Thursday, September 27, 2007

Nertz Numbers

Tonight, Robert and I played Nertz (which is like a speed solitaire in which you play on common aces in the center but have your own stacks to build on and a pile of 13 cards you want to get rid of) for a combined score of 72, which is our new high score. (I can't remember our combined low score, but it is less than 0.)

Our individual high scores are 42 (me) and 39 (Robert - tonight - despite suffering from the cold that had knocked me out last weekend).

It felt sort of odd to lose with a score of 33, but I still liked scoring my age, which does tend to get harder as the years go by; I have fewer than 20 years to enjoy this as a possibility.

(UPDATE: Re-reading this, I was filled with sudden uncertainty whether that is my age; I had to ask Robert, "I am 33, aren't I?" This is not the first time I have had to do this in the past several months. Ugh.)

My absolute favorite score was 40 (my two favorite numbers multiplied together). I also am quite fond of any multiple of four and I like any power of 2. 10 is a good number. I am not so crazy about most of the prime numbers and negative numbers just suck.

We have a house rule that the stacks in the center area have to be lined up in alternating red and black suits because I have such an advantage in peripheral vision (and general pattern recognition) that without some predictable layout as a guide, Robert gets his ass handed to him the majority of the time. With the house rule, the game is competitive.

He (and hell, I) might go catatonic if he tried to play the ultra-fast, cut-throat, chaotic game that the S. family plays. We play a very genteel, civilized game in our house. Well, Robert does. I suppose I do occasionally say something like, "You blocked me, you fucking fucker. Fuck you. Hah! Take that, you jerk! Hey, that was my ace! Waaaah."

7 comments:

rvman said...

"Competitive", in this case, means I win about 1 out of 5 games. She has an advantage in:

pattern recognition
hand-eye coordination
experience
competitiveness
reflexes
peripheral vision

Anonymous said...

rvman, perhaps you can develop an advantage in trash talking.

Tam said...

I'm pretty sure Sally has an advantage in that too.

Anonymous said...

Okay, how about distractive love talking? "Your hair is especially beautiful today." "Underneath these pants and underwear, I'm wearing nothing at all." "I finished up the laundry."

rvman said...

Well, I don't know how it relates to debbie's suggestion, but I have had success by getting Sally laughing so hard she couldn't see.

Anonymous said...

That's the spirit!

NNA said...

Hi, I found your blog post through a search for "Nertz". It is cool to see others that know about the game. I hope you don't mind but I wanted to let you know about playnertz.com, the site for the National Nertz Association. There is a bunch of interesting Nertz information there and you can also find out how to play Nertz online there. I hope you will check it out. Feel free to join and also let your friends and family know. Thanks