I'm just coming off a fantastic weekend. My wife and kids are off to NY to visit family for a few days, so I took the opportunity to get together with my gaming buddies. As it so happened, we had something of a perfect storm - both of their wives were also away on Saturday, so lacking any other obligations, we chucked cards and threw dice and smoked pipes and had a ridiculously good time. We made it through two full games of War of the Ring (a multi-hour wargame based on Lord of the Rings, currently one of my faves); I lost the second game on the last turn as Frodo succumbed to the corruption of the ring standing at the brink of the Crack of Doom. Several games of Settlers of Catan were also in the mix - Cities and Knights as always but also including Fishermen, which is an excellent little expansion that was a magazine insert a few months ago and is relatively easy to track down (as well as being a bargain at generally under five bucks). If you're a Settlers fan, you owe it to yourself to get this one. In addition, we sampled a few new ones - Hive, which was fun but light (you can play it online at hivemania.com); Citadels, which was an instant favorite; and Twilight Struggle, which has immediately moved to the top of my "must haves" list. We started with WotR on Friday night at 9pm, and when we were finished went immediately into Settlers. We finally crashed at about 4am, slept until 11, and dove right back into Settlers after breakfast. The last game of the day was Twilight Struggle, which wrapped up at about 2am this morning. I haven't done this much gaming in ages - and I'm exhausted.

Gaming is such a fulfilling hobby. I think a lot of folks might read this list and wonder how I could sink close to 20 hours in one weekend into board games. For me, games have it all - the thrill of competition, the challenge of strategy and tactics, the rush of victory and the camaraderie of good friends. If you think of things like Monopoly or Trivial Pursuit when you think of board games, you need to know that the mass market crap that lines the shelves of your local big box retailer can't possibly compare to the fine offerings that you'll find at a smaller hobby-oriented games shop. There is a game to fit every person, whether you want competition or cooperation, a ten minute filler or a four hour dicefest, and they'll all offer something more than your standard roll the dice, move the piece insomnia cure with a Milton Bradley logo on the front.

I was going to say something about the recent Mark Driscoll thing, but to be honest, I'm in too good of a mood and I'm running on five hours of sleep. Maybe Driscoll should sit down with Pagitt, McLaren, and Bell for a game of Catan and a good cigar.