Thee Shall Enjoy This Post

As previously mentioned, I went out to New York to visit some friends, the H's, last week, and I had a great time. As also mentioned, one of the parts that was the most fun was playing Quaker with Klara, Becca, Ruth, and my siblings. We never really called anyone out, even though everyone lost, especially Cara and Ruth.

For those of you who have never played Quaker or are otherwise unfamiliar with the game's precepts and ordinances, the main object of the game is to keep from smiling. Laughing is even more frowned upon. Everyone sits in a circle. When Person A's turn comes, he says to Person B on his left, "This is a very solemn occasion, Brother (or Sister) [middle name of Person B]." To this Person B replies, "Yes it is, Brother (or Sister) [middle name of Person A]."

It's often a hilarious game, but I have never participated in one more amusing, comical, convivial, entertaining, exhilarated, frolicsome, gleeful, happy, humorous, jocular, jolly, jovial, joyful, joyous, laughable, lively, merry, mirthful, priceless, rollicking, side-splitting, or uproarious than the Great Quaker Game of June 15, 2006.

(Thanks to Thesaurus.com for the list of adjectives.)

Here is the first mistake.

The second time around, Cara (who, to be fair, was rather tired) couldn't keep from laughing, so she turned into a sort of sobbing fit. Klara quietly (too quietly, unfortunately) chided her for being so noisy a Quaker, and poor Ruth didn't stand a chance of keeping a straight face. She can't usually anyway.

Here is a rough transcript of what was said after Cara's affected lamentations:

Klara: Indeed it is, Sister Beth, I weep for you as well. This
is a very solemn occasion, Sister Alison, do you not agree? Our Sister Beth must be thrown out of the community.

Cara: I was crying; I wasn't laughing.

Klara: Oh, I see through thee, that thee laugheth. I see a
cheerful heart, I see a jovial heart, and that is a sin.

Ruth: hee hee hee etc.

After we had played Quaker for a while, we decided to play a different version, one that I believe the H's had made up themselves (correct me if I'm wrong). In this new version of Quaker, each Person A tells his Person B of some physical flaw that B has and compares it to something. Person B refutes this heartily, but without smiling. I wasn't in the room when the new rules were explained, and it took me a minute to figure them out, as you can see from this clip. I made another similar mistake, in the next clip, but that time Cara stole the show. She could barely manage to say....but you'll have to listen to find out WHAT she could barely say. Ruth finished off the clip with a terrific quote of her own. Listen here for the audio clip that everyone's talking about.