Best. Game. Ever.

Saturday night was Game Night at my brother-in-law's and sister-in-law's house. Some folks rotated between games but I spent the entire night playing Telestrations or, as I like to call it, The Most Hilarious Game of All Time. I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe. I even got a headache from the laughing. So much fun.

The game comes with a handful of miniature dry erase spiral bound notebooks, dry erase markers, and word cards. Everyone gets a word, which they write on their notebook. They then have 90 seconds to draw the word on the following page, like you would in Pictionary. When time's up, you flip the notebook page over to hide your drawing, pass the notebook to the person on one side of you and receive a notebook in the same condition from the person on the other side of you. The timer starts again and you have to look at the drawing in your newly received notebook, guess what the word is and write it in the notebook. Flip page over, pass notebook. Timer starts again and you now have to draw the word in the notebook. And so on until you get your original notebook back. Sort of like a combination of Pictionary and Operator. You score points if the word at the end matches the word at the beginning (and you can also score points for most creative and most hilarious).

Let me show you why this game is so freaking hilarious. My word: Director.


My (admittedly too complicated) drawing depicting "Director":

A great guess:


A clever depiction of "romantic comedy":



Aaaaaaaaand here's where it really starts to go downhill:

Almond Joy? Ooookay. Let's see how the next person drew that:

Freaking awesome. And the final guess was...?


This is why I love this game. "Director" to "Hula Dancer" in six short steps. :D

This was another favorite from the night. I laughed so hard, I cried:

Seriously. Best game evar.

Welcome to Jersey Shore

So we're at dinner last night on the patio at this decent restaurant in a decent town. Now, the word "decent" can be interpreted a thousand different ways, but for the purposes of this blog post I'm using it to mean "typically drama free and populated by people who are reasonably educated and sober." Anyway: Us. Patio. Dinner.

There are two guys at the table behind us who, not long after we order, are joined by a girl. A few minutes later, another girl joins them. This second girl is wearing a black one piece bathing suit with so many parts of it cut away, it might as well be a two piece, and a teensy tiny aqua colored beach wrap skirt type thing. Please understand, I'm being generous when I apply the word 'skirt' to this piece of material. Oh, and how could I forget? She has fantastically huge matching aqua-colored feather dangle earrings. (I love that everything about this chick requires endless strings of adjectives.)

Eyebrows are raised. But you know what? We're out on the patio, it was a gorgeous day, they'd probably just come from the beach...whatever. The fact that she was in a restaurant in swimwear wasn't really a big deal on its own.

Several minutes later, we start hearing talk of, "Where is Crystal?" Almost immediately, 'Crystal' emerges from the restaurant onto the patio, bursts into tears, and shouts to the table behind us that she just got into a fight in the bathroom "because of you guys" and she just wants to go home.

Let the drama begin.

There is more crying on Crystal's part, lots of cajoling on the table's part to get her to come sit down and calm down. Crystal refuses and is getting louder and more incoherent by the minute. It's fantastic. We are suddenly on Cops or some outdoor patio version of Jerry Springer. Crystal is clearly drunk out of her mind. She is now screaming at her table of friends (who continue to calmly encourage her to come sit down) and kicking/shoving the portable fencing enclosing the patio. Crystal storms off down the street.

Many, many eyebrows are raised.

The non-bathing suit wearing chick whispers an apology to the rest of the patio. The table debates who's going to go get her drunk ass. No one leaves. It's remarkable. It's as if they believe that she'll simply keep walking forever and eventually become Not Their Problem. Like there is some barrier between Crystal and the patio now, like we are all protected.

Ben and I just wait for Act II.

Ten minutes pass. During this time, the table discusses how crazy Crystal is, how drunk she gets, how many times she's tried to get into fights with bathing suit girl, and so on. It is a marvel to listen to.

Crystal returns.

Now she's on a mission. She is going to "KICK THAT GIRL'S ASS." She breaches the patio and rushes the restaurant door. One of the guys at the table, "Joe," finally gets up and chases after her. The next time I see them, Joe is carrying Crystal fireman-style over his shoulder while her drunk ass brain tries to catch up to what the hell has just happened to her.

Over the next thirty minutes--THIRTY MINUTES--bathing suit girl shouts into her cell phone at Joe while he tries to get Crystal into a cab. Apparently it never occurs to her to simply stand up and walk around to the front of the building. "NO, SHE CAN'T GO TO MY MOTHER'S HOUSE! IT'S JIMMY'S BIRTHDAY TODAY. THE DOG. SHE'S GIVING HIM A PARTY. MY MOTHER WILL FUH-REAK IF SHE SHOWS UP THERE. NO! SEND HER TO WINDSOR. WIIIN. SOOOOR. DID YOU JUST FUCKING HEAR ME? SHE CAN'T GO TO MY MOTHER'S HOUSE! JUST SEND HER TO FUCKING WINDSOR. JUST PUT HER ON....CRYSTAL? BABY? YOU GOTTA TRY TO BE A LITTLE SOBER RIGHT NOW, OKAY?" And so on and so forth.

Finally, Ben leans across the table and whispers to me, "I've never see Jersey Shore, but I'm pretty sure this is what it's like."

For Harry Potter Fans

This is hilarious (thanks to my brother-in-law for the link).

