Monday, March 27, 2006
#4 - The Romance of Sound and Senses
April Fools! It's not April Fools day yet!
However, in honor of impendingness of it all, I thought I'd send you a story that appeared on the FunLog March 20th. It's about a fool I loved. A very spiritual fool. An invitation to a unique kind of poetic sense and nonsense, a gift from a gifted player.
The Romance of Sound and Senses
Ken Feit was a fool. A true, juggling, storytelling, magic-making, deeply spiritual fool. He touched our lives briefly and profoundly, teaching me, for example, how to make my very own Hand Frog.
He died as we all eventually do, tragically, and too young. Those he touched are forever connected through his inspired madness. One, performer, story-teller and fellow Feit-follower Sam Yada Cannarozi, sent me a copy of an old work of Ken's, called "The Romance of Sound and Senses." As I read it, everywhere in it I could feel Ken's loving wonder, still present in my life.
Here's a taste:
klinkerufff
alora fasoma
salugot fasinkel
dugacha chakut, dugacha chakut.......pooff!
"This is what this poem says to me. The first line tells me of a sculptor who's beginning to work on a block of marble. He's digging into it with his chisel and hammer, and pulling out pieces of marble...dugacha chakut, dugacha chakut, dugacha chakut...dug, dig, gotcha, got you marble, I got you, dug, dig, dugacha......cha, penetrating, kut, cutting and resisting with a blunted point....ttt....dugacha chakut. In the second line he blows the dust off his chisel....klinkeruff, the klinky metal....ufff of a blow and the dust flies off all over the floor with the chips. And then he stops and looks at his statue and imagines it complete, a masterpiece, so smooth and fine and brilliant....flora fasooma. But he opens his eyes again and sees it for what it is, very rude, incomplete....salugot fasinkel. The fasooma and the fasinkel is the difference between a dream and the real thing. The sculptor is a realist with a twinkle in his eye and he goes back to work....dugacha chakut, dugacha chakut....pooff!"
I made an unauthorized PDF of the file, for you to read and give to every one. As soon as I get my new printer, I'm going to make a copy to read to my grandchildren. If you know of anyone who actually has the copyright for this work, please let us know about each other.
Here is the file.
For more about Ken, see: Joseph Martin's Foolish Wisdom: Stories, Activities, and Reflections from Ken Feit, I.F. (Itinerant Fool).
My "Life of the Party" column in the current issue of a games magazine called "Knuckebones" described some of the games you might consider inviting to a Word Games Party. For some reason, the magazine doesn't publish its often quite wonderful articles online. I, on the other hand, have their permission to do so with mine.
Word Games Party (Life of the Party)
A Word Games Party is one of those events where different games are going on at the same time pretty much all over the place. Different word games, of course.
If you think that the most important word in the term “Word Games Party” is “Party,” a Word Games Party is bunch of those funny kind of games where everyone gets all excited and starts calling out words at the same time, getting silly and laughing as much at themselves as each other, I’ve got a few ideas for you:
A-Z
There's nothing funny about A to Z, and yet, this game made us laugh, almost non-stop, for an entire hour. Each player or team gets an alphabet board. Dice are rolled. A category is selected from a card. And then that player or team has fifteen or thirty seconds (depending on the dice) to name items that fit the category. As soon as an item is named, its first letter gets covered on the alphabet board. Name as many items as possible within the time limit, each starting with a different letter, and then name more, in a different category, when it gets to be your turn again. The object is to be the first player or team to complete the alphabet. Transparent discs are used to mark which letters have been used.
There were eight of us, so we played it in teams. It turned out to be so much fun to play with a teammate that I'd recommend, even if there are exactly four players, that you play it in two teams. Some of the categories are excruciatingly difficult. Like, names of foreign newspapers, or famous military leaders. Others are delightfully easy, especially for us average American folk - like snack foods or fast food restaurants. So, you might think that success depends on the luck of the category drawn. And you'd continue thinking it until someone throws the dice and the hand symbol appears. Then, when naming items, instead of trying to find things that begin with one of the ever-dwindling assortment of available letters (like Q and Z), you select someone else's board, and remove their discs. Since the letters already covered tend to be those that are easiest to use, things have a way of evening out with depressing rapidity.
The electronic timer ticks with ever-increasing franticity, until a voice says “time’s up.” Giving yourself over to the roll of the dice, you select one of two time limits - either the full 30 seconds or the painfully brief fifteen. You find yourself playing a remarkably absorbing, unique, challenging, easy to understand, and genuinely fun word game.
Smart Mouth
The thing is as much a toy as it is a game. The design of the toy - I know, it's really a "game mechanism," but it's just so darn much fun to play with - makes a very simple word game concept into a genuinely fun, exciting challenge.
OK. The game first. It's a word game. You're given two letters. Your objective: to be the first to call out a word that begins with one and ends with the other. For example, S and T. You could call out "SIT," but you'd be wrong, because words have to be at least 5 letters. How about, um, let's see, "SMART"? Why yes, that's exactly right.
Easy to understand. Challenging to play. And there are variations, and more variations, so you can play it with the kids or with your friends or your parents, and everybody'll have fun.
Now to the toy part. There's a box on a base. The box has two sections - each rounded at the top, each holding 36 letter tiles, which are also rounded at the top, so they can only fit in their sections one way, which turns out to be exactly the way they need to be if they are to be displayed in the right direction. There are two different colored tiles (so that the letter combinations will all work), each color goes in its own section. Fill the box. Put its cover on. And slide it forwards. When you slide it back, you reveal the first two letters. Simultaneously. To all players. The first player to call out the correct word gets those tiles. Which is how score is kept.
Elegant. Easy to understand. A device that works so well you can actually throw out the nice, sturdy box the game came in. My only regret - I had so much fun playing with the toy that I had to be the judge for the whole game. Oh, well.
