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Providence's Great Blizzard
I was a young child during the Great Blizzard of 1978, and I can't say I really remember any of it. My friend Keith can't remember a thing of it, either, although I vaguely remember some sort of story about him having to go to the hospital for something-or-other (he was a newborn) during the blizzard and the only vehicle that could get through was a firetruck. Awoooooga!
Anyway, on those cold or stormy days when we'd worn out all of our traditional means of entertainment, namely pretending we were Ghostbusters or zombie hunters, or terrorizing his grandmother, we'd whip out the board games. Keith's grandmother had a couple of the old standbys - Monopoly and such - and we would tire of them rather easily. And then we would pull out the bizarre box emblazoned with the 70s lettering, "Providence's Great Blizzard!" Yes, some local yahoo had made some money making a board game of the Blizzard of '78. This is where we got most of our information about blizzards.
The game was actually pretty freaking boring, with two sides to the game board - the "sunny side" was the first (pre-storm), and then eventually you had to flip over to the actual storm side. We rolled our dice and walked our pieces around until that fateful moment when we, too, got to relive Providence's Great Blizzard! (Thankfully this was not at all like a Jumanji board, and no snow ever crept inside our windows.)
Would you believe that, like the storm, I can't remember anything else about this game but how boring it was? I don't think we ever finished an entire run before moving back to zombies and ectoplasmic residue.
I wonder if someone will make a game about the Blizzard of '05. It doesn't have that snappy ring to it that "Blizzard of '78" does, but who knows? It could happen. I wonder what Keith is up to now.
Anyway, on those cold or stormy days when we'd worn out all of our traditional means of entertainment, namely pretending we were Ghostbusters or zombie hunters, or terrorizing his grandmother, we'd whip out the board games. Keith's grandmother had a couple of the old standbys - Monopoly and such - and we would tire of them rather easily. And then we would pull out the bizarre box emblazoned with the 70s lettering, "Providence's Great Blizzard!" Yes, some local yahoo had made some money making a board game of the Blizzard of '78. This is where we got most of our information about blizzards.
The game was actually pretty freaking boring, with two sides to the game board - the "sunny side" was the first (pre-storm), and then eventually you had to flip over to the actual storm side. We rolled our dice and walked our pieces around until that fateful moment when we, too, got to relive Providence's Great Blizzard! (Thankfully this was not at all like a Jumanji board, and no snow ever crept inside our windows.)
Would you believe that, like the storm, I can't remember anything else about this game but how boring it was? I don't think we ever finished an entire run before moving back to zombies and ectoplasmic residue.
I wonder if someone will make a game about the Blizzard of '05. It doesn't have that snappy ring to it that "Blizzard of '78" does, but who knows? It could happen. I wonder what Keith is up to now.