Another LDR Date Idea

So I like playing board games, and luckily so does my bf.  However, playing board games together can be a little logistically difficult when you live on separate continents.

First, we tried looking to see what games we each had in our respective locations to see if we could set them up and mimic each other’s moves.  Monopoly seemed too cumbersome, so we played a couple rounds of Mastermind.  Our sets varied a little so we said that the red on my board was equivalent to the purple on his board, etc. Mastermind was kind of  fun, but really not super interactive.  My bf remarked that the person holding the code really could be substituted by a computer, so we moved on.

We looked up a few game playing websites to see if there was anything else we could do and found Pogo.  Pogo is okay, the design is simplistic and it took us a while to figure out it didn’t like Firefox on Macs.  We finally realized that the makers of Pogo only really envisioned Mac users playing on Safari.  Once we had that set, we discovered Cribbage and Backgammon.  Those are basically the only board games (besides Chess and Monopoly where we had any interest).  We also realized that is possible that we are just too old-fashioned with our game tastes.  Most people in this day and age like super amazing graphic games with lots of characters, actions, etc. and we like board games.  However, it has been fun to learn Cribbage and use Skype to see each other’s reactions while we outsmart the other or get an especially good hand.  This has actually been a great way for us to have weekend dates when we have time on our side, and exhaust regular conversation and just want to have a little fun.

If anyone has any other board/card game website suggestions, would love to hear them.  Honestly in my ideal world, we would find a site that is a virtual card deck where we can play whatever game we want and deal however we want.  Ideas?

Date Night When You Are In A Long Distance Relationship

Sometimes I miss going on dates since I’m in a LDR.   Particularly, I miss going to the movies together–sharing popcorn and having a shoulder to rest my head on or hide behind.  It’s Oscar season and we are both into movies, so we started the plan of watching movies separately and then discussing them later.  I know it doesn’t lend to hand holding during the movie but at least it gives us a similar experience and something to discuss after. It also actually makes us find even more time for each other, which is something we would need to do in person, so it’s yet another cool way to strengthen our time together and apart.

Last week, we even took it a step further and turned on our Skype (again, thank goodness for technology!), and while I watched The Hurt Locker on On Demand, he watched the same flick on his computer.  Since he has two computers, he used one to watch me watching the movie and I turned my computer around to face me on the couch watching the TV.  This was a fun experience for us, but I think was a little more distracting for me because I spent some time trying to sync up our movies as much as possible.  The problem with our sync issues ended up being that while I was watching a NTSC version, he was watching the PAL version (so his version was faster).  So quick note to any of you in a long distance relationship who want to try this date at home, make sure that you have the same standards while enjoying your Skype date.

Since time and access to movies is a little more flexible for him (95% of all DVDs for sale in Kenya are bootlegs so you can get any new movie in the markets at any time), I am now behind on my movie watching.  So far, he is ahead by three movies, and by tomorrow I’m sure it will be four.   Which means, I should really get off this blog and go to the movies so I can participate in our next LDR date tonight or tomorrow.