Dice - many, many dice

Dice are probably as old as culture. In one form or another, dice have been since man first became aware of the diceyness of life. (For previous DeKoven dice-significance-expounding, see Chance and Odds - accounting for the wild things in nature). There are probably thousands of different games that use dice. And, given the many, many pages in Kevin Cook's Dice Collection, probably almost as may different kinds of dice.

And therein lies a most empowering find for anyone who likes to play more or less abstractly with fate - because all these amazingly odd-shaped dice (he has counted 75 different shapes so far), and these dice with different combinations of dots and numbers and letters and pictures and colors, combine to provide a fathomless treasury of fate-tempting games and game ideas.

Take a look, for example, at some of the dice available through Koplow Games: place value dice, decimal dice, interrogative dice, money dice, parts of speech dice. And, lest you think this is all some educational ruse, click on over to Koplow's Double Dice - the old die-within-a-die game, where the outer-die meets the inner-die to add or subtract, multiply or divide, match or differ.

Can't wait to get your hands on one of these new, fun-enticing dice forms? Well then, think of thanking Mr. Cook personally for his small but print-and-playworthy collection of Paper Dice.


Thanks for this dicey link go to Grow-a-Brain

Putting a Face on Time

Of all the endearingly silly ways to watch yourself waste time, Daniel Craig Giffen's Human Clock is by far the most of both - endearing and silly, which explains why it is a recipient of the coveted Major FUN Award.

Everything on Giffen's site shows an almost maniacal dedication to human-scale whimsy. There are three clocks: digital, analog and text. Each mode is sillier than you'd expect it to be. To change between clocks, you go to an equally silly, but fully functional control panel that looks like something drawn by a fifth grader, and acts like a grown-up web interface. Try all three.

Then there's artist Yugo Nakamura's Industrious Clock. Not as human, perhaps, but it definitely conveys a certain "hand-made" humor. Nakamura's art, and playfulness, are even better represented by his "Surface" collection. Click on the small circles on the bottom of the page to explore.