Apparently the MONOPOLY – Firefighters Edition has started shipping because I got mine yesterday. Of course, I had an early order in, but now we know that they’re boxed and being sent out. I unsealed the box and looked through the game cards, etc., and got a kick out of it. If you’re familiar with the original game (and who isn’t?) you won’t have any learning curve with this one. The rules are the same and the game board is identical except that the names of the properties and streets have been changed to reflect the theme.
Instead of building houses and hotels, you build fire stations and after 4 of those you set up a Headquarters. And what were the four railroads on the original are now four company units, an engine, a truck, a squad and an ambulance. But the goal is the same cutthroat result as before, drive your competitors into bankruptcy.
For some reason, that reminds me of an old firehouse game that we used to play called “Red-ass.” You couldn’t buy it anywhere, it had to be homemade. But it was one of those traditional things that spread through firehouses all around the country by word-of-mouth and had been around since Noah went sailing. It was kind of a Parchesi-type game played with marbles. The game board was a piece of plywood that somebody had made by drilling dimples into the board that would nestle the marbles that you moved around just like the Parchesi pieces.
I can’t remember the rules, or what made it different from the Parchesi, but I do remember that it was very rarely that you ever finished the game because there was always a moment when somebody reached a setback that so infuriated him that they’d pitch the board, marbles and all, across the room and then storm out. They’d got the “red ass.” Did your day room have a Red-ass board in it?
Well, you might want to get a Firefighters Monopoly board for the day room, anyway. It looks like it’ll be fun to play. Speaking of playing, the NHL has been playing for two weeks now and most teams have played about 8 games so far. It’s time to start running the Top-10 goals, hits, plays, etc., now that they’ve got some action under their belt. Today we’ll start with the Top-10 Goals from last week.
After you watch those, then we’d better get the equipment checked out. I’m going to see how the Sunday breakfast is coming along and get some more coffee started.
