CB's Question of the Day

[cabenson]

What was your favorite outdoor game as a child?

My answer: Lawn darts (my eye!) and a game we made up called "Butt Beater" which was similar to tag but involved a wiffleball bat.

Comments

[slcadet.livejournal.com]

Mine was hide and seek where the kids on our block would play, on the whole block. Great fun.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

We used to do that as well. Occasionally, one of the block mothers would warn their children to "Stay away from that Cabenson kid."

[slammerkinbabe.livejournal.com]

My cousins and I made up a game called Devil. Basically, it was like the coolest variant of Tag ever. Players were divided into pairs, excepting the Devil, who was "It" (with an even number of players, the Devil could either have a henchman or one of the teams could have three players, depending). All players excepting the Devil also had a "talisman" (a fifty-cent word, at least for an eight year old, that I got out of some book), which was usually a toy or a doll or something. (One of my cousins liked to use a Ring Pop.) Said talisman gave you magical powers of your own choosing. If you chose to have Freeze Power, then when the Devil tried to tag you, you could freeze him and run away. If you had Hop Power (we had very inventive names), you would make the Devil hop on one foot and then you could escape. But if you didn't manage to point at him and state your power before he tagged you, then he took your talisman and hid it, and if he caught you before you had found it and were therefore powerless, you went to jail. Because it would have been blasphemous to go to hell. Then your partner had to find your talisman and use it to rescue you before *they* got caught.

It is a game that tended to go on forever, but it was a great deal of fun.

We also used to play Cops and Robbers after dark. At least until I (a perpetual cop) chased one of my cousins up a set of brick stairs and he fell and knocked three of his front teeth out.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

Oh god, that sounds so sophisticated. We just "tagged" each other by pounding them with a plastic bat.

[theholyinnocent.livejournal.com]

Running away from bullies.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

Duuuuude. Now I feel like one of those emo kids.

[sing1118.livejournal.com]

What thi said- I was never a yard-type child. I was usually reading.

But when I was at camp, usually popcorn tag. You know, where everyone you tag then has to stick together and try to tag people in a blob? And in high school, it was Ultimate Frisbee. I did play soccer, synchronized swimming and regular swimming, so I wasn't slow.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

I was a huge reader too, but my mother insisted on shoving us outdoors as often as possible.

[lostingeekdom.livejournal.com]

The outdoor games were seasonal. We played cricket pretty much round the year except during the monsoons, when we were restricted to indoor games.
There was also 'Gilli-Danda', a very simple but old game, reputed to have been played even during mythological times. Fun, but if you're not careful, it can take your eye out. And just after the monsoon season, around October-November, when the winds were good, we'd be flying kites. Kite battles are entertaining. I even learned to make my own kites.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

We played with crickets...does that count? I bought a XENA kite a few years back...maybe I should try flying it.

[lostingeekdom.livejournal.com]

How do you play with crickets? And yeah, dust off the Xena kite, and add some of the glass coated strings .. and she'll kick ass at the kite battles.

[amazonqueenkate.livejournal.com]

We made up a game called "war," my siblings and I. We chased each other around, yelled at each other, and would dig little holes in the yard to trip one another. It was fun times, and we didn't grow out of it until I was twelve or thirteen. Good, good times.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

That sounds like fun except I would have had my ass beaten for digging up the yard.

[amazonqueenkate.livejournal.com]

We did our best not to get caught. When we did, we had to fill in the holes. ^_^;

[babeeaimee.livejournal.com]

Me and my sister played 'horses' - we treated the poor old family dog like a pony, and made it run around and jump our home-made jumping course for dog-treats.

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

We played "Make Kerry Eat It" and would feed gross stuff to my younger brother.

[spikeindenver.livejournal.com]

On the mean streets of Milwaukee, WI we used to play kick the can in the middle of the street with all the neighborhood kids.

You could hide anywhere on the entire block, and it was so much fun. We had this great big empty coffee can, and you could catch us kicking that thing around most nights during the summer...

That question brought back cool memories. :)

[maroukian.livejournal.com]

we were the original dodgeball
and we tried to knock each other out...
literally

[stargazer1960.livejournal.com]

In Texas we dug an extensive network of holes and tunnels in a huge vacant lot on Marshall Street. We played "Vietnam War." It was 1972. Our parents were mortified when they realized that the reason they couldn't find us was that we were underground.
IRONY- My sister was a general and I was a nurse. And I turned out to be the lesbian!

[cabenson.livejournal.com]

Yeah, well, we both know your sister likes to be in charge of everything ;)