Rock, Paper, Scissors
Dwayne "The Rock Paper Scissors" Johnson. Is that a thing?
Hello, lovers of fun and revelry! Jason Adam Katzenstein here. If you’re anything like me, you spent your childhood agonizing over whether or not you’d be the kind of kid who put a line through their sevens. If you preferred Pokemon or Digimon. And, of course, if you said “shoot” after saying “Rock, paper, scissors.” There were so many tiny decisions that added up to your whole thing.
I am, as you may have noticed by the Pokemon v. Digimon detail, thirty-three years old. I don’t play too much R,P,S these days. But what is a cartoon if not a delightful game we play with our readers, who expect an outcome and are often thrown off-kilter, surprised, delighted? For what it’s worth, I think that the most important thing is to get on the same page before you begin a round of R,P,S — are we both saying shoot? Or are we not? As with so much in adult life, communication is so important.
I legit love paperwork when it’s actually on paper but if it’s paperwork on the computer I don’t care for it!!!!
My RPS strategy? Glad you asked. Always pick Paper. Paper is going to beat rock. Now, keep in mind, rock loses to scissors, so if you think your opponent is going to pick scissors, you should go with rock, which beats it. Now, and this part is important, if your opponent is going to pick paper, definitely don’t choose rock, because paper beats rock. In that scenario, I would go with scissors, which beats paper. However, keep in mind that if you go with scissors, that leaves you vulnerable to rock, so you might consider going with paper. It’s important to note however, that if you play paper and they play scissors, they will win, so definitely play rock if they plan on doing that. If you decide to go with rock, you are leaving yourself open to being defeated by paper, so it might make more sense to go with scissors, unless they go with rock, in which case play paper unless they go with rock in which case play paper. Now, it can get complicated if they go with scissors, but that never happens, except for all the times it does, which means you'll want to go with rock. So that's basically it, go with paper, or rock, or scissors depending on what your opponent goes with. If you keep all that in mind, you'll never lose, except for all the times you do lose. You'll probably win like, 50% of the time, maybe a little less.
There once was a stoney clan, who raged against the man. But they encountered a sheet of paper so neat, it flattened them like a pan.
There next was a papery herd, each smart and straight as a nerd. But they met with some cutters, one after another, and it snipped them up something absurd.
There last was a scissory bunch, slashing up breakfast and lunch. But when they faced the rocks -- scandal! -- they flew off their handles, and we haven't seen anyone since.
Avocado pits are just tiny little rocks. And cartoons are printed on paper. Is this a stretch? Well, shoot. Um, scissors.
My dog, Stanley, is a pretty smart pup. He loves games and can play them all. Fetch? Get out of here. He plays rock, paper, scissors. Roll over? Quit it with that. He prefers chess. And sure, he hasn’t won a game yet, but you try to castle without opposable thumbs.
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Navied: Sisyphus … 🪨