We celebrated a very special moment in our house last week. I honestly thought of calling CNN so they could break into whatever trite election coverage they had on at the moment. This was that big.<\/p>\n
My wife played Parcheesi with me.<\/p>\n
Bridget has developed a great love for playing board games. We have encouraged this because it’s something we can all do better and – I can’t believe I am saying this – a game of Chutes and Ladders or Mancala is better for a kid than watching TV or playing a video game.<\/p>\n
Both Maria and I grew up playing a lot of games so we enjoy this diversion. Well, we do most of the time. Like all kids, Bridget likes to win and sometimes goes a little too far in her quest for victory.<\/p>\n
Sometimes she learns a lesson. But sometimes she makes a little sad face and decides she doesn’t want to play anymore.<\/p>\n
Which brings us to the momentous decision by my wife to open up the Parcheesi box.<\/p>\n
Bridget asked to play the game and I let out a laugh. After all, I didn’t know how to properly explain “The Parcheesi Incident” to my daughter.<\/p>\n
Much to my surprise, Maria not only agreed to play with Bridget, but she even said it was OK if I played.<\/p>\n
The last time Maria and I played the game was about seven years ago. I don’t remember the exact date, but I clearly remember what happened.<\/p>\n
As is the case with a lot of games, Maria was winning. I just don’t always have the luck in board games (except Yahtzee because I kick butt in Yahtzee). I watched her get three of her four pawns close to home and resigned myself to a loss.<\/p>\n
Then, I caught a break. I hit a lucky roll and sent her final pawn back to the beginning. This shouldn’t be that big of a deal except her pawn was one space away from getting into a safety zone and effectively ending the game.<\/p>\n
Maria didn’t appreciate that.<\/p>\n
She appreciated it even less when I sent her pawn back to the start a second time. But she really got steamed when I ended up winning the game.<\/p>\n
She quickly packed up the game and stormed off. Maybe I rubbed it in a little. I honestly don\u2019t remember, but I bet I wasn\u2019t the best winner on the planet.<\/p>\n
Apparently, that wasn\u2019t enough. I was supposed to not send her pawn back to the start. Like that was going to happen.<\/p>\n
That effectively spelled the end of Parcheesi in our house. I couldn\u2019t even bring up the game for a few years, much less jokingly suggest we play a game.<\/p>\n
That all changed last week. The game came out and we played nicely (I apologized before sending Maria\u2019s pawn back to home the one time I had an opportunity). There were no fights.<\/p>\n
Naturally, I have taken it a little easy on Bridget when we play. I don\u2019t try to lose, but I don\u2019t send her pawns back home when I have the chance.<\/p>\n
I worry that grudges can be passed down genetically.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We celebrated a very special moment in our house last week. I honestly thought of calling CNN so they could break into whatever trite election coverage they had on at the moment. This was that big. My wife played Parcheesi…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-board-games","category-columns","wpcat-22-id","wpcat-3-id"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=42"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=42"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=42"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regularguycolumn.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=42"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}