One thing my family loves to do when we get together is play Canasta. We have our own version with our own rules.
We used to play Canasta with our friends when we were teenagers as well. We often had Mitch Johnson and one or two other friends over for late night games of Canasta up in the attic. I recall one game that had run long into the night. At some point, Mark accused Mitch of cheating and proceeded to pull a dozen or so cards from various places Mitch had hidden them. Mitch was caught. We laughed and he was duly punished by taking away points or Mark wrestling him until he cried (which actually happened at times, despite Mitch being much bigger than Mark, Mark was incredibly strong). Eventually we got too tired to play any more. Mitch left (he lived just up the street) and Mark got up with him. That’s when I found Mark’s stash of cards – he must have had hundreds of cards hidden. Lucky for us, despite having all those cards, he wasn’t very good at cheating. I don’t think he won!
