The UpNorth Game

[Duffman]

A few years ago Mrs Duff and I came up with a game to pass the time on upnorth road trips. Once you reach a certain latitude, either the Powerloon or the KQDS family of radio stations come into play. We started out calling it the radio game, and what you do is draft a fantasy playlist of bands and songs that you think either of these radio stations will play by the time you reach your destination. We also play it while camping, but then we have set hours of the game, usually a three hour block.

Rules are constantly changing from year to year, we don't play as much on the road anymore, but do enjoy it with a larger group while camping. Last years rule was once you drafted a band, you could also pick a band that no one could take, thus eliminating them from the game. Also, once a band was picked, it could not be picked again.

It's a serpentine draft, you can pick names out of a hat, draw cards or straws to determine draft order.

This years rules were as follows;

Your team consists of 5 bands.

If the band you pick comes on the radio, you recieve 2 points.

You can pick a band and a song that you think will be played, if you are right you recieve 5 points, if it's the band you picked but NOT the song you picked you recieve 0 points.

A person can pick a band that was already drafted, but you must pick a song.

If a band gets played a second time during the time frame, the person who drafted it gets 3 points.

This past weekends game was very competitive, 5 of the 6 of us picked songs, and three of us got 'em. There were three repeat bands within the time frame (three hours). And thanks to Springsteen, a 11-11 tie was broken with ten minutes to go and Duffman was the Trout Lake three year reigning champion.

It's funny how far the obvious bands will last in the draft, I still can't believe I got the The Steve Miller Band with the 30th pick.

The draft board was the next mornings firewood, the timeframe needed to be changed because the Bulldogs were playing when we wanted to play.....

[slabchaser]

i love it. sounds like a good way to pass the time.

[Ralph Wiggum]

Sounds like fun!

[McGurk]

Sounds like a game that might work with KRCQ out of Detroit Lakes, I may have to give it a spin this weekend! Gotta love the Price Shocker!

[PierBridge]

Love the Power Loon and the game sounds fund.. you have a friend named Bush? LOL!

[Dark Cloud]

Nice one Duff, I like it!

Pier - His full name is BushWack.... Seriously, lol...

[S.D. Ice Angular]

I Like It!!!

[Duffman]

Both Bush and Kunz have the same first name. Kunzeye was trying to convice us that Eddie Money had played, I put a question mark there 'cause the rest of us were not conviced. And when a Eddie Money song came on three songs later.....that ended that debate (I'm pretty sure the first one was Billy Squier)

One tip; If you become too good at the "Game", you will be on the short end of a lot of mockery. I've been accused of all sorts of things from e-mailing a request list pre-trip to the radio station to calling in requests while I'm taking care of number 2 sitting on the thunderbox in the woods.

I forgot to include one of our rules, you cannot listen to the radio station the day of the game until the game begins or the draft is over.

It would work with any radio staion, as long as you have a good idea what kind of music the station plays.