The Game that Never Ends

Last night we decided to play Clue. It’s not anyone’s favorite game, but Cal wanted to play so we all agreed. I shuffled the cards, inserted three in the “secret envelope” and dealt out the rest of the cards.

Everything went along swimmingly for about fifteen minutes. Then, Cal got a phone call. From the tenor of the conversation it sounded like the conversation would be long. The boys went off to play computer games, Ariel practiced violin, and I picked up the thriller that I’m halfway through. (The good guys are stuck in the hideout of the bad guys, and one of the two people they’re rescuing just died. Plus, the good guy’s girlfriend is very angry they went without her and she’s sending them text messages.) Anyway, after an hour, Cal hung up and we were back on track with the game. However, by this time Matt and Jake had gotten giddy. There’s nothing to make a game of Clue drag like male teen giddiness. For example, sending their sister’s token to a room to the opposite end of the board just for the heck of it. Or renaming the weapons—the knife becomes the booger-picker, the revolver is the booger-picker shooter, etc. As you can imagine that goes over really well with Ariel.

About that time, the phone rang again. We all left for our various amusements. (In the book, the ticked girlfriend was coming to the rescue of the trapped good guys.) This conversation was only about twenty minutes. After that, we came back to the game. We all traipsed around the board from one room to the next. Never seeming to find the right combination of person, weapon, and room. Finally, Ariel got tired and announced she was accusing “Mr. Green in the library with rope.” Luke announced, “Nope, the library’s wrong.” Then Matt accused “Mr. Green in the hall with the rope.” I said, “No, Matt, it’s not the hall.” Then I accused “Mr. Green in the billiard room with the rope.” Jake said, “Wrong.” At this point, Matt opened the secret envelope and said, “Uh, there’s a problem.” It turns out that Mr. Green did it with the rope and the lead pipe in some non-existent place. Perhaps, the fourth dimension. Yep, I messed the cards up. So the three hour game had no resolution.

Time to get back to the thriller and find out if the girlfriend really saves the guy or gets caught herself. The bad guys are really bad, so I’m hoping that she’s packing her booger-picker shooter. (Sorry, I couldn’t help that—I’ve been spending too much time with my 13 and 15 year old boys.)