Katya wants a chinchilla, which reminded me of the first time I saw a chipmunk. I was on holiday in Cornwall and we'd discovered a jumble sale on a bookstore's forecourt. Centre spot in this jumble sale was this crazy creature streaking around its huge cage. My sister and I were enthralled. When it stopped still, which it did for all of two seconds before continuing on it's "wall of death" style zooming, we saw the little creature for what it was, the black streaks running down it's body, the distinctive facial markings, and because it was the first time we'd seen one, we were of course deeply charmed.

I've loved chipmunks ever since, so have a gratuitously cute picture:



That jumble sale was memorable to me for another reason. Pride of place on one table was a book, a philosophy book. It was a logical discussion of "game theory", the idea that life can be lived by the rules and attitudes associated with playing games. It goes something like this:

- Playing to win ends the game and makes the loser feel bad
- Losing the game makes us feel bad and is really easy to do
- Playing for a draw is stimulating, challenging and draws the game out indefinitely

This solidified some theories and ideas that I'd been working out in my own head for ages. I played chess very badly so had decided maybe a year earlier to play each game in a way that would make the game last as long as possible. The best games i remember were ones where we were reduced to one piece each, or my king and the opponents king and queen or knight or something. I'd be moving slowly around the board, avoiding the corners, trying to pre-emt the trapping moves my opponent is sure to make. My king was the the slipperiest king ever, trudging his way around the board, avoiding every trap, escaping eevry check and frustrating my opponent royally.

I lived by my own iteration of "game theory" for years, everything I did geared to the perpetuation of the game. It's very liberating to think of life as a game and to decide to play it in a non-competetive way, recognising the tactics of other players and attempting not only to frustrate someone's winning tactics, but trying to enhance someone's losing game so they too can continue to play.

As happens in philosophical thought, my theories and ideas have evolved over the years and what I believe and live by these days bears little resemblance to what I read in that book but there's still elements of it there. What was interesting at the time was to discover that the ideas in my own head had been discussed and written about in academia, had been contemplated by the great and good of the philosophical community. That gave my confidence a boost. I'd had my own invention, my own thinking, my own theories validated by the philosophical commnunity and I never knew. Excellent!