Ready Player One!

Longtooth Follies

John Clark succumbing to more dark humor. This month’s offering was inspired by Vaughn’s last post. Face it readers, we who blog here are getting up in age. Vaughn’s 79, I’m 78, and a certain unnamed sibling will hit 77 in July. I can’t speak for the other regulars, but I bet most of us are collecting, or within hoping distance of social security. How about the following scenario?

We begin reaching that scary point where we can no longer live independently. We’re fragile and creaky, but we still have all our marbles (maybe a lot more that the average geezer/geezerette). Maybe writing has become a chore, but the gray matter continues churning out cool stuff. How about we all move to the same assisted living facility?

Screw such mundane activities as decoupage and cookie decorating, forget troops of well-intentioned do-gooders coming in to sing or demonstrate crafts. We’re gonna come up with some doozies of our own to keep things lively. The following list is by no means complete, so I encourage you to submit your own.

1-’Let’s Swap Teeth.’ This has multiple iterations. We can fill a punch bowl with rum to kill germs, then everyone tosses their dentures in. Game One is played with the lights off. Each participant tries uppers and lowers until they think they have a match. First person to get a correct set wins a prize. The second iteration is called ‘who am I?’ Players get three tries to identify the dentures’ (properly paired beforehand) owners. Once again there’s a prize. Iteration three is ‘Who looks creepiest?’ Each player randomly inserts upper and lower dentures with everyone voting on which participant looks the creepiest. Winner gets to scare the crap out of a random staffer.

2-This time, we’re playing ‘Let’s get ahead.’ We break into the arts and crafts room after everyone goes to bed. Participants vie to create the goriest paper mache head. The one chosen as the winner is snuck into the staff refrigerator to elicit suitable screams.

3-’Helmet Hair Hockey’ requires the theft of two suitable wigs that are then sprayed with aerosol starch until they resemble the mouth of a large cave. Two players, one on offense, the other on defense maneuver a pilfered pill box up and down a hallway, using canes to propel the ‘puck’ First player to score six goals wins. Bruised shins are a sign of participation. Bonus for anyone willing to wear one of the ‘goals’ to breakfast the following morning.

4-’I want my Mummy’ requires a team effort. After picking the lock on the first aid closet and collecting all the Ace bandages, one player volunteers to be completely wrapped in the pilferage. This is best played on visiting day with one inmate/resident agreeing to skip family time so the wrapped individual can try convincing the visitors they’re the missing relative.

Where’s My Mummy?

5-’What the Hell is it?’ is another team exercise. Players must be able to steal portions of food blended for special diets and bribe food service staff to provide a list of foods included. Contestants are blindfolded while sampling the stolen purees. Winner is the one guessing the highest number of foods in the blend.

6-’Let’s play pool’ is perhaps the most challenging one of our planned games, especially since we heard what happened when residents at The Elwood Delp Home For The Depraved survived a near disaster, but more about that in a bit. Playing requires picking the lock on the therapy pool door. Players can choose bathing suits or go commando for this event. With the lights out, everyone enters the pool after choosing a leader. Said leader secretly designates a target. When the leader shouts ‘Marco,’ the target then yells ‘Rubio.’ They are free to take three steps in any direction. When caught, the target is submerged while the captor counts to half their age. If the target feels like passing out, they tap their captor who is supposed to release them immediately.

It is important to follow protocol with this game. At the Delp Home, they were in the midst of a rousing tournament when Thirma Sneed snuck into the pool from the memory care unit, and got so lost in her own fragmented thoughts that she damn near drowned Fingus Troon, former mayor of Rockland.

Those are my proposed high jinks. What might you add?