Tactics. Deviousness. Tossing monkeys. Another Silly Army Sunday

Happy as two pigs in... What could these two possibly be building?

The Silly Army spent Saturday night on Southbourne beach, playing games, enjoying a barbecue and making some rather interesting sand sculptures. This meant many of the Bournemouth sports and games club members were a little tired come Sunday games, but because we’re all solar powered we were soon rejuvenated by the glorious day that greeted us. There was also some kind of Jehovah’s Witness convention in Dean Court, meaning that instead of ethnic music this week we were treated to hymns as we played.

Things got off to a leisurely start with a game of ‘hunt the cigarettes’ as Dave had lost his. We never found them but rumours that some higher power was smiling on us abounded after Pete discovered a rouge tenner – a nice boost to Silly Army funds.

Members were slow to arrive so we started off with some hula hooping, which Pete has clearly been practising. After we’d all swung our hips for a while, we were joined by Alex, who brought a veritable bag of goodies on his bike.

Alex assumes the position...

Not only did he have a bag of water bombs, he also came armed with a leg catapult (which looks alarmingly like surgical stirrups when put on). Alex and Duncan had soon worked out a game involving firing the water bombs with the catapult; Duncan nobly volunteered to be the target while Alex assumed the somewhat ungainly firing position to shoot bombs at him.

Once the water bombs were spent, Pete, Alex and Duncan spent much time firing missiles and balls of various shapes and sizes – the leg catapult could just prove to be a winner; the position you must assume to use it not so much.

Games proper began with Monkey Toss:Extreme, which it is quickly becoming clear is mostly an excuse to call your friends ‘useless tossers’ should they miss the target.

This is a sneaky game of tactics, deviousness and tossing monkeys, and the more we play it the more strategies are starting to emerge.  Team Dave quickly took an impressive lead as Pete’s team played and lost too many monkeys too soon. But it should never be said this team, including Kathy, Terminator, Alex and Helen, lacks tossers, and thanks to some sneakery Dick Dastardly would be proud of, Team Pete staged a comeback to ensure this was a game that mattered.

Chris and Pete stage a pump off - foot pump v hand pump. Chris had the best pump action.

Hockey was next and was a tough, long game in the heat. The yellow team were dominant for most of the game with the vast majority of action taking place in the red half. A spectacular goal keeping balls-up by Kathy didn’t help the red team’s cause, and while Esther, Pete and Duncan in particular fought a valiant game up front for the reds, the yellows took the game, with Alex and Omar in particular showing great speed and skill and an overall great team effort.

We tried dodgeball in a triangular formation, which proved interesting and over very quickly when double dodge was introduced. A few rounds of standard, circular dodge were also played to keep traditionalists happy.

Sticky ball followed and again the heat seemed to be affecting people’s shooting abilities, as there were several missed goals from usually on-target strikers. Though the teams were quite closely matched, it was the yellows’ day and they were winners.

Sticky ball in progress. The yellows were the wieners this week.

Following tea, we played combi-ball, a game where scores can quickly be reversed. The yellow team got off to a flying start, but the blues staged a spectacular comeback for a closely fought battle. The blue team eventually took the game with a neat single-point side goal courtesy of Ras.

Dave had brought along a new game called Cub, which we played next. This involves throwing sticks at your opposing team’s knights (blocks of wood) and trying to knock them down without hitting the king in the middle.

It may have helped if we had read the rules properly, as we missed a crucial point about moving forwards so the game went on for an hour and a half. However, it was very entertaining and, now we know the rules, is sure to be a Silly Army regular fixture.

Cub is our newest game.

Though it was getting late and we’d packed many of the toys away, we wanted to play on, so we put up the net and played badminton (Helen knows how to play badminton!)

Ras also developed a game of his own using the cub toys like skittles and a volley ball to knock them down then tag people with. The Silly Army always welcomes game suggestions, so if you have any ideas what we can do with our toys please let us know and we’ll try them out!

We also held an EGM to vote on an amendment to the constitution and to vote Kathy on to the committee to handle press, PR and propaganda (more fool her).

The Silly Army meets in King’s Park, Bournemouth, every Sunday from 1pm and Wednesday from 7pm. We love new members so please come and join us, or bring a friend! We’ve got loads of social events and activities planned over the summer, too.

Join the Silly Army and you can do this too.

The Silly Army are tossers…

Cheeky monkeys - the stars of our new game, Monkey Toss.

