Maryland Trip and Role Playing Games by Ruth Paget

Maryland Trip and Role Playing Games by Ruth Paget 

One year after Thanksgiving, my husband Laurent and I set out for Fort Meade outside Baltimore, Maryland for one of his business trips. 

I knew from American history class in high school that Baltimore, Maryland was important for the defense of Washington, D.C. Baltimore sits opposite Washington, D.C. over the Potomac River. If ships sail up the Potomac to attack D.C., cannons from the highlands of Baltimore could fire on invaders below. 

Maryland is still a key player in the nation’s defense. The U.S. Naval Academy is in Annapolis. The National Security Agency is also located in Maryland, but is hard to find. 

I had no plans to visit Washington, D.C., since I was a Close-Up program participant in high school and had studied government in a weekly club with a year-end trip to Washington, D.C. for a series of workshops and presentations devoted to governing the United States. 

I still felt like a Close-Up participant despite being almost sixty. I had also worked for several years as a youth services librarian and felt as if I had reverted to eighteen years of age. Specifically, I wanted to see if I could come up with any ideas of how to get more money into the economy and banks with a role playing game. 

I thought of ways to reduce the nation’s debt on the 5-hour trip to Baltimore from Los Angeles. The game and some of the solutions I thought of for the nation’s debt crisis follow: 

Game: Reducing Nation’s Debt Background: For each $1 deposited in the bank, the bank only has .05 cents in the vaults to cover it due to bad loans. 

Watch the film It’s a Wonderful Life starring Jimmy Stewart to know why this is a very bad situation. 

Adults are deeply in debt with credit card companies stopping to raise credit limits despite credit scores. 

Young people have money, but not too much. 

Role: You are the Treasury Secretary whom the President has asked to get money into the economy and banks quickly before year-end. 

Mission: Get money into the economy to make federal payroll every two weeks. 

Possible Problem Solutions: 

1 – Lower the percentage of money taken on coin counting machines to 5%, so coins in jars go back into the economy. 

People accumulate coins in regions where tourism is a major industry. Getting outstanding coins into the economy avoids expenses related to minting new ones, especially expenses for mining ore. 

2 – Set up Recycling Centers for Plastic, Aluminum, and glass 

Make recycling a win-win situation with people who bring in these items being paid to do so in the form of refunded deposits. Money can be used for junior college tuition, bus fare, or car maintenance funds. 

3 - Set up Christmas Savings Clubs at Banks 

When I was growing up in Detroit, banks advertised these clubs and said you could deposit $50 a month to have $600 at Christmas for gifts or meals. 

4 – Set up Layette Savings Funds to buy baby furniture and clothing for newborns 

$2,000 can buy the basics. This fund can be used for emergency car repairs, too. 

5 – Set up Car Maintenance Funds 

$2,000 to $3,000 in the bank will make it easy to do transmission fluid changes and buy new tires. 

6 – Set up an Emergency Rent or Mortgage Fund for two years 

Multiply your monthly rent or mortgage by 24 months to set the amount you need to save to have a basic safety net. 

7 – Set up a Trousseau Fund This is a fund for a layette plus wedding dress and/or tuxedo. 

The amount will vary depending on what kind of dress or tuxedo you would like. 

8 – Set up a Vacation Savings Fund 

Find out what hotels, rental cars, and meals will cost you in advance of your vacation and save for the basic amount. 

Divide that amount by 12 and make monthly deposits towards it. It is easier to buy souvenirs when you know the major expenses are covered. 

9 – Buy relatively inexpensive print items for Christmas 

These items include: 

-art posters 

-note cards

 -stationery 

-greeting cards 

-lithographs -

wrapping paper 

-art books of varying price levels 

-origami paper

-origami guidebooks

10 – Set up a dream car down payment fund 

11 – Sell Kitchen Items 

-cookware 

-placemats 

-napkins 

-tablecloths for kitchen and patio 

-holiday decoration items 

-cookbooks 

Check bookbub.com for cookbook deals on e-readers.  Many deals between .99 and 2.99.

12 – Sell Comic Books and Graphic Novels 

13 – Sell Paper Products for the Home 

-toilet paper 

-tissues 

-paper towels 

14 - Promote Junior College Enrollment

15 -Buy clothes

You can usually enroll immediately into a junior college without waiting a year as you do for a university.  Junior colleges might also want to think about offering online courses to expand the number of students who can enroll at a college locally and outside the state at non-resident fees.

I was trying to think of items to sell that were already in stock, so sales tax could be immediately collected. A perfect game I thought would have 20 items listed to get money in the economy fast, but the plane landed. I would get back to the game another day. 

Laurent and I were headed out to a hotel near Ellicott City, Maryland. We went to Costco and got deli salads, cocktail shrimp, muffins, and cookies. 

Costco was near a shopping center with a Pizza Due (managed by a UChicago graduate I found out), Carrabba’s (my favorite place for seafood pasta), and a Barnes and Noble bookstore. 

We headed out to Pizza Due for dinner. We met the manager and ordered iceberg lettuce quarters with blue cheese – honey – and walnut dressing followed by an Italian sausage and cheese, deep-dish pizza. I loved this combination as a student at the University of Chicago as I endured icy winters and memorizing art history slides. We planned our weekend outings to travel and see friends over dinner. 

