Spoons
Objective: Initially, the objective is to get acquire 4 of a kind. The first player to do this either takes a spoon from the middle (there should be one fewer spoons than players), or, if there are no spoons, puts their finger on their nose. Once one person has done this, everyone else copies, even if they haven’t yet got 4 of a kind. The last one to do so loses.
Version 1 (Without stock-pile)
Players and Cards: 3+ - more is better. You need four cards of one rank for each person playing. For example, with seven players you could use all the aces, kings, queens, jacks, tens, nines and eights from a standard pack (28 cards). With four you could just use the aces, kings, queens and jacks (16 cards)
Deal: Shuffle and deal the cards so each player has 4.
Play: All players simultaneously place one unwanted card face down to their left, and then pick up the card that the player to their right has placed. Then they do the same again, and continue until someone collects four of a kind. There are no turns - the passing happens as fast as the players wish, but during the play cards must only be passed one at a time, and you must never have more than four cards in your hand at one time, so you are not allowed to pick up a new card from your right-hand neighbour until you have reduced your cards to three by discarding one to your left.
Version 2 (With stock-pile)
Players and Cards: 3+ players. Play with a full pack of cards.
Deal: Four cards are dealt to each player and the remaining stock of un-dealt cards is placed to the right of the dealer.
Play: The game is played in the same way as the version without a stock, described above, except that the dealer draws cards from the stock, and the player to dealer’s right placed unwanted cards face down on a discard pile. The rule that you can never hold more than four cards at a time still holds, and you can only discard and draw one card at a time. The dealer can discard cards and draw replacements from the stock as fast as he or she likes. The other players are restricted only by the speed at which the player before them passes on cards. When the stock is exhausted the discard pile is used as a new stock.
(If playing this way, the dealer has a slight advantage, so you’ll probably want to rotate who’s the dealer.
