Yu-Gi-What?

                                                                                

Okay, so last Friday was my daughter and son-in-law’s wedding anniversary and I stayed with the boys while the parents went out to celebrate.

The youngest of the three, Nathan, the “boy wonder” who now sports a cast asked me to play a card game with him. “Sure, want to play poker?” I ask.

                                                                                                                                                 

“No, granny, let’s play Yu-Gi-Oh.”

                                                                                  

“I never heard of it. What is it?” I ask, but I do remember buying him cards for Christmas last year.

                                                                                                      

“I’ll show you,” he replies and then plops a tin can on the table.

Joshua who happened to walk into the kitchen for a snack begins to laugh. “Nathan, granny is not going to understand how to play this in one night. Pick another game.”

But Nathan’s poor puppy dog expression touches this grandmother’s heart strings and I reply, “I’m okay, Josh. How hard can this game be?” Ha!

Now I need to give you a little history of the game before I go any further with the story.

Yu-Gi-Oh is a Japanese collectible card game developed and published by Konami. The game is based on the fictional game of Duel Monsters created by manga artist, Kazuki Takahashi.

                                                                                       
 Two players duel each other using different cards representing Monsters, Spells, and Traps. The object is to win life points. Sound easy? Not really as you’ll soon see…

Nathan puts down four cards, 3 are face down and one card, face up. “Gran, you do the same with yours and read the bottom of the card. It tells you the level rank and point system.”

“I can’t read this writing. It’s too small,” I reply.

Nathan runs to the kitchen cabinet and pulls out a magnifying glass for me to use, but it takes me awhile to make out the writing. “Gran, you have to put your card down on either an attack position or a defense position,” Nathan urges me.

                                                                         

“Can’t we play poker? It’s hard to read these cards,” I counter.

“Please,” he begs. I do what any loving granny does and I try to play.

“I win,” I shout out after placing a dragon card on attack position against his monster.

                                                                      

“No, you didn’t,” he counters. “Read the card.”

“But I have a dragon,” I reply. At this point, Nathan calls for help.

Joshua comes in and tries to explain the Yu-Gi-Oh rules to me, but even though he is helping me with the cards, I have this vague feeling that we could probably bring peace to the Middle East, much faster and with fewer rules. Trying to be a good sport, I suffer on and play the game, which by the way, I’m losing, big time.  My oldest grandson comes home from his job and walks into the kitchen for something to eat.

                                                                     

“How did you con granny into playing this game?” He inquires, laughing hysterically.

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” I reply. I now have all three boys helping me, but I still have no idea what I’m doing and I’m feeling really stupid. I was eventually saved from further humiliation by the arrival home of my daughter and her husband.

As I walked out the door, Nathan yells out, “We can play Yu-Gi-Oh again tomorrow when you come over.”

I need to hide those cards.