Over the five weeks we were there, we also accumulated the following gifts for our daughter Florence Paget, who was working at an investment bank at the time: 

-a Liberty Bell replica from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 

-a Harry Potter Tic-Tac-Toe Game 

-Three books by Charles Whelan that we bought at Barnes and Noble: Naked Statistics, Naked Economics, and Naked Money 

I worked on creating war games that future presidents or military officers could use. I wanted to make games that you could work on individually or play around a card table or dining room table. The games I worked on include: 

-Novgorod - about the battle on frozen Lake Peipus in Russia 

-Tagalog - about restoring friendly diplomatic relations with the Philippines 

-Hangul - about the problems involved in unifying the Korean Peninsula 

-Bento - about the possible role of Japanese lunch in winning a war against Russia 

When we flew home to Monterey, I felt I had done a good job playing defense in my own little way, too. 

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks (Japan) and Teen in China

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Driving in Washington, D.C. and More Mommy Time by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Driving in Washington, D.C. and more Mommy Time by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget 

My lazy days of summer reading by myself in the air-conditioned apartment were coming to an end.  Florence was coming back from her summer vacation in France.

She stayed with her grandparents in the Nantes area at the mouth of the Loire River that opens out into the Atlantic Ocean.  Naoned is the Breton name for Nantes.  Nantes is the ancient capital of Brittany, Celtic France. 

Chrétien de Troyes wrote the first version of the King Arthur and Knights of the Round Table story here.  I told Florence she might see Sir Lancelot, King Arthur, and Queen Guenivere walking around and to be on the lookout for them when she visited her grandparents.

This region is still considered by many to be allied with the Celtic British Isles with Celts in Cornwall, Wales, parts of Scotland (the Picts), and Ireland.  Galicia in Spain is also Celtic.

The Celts all play bagpipes, write poetry, sing, dance, and eat haggis and other offal type foods to save money.  They tend to drink bad wine like vinho verde (northern Portugal is considered to be Celtic as well.) 

One of the great modern musicians from Brittany is Alain Stivell.  He is a Pied Piper when he plays a harp. 

One of my great life experiences was driving around Brittany with Laurent after we visited Carnac with Stivell’s music playing and a CD by the French navy band just being awestruck tourists. 

Florence was now coming home from her vacation in King Arthur Land and Laurent was out on a cruise, which meant I would have to pick her at Dulles National Airport in Wasington, D.C. all by myself in the blue Nova.

I have driven in Chicago from Madison (Wisconsin) after ice storms and could do it, so I knew I just had to pay attention to exits.  This was harder said than done in pre-Internet days. 

Not everyone had websites, but our ship ombudsman obtained the exit I needed to take on the Beltline around DC and the three exits in front of it.  

I needed to know the three exits, so I could move into position to take the Dulles exit and not have to go around DC to get back to the exit again, if I missed it.

When Florence was due home, I made it to the airport with lots of time to spare.  I parked in the expensive parking lot, so I would not have too far to walk with a purse, child, and suitcase.  This parking lot is well lit, had video surveillance, and human attendants at the pay station.  (Safety first with children is my motto.)

I finished reading The Art and Architecture of Japan by Robert Treat and Alexander Soper while waiting.  (The Japanese have messes, too, but put them all behind sliding doors until they can organize things.  Everything looks neat and orderly on the outside.)

Florence ran out to see me from her Air France flight when she got off the plane.  I picked up her bag, carried it to the parking lot, put it in the trunk, and played Speed Racer a bit to deal with Beltline until I could get on the slower highway down to Hampton Roads.

It started to pour rain.  I had blankets and snacks for Florence to eat.  She fell asleep, so I could fret about buying new windshield wipers all the way home in the rain.  We did make it home and tree branches were everywhere from the wind.

Florence tumbled into her bed and slept until the next day.  I checked for nor’easter warnings – fall or winter hurricanes. 

If one were coming, we were going through the Great Dismal Swamp to Georgia to my sister’s or Up North from there to Wisconsin and grandma.  I think my family had property where Hurricane Hazel hit and learned as a small child to just leave and not look back when hurricanes rolled in.

When we woke up the next day, I made croissants (Pillsbury Dough Boys after the drive to DC) for breakfast and hot chocolate.

Florence did theatre skits for me about things she did in France for summer vacation.  We played theatre for an hour until the swimming pool opened.

Florence ran to the pool in the 90 degree heat at 9 am in the morning.  She dove right in and stayed in for 2 hours. 

When the lifeguards announce, “Adult Swim,” the kids scowl and say they don’t want necking in the pool to give them cooties.

I was hungry and did not want to stay at the pool for 6 hours after a DC drive.  We went to Pizza Hut where I ordered my usual order: a medium meat pizza, a medium vegetarian pizza, the salad bar (it was unlimited, but I usually only went twice for coleslaw and potato or macaroni salad), and diet soda.  We took home leftovers for dinner.

After our pizza outing, we went home, so I could unpack Florence’s suitcase and wash and dry her clothes.

While the clothes were washing, we went to the library and took out books about gardens.  Her grandparents had vegetable, fruit, and herb gardens as well as topiary bushes and “the lawn” for croquet and badminton games.  We hid Florence’s Easter eggs in the bushes around the lawn and gave her basket to go looking for them.

We stayed home during the next few rainy days.  We went and got daddy and went to Applebee’s for steak and shrimp for completing a mission.  I told Florence that steak and shrimp is called “surf and turf” in English or “mar et montaña” in Spanish.  (Many Mexican restaurants also serve this dish when you do not have a chain around.)

Laurent and Florence watched Mission Impossible and James Bond, so Florence would know what dad was up to at work. 

I preferred Stephen Segall for his East Asian philosophical pronouncements in corrupt police situations, Jackie Chan for humor, Jean-Claude Van Damme for his lithe moves despite girth, and Miami Vice for the music, pastel-colored clothes, and sunglasses.

If I needed pop culture explications of these pop culture shows, I would go to the Boathouse and eat crab legs and dunk hushpuppies in melted butter.  I was starting to realize that you can make a lot of money in pop culture.

By Ruth Pennington Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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