Friday, July 30, 2004

Muggins!

National Review's John Derbyshire has just been engaged in a bit of cribbage blogging:

Fifteen two, fifteen four, fifteen six, and two for his heels.
Where I come from, his heels is counted as soon as the deck is cut and the start card is shown (if that card happens to be a jack). His heels is not scored along with the hand, as in Mr. Derbyshire's example.

Perhaps Mr. Derbyshire is thinking of his nobs, which is indeed scored with the hand, but is worth only one point.

UPDATE: Just received the following from Mr. Derbyshire:
I thought "nob" might be misunderstood. Just amazed any Americans know what I'm tallking about.

JD
Do Americans not know cribbage? In my experience they (that is, we) do.

I spent a considerable amount of time in my formative summers playing cribbage, primarily with other young Americans. Even knew several young Americans who made their own cribbage boards. Partook in an annual amateur cribbage tournament (and typically lost in the first round, to another American). The two perennial tournament winners were a schoolteacher from Wisconsin and a school administrator from St. Louis and Minneapolis (all of which are firmly ensconced in America).

And Derbyshire weighs in at The Corner:

YOU TRY TO BE NICE...
...and they throw stuff at you. Blogger David M. was reading The Corner last night:

"National Review's John Derbyshire has just been engaged in a bit of cribbage blogging: 'Fifteen two, fifteen four, fifteen six, and two for his heels.' Where I come from, his heels is counted as soon as the deck is cut and the start card is shown (if that card happens to be a jack). His heels is not scored along with the hand, as in Mr. Derbyshire's example. Perhaps
Mr. Derbyshire is thinking of his nobs, which is indeed scored with the hand, but is worth only one point."

Where **I** come from, David, it's "one for his nob" in the hand score. I thought that would be mis-interpreted, though, so I substituted "two for his heels." Who knew that any Americans had even HEARD of cribbage?

(Although, now I come to think of it, there is a cribbage reference in that 1970s movie THE STING.)

He adds more:

CRIBBAGE
This wonderful game most certainly *is* played in the USA -- I've had lots of e-mails from enthusiastic players.

My dad fell into Alzheimer's in the last few months of his life (age 84-5). It didn't affect his cribbage game a bit. In his worst spells he didn't know who I was. ("Social Services have sent this very nice young chap to play crib with me," he remarked to his sister one day. The young chap was me.) He still whipped me at cribbage, though.

In fact, if you enjoy cribbage but would like to taste true humiliation, go to a traditional-style English pub and seek out the old crib players. These guys will be at least 70, gnarled, toothless, and decrepit-looking, and will have sunk 8-10 pints of bitter beer before 9 o'clock. And they will whip your hide at cribbage, cackling with glee as they leave you in the lurch.

And more:
WHERE TO GO FOR A GOOD GAME OF CRIBBAGE
"Derb---Just a friendly FYI: Cribbage was--and still is--the game of choice among US nuclear submarine officers. I'm sure there's a book that could be written about the importance of cribbage to the morale and camaraderie of these men during the Cold War (& beyond). It's ideally suited for the officer's underway schedule: the officer of the deck (OOD) and engineering officer of the watch (EOOW) often relax after six hours of hunting Russian, Iranian, and North Korean subs by enjoying the fellowship of 'the board.' I'm quite sure that this is true in the Royal Navy as well.

"ps: I'm referring, of course (!), to the hunter-killer attack subs, not those 'floating hotels' (aka 'boomers' or ballistic missile subs)."
And yet more, this time on cribbage lit.