On Saturday, February 22, 2003 8:33 AM, Michael Doelle wrote:

>>We must still be world champions at conkers !<

>Ahhh, wozzat?

Fred, replied with, "Chestnuts"!  But to be more precise, a conker is the
fruit of the Horse Chestnut.  A hole is drilled vertically through the
chestnut and a knotted piece of string passed through the hole so that the
thing resembles a pendulum.  Two players line up with their conkers and,
having decided who gets first go, while one player holds the end of the
piece of string and suspends his conker vertically, the other player takes a
whack at it with his conker.  The idea is to split and break the opponents
conker.  Some people swore that soaking the conker in vinegar was a sure
fire way to toughen it.  :-)

Playing conkers  was also hell on the knuckles, especially when an opponent
"accidentally" missed hitting the conker and hit your hand instead!  :-)

Strike