Store

Dedicated to the notion that video games and the like are making us antisocial -- the store's motto is "Unplug and reconnect" -- Blue Highway stocks hundreds of dice, card and board games, not one of which you can plug into the wall. If years of guitar heroism and assorted Wii-ing around have ripped your family and friends asunder, Blue Highway has all the pieces you need to put your social life back together, with some assembly required.

The "classics" shelf alone is loaded with enough goodies to keep you and yours distracted for weeks. It's packed with such warm and fuzzy old favorites as Clue, Monopoly, Taboo, Othello, Parcheesi, Risk and Twister. (Doubt these games' ability to educate and entertain? Get out the "Twister" board, call up several friends you'd like to know better and have each one bring a six-pack.) Recent favorites like Apples to Apples and Sudoku are equally well represented.

But these are games you can find most anywhere, and Blue Highway is all about the unusual and unexpected. While you'll find the typical role-playing-game accoutrements and military strategy games carried by many game shops, you'll also discover such rare gems as Ticket to Ride, in which you try to build and protect a rail empire; Katamino, a wood-piece game that's as addictive as Tetris; Argue, which is as good and loud as its name; Curses, a party game that sets up side-splittingly funny situations; and The Game of Redneck Life, which you win by "having the most remaining teeth." Don't blame me; I didn't write it.

It goes without saying that Blue Highway also stocks chess, backgammon and nearly every other game that your ancestors used to pass the time before wireless shock controllers existed.