Hearts

Foreward: I realize how much of a nerd I am with this post. And in case you didn't know how much of a nerd I am, you can see that now. Enjoy.

When our internet goes out, I get to start playing with stuff that is actually on my computer, as opposed to wasting endless amounts of time in hopes of one day reaching the end of the internet. I believe that to actually be an impossibility, however it is a goal that I often strive to go for. Every once in awhile, I feel like I may have accomplished my goal, however I then remember Facebook offers an endless amount of excitement, seeing who my friend’s friends are friends with to see if I can actually make a link to someone from my past, or to see how big circles of friends are.

However, the reason I am posting is because our internet is out (I am posting through our neighbors internet connection which my computer connects to when I am in my living room, and its not constant) and I have just gotten through a rousing game of Hearts. The competitive spirit in me ALWAYS wants to win, ie: come in first and have all 3 players behind me; and when I can’t, I feel as though I am a failure since I cannot beat the computer at Hearts. I just finished one game (impetus for this post) where I thought I was going down since the first hand I received the queen, garnering all 13 points that entails. I picked up 4 more hearts on the next round, which ultimately saved us, since without my 4, Pauline would have shot the moon, which would have doomed Michele, Ben and I to a HUGE deficit. I held steady on the next hand gaining no points, however the 4^th round boosted me up to a whopping 38 points, which was actually 3^rd place since at this point, as Pauline had 42. Michele was a very strong leader with a mere 5 points, and Ben was right in the middle with 20. Over the next 2 rounds, I held steady at 38, with Ben picking up the majority of points, leaping to 41, Pauline picked up a few to 45 and Michele held very strong, picking up 1 to be at 6.

Pauline fell off quickly over the next 2 rounds, taking a huge jump to 81, Ben also made a jump to 52, while I picked up a few to 42. Unfortunately, Michele got 1 heart, taking her total to 7. At this point, I felt I was doomed since Michele was beating me by 35 and Pauline was knocking on the door to losing since she was a mere 19 points away. I continued on, however, and in the next round, Ben picked up the majority jumping to 69. Pauline picked up 5, and Michele broke the double digits by getting 4 on her way to 11. I steadied the ship, staying at 42.

In the next round, Michele uncharacteristically took a queen and a couple hearts making her go to 25. I, again, got no hearts, and Pauline picked up 1 taking her ever so closer to 100, ultimately spelling out my doom. Ben, however jumped on Pauline’s heels by picking up 11 on his way to 80. The next round truly made a competition out of the game. For the 3^rd round in a row, I picked up zero points, and for the second round in a row, Michele took the queen and a heart, bringing her to with 3 points of me. At this point I became a little more optimistic in my chances of winning this game of Hearts. Since Michele took the queen and one heart, that helped my effort by not allowing Ben and Pauline to reach 100, allowing for one more round. Pauline ended up taking 11 hearts in the round reaching 98. Ben finished the round with 81.

This is all of course set up for what should be the final hand, assuming Pauline would take her typical quantity of hearts. Thus, I needed to make sure Michele got 4 hearts so that I could win. In my hand I received the queen, which I promptly passed left. As the tricks were being dealt, I kept wondering when Pauline was going to deal it, and when she finally did, who was there to pick it up? Michele! Now all I needed was for Pauline to pick up 2 hearts, which she did. For the 4^th straight round, I picked up no hearts, while Michele picked up 13, Pauline picked up 7, and Ben had 6. The score flashed up with my name highlighted indicating my improbable comeback victory. Being down 35, with another contestant knocking on the door of 100, I thought this game was dunzo. But nonetheless, I kept playing smartly, tried to make Michele take the tricks, and in the end, I ended up victorious.

This just goes to show, that no matter how far down you are, no matter how much of a hole you are in, you can always get out of it by keeping your head about you, staying strong, and keeping to your gameplan.

Maybe there is a greater lesson in this simple game of hearts, or maybe it was just a way to waste a few minutes of my Sunday afternoon while watching coverage of the blizzard and the Olympics; either way, I staged a sweet comeback, that will live down in the lore of Hearts history (ok, so that’s a stretch).

Oh, this also means I won't be online all the time until our problem is fixed which hopefully will be sometime this week. But I'm not gonna hold my breath.

still waiting
-wait