I haven’t written lately about my Kindle Fire tablet, but I’m still happily using it and also continuing to try new apps, as I wrote about a while back. I recently picked up a new one that not only caught my interest but also triggered my sense of nostalgia. (More later about that.) It’s a gorgeous little app for the card game Cribbage.
For those who don’t know, Cribbage has been around for hundreds of years in one form or another. It’s normally a two-person game played with a regular deck of cards, but it also requires the use of a unique way to keep score — a wooden (usually) board with holes and movable pegs. And it’s not just for geezers because there are still a lot of people around who play the game, judging by the fact that the boards themselves have become art objects.
My memories of Cribbage start with playing it with my dad. He loved the game, and I can remember sitting down to play it with him countless times through the years. But he died in 1984, and my next Cribbage memory is from a few years after that when I happened to stumble onto a version of the game for my PC. This was in the days before MS Windows (and Solitaire) so games with really good graphics were rare, but this little program was amazing. The cards were very realistic and the game play was smooth, and it was so cleverly programmed that when I played it on Christmas the King of Spades was wearing a Santa hat!
I remember thinking how intrigued my dad would have been by the computer game, and as far as that goes he’d probably have been interested in my new tablet app too — but he still would have preferred to sit down with a real deck of cards and his trusty cribbage board. I only wish we could.
Telecats – “Lucky At Cards”
Geezer Music Club 
Goodness, I haven’t played crib (as we call it here in Oz – we shorten everything) since my father died in 1987. He taught me to play when I was young. So he’d have someone to play with, I guess. It looks as if we were running in parallel there.
It’s the only card game worth playing with just two people.
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You’re right, once again we match up.
Honestly, I can’t say the virtual game of Cribbage is much fun — for one thing, I can remember when playing with dad that if one of us won before the other turned the last row on the board, we’d laugh and say ‘skunked you’. Did you have anything like that?
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No, I don’t remember anything like that. I think we were pretty evenly matched.
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Parents taught me to play Cribbage much to their dismay. I spent one entire summer while in high school playing with another classmate up the street, disregarding and avoiding most every chore I was given. Got into much trouble over it all. Also… I have always played that if you don’t make the last turn before your opponent reaches the finish you have been officially “SKUNKED”!!!!!
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Ah, another veteran of ‘skunking’ – must just be an American thing. I seem to remember that we even used it in other games once in a while, although Cribbage was the main one.
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There are no skunks (well, no four-legged ones) in Oz, maybe that’s the reason.
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Would be glad to send you a few, Peter. 🙂
PS I think I’ve got the settings tweaked now so that your comments won’t keep getting stopped and held.
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