Tea and Kate

In case I haven’t posted this before…. A list Reid made early in first grade when he was learning to be literate in both Spanish and English. He decided he wanted to make a book of photos, so he wrote this list of photos to include.

The same set of gentlemen (those being Liam, Reid, Wesley, Alden, and I) also created another derivation of Rock, Paper, Scissors, creatively entitled “Rock, Paper, Scissors, Tissue, Porch.” Unlike Salsa, Octopus, Train, which features a sub-game, Rock, Paper, Scissors, Tissue, Porch features a meta-game. Specifically, Rock, Paper, Scissors, Tissue, Porch, is a regular game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, within a larger game of Rock, Paper, Scissors. This is how it goes:

1. Players start as usual by saying “Rock, Paper, Scissors,” before throwing their choice of any of the five options including Tissue and Porch.

1. Rock, Paper, and Scissors (RPS) work as usual. R->S->P->R

1. Porch beats all RPS (because none of those affect a porch). Tissue looses to all RPS (because each of them destroys a tissue). But Tissue beats Porch (because no one wants a gross tissue on a porch).
2. This means that Tissue (T) and Porch (P), combined with RPS form another RPS system, in which each beats one and it’s beaten by one, in what is called a transitive cycle. T->P->[RPS]->T. So this is a meta game of Rock, Paper, Scissors wrapped around a regular game of Rock, Paper, Scissors.

Goodbye summer, the days without end goodbye summer, you’ve been a good friend. Goodbye summer and hello to fall the days will now move at a strenuous crawl, say “hey there” to school and all of the kids “did this summer make you happy?” Yes it really did.

Wesley, Alden, Reid, Liam and I created a new variant of Rock, Paper, Scissors called “Salsa, Octopus, Train.” It goes like this.

Train beats Octopus. (squish)

Octopus beats Salsa. (slurp)

Salsa beats Train. (spicy)

However, unlike “Rock, Paper, Scissors,” the game doesn’t end there. In Rock, Paper, Scissors, when you tie, you simply go again. Ties are strategically valueless. But in Salsa, Octopus, Train, ties are an opportunity to score a point, using a second set of rules:

1. In a tie, Salsa beats Salsa, Octopus beats Octopus and Train beats Train.
2. When a tie occurs, such as “Salsa, Salsa,” the first person to quote the rules, such as “Salsa beats Salsa, so I win,” gets the point. However, experienced players are often both prepared to quote the rules, leading to a rule quoting tie.
3. In the advent of a rule quoting tie, the first person to concede the point to the other player, such as “oh, right. You win,” actually wins the point. However, expert players are often both prepared to concede, leading to a concession tie.
4. In the advent of a concession tie, or any other disputes, no points are awarded, in the fashion of basic Rock, Paper, Scissors, and regular play resumes.

This creates a nice little sub-game, which changes the focus and makes it quite interesting. We would love feedback if you try!

By Liam

A few weeks ago, thinking our road trip adventures were over, Mom and Dad took us on a drive to Fan Lake in Deer Park to go to one of my favorite places in the world, Camp Reed. At first Reid (my brother not the place) was having some second thoughts about Camp (afraid he wouldn’t meet new friends) where as I was entirely ready to do archery, explore, stay up late, sleep in, swim, and have fun whether I did it with a friend or not.

Thankfully, I made many new friends at camp wether they were in my cabin or not. The kids in my cabin’s names were Brody, Alijah, Sparrow, Cody, Tristan, Christian, and Anthony. There were definitely some interesting children in my cabin so I’ll go forth to tell you a fact about each of my cabin mates.

Okay, so Brody has been to camp five times and his favorite counselor was Aztec (my mom’s cousin). Alijah is a newbie to camp like me and lives in Spokane Valley. Tristan is about 4 feet tall and claims he’s twelve; his mom is in jail and his dad smokes tobacco. Anthony is scary, always wants to get into fights, and has a collection of rocks that he will throw at random intervals (he also calls me Cricket for some unexplainable reason). Sparrow is entirely Native American, probably like ten feet tall and has long hair. Cody is bisexual. Christian is overweight and I don’t know much about him.

My best friends at camp were Brody, Sparrow, Alijah, and Sky. Overall at camp I had by far the greatest week of my life and will never forget it.

By Reid

We thought our camping trip was coming to a end, but Bri and Anna (our uncle and aunt) invited us to the Olympic Peninsula to use our tent once again. First we set up the tent (in the HORRIBLE weather—it was really windy and rainy). Once we finished we waited for Bri and Anna. After a little while, they finally arrived.

The next day we drove to a six mile hike. We noticed how huge the trees were: not as big as red wood trees but very close to that size. The hike was long but we survived it. After that we went to the hot springs. They where surprisingly warm but not too hot.

The next day we went to a beach at low tide. There were so many things: star fish, anemones, sea urchins and……….A DEAD SEAL! After that Liam, Anna, and I wrote a 🤑, a huge 🤑. We also flew a mini kiteboarding kite.

The Olympic Peninsula is rain forest, but different from Costa Rican rainforests. It’s wet and full of life!