out there all over again.

When we were kids, Leslie, Carey and I put on more impromptu variety shows than the Muppets.  Sometimes for my parents. Sometimes for our grandma. Very occasionally, it was just for each other and the eyes of a few dozen admiring stuffed animals.

Record albums were the most common prop. Not exactly titles off the Billboard 100, either. A Li’l Orphan Annie fitness album (“Feeling Good With Annie”) may have been the most used, starring one sister as Annie, myself as Daddy Warbucks and a babysitter as “Professor Fitness.”

This was deathless entertainment, mind, especially when Professor Fitness accused Daddy of being “Flabby, flabby, flabby!” As my own frame was spindly, spindly, spindly, the show quickly reached the levels of high comedy – though not nearly the bladder-opening levels of hilarity achieved by my sisters and their Strawberry Shortcake disco album.

Yes, really.

It went beyond musical extravaganzas, mind.  Often way beyond.

Sometimes it would be skits, with the scripts either checked out from a library or made up five minutes in advance. (Our combination of A Christmas Carol with the characters of Star Wars lives on in my mind for some reason.)

Sometimes it would be self-developed games like Commercials – do a 60-second spot on a random “product” – or Channel Changers, where each person had to jump in with an overlapping radio show, every time the dial was re-tuned.

And of course, there was no missing the Christmas Eve Fashion Show ™, featuring the latest in pajamas unwrapped by us just 45 seconds before.

It was wild. It was weird. And I think it was a big part of why we grew up the way we did.

No, not in need of psychiatric assistance.

There was always a chance for that moment in the footlights. In the end, it didn’t even really matter what the moment was. We were having fun. We were learning confidence and creativity. We were developing decidedly odd senses of humor.

We were being a family.

Those are the best moments of all. The ones that build the mental photo album and remind everyone, then and years down the road, just how lucky they were to have each other.

It might not be ready for Broadway.

But it’s not too shabby, shabby, shabby.