Upon picking Ella up, Mom gave us the rundown of what she and Ella played. There were puppets, and then dinner, then dog petting and then they got the "Marching Paper" out. Apparently Ella likes to unroll a tube of Christmas wrapping paper out onto the carpet in Grandma’s living room and then she charms Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Andy into marching across the paper with her while singing some kind of marching song. On the drive home I thought all about the nonsense games kids play. Ella also plays the "Run and Scream Game" where you mostly just run, and scream, and sometimes there’s even jumping. She also recruits our dog Wednesday to lie next to her on the floor, she says "'Mon Day-day, way down!" and our dear dog obeys and Ella whispers secrets to Wednesday. This is the "Nigh-night Game" and Ella thinks it’s just rolling on the floor, knee slapping hilarious. I don't really get it, but this just tells me I'm officially no fun.
When I was a kid we used to play "Sandwich" with the neighbor kids. We would gather up all the throw pillows in the living room (in my mind they were gigantic) and you would build layers, neighbor kid, pillow, me, pillow, other neighbor kid, pillow, other neighbor kid, pillow, little brother pillow etc. and we’d keep building till the whole thing fell down in a pile of bonked heads. No point to it, other than squishing the farts out of the person on the bottom. Or sometimes my brother and I would play “Alligator” in which we would try to break each others necks, literally. My brother’s mattress had been put on the floor because too many ‘monkeys’ had been jumping on his bed. Well, this just facilitated a more dangerous game were you tipped the mattress up against the wall and then my little brother (who usually went first) would have to run all the way across the box spring before I slammed the mattress back down onto his head. I remember making all kinds of elaborate rules; like you can’t start running with your left foot first or you have to sing “Jingle Bell Rock” while you run. And you couldn’t be the alligator until you could escape. I'm sure at the time my Mom never understood the charm of "Sandwich" and she's horrified that we ever even played "Alligator" but now I know she likes to participate in "Marching Paper". Because when you become a Grandma a magic switch flips and you get it again.
What stupid games did you used to play?
8 comments:
We just did the normal everyday stuff like slide down the carpeted stairs in a slippery sleeping bag, make strange concoctions of pepper, mustard, chocolate syrup and Tobasco to see who would eat it and try our hardest to get each other in as much trouble as possible.
Most of my REALLY young childhood games/memories are actually of entrepreneurship. My best friend and I would dig up worms to sell to "the boys" (my brother and his friends) for fishing at a penny each. We soon figured out how to double our profit by cutting the worms in half. We were 3. I also use to drop my popsicle in the dirt and lick it once for a quarter.
The boy down the street and I would lay under his family's boat (see? retards) and "play" (read: imagine) house. We didn't do a damned thing under there except essentially tell a story. "Ok honey, have a good day at work. la la la la la.. Welcome home honey! Wow was work?" Everything else we did on a regular basis involved catching critters pretty much.
JJ
Oh yes, the silly games with arbitary rules! My daughter loves to make up games - "This is the I'm a Princess you're a troll game", or "This game is called hide the tissue on the leaf". All very fun I'm sure but the rules are pretty tough to pick up. My friends and I used to play a game where we 'read' each other's minds. Hee hee ... much hilarity and shouting resulted from that!! :)
my sister, cousin and i used to fold ourselves into the sleeper sofa.
we also played restaurant: our fave dish was marshmallows blown up in the microwave on top of graham crackers.
"spit torture". Sit on your sister and collect as much spit in your mouth as you can. Then let it slowly drizzle out of your mouth towards her face, try and suck it back into your mouth before it hits her face. If you hit her in the face with spit, you both lose, because then she is seriously pissed. Makes me laugh just to think about it.
The "walking fingers" game in the back seat of your parents car in the worst traffic ever on the way to Michigan. You walk your fingers like they are two legs towards your sister enough times until she is so pissed that she just has to slap your hands. When she is finally able to slap you, cajole her into doing it back to you. Then there is slapping, yelling of "OW" and laughing in the backseat while your parents are drivng. Makes for a very loonnnggg drive. I can't wait to see what my boys come up with.
I believe I played some kind of "walking fingers" game, and of course it always resulted in "Don't make me pull this car over!"
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