Re: Taking It to the Next Level

Dude, I had the CRAZIEST weekend!

Board games. Some people love them, some people hate them. More about this and the general concept of "organized fun" later.

So, I'm like sitting there, and someone says something about a board game. So I'm like "I know, let's go to TARGET! And get a board game. And then PLAY IT! And everyone was like "yeah!" So, we hopped in the Civic, jamming the original Albini mixes of in Utero, I was like "man, they really killed this album in the mastering process, didn't they?" and everyone else was like, "Whatever man, it rocks." And it's true. It could have been mastered onto a My First Sony by holding the detachable microphone up to the speaker on an answering machine, and it would still rock pretty hard. But Kurt is still dead. RIP.

So we get to Target, and I was thinking "Cranium." I have thought this a few times in the past, but I have never acted out on this emotion. There we were, in the game aisle. We passed Blokus, and I thought of the Orrs. But I had to move on.

Then I saw Cranium. I was about ready to just go ahead and grab it, but then I saw something else. There was a slightly larger box, but bearing the Cranium name. This box was also like really heavy. It felt like it was filled with a giant Cadbury Egg or something. It was Cranium Turbo, and it was only 10 cents more than regular Cranium. How can a bigger box and turbo-izing something only cost 10 cents? I had to find out.



So, we headed home, but Hector asked me if we could stop at the Taco Bell drive-thru, and I was like, whatever, I guess. So we went, and it took FOREVER. Anyway, we get home, and when I opened the box, I was blown away by the contents. No wonder this thing was so heavy.

So we started playing. The team of test-gamers including myself, Hector Orton (I forgot to mention that he was dressed like a businessman throughout this whole thing), Jenna "Killer" Beez, and Torlando (with a first name like that, do you really need a last name?) began to "check it," as they say. I went and got 3 AA batteries for the buzzer thingy. What kind of thing takes three AA batteries? I thought that was kind of weird. I was right, it is weird. It's not only the buzzer, but it's the thing that tells you what color to go on and how many spaces to move. High tech, except it looks like a retarded Bop-It. It also SOUNDS like a retarded Bop-It: it plays this drum beat as it is counting down your time, which is kind of funny (like in the way that the Jeopardy song is kind of funny), but also kind of annoying (in basically the same way that the Jeopardy song is annoying). It's hard to resist though, because it's got a big button, and you just wanna PRESS IT.

So you are probably all wondering what makes it TURBO, right? OK, here's the deal. There are these turbo cards for each category that you need to get four of in order to win. But instead of doing one Cranium-type task, you have to do three of them all correctly. And they're pretty hard. This is probably why it took us 2-hours-PLUS to finish the game. They were fun-filled hours though. There were some pretty triumphant moments, like when Torlando successfully made a six-pack, potato chips, and a sofa out of the modeling clay. You see, the six-pack was not like a six pack of beer, no, it was a six-pack like a strong man's stomach! Yeah. It was truly Cranial. Or there's this one thing where you have to take one of your teammates and move them like a puppet to act out some kind of charade. You can imagine the wackiness.

All, in all, the game kicked ass, and I can't wait to play it again. Which brings me to my next item of business.

CRANIUM TURBO PARTY. MY HOUSE. FRIDAY NIGHT. 8PM. SNACKS PROVIDED. GET READY TO GET TURBO. I AM NOT JOKING.