Email Signup
Choose one friend to be your primary target. Any time there is a chance to submit an email address to something, from a band’s email newsletter list to a forward-happy friends address book, write down your friend’s/target’s email address. Much like the catalogs.com game, you always win without ever getting to see the fruits of your labor.

Back Window Drive-Thru
Pretend your driver door window is broken and attempt to pay/receive food through one of your other windows. The most absurd window wins. With the prevalence and accessibility of smartphone video cameras, not recording this is not an option. For example:

Full iPod Shuffle
Your chance of success in this game are almost as low as The Million Dollar Game, but it’s still worth playing (kind of like getting a birdie in golf – it only happens once every six months, but keeps you playing until it happens again due to the mental illusion it creates about your golfing ability). Put your iPod on full shuffle and try to guess an artist that will appear in the next 10 songs. Not only will it help burn hours of your road trip, but it will help resurface some songs that you completely forgot you have.

You got any original games we need to know about?

The Back Window
Next time you’re going through a drive thru, pretend your driver door window is broken and attempt to complete the entire transaction through the back window. Remember, as far as the drive thru guy is concerned, this is completely normal to you. There’s only one rule – find a way to get it on video and share it with me.

The Jason Aldean
About a year and a half ago, I wrote about one of the most random things that has ever happened to me. To this day, I still don’t know if it was real or if someone was screwing with me.

Point is, you’re trying to make your friend think that a famous person texted him by accident. Be as creative as you want, but keep these important things in mind:

+ Make sure the area code matches the celebrity.
+ Start with something subtle, yet grand enough to get the person to bite
+ When the target asks who it is, respond only with the first name, inserted into a casual phrase (Dude, it’s Matt.)
+ If he presses further, reveal the last name, but act kind of bothered that you’re having to do it
+ Try to convince him you’re going to have to change your number now
+ Take a screenshot of the entire conversation and post it for the world to see (send me a link!)

Split and Funnel
I learned this game from Tripp and LV at Disneyland a couple months ago. This game really only works when it’s crowded and there is consistent foot traffic walking in the opposite direction as you (malls, parks, etc).

When it is your turn, one of your other group members quietly calls “split” or “funnel”. If “split”, you have to walk between the approaching group/couple, even if they’re holding hands. If “funnel”, you have to both walk around the outside of the oncoming traffic, even if they’ve decided to funnel themselves and the polite move would be to walk between them. The goal here is to make it seem as natural as possible. Once someone yells at you for being an a-hole (like they did to Tripp), you lose.

Have you made up any games that we need to hear about?

Click here to read more of my Original Games series.
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Post sponsored by Atlanta Personal Injury Attorney, Robert N. Susko

Coin Game
You and your opponent throw a nickel or dime onto the ground in main walkway closest to your departing gate. Owner of the first coin to be picked up by a stranger is the winner. Feel free to change things up as the rounds progress – first woman to pick one up, first business man, first airport employee, first person talking on a cell phone, etc. Oh, and the reason you use a nickel or dime in this game is simple. No one picks up pennies and everyone picks up quarters.

Drink Order
Try to ask for as many different drinks as possible that you are certain they don’t have. This can be a one player game (try to beat your previous record) or a multi-player game, just as long as you and your opponent aren’t sitting next to each other. One of the reasons this game is so fun is because no one has ever been more hurried (in the history of humanity) than a stewardess during drink rounds. Here’s an example:

Stewardess: What would you like to drink?
Me: Um, Mellow Yellow please.
Stewardess: I’m sorry, we don’t have that.
Me: Oh, OK. Let’s see…I’ll just go with a black and tan.
Stewardess: No black and tans.
Me: Hmm… Really? Fine, just give me a Fanta grape.
Stewardess: Sir, we don’t– You know what? You get nothing.
Me: OK, OK fine. I’m just messing around. I’ll just take a Monster energy drink.

New Identity
Some might call this lying. I call it an exercise in improvisation. When the stranger next to you inevitably asks what you do for a living, make something up on the spot. Try to keep this ruse going as longs as possible – again, trying to beat your previous time. To increase difficulty, try doing a little research before he asks. Look at what he’s reading and listen in on those last minute phone calls to choose a profession that closely resembles his. This way, his questions will be more pointed and complex. If you are able to exchange contact information and keep this going after the flight, you’re immediately inducted into this game’s Hall of Fame.