…Monkey tossers, of course! Monkey Toss made its debut proper and Monkey Toss: Extreme was premiered in King’s Park last Sunday at the Silly Army Bournemouth sports club.

Glorious sunshine meant conditions were perfect for tossing magnetic monkeys as it was just too hot for very much running around.

Tossing seems to have been uppermost in the minds of chief games inventors Pete and Dave of late, as we started with another game that involved throwing things – this time rockets – at each other.

Incoming! As Karl and Pete choose their weapons, Alex goes in for the kill.

Missile Command made use of the Silly Army’s collection of home-made hula hoops and a box of rockets picked up by our chief inventors earlier in the week. Played in teams, the hula hoops acted as bases while the rockets were launched, lobbed and variously pelted across the field in an attempt to knock these bases out.

Though it needed a few rounds of testing to make the game run more smoothly – including adding balls and space hoppers to the bases for easier to monitor targets – Missile Command is shaping up to be a good game, with a real fear factor when the rockets fly towards you.

After a quick hula hoop skipping race – in which Alex and Karl demonstrated the benefits of long legs compared with Kathy and Mike’s shorter ones – we decided to try a running around game and played hockey.

This was tough in the heat, but new player Karen was impressive, particularly in her displays of falling over – surely a Silly Army natural! We had some new balls from Tesco and these took a bit of getting used to. The game was close as everyone suffered in the heat and we agreed to play first to five. It was the yellow team who claimed victory.

After a few rounds of dodge ball in the shade to allow everyone time to recover, another close match followed as we played sticky ball. Alex’s pitch-long throwing helped the blues win the first game while Terminator and Jamie’s on-target shooting claimed the second game for the yellows.

While the rest of her team launch rockets, Kathy attempts to distract the opposition by pretending to be a scarecrow.

Giles suffered from being accidentally landed on by Pete (a scary fate indeed) in the third game and decided that was his cue to leave early, leaving the yellows a player down. Another impressively long throw from Alex, caught by star shooter Helen leading to a goal, showed the blues meant business, but ultimately the yellows worked as a tighter unit to claim the game and the match.

During tea break, some players limbered up for Monkey Toss. Give Pete wood, colourful metal and a bunch of magnetic monkeys and it’s only a matter of time before he creates something to play with – surely he’s missed his calling as a Blue Peter presenter.

"This, sir, is how one tosses one's monkeys."

The aim is to throw monkeys on to the metal with points awarded (by Monkeymaster Dave) for the best position or arrangement of monkeys. Quite how the scoring system works only the Monkeymaster knows,

After we had got our breath back and enjoyed a squirting from Karl’s water pistol, we played another variant of Monkey Toss – Monkey Toss:Extreme, which utilises both of the newly created goals.

Teams had to transport their monkeys from one end of the pitch to the other while two of the opposing team tried to catch them and steal their charges. Any monkeys that successfully reached their destination were then tossed towards the monkey toss goals. Any monkeys that missed the board were handed to the opposition team.

Extreme monkey toss in action.

A game of deception, running and hiding your monkeys, Alex once again proved that fast legs win matches, and it was Alex’s team that got the most monkeys on the board – enough to spell the word “Toss.”

Cladwhacking came next, Omar showing great agility and an a surprising amount of energy to help the yellows win.

We tried some more Missile Command to demonstrate it to the latecomers before space hopper cricket. This was really Alex and Karl’s game, Terminator also putting in an impressive performance to ensure their team thrashed Pete and Steph’s team 65-18.

Before the rest of the gang arrived. Kathy and Pete had been busily constructing a circle of trampettes for another new game – pinning them all into the rocky ground producing some language almost as colourful as the trailer.

Alex just loves throwing stuff. Dave, meanwhile, loves holding up nets.

The Circle of Doom is a form of dodgeball where the aim is to bounce the ball off the trampettes and hit your opponent, knocking them out.

Catching the ball was not allowed, which made things much more interesting because it goes against natural instinct.

Afterwards we invented another ball/trampette game. Quadrant Ball saw players standing in different segments of a circle, bouncing a ball of a trampette and attempting to make their opponents miss it.

When the ball was missed, the opponent in question had to move round one segment; if the ball bounced out, the thrower had to move round one segment. Once you had been round the circle and were back to your starting section, you were eliminated. Most impressive knock-out of the day was awarded to Pete, whose ball hit the side of the trampette and bounced over his own head, thus eliminating himself.

