Tom and I spent the weekend with John and Jackie in Columbus doing fun stuff.  Tom and John spent most of the day on Saturday playing paintball while Jackie and I went to Temptations Yarn Store to spend the gift card she and John got me for Christmas.  It is always fun to feel the beautiful yarns at Temptations – alpaca, wool, silk, cotton, yak, tencel.

After that we went to North Market, which reminded me of The Continent which I used to visit in the 1970’s and 80’s.  North Market looked exactly the way the French Market at the Continent looked, so it was fun to go and browse around.  Of course, I had to buy a few yummy things!

 

 

 

 

 

Jackie and I had a delicious lunch at a restaurant called Melt, which is part of a small chain that started in Cleveland.  All their sandwiches are a kind of grilled cheese, but not the usual grilled cheese!  I had one that had meatloaf and mashed potatoes on it.  I couldn’t even eat half of it, so Jackie and I got our other half sandwiches boxed up for Tom and John for supper.

We finished off our time in downtown Columbus by checking out the Origins Game Fair.  Just by walking through we decided that we had to come back on Sunday with Tom and John to really check it out.

Tom and John both enjoyed their time playing paintball and came back with battle wounds which have now turned into black and blue bruises.  Running around in the woods while people shoot you with projectiles.  Not my idea of fun, but they had a great time.

Sunday the four of us went to church and then back downtown.  We ate at another interesting restaurant – Columbus has so many – called Double Comfort.  They had homemade biscuits and beignets that were delicious.  Jackie and I had wonderful salads and John and Tom both had biscuits with lots of toppings:  gravy, bacon, eggs, cheese . . .  I think I could probably eat at a different Columbus restaurant every day for a year and still never try all the unique places there.

In order to work off our lunch, we got a family pass to the Origins Game Fair and walked around for a couple of hours.  If you like board games, this is the place to be!  Origins Game Fair took over the Columbus Convention Center for five days of game play fun.  There were seminars, classes on game strategy and designing your own games, and lots of gaming tournaments.  Everywhere you looked were roomfuls of people playing games.  We spent most of our time in the exhibit hall where game companies were showcasing new games and selling all their games.

We checked out Mayfair Games, which makes Settlers of Catan, a game Jackie introduced us to and which we enjoy playing (even though I always lose).  I also talked to a representative from Rio Grande Games, which makes one of my favorite games, TransAmerica.  Whenever we play this with others, they want to get their own copy – simple to learn and fun to play together – but Rio Grande no longer makes it.  I asked why, and the representative started talking about European copyrights and the designers wanted to market it themselves and then went bankrupt so Rio Grande was hoping to get the copyright again . . . I think my eyes glazed over at some place.  It takes less time to explain the rules of the game!

 

 

 

 

 

 

There were so many new games in the exhibit hall for sale that we could have spent hours trying them out and deciding which to get.  We ended up buying three (between the four of us).  Smashup, which is a game of trying to take over the world, Tsuro of the Seas, a variant on the popular Tsuro but with less strategy (Tom likes strategy games and I like luck games because it is the only way I ever beat him).  John and Jackie got the game Love Letters Hobbit Edition which they had played at a friend’s house.

Going to Origins Game Fair was really fun.  It is nice to see so many people (attendance was expected to be around 35,000) who love board games as much as we do.   If we are in town next year, we will certainly go again and maybe get in on some of the game play.  I think it would be fun to play Settlers of Catan on a giant board!

 

When we got back to John and Jackie’s, there was still laundry to do, so I put in a load and we played Love Letters.  When that load was done, I put in another and we played Smashup.  Then it was time to head home after a fun and busy weekend.  Thanks, John and Jackie, for being willing to play with us!