Linkity
Linkity is a fast-action, get-tense-and-yell-alot word / card game.
The deck consists of 81 cards. Each card has a single letter on it, along with a cartoon of a letter-shaped bugs. Why bugs? According to the manufacturer, there is "no particular reason - we just liked the bugs." Players are dealt hands of 7 cards. After the first card is played, players compete to put the next card down - while saying a word that starts with the letter on the card, and is related to whatever word the previous player used. Let's say Tamara starts with the letter "A" and say "Apple." Let's say Rick throws down his "S" card and says "Slice." And then Celia, throwing down her "G" card says, naturally, "Golf." See, the word "Golf," though having nothing to do with the original word "Apple," can be demonstrably linked to the word "Slice." Hence the name of the game: Linkity.
Each player (3-8) begins a round with seven cards. Players don't take turns, they simply go as soon as they can think of a contextually appropriate word that starts with a letter that appears on one of their cards (though you can only put one card down per turn) and has something to do with the word just said. And yes, of course, players can challenge each other (greatly adding to the intrigue and potential silliness of play). The first player to use all her cards wins the round. The rest are penalized one point for each card remaining in their hands. A full game requires three rounds and takes maybe a half-hour.
Since there are no turns, you really have to think fast, and often creatively in order to win. It's this creativity-under-pressure that adds both to the hilarity and intensity of the game, and adds to the temptation to try words that aren't quite exactly, well, linked. Which adds correspondingly to the party-like spirit of the whole game.
When playing for the first time, disregard the first round. This gives everyone a chance to get a good understanding of the slightly subtle concept that a word needs only to relate to the immediately preceding word. The game works best when players are of roughly equal ability. So, if there are kids around, let them play their own game. They deserve it.
On the other hand, if people really like to get down and serious about their games, you need to give them the opportunity to more Game than Party. Here are a couple more challenging games that you might consider adding to the mix.
Wild Words
On first glance, it could be easily mistaken for that highly popular word/board game, SCRA*LE. And, in truth, the similarities are close enough to make any SCRA*LE player to feel right at home. Of course, it's the differences that make it interesting - differences that are different enough to make it a completely new, and disturbingly compelling game.
Here is one play, illustrating the various possibilities inherent in a single turn of WildWords. You will note the SCRA*LE-like board. On closer inspection, you will note that despite the apparent SCRA*LE-likeness, there are differences - like the squares that say "Lose 20 on Play." Omigosh, you mean there are squares you don't want to cover? And the surprisingly many squares that say "Turn to Wild."
Which brings me to what may be the most clearly unSCRA*LE-like concept of "Wild" you'll ever encounter. A wild tile, indicated either by the * or by it's turned-overness, can be any string of consecutive letters. Not just any one letter. But any one or many letters. This change is radical. It's what makes WildWords into a unique word/board game. Uniquely profound. Uniquely challenging. Uniquely fun.
Then there's the whole thing about challenging another player - you know, when you think someone's spelling a word that isn't in the dictionary. That has also been most discerningly enwilded. First of all, with the possibility of a single wild tile standing for maybe seven letters, it's a lot harder to know whether or not there's a challengable word. Which makes it all the more inviting to bluff. Which makes it all the more necessary to challenge. But in WildWords, when one player challenges another, all the other players (SCRA*BLElikely, WildWords can be played by 2-4 players), must also agree or disagree. In either event, if they are wrong, they each lose 20 points. Harsh. In a beautiful kind of way.
Also, I gotta tell you, the tile holders are probably the best tile holders ever to hold a game tile. Smooth. Cool. Hefty. With wood-protectors, even. And the easy-to-read tiles are all packaged in a plastic bag inside a drawstring bag. With six extra tiles, just in case.
Palabra
Palabra is a word game that is easily as deep as Scra*le and yet requires only a deck of cards. 120 cards, actually. Cards with letters on them. And colors. And some even with special symbols. And some more special than that.
It's not just a word game. It's also rummy-like. So, if you really can't find a word, but if it just so happens that you can make a "straight" with, say, the letters J, K, and L, well, go for it. Since a J is worth 9 points and a K 6 and an L 2, you got 17 points right there. And if they are all the same color, you'd double your score. And if some of the cards have stars on them, you might double or triple the score again!
The competitive part, and I mean, really competitive, comes with the "shaving" rule. On your turn, if you have cards that match those the person before you just played, you can use them to take points off his score and add them to yours. Kind of a delicious moment in the annals of legally mean things to do in the name of fun.
I know. It sounds just too complex to be fun. So many other things to think about that it could take away the joys of word-making. And yet, it turns out at least as interesting for the word game lover as Scrabble, with all the fun of a really good card game.
The deck has been recently refreshed - the cards are a bit thicker and the color key on the side of the cards has a different shape for each color - a great help for people who have difficulty telling colors apart. If you have the old set, it's still worth getting a newer version, because with 2 decks (yes, 240 cards!) you can play with up to 12 people.
Fun? You bet! Something people might want to spend the rest of the evening exploring? You bet again! Hmmm. Betting. As one might do in poker. Hmmmmm. And hmmmm again. Given the 28 variations currently described on the remarkably thorough and generous Palabra website (which includes resources like the inestimably valuable 2- and 3-letter word list, vowelless words, and Q-words not followed by a U), given, in particular, variations 13 (called "All Poker") and 24 ("Texas Hold 'em), poker, most definitely. And there's, for further example, a more Scrabble-like crosswords (variation 12), of course. And, after the party is over already, and this one guy keeps hanging around, you can always note, should someone enjoy playing with someone’s self, so to speak, that there is a significantly amusing solitaire (variation 21), even.
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