The Spanking.

Last night I got spanked.

Yes, spanked. Oh you do want to hear about that, don't you.

I shall tell you. Come closer. Close your eyes.

It all started out as a harmless Home bonding activity, hosted by Cheri.

The rulemaker.

We started off with some question and answer games. "Do you behave badly when drunk?" "Only during my lunch hour." Ha ha ha. "Are you faithful?" "I tried once, but it was a disaster." These are called ice-breakers. Yeah, as if there is ice in our cushy Home. Anyway, I can see where the word 'amusement' comes from.

Then on to some juicy someone-has-to-leave-the-room games. In this case to guess a word by returning and asking the rest, "How's yours?" one at a time. We had 'eyes', 'memory' (fuzzy, Polariod, colourful), 'family' (the best, cut-off, artistic), etc. A thinking game which Teresa lost. So Teresa got a punishment. It was a ten second dance to a Ben-and-Joe-provided, African-Islamic beat, in front of the whole room. Here is a picture of her dancing:

Not really. Did I have you, Teresa? Oh, to have seen your face. Anyway, those are people watching her dance. Plus a bonus item of Ben's tongue. To die for.

After all that brain activity, we opted for something a little more entertaining, namely, making animal noises with our mouths, while sitting on someone's lap. Throw a blindfold in, and a yellow cushion, and you have tons of fun.

In this game the blindfolded person gets random butts on his/her lap, and orders them to make random animal noises. What you see here is an attempted quack. Makes for some great bonding. Fighting together in the trenches is great, but there's nothing like some good old making-animal-noises together.

Anyway, once the novelty of this one had worn off, Cheri, together with her sidekick, Ben, decided on a little game that is always a crowd pleaser. They like to call it The Spoon Game. I like to call it The Fateful Spoon Game.

You deal cards, pass them around, and whoever is first to get four cards of the same number snatches a spoon from the middle. Trick is, there are one too few spoons in the middle. Someone misses out.

Here is Ben dealing the cards for that one, and me innocently taking photos. Little did I know. Little did anyone know.

Now, me, when I play cards, I play cards. I'm watching the cards, watching the body language, counting, analyzing, conniving--who ever heard of spoons?

Man, did I have that round down. I knew exactly who had what, and how many of it. I knew what to pass and what not to. I could see a John at one end getting nervous, and a John at the other end getting happy. Cards were flowing through my fingers like clearwater.

Those are what you call excuses.

So yeah, I'm the guy that ended up without the spoon.

It wasn't that bad. An empty hand traded in for a shiny new punishment. No sweat, right?

Right.

Where were the Refuge Home's affection-related chastisements when I needed them?

Couldn't I just do a ten-second dance?

The next punishment on the list was entitled, "Get An Old Blackie, From Uncle P."

And yes, we filmed it.

Enjoy this one.

Joe.