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Loaded Questions: How Well Do You Know Your Family?

Vicki Briganti – CW50 Writer / Producer / Editor

My family is gathered at the Howell B&B. As we finish lunch, we talk about current events while my nephew Carl patiently waits to go outside and play bocce. After that, he's itching to play our favorite board game, Loaded Questions.

According to amazon.com, Loaded Questions is a multiplayer game that tests your knowledge of other people's opinions. By correctly guessing your fellow player's answers to probing, opinion-oriented questions, you advance around the board. The box says it Makes Every Family Happier and Every Party a Hit!

Have you ever played it? The game recommends 4-6 players, ages 12 and up. Carl is 11. When asked to "Name a sport you're most ignorant about," he put equestrian. How many 11-year-olds use the word equestrian? By the way, the disease he's most afraid of? Hemophilia. He even spelled it correctly on his player sheet. Other player's answers were cancer, leprosy, rabies, and flesh eating bacteria. I should have put scurvy.

Loaded Questions
Doug in the lead during Loaded Questions (credit: Vicki Briganti)

Classic Game of Who Said What

The manufacturer discontinued my particular edition. I bought it on sale at Meijer for $15. I still enjoy playing our other favorite board game, Apples to Apples, but Loaded Questions makes us laugh harder and takes longer to finish. We've already had to suspend two games because players needed to leave for the night.

You learn new things about your opponents. Things like, hey, maybe our family doesn't like baseball since our responses to "Describe the game of baseball" were slow, slow, boring, and slow waiting. We still laugh about "What advice would you give Christopher Columbus in 1492?"

1.     Bring water

2.     Go home

3.     Leave the Indians alone!

4.     Take a different route

5.     Don't wear a dorky hat

Good luck trying to guess who said what with those clever answers. If you think you can win because you know your family, guess again. Who knew for the question "Who are your two biggest heroes?" that Carl would write Nick Cannon and Abe Lincoln. Really? Nick Cannon? Doug had to guess who said what for that one. "I don't even know who Nick Cannon is," he said.

Later, I asked Carl why they were his heroes. He said, "I admire Nick Cannon's easy job and Abe Lincoln is the most noble president ever." My sister Lisa cautioned him. "Be careful what you tell Aunt Vicki. It might end up in her blog." This is what I'm writing in my blog, Lisa. Your answer to "What gift could be so bad it would make you cry?" was an empty box. That's what you'll receive for Christmas if you're mean to me.

Our Party's a Hit

Get ready for table eruptions. My dad shouted "You people are hoodwinking me!" as he took the lead. Angry murmurs abound when you don't at least answer hypothetically. For the card "What is your favorite circus act?" my family pounced when I said I don't like the circus. For example:

Question: "If you found $50 and had to spend it immediately, what would you buy?"

Carl: "I don't buy things."

My loved ones deem each other "scammers" during this competitive game. To convince her to play, we told my sister it isn't a game, it's a "fun, family activity." My nephew Paul warned her to keep an eye on Doug. "He acts like he doesn't know who said what, but then he'll sweep the round." Doug the Newbie was in the lead the last time we played.

If we were being honest, we learned each other's white lies. "What excuse do you give when you want to get out of doing something?" Our responses were I'm sick, I did it last time, I'm busy, and I'm really busy.

Now I know who said what. This could work to everyone's disadvantage in our personal interactions. If I need help with yard work next month and my dad says he's really busy, I can shout "You are hoodwinking me!"

I might not know my family as well as I thought, but after playing this game, I know they're a bunch of scammers.

>> More Motor City Musing With Vicki Briganti

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