Donimoes!

When I stayed with Grandma and Papa T growing up, I played dominoes (only I called it donimoes) with her almost every day. Sometimes Papa would play with me. I got pretty good at playing dominoes and started beating Papa. Being the competitive fellow he was, this was really hard to take, and after a while he quit playing with me.

I had my own dose of being the sore loser this past weekend, and now I understand why Papa quit playing dominoes with me…it simply wasn’t fun. Now, let me preface the rest of this entry with the fact that while I am competitive, I don’t usually mind losing…I may not LIKE it, but I can deal with it if I’m facing a decent competitor and am playing up to my best. Apparently, what I can’t deal with is losing to someone who is a decent competitor OVER and OVER again.

It happened like this. I learned a new game on my Hoyle card games software called Spite and Malice. It works very similarly to two player solitaire with two decks only there are only 4 “ace” spots in the middle, you do not build according to suit, kings are wild and you take turns. You have to empty your “pile” and the first player to do so wins 5 points plus points for the number of cards in the opponent’s pile. It’s fun, I beat the computer on hard every single time I play, so I thought it was time for a more worthy opponent.

Enter David. I taught him Friday after dinner and we played a few hands without taking score. I chalked his beating me to the fact that I wasn’t playing all that competitively (we weren’t taking score after all and he did need to get the basics of the game). However, after playing several hands on Sat., and winning only a couple, I was beginning to feel myself get agitated and aggravated that I wasn’t winning. I even fussed at one point that David was taking too long to decide how to lay out his cards. “It’s just a GAME after all,” I quipped. Even moving much faster, he was still beating me. I felt myself becoming obsessed with winning this stupid game, so I was playing beyond the tiredness of my back.

Sunday we are still playing and I am STILL losing. I can barely stand it! I feel so stupid, but I can’t handle losing this game. We go exercise, I come home starving, we order dinner, I eat, we play, I lose again and this time I realize that I am simply not having fun playing this game…and that’s the point of games after all, right? To have fun. So, I told David that I cannot play Spite and Malice with him anymore. I have officially entered the ranks of “sore loser.”