Game Night: Let's try to keep it G-Rated, people!

 Game night always seems to bring out the best in others. It tends to highlight each individual's intellectual aptitude, providing opportunities to demonstrate grace in winning or losing while encouraging participants to really stretch themselves beyond their typical comfort zones. The high level of conversational topics is mind-boggling. Take for instance, a late-night and only moderately-adult-beveraged-induced evening of Trivia Pursuit on Sanibel Island. "The Appian Way is the Route 66 of the Ancient Roman World," sniffed Geri haughtily while we are stared blurrily at her as we had presumed that the Appian Way was the screen-selection category of apps featured on our Ipads. Our method of deduction hit its highest point as Bev and Geri discussed the college team upon which OJ Simpson played in the Rose Bowl. Bev brainstormingly mused, "Well, his nickname was The Juice so he must have played for Florida." Geri, who gets mean when she drinks adult Kool-Aid, snapped, "He was called The Juice because his name was OJ."

Christmas Day brought on its own bout of intellectual challenges as we competed in a rousing game of Tic*Stac*Toe. This 3-dimensional version of the paper version featured complexities unfathomable to the strategic intellectuals gathered around the Mehlenbacher table. Honed for years on Farm-opoly, certain players did not, at first, take Tic*Stac*Toe as seriously as was necessary. But when Amy Mosiman trounces you in a game, you know that you've lost your touch and soon, those Xs and Os were being played with the strategic precision of chess pieces at a World Tournament.

And finally, Game Night at the Brown's house proved, once again, that teachers are adults in name only. The party got off to a vindictive start when one player, trying to get her team to guess a movie title, used her life as the model. "When I get to my house and there is no one there, I am..." she prompted. "A spinster!" Another team member hollered, dodging a hail of sharp-edged Triscuits. "No," she said, glaring at the insensitive jerk across the room but using the remark to her advantage, she valiantly went on, "but being single, when I get to where I live, the house is empty so I am..." "An old spinster!" yelled the player again who was immediately administered a breathalyzer and sent home. In the next round of the game, we were denied words so guessing "The Nutcracker" left those of us with morals blushing. Switching to what seemed to be a less dangerous game didn't help. My team was given the task of using clay to prompt a guess of the unknown term and fortunately, you could "animate" the clay to help your fellow players. We had reached the part of the evening where everything in clay-mation resembled a storyboard for the adult entertainment industry. Trying to maintain some dignity, I ignored the other guesses and offered one of my own. "Saxophone," I inquired, observing the clay being pushed forward and backward. The clay-mation master looked excited and the clay was pulsated with even more enthusiasm. "Uh...saxophone...sousaphone..." I panted as the the clay-mation master nodded encouragement and squeezed the clay held tightly in her firm fingers. Suddenly the time was up and the clay-mation master practically erupted from her chair, "It was a trombone, you idiot," she screamed, signaling the end of yet another climatic Game Night.