Favourite Friday: Offline Games

Hi everybody, welcome back :D

I’ve been sick with a nasty cold last week and was sleepy most of the weekend, so I didn’t feel like posting. Today some ordinary stuff:

Favourite Games to play (without any electricity needed): Bananagrams. A friend of mine brought me one back from the US some years ago after I enjoyed playing it with their friends. Just awesome, and it’s a fun way to learn vocabulary as well. Nobody is Perfect – I won this board game as a kid at a fair as a prize, and loved to play it with my family ( but I don’t really like the newest edition, which I recently played at the in-laws’ home). It’s all about guessing the meaning of foreign words and stuff. Settlers of Catan ist pretty cool as well if you don’t play it too often.  Some years ago I tried to learn chess and I’m not very good at it yet, but still I would like to play it more often. Then there is a German card game called “Elfer raus!” (“elevens out!”), which, according to Wikipedia, is similar to a game called “Sevens”, but is played with a special deck of eighty cards with numbers one to twenty. We played it at home a lot on rainy Sundays. Generally I enjoy games where you have to know a lot of random facts and weird words to win, because they are a bit of challenge, a bit of fun, and a bit of learning new things. Games have to be either competitive (but not too hectic) or really really nice, because otherwise I’d get bored quickly.

Favourite Friday: Summer and the Internet

Favourite things about Summer: Not feeling cold all the time. Not needing to wear or carry around an uncomfortably bulky anorak. Sunshine – it lifts my mood so much! Leaving the windows of our apartment open day and night, which makes me feel more connected to the world around and nature in general. Talking walks through fields turning golden. Eating lots of berries in the in-laws’ garden. Long hours of light. Thunderstorms and heavy rain after days and days of sweltering heat. Sitting outside with friends until it is dark, having a barbecue or just talking and enjoying the warm night. Watching clouds and stars. Hoping for fireflies (sadly, I haven’t seen any in ages). Beach walks.

Favourite things about the Internet: I learn about 3 new words each day. Seriously. I read so many English blogs and websites and online books, that by the end of the day I’m able to recognise more words than before, and some of them will even be ready to use. In addition the internet makes it easier for me to buy things which are either completely unavailable here (e.g. witch hazel extract ready to use, or rooting needles) or only in insanely expensive special shops. I also enjoy reading free books, listening to music, and watching old, old tv-programmes. And I also use it instead of a TV set, because I can watch most programmes from my favourite channel (they have a lot of science, documentations, and culture/art related shows) online for a week after the original broadcasting. Not to mention keeping in contact with people around the world without worrying about how much a letter or a text message to Africa will cost me.