Pizza conversations

[jack]

* At pizza. An explanation of how to stuff a game of mao. You wouldn't even think this needed to explicated, but apparently rules that break causality are really unhelpful; I didn't think there was any game crossing mao with could make it more complicated, but I guess chrononauts qualifies :)

* By the River, to L. "You know, it's been 8.30 for an awfully long time. I'm thinking my shiny new phone doesn't refresh that part of its screen during a call."

* By the River, to A. "Here's everyone I met and everything I said this week bleeaargh. What do you think? What about you? Aah! It's 10.00!"

* To the door to pembroke. Ah, stout door, how I associate you with not-remembering-which-college-you-are during my first year, and not-poohsoc-at-all-because-no-one's-actually-had-a-room-inside-in-my-time-here. Why do you shut? It's really not worth bothering, is it? To post pizza!

* The really really quiet one, when we all talk in low voices just to see if we can. It is nice and peaceful, but always creeps up again as people compete for the urgency of what they want to say. Speaking objects are mooted, but then mooted.

* I should have proper air drums for "ba-dum tssch" moments.

* I should have proper air guitar for whenever I play an Ace of Spades ("dnadnaNaaaaa"). Maybe I could train my computer to play a sound file five seconds after I say "Ace of Spades", that could actually work. The drums would still be difficult though.

Comments

[keithlard.livejournal.com]

I did not understand any of that :(

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. Would you like to? Sorry, half of it might only make sense to people I know, and half of it only to people who think like me. I throw a lot of words at humour and only some of them stick... Is there anything I can actually explain or wouldn't it help?

PS. Hi! I'm Jack, pleased to meet you. Whence did you find me? :)

[keithlard.livejournal.com]

Oh well I did not know what 'mao' and 'chrononauts' are, that might help :D

You are friends with fanf, rmc28 and lusercop :>

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

LOL. Of course. But I don't know *which* cambridge things are universal enough that other people know them and which aren't.

Mao (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_(game)) is a card game known for having changing rules (just like Mornington Crescent except that there *are* rules). It is traditional but not required to play the air guitar when playing the Ace of Spades.

Chrononauts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrononauts) is a more obscure card game based on time travel. The rules are all worked out, but somewhat confusing, and based on the paradoxes of timetravel. The cards are laid out representing a timeline, and you have to engineer desired results by altering events which to some extent cascade forward. But you can achieve global thermonuclear war, or thirteen paradoxes, in which cases everything is basically over.

[megamole.livejournal.com]

I should have proper air guitar for whenever I play an Ace of Spades

(fx: passes Motörhead sample over...)

[simont]

You've seen the actual air guitar some students built as a project, I hope?

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

No, that's what they were busily reinventing starting from a different point (considering variations on led and then air keyboards) :) Curse you for not still being there :)

[uisgebeatha.livejournal.com]

I've never played chrononauts before. Is it as scary as Mao? Still, I survived Mao, so I'm sure I could manage other geeky games. :)

"You know, it's been 8.30 for an awfully long time. I'm thinking my shiny new phone doesn't refresh that part of its screen during a call."

You want to be getting yourself a Nokia! They do everything, like make the tea!

Maybe I could train my computer to play a sound file five seconds after I say "Ace of Spades", that could actually work.

I see a challenge there. *plots* My Java-fu is weak still, but if I ever get good at speech-recognition software I'll let you know...:)

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Mao and Chrononauts are both quite different from all other games, though Mao has ties to zendo, mornington crescent, penultima, uno, and war :)

Play Mao again now you're good at it! :)

I never played Chrononauts. It's mainly good for the idea, I don't know if it's worth playing more than once or not :)

You want to be getting yourself a Nokia! They do everything, like make the tea!

(a) AFAIK my moto has a kitchen everything in, the problem is that I haven't read all the manual yet so I'm not sure what it can and can't. We need not more functionality but a more intuitive and openended UI (cue javapixiebouncing :))
(b) I don't *want* hot tea spontaneously manufactured three inches from my groin whenever anyone calls me.

I see a challenge there. *plots* My Java-fu is weak still, but if I ever get good at speech-recognition software I'll let you know...:)

Well, fu is probably overkill. There are existing (free?) recognition things, aren't there? What's needed is to customise one so it's really good at spotting that one thing and doesn't go off by accident; and chain it together with something than can play sound. It needs someone to faff setting things up, not innovative code :(