The Silly Army meets at King’s Park, Bournemouth, every Sunday afternoon from 1pm and every Wednesday from 7pm. Come along and join us. Visit our website for more information and more detailed description of the games we like to play.

Silly Army members do it twice a week!

Dave demonstrates a new game - Monkey Toss.

It’s Wednesday. It’s cold, grey skied and raining. That can only mean one thing: Silly Summer is upon us.

The second week in May was an important one for the Silly Army as we re-launched our Wednesday evening “Silly Army Lite” games sessions. Running from 7pm to darkness and beyond, these shorter meets focus on net games and a few interesting adaptations of our Sunday repertoire. More about Silly Army Lite later; first, let’s take a look at what we got up to last Sunday.

Two magic words greeted the early arrivals at King’s Park on Sunday: Monkey Toss.

Monkey Toss was an idea dreamt up by fearless leaders Dave and Pete (who, quite frankly, spend too much time thinking about things to do with primates) while playing with a magnetic monkey one day.

They discovered that by tossing the monkey against something metal, they could achieve all manner of amusing positions. The idea quickly formulated to gather a troop of 12 magnetic monkeys, and some metal, and award points to players for the positions they achieved. Twelve sticky monkeys were quickly assembled and on Sunday the game was trialled by flinging the monkeys at Sweetpea (the world’s most beautiful, most colourful car).

This car is a babe magnet. For small, hairy, magnetic simian babes.

Testing the game proved popular – after all, who doesn’t enjoy tossing monkeys? – and resulted in Pete’s car becoming something of a babe magnet, albeit for babes with more body hair than he has…

When the serious silly games got underway, a tough game of hockey ensured that everyone was soon feeling energised knackered. This was a hard-fought and drawn out battle, eventually won by the yellow team.

Having been worn out by hockey, we opted for a few rounds of dodgeball and double dodge, where particular mention must go to new member Jamie for some spectacular dodges, including an impressive leap. Could dodgeball king Ras have found a rival for his crown?

Lining up for sticky ball.

Sticky ball followed and proved another tiring, well-contested encounter, which the blue team won two games to one.

Next came tchoukball, recently updated with the addition of two extra trampette goals to give a grand total of four. The yellow team proved best at communicating and working together to win this game.

After a short tea break, we played old favourite crumbs and crows (or is it crows and crumbs?), the game guaranteed to get everybody confused, but also sure to get everyone talking – to ask “So, are we crows, or crumbs?”

Crows and crumbs, for the uninitiated, is a chase game in which players are split into two teams, one crumbs, the other crows. When your team name is called, you run and the other team chases you. It’s a constant source of amusement how much confusion this game can cause!

How to play tchoukball, as demonstrated by our loveable leaders. Scary faces entirely compulsory when attempting to score.

After this “genteel” pastime, everyone was in the mood for a good, hard cladwhacking. Good and hard it was, too; another long game, involving lots of good-spirited combat and friendly whacking. This was won by the yellows, who comprehensively thrashed the blues.

Next it was time for a new variation on an old game; Space Invaders. Instead of two sets of cones to knock down, there were seven, each within an exclusion zone and each with one cone for the blue and one cone for the yellow team.

The yellows comprehensively won the first game, quickly adopting a team strategy. However, the blues staged a comeback in the second game after Pete started talking tactics. This was clearly the yellow team’s forte, however, and they eventually won the match.

Space Invaders proved unexpectedly tiring, so another tea break followed. We rounded off the day with a game of space hopper cricket, which once again saw individual against individual. This quickly became the Ras and Terminator show as their impressive space hopper batting saw Terminator declare at 20 runs, only for Ras to score 21. Helen also proved good at this game, while the rest of us battled it out for Golden ducks.

We reconvened on Wednesday evening for two games of hockey (won by the reds first and the yellows second), sticky ball (a yellow whitewash), and bigminton/Silly tennis (won by team Pete on both occasions).

We love to play hockey night and day.

The Silly Army meets at King’s Park, Bournemouth, every Sunday afternoon from 1pm and every Wednesday from 7pm. Come along and join us any time throughout the sessions. You’ll find us behind the playground at the Ashley Road entrance. Visit our website for more information.

We also like to go on social events and are holding a bike ride this Saturday, going from Boscombe to Corfe Castle. Contact us if you’d like to come along! Cycling up trees is entirely optional…

Pete loves bikes. Pete loves trees. So this has gotta work, right? Join us for our bike rides!