Random Thoughts on Monday

Ok, I already broke down and bought a game. But I swear, that is the last one for the year. Really. I snagged a copy of Ubongo. There was only one copy being sold in the US (on the BGG market) and it was $25 so I grabbed it. It wasn't terribly expensive and its not getting traded much (well, Mike has a copy for trade, but he has everything anyway...) If it had been a new game or one that is always in stock by retailers or something I would have waited. So anyway, last game buy of the year.
And BTW, that really means last purchase after Le Havre - which was supposed to be the real last purchase. Le Havre is sounding a bit to me like the next Agricola (i.e. really popular, but not yet picked up by a company in the US). This could take another year to get over here, so a few of us in the area pitched in to import some copies. About $58 with shipping, which isn't too bad (my pre-order Agricola was more). If I don't like it (or need it), I'm sure it'll trade quickly this spring.
I purchased Sorry! Sliders for my son for Christmas. He'll love it, and I'm pretty sure his mother will too since she like Crokinole. While I love playing games with my son, its even better when we play things as a family. Sorry! Sliders is getting attention on the BGG because it is a mass market game that isn't derivative drivel of existing crappy games (how many versions of Stratego(19), Monopoly(360+?), Candyland(9), Risk(20), Operation, Chutes and Ladders, etc can they make). Having just said that, Stratego is not a terrible game, and I have a soft spot for Risk, but I really wish that the toy companies in the US would put some effort into creating something that isn't total ass or a Transformer version of an existing game. And nobody is playing Monopoly (and those of you that are, don't play it correctly anyway), so just stop buying them.
We played some Pitchcar last week. My son likes this and its fast, so my wife will play too. My daughter plays, but gets bored really really fast and walks off. That's ok, she still has a couple years to get to the point of really playing games. I also got in a game of Battleball with my son. I really like playing this with him, but its a pain putting the guys back into the plastic. Maybe I should just give up and throw it all into the box. Its not like I'm going to trade this game away or anything.