Bocce Ball & Poker

So I knew that blurting out this statement: “Wow, I am like winning every game I play!” was a bad idea the moment I said it. Because everyone knows that once you say something like that, the odds of your continued success take a dramatic turn for the worse. And because anyone with a competitive husband knows, them are fighting words. I might as well have said to my darling husband that I could take him in a 50 yard dash and then eat twice as many burritos as he could.

My competitiveness with my husband dates back to our dating years in college. We took our first class together junior year. We both had good attendance. We both took copious notes. I studied. He did not. He got an A. I got a B+. The class: Drugs and Culture. I’m fine if chooses to bring this up in large groups. Because with bragging rights will come the need to explain why he choose such a lame class to begin with. And once he’s done explaining that, we can talk about my superior grades in every Math class starting from junior high on.



Earlier in the day of aforementioned statement (while on an extended family vacation on the Oregon Coast), my sister and I had beaten my husband and dad in a lively game of beach bocce ball. Unlike playing bocce ball on the grass, the sand is really fast and unpredictable - meaning that it takes a lot of skill to get your balls to land closest to the cue ball. The odds were not in our favor. After all, my dad is an above average bowler and has his own bowling shoes. And my husband probably slept with his basketball before I was in the picture. So these are men that know how to handle balls. But my sister and I were not to be denied. I don’t remember the exact score, but I remember that it was convincing enough that neither man asked for a rematch. Instead, my brother and 9 year old son asked for the next game. Another victory. So beautiful in fact that some elderly folks stopped along the beach to take a picture of my sister’s amazing landing of three balls. We were that good.

Coming into bocce ball, I was already on a high from winning Texas Hold Em the previous night. I won the last chips from my sister and father at 2am. My mom, sister-in-law, and husband had already lost it all earlier in the evening. Not bad for a rookie, eh? Even my brother was impressed with my ability to bluff. After all, it wasn’t a skill I often used in his defense during his high school partying years. Brett was fast asleep when victory was declared, but of course I woke him up to share the news. Because that is what good wives do. They wake sleeping husbands up to share good news, to just talk, to check for predators, and to get them to agree to things like major house remodels.

So the precise moment I uttered this statement was during a spirited game of Catch Phrase. (yes, my extended family enjoys a long list of leisure sports.) The Women had just handily won the first game against the Men. Confident from the poker victory and back to back bocce ball wins, I was feeling invincible. (editor's note: upon first reading of this post, my husband pointed out that I had actually written invisible -- opps.) At the time, it felt so right to point out my long string of successes. Particularly to my husband. This ended up being poor timing. You could say that this emboldened the enemy.

The Men ended up winning the next three games of Catch Phrase. I tried to point out that the Women were actually at a disadvantage because there were four of us versus three of them. In a game where the object is to pass a disk to the other team before the buzzer goes off, we had a 25% higher chance of the disk landing on our lap. I thought this was a solid point. Of course the Men argued back that this disadvantage was neutralized by the fact that we had more people to guess for our team. But then I ask, what would my college Statistics book say? I think it would say that I was right.

In an effort to reclaim my title, I then suggested that we then play a game of Scattegories. A game where each man and woman is on their own. The object: write down a unique item that fits into twelve predetermined categories all based on the same letter in three minutes. I felt like this would be an opportunity to recoup my loss, but then soon recalled why I stopped playing Scrabble with my husband years ago. He kicks my butt at anything involving vocabulary, spelling, or trivia. Oh well, I can still eat more chocolate chip cookies in one sitting than he can.

The game decider between my husband and sister: the category was “tool” and the letter was “g.” My sister’s answer: “gadget.” Excellent! Except that the Men didn’t agree. They said they didn’t have anything called a “gadget” in their manly tool boxes. (If the true be told, I don’t know if Brett could tell you the names of most of the things in his tool box.) Yeah, well my kitchen drawer is FULL of gadget tools. What else would you call something that allows you to squeeze all the juice out a lemon without getting any of the seeds? An AMAZING gadget!

So the weekend ended with my title in question, but I have since regained my position with my husband. I can man handle him in Nerts (the fast paced double solitaire game) and did so this week. Unfortunately though, Quinn is the all time Ballbach Nerts Champion. Both Brett and I can’t beat the kid. Ever.

Sounds like it’s time to get a Ping Pong table ….