I love playing Solitaire. It’s something I probably inherited from my parents, but I never 
learned how to shuffle the cards. Not that I’m THAT much of a klutz — well, truthfully, I am, but when I try to shuffle, the cards fly everywhere. So back in the dark ages, before the invention of the home computer, I had a hard time playing any card game.
When I was expecting Don I was certain he would be a football player, because every night he kicked. He tackled. He ran around in my stomach. Never still for a second. So every night I sat at the kitchen table and played Solitaire. After a month or so, I decided to start keeping track of my wins and losses. By the time Don was born, four months later, I had played more than two thousand games, and won two of them. Not a very good record, but I’m sure it was because I couldn’t shuffle the cards. My luck couldn’t have been that bad — I hope. Maybe I was just too sleepy to record all of my wins. Okay, that sounds better, so that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
When I got my first home computer I didn’t know anything about how to use it. I had figured out how to plug up my VCR to my TV, so I really thought I could figure out how to use a computer also. Wrong answer. So, I called a nerd — my brother. He’s great with computers. He came in, started fooling around with it, reeling off facts and miscellaneous stuff faster than I could write it down, or understand it. Then he left, telling me to just play with the computer, because that was the best way to learn. Thanks Ray. It’s a well-known fact in the family that the guy’s a genius, but he could never be a teacher. Hehehe, guess what he’s doing now, along with being a priest and chaplain? He’s a professor at Brescia University. And his students understand him. Doesn’t say much for me though.
Back to the Solitaire now. While playing around with my computer, I found the games. And there was my old friend, Sol. No more shuffling cards. The computer did all the work for me. I had to learn to play all over again, clicking that crazy little mousie around. I keep knocking it off the desk, so half the time I’m chasing mousie around the room. Then I got really brave and discovered there are more than 5000 ways to play Solitaire. I learned three of them.
After I started working the afternoon shift at the nursing home, I had to have something to help me relax when I got home around midnight. There was my old friend, Sol, just waiting for me to boot up the computer. The only problem there was that I eventually got Carpal Tunnel syndrome. Now that hurts! No Sol for a couple of weeks, while I had to wear a brace on my wrist. How do you make lemonade from a lemon like that?
I still play Sol at night. Can’t sleep if I don’t play a few games. When my computer crashed last year I had to buy an e-reader that had games on it so I could play Sol. Not that I minded reading the books. Don’t get me wrong there. I love to read. But without Sol I just couldn’t sleep. And just to put a little more fun in it, I now have my mom hooked on it too. She always used a deck of cards until I kept telling her how much easier it is to play on the computer. No more shufflin’ for these smart ladies. Nope! Not us!
A.
Angie's Place 