Me against the world

It's useful to have a measuring stick to judge our lives. That measuring stick is typically our peers both now and in history. I'm usually not a big supporter of self actualization. We become better writers, teachers, lawyers, artists or basketball players from practice with a societal standard in mind. But there are some things and some times when we should not use a standard. Few times in my life are happier than when we play a made-up game that is probably so faulted that 1) we could only stand to play it once and 2) no one else outside of the current moment would deem it fun.

Here is a nice article by Roger Ebert about another such activity. I'll have to make a copy for mom. (You all remember the 'apple' story?).