Spider Solitaire Appology

Steven Vollom stevenvollom at sbcglobal.net
Thu Dec 4 02:29:10 UTC 2008


Knapp wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 9:37 AM, Steven Vollom
> <stevenvollom at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>   
>> After playing the mid-level game of Spider Solitaire, it took a while to
>> remember how I played before.  I told a lie in my explanation of the win
>> percentage, but not on purpose.  Using Spider Solitaire as a memory
>> exercise, I could not do it with the easiest game for it was too little
>> competition.  The second level caused too many losses to keep me
>> interested, so I would not start a game until I had at lease two runs of
>> three to start out the game.  I would just redeal until that came up.
>> With that much of a head start, the game became winnable enough to keep
>> it interesting.  So winning percentages became high because I didn't
>> start a tough game.  Anyway, it has been more than three years since I
>> played, and I wasn't playing to prove anything; I was just playing to
>> exercise my memory.  I am embarrassed, because I lost about 10 games in
>> a row, when I started playing again.  It wasn't until that happened,
>> that I remembered how I got winning to happen enough to want to continue
>> to play.  I don't want you guys to think I can't be reasonably trusted.
>> I try very hard to not lie anymore.  I am ashamed when I do and don't
>> realize it.  I don't do it on purpose anymore.
>>
>> Steven
>>     
>
> In my religion, Zen Buddhism there is a precept not to lie but to tell
> the truth. This is a great way to see your true self. When you stop
> lying even little lies you tell yourself become starkly appenent and
> this then lets up clean up our act.
>
> What you have done is not telling a lie it is more just a mistake.
> Having bad intention is very important to well done evil lying! :-)
>
> Wikipedia
> Lie
> A lie (also called prevarication), is a type of deception in the form
> of an untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive
> others, often with the further intention to maintain a secret or
> reputation, protect someone's feelings or to avoid a punishment.
>
> Wikipedia
> Truth
> The meaning of the word truth extends from honesty, good faith, and
> sincerity in general, to agreement with fact or reality in
> particular.[1] The term has no single definition about which a
> majority of professional philosophers and scholars agree, and various
> theories of truth continue to be debated.
>
> I would highly recommend learning to play the game GO to help your
> memory and be sure to eat lots of fish and green veggies!
> quarry is good with gnu go as the engine
> I mostly play using qgo on the IGS server so that I can play real people.
> some good sites are:
>
> http://senseis.xmp.net/?Go
> http://goproblems.com/
> http://www.pandanet.co.jp/English/
> http://www.gokgs.com/applet.jsp
> http://www.usgo.org/resources/whatisgo.html
>
> Don't expect to start winning until you have played for a year! A
> great way to learn to be humble! It is also a great way to understand
> how China thinks about taking over the world in it's own way.
>   
Hi Doug,

It takes too long to tell, however, I didn't remember even how to play 
the game, it had been so long.  And until I played about a dozen games, 
my memory did not refresh.  Suffice it to say, I don't like to practice 
losing.  It isn't really a big deal with me, however, most skill games 
are made so that you lose about 10 for every one you win.  It may be the 
reason, I wasn't much of a game player all my life.  Because Spider 
Solitaire was such a losing experience, I changed the rules and made a 
more fun game out of it.  It still gave me the mental exercise to help 
improve my waning memory, I just was able to experience the feeling of 
victory 8 out of 10 times instead of 1 out of ten.

What I ended up with was not an easier game, just a more gratifying 
game.  And a million can play at one time and there still be only one 
winner.  That makes it much like Texas Holdum.  One person can play too, 
and still not feel like he is cheating, for it is a different game.  
Everyone has the same chances.  Time is the enemy.  I just changed what 
constituted winning and eliminated the regular rules in favor of a 
couple of new ones.  You would love it if you liked Spider Solitaire.  
If you want I will send instructions on how to play.  It really could 
catch on.  It is not tiring and you are always having fun and not 
feeling defeated.  The explanation takes a couple of letter sized pages 
of writing.  Let me know if you want it.  I can cut and paste it into an 
email.

Steven




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