How to Play Spades

On February 14, 2020February 14, 2020 By TayciIn Uncategorized

HOW TO PLAY SPADES: A THREAD

Thank you Twitter for this guide.

since y’all parents and uncles and aunties failed tf outta you, i’m gonna teach you losers how to play spades. everyone tends to play it a little different so i’m gonna start with the basics and add on extra shit at the end.

alright so first the basics: it’s a four person game, you and a teammate, and the other team also consisting of two people. there is NO COMMUNICATING with your partner once each round starts. that means no talking/hand gestures/taps/etc. taken VERY seriously.

it’s also all about TRUST. you need a teammate that can sense when you’re about to make a play, and vice versa. more on those plays later. let’s get into the deck.

52 cards are used in the game. All the regular cards MINUS the 2 of Hearts/2 of Clubs. They are replaced by the two JOKER cards. One being the “Big” joker, the other the “Lil” joker.

The Power Structure is as follows:

-Big Joker – strongest in the game, beats everything
-Lil Joker – second strongest, beats all EXCEPT Big Joker
-2 of Diamonds
-2 of Spades (these will both confuse you for the first few times you play, trust me 💀)

-A of Spades
-King of Spades
-Queen
-Jack
all the way down to 3 of Spades, beat all other suits. Only thing that beats a Spade is a higher Spade, 2 of Diamonds, Big/Lil Jokers.

But here’s the thing: spades can’t be used until somebody “Cuts” (runs out of another suit)

So let me show some game play
(this game is available in the app store if you wanna practice)

once the dealer passes out 13 cards to each player, the team the dealer is NOT on makes their bids first, estimating how many BOOKS they can win. A Book is when you win a round. How many of the 13 rounds do you think you can win? your # + teammates, that’s your bid.

there’s almost always a BOARD. A board is the LEAST amount you can bid, usually 4/5 books. So even if both you and your teammate think you can’t get ANY books, the lowest your can bid is “Board”

When you all decide how many books you think you can win, you start. The person to the left of the dealer pops it off, always. You can throw out any card of any suit EXCEPT SPADES, remember, you can’t throw out spades until someone CUTS.

here, my teammate LEAD (knowing what card lead, which is the first card thrown out each ‘round’ is very important) with a club, so now everyone has to throw out a club. If your teammate goes high, you go low. if the other team throws out high and you can’t beat, go low.

the reason you wanna go as low as possible is because it’s very possible that you could win a book with a 10 or a 9 (you’ll hear people say “wow, that 10 walked” meaning it won) so get rid of your 3/4/5s etc

NOT YOUR 2s
REPEAT NOT. YOUR. 2s.
(this app doesn’t use 2s correctly)

here, my teammate lead with a ❤️, so everyone has to throw out a ❤️. BUT WAIT! i don’t have any ❤️s left that means i get to CUT with a spade & because i’m the first to cut, i know they won’t cut higher (use a bigger spade) so i can use a low one to win. i used the 3 & won

downside after making the first cut, you’ve opened the floodgates, so anyone can LEAD with a spade. If you have a lot of spades in your hand, leading with spades is a great way to make the other team use theirs (but also your teammate too, so be careful) also can lead to reneging

reneging is when you cut with a spade but you still have all the suits in your hand. so say the other team throws out a 4 of ❤️ and you cut it thinking you didn’t have any ❤️s but turns out you did, that’s reneging, you’re now a renegger (if you’re not black don’t say it thx)

reneging results in losing books you’ve already won (most of the time 3 books) but ONLY IF YOURE CAUGHT 😉 so if you realize you did it, and nobody catches it, just keep going, keep that poker face STRONG. And don’t admit it after, cause people will watch closer. keep it secret.