Dreams of change (and Mark Henry)

Last night I dreamed that Mark Henry and I were pregnant. And when I say that "we" were pregnant, I don't mean as a couple. I mean we were *each* carrying babies inside us.

I'll wait for a second, while you have the same "WTF??" moment I did.

Aaaaand we're back. To top it all off, I was having twins. I'm sure that part came from the lovely Sandy Williams, who actually is pregnant with twins.

If memory serves, dreaming that you're pregnant is supposed to be symbolic of upcoming change or transformation in your life. In my dream, Mark and I were both very excited and happy about our pregnancies, despite the fact that I don't want kids in real life*, so I'm going to assume the dream was a portent of positive change in our lives. Twins for me...an agent and editor, perhaps? (pleasepleaseplease) Or maybe something else. Who knows. I'll try not to get my hopes up. Maybe it was just the Chinese food I had last night. ;)

*Direct quote from me to my doctor this week: "I live in terror of finding out I'm pregnant."

Rejection

Holy shit, this is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time. Anyone who has ever received a rejection letter will want to bookmark this. Thanks to Tricia Sullivan and Stephanie Burgis for sharing. :)

She-Ra!

Just two quick things tonight.

First, this from Dictionary.com:

Word of the Day for Saturday, January 29, 2011

cacoethes \kak-oh-EE-theez\, noun:

An irresistible urge; mania.

Cacoethes stems from the Greek kakoethes, a combination of the roots kakos, "bad," and ethes, "character." The word occurs famously in Juvenal's Latin phrase insanabile scribendi cacoethes, "incurable passion for writing."

I *love* that the famous usage is for an "incurable passion for writing!" Now if only it was easier to say... (and spell)

Second, this hilarious (and pathetic and true) comic from Dueling Analogs (via my husband Ben).

Ben Gems

During dinner tonight:

Ben: *dramatically straightening his back* My posture has been terrible lately.
Me: O.o
Ben: What? It has.
Me: Don't crane your neck out. *imitates* You look like an ostrich.
Ben: I am an ostrich! My neck is fucked up! I have scoliosis!
Me: *snorts, goes back to eating*
Ben: *pauses* I'm also knock-kneed.
Me: *chokes on potato*
Ben: What? I am. It makes it harder to run.
Me: *drops fork*
Ben: I don't know why you're laughing.
Me: *abandons all pretense of getting laughter under control*
Ben: I can't believe you haven't noticed. We've been married for almost eleven years.
Me: *crying with laughter* You are not knock-kneed.
Ben: *leaps out of chair* See?! *stabs finger at knee cap* That's what knock-kneed is! When the knee cap turns in to the center! Look! *bends leg at knee* They angle out to the side. I AM KNOCK-KNEED.
Me: *pulls up Wikipedia entry for knock-kneed*
Ben: ... Oh. Well I guess not, like, officially...

Several minutes later, What A Fool Believes by The Doobie Brothers comes up in my playlist*, which I have blasting in the kitchen.
Me: *cranks up the volume, boogies down*
Ben: Is this Al Green?







*I know, a rare non-Breaking Benjamin, non-Last Samurai score moment. Don't worry though, a BB song came on right after The Doobie Brothers. ;)

Some cool stuff

A few links I thought you might be interested in...

1. Stephanie Burgis has ARCs of A MOST IMPROPER MAGICK! Very exciting. I can't wait to read this book. Here's the description from her website where, incidentally, you can read the first chapter:
"I was twelve years of age when I chopped off my hair, dressed as a boy, and set off to save my family from impending ruin. I made it almost to the end of my front garden..."
Magic may be the greatest scandal in Regency England. But that's not going to stop Kat Stephenson when there are highwaymen to foil, sinister aristocrats to defeat...and true loves to capture for her two older sisters.

Join the Unladylike Adventures of Kat Stephenson. Book One, A Most Improper Magick, published April 20, 2010.

Check out the full details for the ARC giveaway here.

2. Have you seen Burger King's one dollar cards? Freaking hilarious. They're a selection of holiday cards, each of which comes with an actual dollar bill so the recipient can buy something off their dollar menu. The cards contain such heartwarming sentiments as: "Happy holidays, valued blog follower" and "In a season rich with friendship, you're the loose change." Reminiscent of Despair, Inc., another of my favorite places to get off-kilter holiday cards.

3. In something a little more sincere, Patrick Rothfuss is repeating his incredibly successful Heifer International fundraising campaign. This year he aims to raise $50,000 and, since he'll be matching 50% of donations, that's nothing to shake a stick at. Heifer has long been one of my favorite charities since they provide underprivileged families with sustainable economic solutions -- more like teaching someone to fish instead of buying them a basket of fish and chips. Check them out by clicking through to Patrick's campaign.

This is the best thing I've ever seen

When a certain someone came on screen at his snowy piano, I just about pissed myself.

In other news, we went away for the weekend to Vermont. I *love* Vermont. (Okay, yeah, I was a leeeeetle tempted to use their clever 'ILOVERMONT' slogan but no, I didn't.) It was a nice and relaxing environment for me to experience Book Hate Fest '08, otherwise known as "Renee trying to plot out the remainder of her bleeping book in detail". Good times, good times.

I also finished Mark Henry's HAPPY HOUR OF THE DAMNED and Rachel Vincent's ROGUE. Brief reviews forthcoming!