Proxy Tic-Tac-Toe

The boys and I were at The 99 (Restaurant) recently (kind of a Howard Johnson's for the current decade), and, as soon as we sat down, they immediately got right down to the good work of coloring, drawing Mount Rushmore, picking out which items were in Picture #2 but not in Picture #1, and all of the other rigorous activity in the pages of the children's menu. One activity was tic-tac-toe, and Ian and I played several rounds of it (he never ceases to be amazed at the stupidity of my moves).

It turned out that Daniel and I also played tic-tac-toe, as I was planning out our order, but I didn't realize that I was playing until the game was well underway. It turned out that I was "playing" by proxy - that Daniel was actually selecting and executing my moves for me. It also turned out that I was losing abysmally.

I guess I must have offered to play tic-tac-toe with him, because Daniel clarified: "You are playing with me: you're O-Red [crayon color] and I'm X-Green."

At one point, he mocked me for my clear lack of talent, bursting out with, "Hah hah hah hah! I have four X's - you have three O's."

Apparently I had lost the tic-tac-toe plebiscite.

(May 22, 2011)