Pancake Day

So hubby-Eric and I went down to IHOP for our Free Pancakes. Service was slow. The restaurant was clearly understaffed for the day. We had the free pancakes and some extras... enough that my stomach is still crying in overstuffed pain.

Before heading down to IHOP, hubby-Eric and I played Pirateer. It's an easy one to play, and the instructions are all on-line (click on the "Service" link). In fact, the entire game is on-line (under "Service" and "Free Demo"). With Pirateer, you play one of four groups with a three-ship fleet. You race your opponents to Skull Island to claim the treasure and return home... or chase your opponents to sink their ships. Or both. In our first training game, I managed to sink all of Eric's ships. In our second game, with both of us playing two fleets, he completely outclassed me and brought the treasure home.

After that, I had to open my new copy of Quarto, and Eric asked to play a round. So I whipped his butt. I'm sure the next game we play he'll beat me. He wasn't familiar with the game, so I played with my often advantage of knowing the rules very well while my opponent is just learning. Quarto is a game in which you attempt to get four pieces in a row with a single attribute in common. The trick with Quarto is that you don't get to pick your own piece, your opponent picks the piece you play for you... and you pick the piece your opponent plays. So you can set up a winning play as long as you don't give your opponent the winning piece. I love the game because it's strategic and it's a beautiful game made of wood.

I also pulled out my dice collection and gathered a few games together, including my Dino Dice, which Eric rolled to remember how to play. Dino Dice is a set of five dice with different dinos on the sides. You attempt to form herds of the same type of dino without getting eaten by the hungry Rexes. As his dinos got eaten, Eric said, "Nom nom nom".

So we still need to learn Blokus and Quits. And I need to gather a few other games to take, and refresh my memory of how to play them. Anyone wanna come over to my place for a game night?