Three New Holiday Games

The Quick Choice - this game is played by as many participants as are present and the reward is determined ahead of time, such as, "if you get this one you get the Snickers we've been keeping in the fridge for the chocolate attack." After determining this the participants arrange themselves in a semi-circle around the television set, which is where many folks are on Saturdays and Holidays anyway...and...as the commercial comes up, the guess for $14.95 or $19.95 gets placed, and all points in between. The winner is the person who gets it on the nose or gets closest to the cost of the items that are being given away at "such a discount." Will it be $19.95? It's worth $130.00(!)...so quick get on the phone and call that 1-800 number now!

The Neighbors did what? This game is played by two to three surrounding neighbors who are getting together for the holidays and it's a basic "boys will be boys" game that is played by the participants and it has some simple rules. Each man present gets to explain the perks, vacation spot, meal or movie that he thought really made his experience as a man wholesome and fulfilling during the year. The game ensues as an examination of the merits of this and the winner is able to present a case for or against this situation with overwhelming approval. This is also called the politics game...but that's for another season six months up the road. The prize varies and should be agreed upon before play becomes earnest as the winning might not be worth it...

Sound Off! This is a wonderfully funny game played for the effect with Fox News or some other channel where analysts who are likely overpaid are speaking about what they figure they really do understand. It's a great game because the participants make it fun by...turning the sound off and filling in the dialogue themselves. Rewards should be agreed upon and are given to the person who creates the most gut aches during the process and this is usually very clear to all the participants (kind of like the Iowa Caucus...) Dialogue rules can be set in advance such as "no quoting Bruce Willis movies," or, "can't reference Wal-Mart ads without a penalty."

What you can conclude about these three holiday games is that they have variants in the regular seasons of life, that they are composed out of life, that they involve people, as all games eventually do, and that they attach strongly to the principle of Dr. Erik Berne who asserted that we play games as people in his seminal work "Games People Play."

What you cannot conclude about these three holiday games is that they are controlling your behavior, you cannot blame the rule definer for the way the rules get into your head, that isn't a game, it is a travesty; and this is a "read" based media, so as the person who decides to play, you cannot claim that the power of the visual media made you do it. What this writer hopes you will do is pick up Berne's book and give it a glance.