Fair Deal

MOH made me cry yesterday.
Hubby too.
He accused us of cheating, having secret signals and coded facial expressions.
And all over a game of cards!
We’d spoken to MOH earlier in the week and been invited down for the weekend, but as  the WIFI on the marina was down, we were unable to check the weather for the next few days. We don’t like to leave the boat in cold weather with no heating, especially if temperatures fall below zero, so we said we’d let him know.

Our day had started early, though not intentionally (I couldn’t get back to sleep actually), so we thought rather than go down and stay, we’d just visit for the day.
I took down some cheese and ham that had to be used up, and bought a couple of cauliflowers for dinner (this is becoming one of our favoured meals when we visit).
He was really pleased we were going down, and said he’d sort out dessert.

When we arrived, I prepared dinner more or less straight away so that all I had to do was turn on the oven and let it get on with it. Dessert was a sticky toffee and ginger pudding. (The calorie counter was fried 🙂 or should I say fired? 😉 )

We started with dominoes, and I won the first game. I was happy with that as it meant I didn’t have to worry about being whitewashed.
Hubby won the second, and the third was a tie between him and MOH.
As he doesn’t like drawing for the winning point, they agreed on half a point each.
Hubby won the next game, so on the fifth, MOH changed to aggressive tactics.
If he can, he will play ‘stitch up’, putting tiles down knowing we can’t follow, especially if the number of dots is the same at each end of the game line.
However, he came unstuck by putting the 9-2 tile against a free 2, instead of the other end against the free 9 which would have left the 2s free. With 9s both ends, he put down his 9-8 tile, but with neither 9s or 8s now in any of our hands, we all had horrendously high penalty scores, so it was mutually agreed that game 5 was void.
Dinner was switched on, and we continued playing the final 2 games of our set of 7, at the end of which MOH had still only scored his half point, Hubby had two and a half, and I won overall with 3.

Potty and tea break followed, and out came the crib board.
As with dominoes, we play clockwise, so I follow Hubby and MOH follows me.
The highest single card got the Box first, which fell to MOH and made him happy. It was pretty lousy pegging with only twos or threes in the hands, so we decided half way through our game to have dinner.

After the washing up was done and we’d made another cup of tea, we resumed our game.
And that was when the trouble started.

OK, I confess Hubby and I were winding him up a bit, with lip moving silence and incoherent mumbles but we were not doing anything wrong, honest!
Hubby led with a 6, which I followed with a 9 to get 15 for 2. MOH hit the roof.
We said we’d start again, Hubby leading with a 7, and me laying an 8 to get my 15 for 2.
He didn’t like that either, threw down his cards saying we were cheating, and he wanted to cancel the game!
Now the daft thing was that no matter what Hubby led with, I could score off him, as he had 2 sixes, a seven and a ten. I had a 5, 8, 9, and 10.
This started us laughing.
Which made MOH madder, which in turn made us laugh harder.
So hard in fact, that the tears were streaming down my face, and Hubby’s shortly after.
We pointed out that it was HIS deck of cards, that HE’D dealt us the hand and as always decided not to shuffle the pack!

In order to restore order, sanity, and our friendship (which goes back close to 30 years), Hubby and I suggested scrapping that hand altogether, then we each shuffled the cards, let MOH deal giving him an extra box, and reversed the order of play so that I followed him and Hubby followed me.
For the next three hands we played ‘blind’,  our eyes shut or looking at the wall/door/floor/dogs/anywhere but each other, our hands or the table, and deliberately played to lose. Despite all our efforts, Hubby won, I came second, and MOH a sad third.

However, wanting a chance at revenge and thus giving us the thrashing we had originally been invited down for, we had another game, keeping the reversed order, and letting MOH deal first. The best hand of the game was 16, but again, most were in single figures and we scored more off each other pegging.
On the last hand, it was Hubby’s first show, and with 17, took the Winning Peg with ease. MOH wanted to see if he would come second, so pegged his hand and ended up 7 points short. I had a pathetic 2 in my hand and was in third place before pegging my box, which took me level to MOH, so we both came second.

We put the cards away, had another cup of tea, and started discussing current affairs.
We all had different points of view, so it made an interesting debate, and we left just after 4pm.

MOH said he intends to hone his skills on his brother so that he can thwart our ‘cheating practices’ and give us the thrashing we rightly deserve next time.
Maybe he will, maybe he won’t.
He seems to forget that when there are only two of you, either game takes on a different form of play.
With dominoes, if you can ‘go either end’ when you lay down a tile, you will be able to go next time. With three of you, both ends can be blocked by the other players with something you don’t have. This nearly always happens to me by the way (and yes I ‘lost it’ once) !
In cribbage, with two players, each is dealt 6 cards to discard 2 into the box (so you can be nice to yourself) whereas with three, you are dealt five and discard one, the fourth being made up from the deck. I think with three people (or even 4, when you have 5 cards each and all discard one for the Box) it’s more difficult, and interesting to see how the cards fall.

Note:
We are, and always will be, friends and the ‘thrashing’ is a standing joke between us.
The above picture was taken when MOH purchased his secret weapon.

 

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