Monday 5 December 2011

Buzz! Off

Great! It’s Christmas again. There’s nothing quite like spending quality time with family and friends to forget about the woes and realities of the real world (kicking George Osborne in the shins can wait to the New Year) whilst tucking into shit loads of food and booze. This year is the little man’s first Christmas and whilst I can’t wait to see him open all his presents (sadly Star Wars Lego is not suitable for a one-year old) there are other Christmas matters that need attending to that are of far greater importance. Like revenge…

Let me explain. For the last few years Christmas has been spent round the parents-in-law. Father-in-law provides the real Ale, which makes the piss-water of lager ever more obvious; mother-in-law cooks a mean turkey to keep us all plump and fat; and the remainder of the family are left to watch the Christmas Dr Who special and to play games during the Queen’s speech. Usually, the gaming involves the well-known mechanisms of Trivial Pursuit and Pictionary, but two years ago, whilst browsing this place I had a serious moment of genius:


I’ve got a PS3; Buzz! could be a winner in bringing about extra-curricular family joy and festive cheer to all. And it did. With four players knocking heads together in deadly quizzical combat it brought forth frenzied button mashing, gamesmanship and the odd bit of friendly banter. The endeavour was a hugely entertaining success. Mostly because I was freaking untouchable. No one could get close my fastest finger first. Not even my brother who, truth be told, is a bit of a gaming savant, has defeated me on Buzz! in the intervening period as yet (which I hope still seriously pisses him off). My avatar of the Dark Lord ruled supreme. Jason Donovan continually bowed down and worshipped my amazing skills. Everything was right with the world.

Until the day it happened. I was finally defeated on Buzz! last Christmas by my sister-in-law, who continually likes to remind me of the fact by posting photos of my defeat on Facebook! This would be okay if the Chrimbo tree in the photo didn’t look like it was laughing at me or if my conqueror had defeated me with any kind of discernable talent. The final round, however, consisted entirely of button bashing on sis-in-law’s part in the hope of attaining the right answer as the platforms our avatars were standing on slowly fell towards a bottomless pit of doom and defeat. Except sis-in-law’s platform was gradually starting to go upwards with every answer she managed to correctly ascertain before the other contestants, whilst mine continued to plummet. What in the blue hell? This non-tactic of frantically bashing the buzzer to get the answer right was working. Working, dammit! And before I could accidentally trip over and press the reset button, sis had been victorious. Endless mugging for the rest of the year has since followed.

So, this period of festive cheer is time for revenge and for the status quo to be re-established, as I magnificently reclaim my Buzz! throne. This year I won’t be distracted by the late arrival of the little tinker (due Christmas Eve my arse) and the enforced sobriety, which obviously provided an advantage in your derisory victory. The blue touch paper is lit. The gauntlet has been thrown down. I’ll bring the PS3 and a big bag of awesome; sis, you just attempt to bring it. Sadly, all you’ll be able to do is watch on forlornly as your wretched avatar is crushed into a gormless pulp as my superior quiz skills and answer response outwit your inferior button bashing.  

Re-match?

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Lol good luck!

TToria @http://ttoria.blogspot.com

Jonathan Cardwell said...

I too am the undefeated Buzz champion amongst my friends.

I have not yet been beaten, but fully expect my hubris (or alcohol) to be my downfall.