A couple years ago I bought a game called Travel Bingo. I thought it would be a great way to make family time in the car go by quickly. The idea is that everyone gets a game board with things that can be seen out a car window. The items are things such as: bird on a wire, flag, a church, water tower, bridge, tree, mailbox, cow, stop sign, etc. As we drive past things and the kids see these items they cross them out on their card and the first one to get a row filled out on their card yells “Bingo!!” I thought it looked great!Recently the kids found the game and decided to give it a try. I overlooked a couple things…. First Dill likes to play “Imagination Bingo” This is a great game when Pepper and Dill play alone because Pepper just laughs at his creative finds… his siblings however, are much less tolerant of Dill yelling out “Bingo” because he just saw a cow and a water tower in a church parking lot!!
When all the kids play there is also the ‘sneaky’ factor. No one wants anyone else to know where they saw a Flag or a RV parked behind trees. This is fine until someone yells “Bingo” and cannot PROVE that they saw the items they crossed off!
Now remember, through all these games, I am driving. So now my idea of a peaceful family game has really all but vanished. I am scanning the horizon and out the side windows so that I can either verify or contradict the actual presence of birds on wires, cows in fields and yield signs on side roads. I am referee for the kids all saying, “You did not really see such-and-such!!” and I love the phrase, “You can’t count that, cuz I found it first!!”
But all this is NOT the worst thing about this game. The worst thing I could never have predicted when I first purchased this game. The worst thing is when Pepper plays. I had no idea how ‘into’ this game Pepper would get. When Pepper sees something on her Bingo card she gets all excited. She does this great intake of breath because she is happy that she found an item. This would be fine, except she makes the same sound when I am about to run into something. So there I am driving along and not really paying attention to her playing with the kids and all of a sudden she makes this great intake of breath and I think I am about to hit Bambi! The sound scares the heck outta me!! I practically have a heart attack because she saw something like a railroad crossing sign!! Dill thinks it is hilarious and wants to play the game even more often!!!
The only saving grace is that they all love this game so much we should run out of Bingo cards soon…. I think there was 300 in the box…. I only have about 212 games to go!! ☺
Oh I could have told you that game would be a bad idea!!! I can only imagine the kids fighting over who saw what, and who made up things, and the tension it would cause. At least in my mini van. Perhaps next time you play that game you could drive with all the windows open, and as a favor to your Bingo loving family, you could tear all 212 cards apart so they could pick one out of the middle if they want to.... :)
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