Sky Mall
You and your opponent go back and forth trying to find the most ludicrous items in the Sky Mall magazine. This can go back and forth for a few hours. That is, unless someone finds the trump card. I present to you the most ridiculous item – The SkyRest.

Any other airplane/airport games we need to know about?
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Face Touch
The face touch is one of the most powerful non-verbal forms of communication in our culture today. The mere act of touching your face during a conversation is the universal sign for “you have something on your face, please remove it immediately.” All you have to do is rub the corner of your mouth a couple times and the other person is guaranteed to mirror your actions without even the slightest break in his story. So, during dinner with a friend, see how many times you can make your friend touch his face. If you use words, you lose. If he has to ask, “do I have something on my face?”, you lose.

Accent Game
One of the most embarrassing games you’ll ever take part in is The Accent Game. It’s quite simple. You give someone an accent, a subject to talk about, and 20 seconds. Then, that person must ride it out, as embarrassing as it is.

Now, a couple caveats. One, don’t get stuck in the Italian/British/Old Man league. That’s for beginners and leads to minimal embarrassment at best. Instead, try venturing into Russian/Pre-pubescent Scottish/Norwegian/Urkel territory for maximum humiliation. Two, place under-the-table bets with your friends as to what a person will say when it’s his/her turn. For instance, as you might remember from my interview with Bryan Allain, I have a theory that anyone doing an Italian accent will, at some point, throw in the phrase “mamma mia”.

Tweak the Phone Settings
Ask to borrow your friend’s phone to make a call right before he goes into a serious or professional setting (conference, church, meeting, class, etc). Instead of making a call, change your friend’s phone settings to the loudest possible ring volume. And while you’re at it, change the ringtone to your most shameful option possible. It might even be worth downloading a Beyonce or Gwen Stefani song to maximize the outcome. Then, at the appropriate time, call him. The beautiful thing about this is he won’t even know it’s his phone for the first seven seconds. It won’t be until he is both angry at the audacity of the non-phone-silencer and baffled by the ringtone choice that he’ll realize it has been him the entire time.

Now, go play these games (and the others) and let us know what happens in the comments.
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Ever since writing my last post on original games you must play, I keep thinking of new ones that I need to share with the world. I think your life will be enhanced by playing them.

Laugh Wind Down
One of the funniest things in life is watching someone wind down from a laugh or a smile. You know, those 4-7 seconds of transition where a person’s face slowly and awkwardly returns to it’s normal state. Often times, the mouth gets normal before the eyes do and you end up with this weird unbent mouth/high eyebrow combo, or vise-versa. See which one of your friends/acquaintances take the longest, and which ones, like me, have acknowledged this phenomenon and try to expedite the wind down with a cough or subtle mouth wipe.

Max Headroom
Much like the book-mailing stunt, you’ll rarely, if ever, see the fruit of this game. If someone asks you to take a picture of them, frame it so their faces line the bottom edge and the rest of the picture is pure, undisturbed headroom (just think about the last picture your aunt took for you). The trick is disguising the upward angle of the camera. I would suggest squatting down a bit to make it appear that the camera’s upward angle is an absolute necessity. If the photo shows up on Facebook, you win. Now go and tag yourself in it.

Catalogs.com
On catalogs.com, it is 100% free to order catalogs. There are literally thousands to choose from. A few months ago, I got a designer walking canes catalog in the mail addressed to “Tyler Stanton, Movie Star”. There was no record anywhere of where it came from or who sent it – just that it came from catalogs.com. Naturally, I had my suspicions about who sent it*, so I immediately sent him one about composting toilet systems. Neither one of us have spoken a word about it (until now). I imagine this could go on indefinitely without ever getting old. Everyone is a winner in this game.

Now, go and play one of these and tell us about it in the comments. Pictures and videos are encouraged.

*I’m beginning to have second thoughts about who mailed this to me.
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