So as you play through the 13 rounds, you end making (or not making) your book bid. if you make your bid, let’s say 7 books, you get 70 points. if you lose, you lose 70 points. if you make over your book bid, those are called sandbags (not everyone plays with sandbags)

so say, again, you bid 7 books, but you guys get 9, that means you have 2 sandbags. you get your 70 points for making your book bid, and 2 points, 1 for each sandbag. so now your score is 72. sandbags seem harmless but if you rack up 10, you lose 100 points, so BE CAREFUL.

also, if you keep getting sandbags, it means you or your teammate or both, aren’t bidding properly. look at your hand closer at the start of the game. if you know you usually get one more book than your bid, bid one book higher. it’s a different of 10 points.

if you’ve found yourself more than 100 points behind the other team, your team and bid BLIND. a blind bid is when you bid without looking at your cards, and if you get that bid, you get double points.

so say the score is 250 them, 120 us
we can bid blind, we’d say “blind 6” meaning, without looking at our cards, we think we can win 6 books, to get 120 points instead of 60 for a regular bid.

failing to get your book bid means you’re “SHOT”, and you lose the points. getting shot twice back to back ends the game, you lose.

that’s really the jist of it. games usually go until 500, can be more or less, & last about 45 min. they’re super fun, super competitive, there’s been fights at family bbqs over spades games lmaoo niggas do not play.

and don’t hate on people who tell you to watch first, it really can be hella confusing. sit behind someone and QUIETLY ask questions, watch younger people we ain’t as uptight about talking (as long as it’s not teammate to teammate)

Stories on the Sidewalk

On June 8, 2019June 8, 2019 By TayciIn EducationLeave a comment

Featuring some of Bakersfield’s most famous and influential historical characters

Straight from the mouths of those who were there, Stories on the Sidewalk will be a fun, educational walk through history, where colorful and amazing characters from Kern County’s past come alive on the streets of Bakersfield. This walking tour features eleven stops in downtown Bakersfield, with a different actor at each stop portraying some of Bakersfield’s most famous- and infamous- residents, such as Colonel Thomas Baker, Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren, Madge the Madam, the outlaw Dick Fellows and more. Wear comfortable walking shoes and enjoy these exciting stories of Kern’s rich history, told in riveting, locally written dramatic presentations and performed by local actors.

– The Arts Council of Kern

In February of 2018, I was tasked to write a narrative for the most notable Black residents of Bakersfield, William and Amanda Pinckney. The story was written to inform the residents of Kern County about their life in the 1900s including their journey to Bakersfield and their “current” struggles with racism.

More information can be found at these sites

The Arts Council of Kern- Stories on the Sidewalk

KGET- Stories on the Sidewalk tell about Bakersfield’s history

Walk into Kern’s past with Stories on the Sidewalk

Not So Secret History: Eugenics in America

On December 17, 2018December 17, 2018 By TayciIn EducationLeave a comment

Originally Posted on Blogging for Books

This post is for educational purposes only. All images owned by the American Philosophical Society Library.

Any group of farmers who permitted their best stock not to breed, and let all the increase come from the worst stock, would be treated as fit inmates for an asylum.

Theodore Roosevelt, 26th U.S. President

This collection of images show a history of America that is not often talked about. Touted as the Land of Freedom and Progress, history such as the Eugenics Programs that inspired Hitler beg to differ. These images from the American Philosophical Society Library are from the Eugenics Record Office (1910-1939).

The Eugenics Record Office (ERO) was a research institute established by the Carnegie Institute and financed primarily by the Institute, the Rockefeller Family, and Mary Harriman, an American Philanthropist. Charles Davenport, the founder of the ERO, believed that it was necessary to apply Mendelian Genetics to humans and together with the help of his wife Gertrude Davenport, an embryologist and geneticist, they wrote papers supporting the ERO and his ideas about Mendelian Genetics and humans.

Not only was the ERO financed by well-known and respected members of American Society, it was also run by various committees with other influential people. The Committee on Inheritance of Mental Traits included among its members Robert M. Yerkes and Edward L. Thorndike. The Committee on Heredity of Deafmutism included Alexander Graham Bell. Harry H. Laughlin was on the Committee on Sterilization, and the Committee on the Heredity of the Feeble Minded included, among others, Henry Herbert Goddard. Other prominent board members included scientists like Irving Fisher, William E. Castle, and Adolf Meyer (Wikipedia).

These photos, which were given to the American Philosophical Society Library, are some of the non-genealogical material collected by the ERO. The collection mainly consists of portraits of those deemed to be “Unfit” as well as photos of newspaper articles supporting Eugenics, Pedigrees, propaganda, and portraits of notable figures and contests showcasing “Fitter Families”.

While the ERO was eventually closed down due to the rise of Nazism and large criticism, it’s role in American Eugenics is just a small drop in the bucket of Eugenics in the United States.