christmas presents!

Last night Kris and I exchanged gifts, as she's going to Ohio and I'm working today (theoretically, I'm working right now, but my head's not in the game yet) and tomorrow. I made out like a bandit...

I got the 2005 version of New York Mets Monopoly. Kris and I played one game that lasted until midnight. She bought Boardwalk-equivalent Tom Seaver on her first turn, and several tense go-rounds occurred before I landed on (and purchased) Park Place-equivalent Mike Piazza, thereby blocking what would have been a crippling monopoly for me.

I eventually prevailed through my ownership of Home Plate and First and Second Base (which correspond to the railroads in the original), and my monopoly of Carlos Beltran, Kaz Matsui and Doug Mientkiewicz (Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Pacific Avenues in the original, respectively); meaning that last night's Monopoly victory has been the biggest contribution to date those three have made to anything associated with the Mets and winning.

I must mention that Kris had some particularly bad luck with the "Home" and "Road" cards (Community Chest and Chance cards from the original), which severely handicapped her (despite her ownership of both utilities - WFAN and the Daily News; by the way, Spector - you're working for Kris now).

It's also worth mentioning that my official bad taste joke of the game was suggesting that Darryl Strawberry and/or Doc Gooden should have replaced the original angry-looking guy in jail.

It's also also worth mentioning that the first two properties after Go (which used to be Mediterranean Avenue and Baltic Avenue) were the Home Run Apple and Shea Stadium, and both were worth $60. Apparently, the Home Run Apple, while a part of Shea Stadium, is worth as much as Shea Stadium, yet buying Shea Stadium does not give one ownership of the Home Run Apple. Interesting.

The final thing worth mentioning is that Kris' game piece was a hot dog. And that's just inherently cool.

My other sweet gifts were cute Love Tokens, which I can cash in for kisses, hugs, massages and rolls in the hay; the truly creepy Zombie Survival Guide, which might be scarier than any such movie thanks to its matter-of-fact writing style and lurid descriptions of zombie attacks; season one of The 4400 on DVD, which is a show Kris and I both enjoy; and season one of the new Battlestar Galactica on DVD. Kris will watch it (or is "tolerate" the right word?), but she knows I absolutely adore it. While holiday shopping last weekend with Kris, I cooed over the DVD set in a store, and her ensuing half-smiles and cryptic comments now make perfect sense.

So Kris did really, really, really well, and I hope I did as well in my gifts to her. I'm going to miss her this weekend...