Are you game?

Reader question:

Please explain this, with “are you game” in particular: “We’re cycling to the Western Hills on Saturday. Are you game to join us?”

My comments:

The Western Hills in Beijing, where the Fragrant Hills is located?

That sounds exciting because, right now, it’s the best time to observe red leafs fall. In a matter of weeks, when real winter winds arrive, all the colorful leafs will be gone, and swiftly, too.

Anyways, cycling all the way to the hills sounds like an exciting proposition. And if the speaker asked me, I’d say: “I’m game.”

And that means: Count me in. I’m going!

Are you game?

That means: Are you fun enough to play?

The essence of “game” is fun, you see. Picture kids playing a game of hide and seek. Isn’t that fun?

Or watch a sports game, an English Premier League football match, for example. Even on TV, you can feel the joy and thrill in the air, what with fans singing songs in unison, taunting opponent players and fans with trash talk, applauding whenever their team makes a good play and erupting in total uproar when a goal is scored, pumping fists in the air and all that jazz.

Yes, you get the vibe. Games are fun – and challenging if you’re talking about pro sports.

So, in short, are you fun to join us?

When they ask you that way, they mean for you to take their endeavor as a game, a fun and exhilarating game, be it a cycling trip to the Western Hills or a real sports game, or, as a matter of fact, any activity.

And if you care to join them, they take it to mean that you’re as enthusiastic and ready as if you’re playing your favorite sport.

Basically, that’s the idea of “being game”, meaning you’re eager to do something fun, something new, something adventurous or something challenging.

All right?

Okay. Here are a few recent media examples of someone being game:

1. Chris Paul

Houston Rockets

The implicit framing of the Top 100 is this: Who are the players who really matter in the games that matter most? Paul (18.6 PPG, 5.4 RPG, 7.9 APG) jumps near the top of the list – not because he happens to play for one of the best teams in the league, but because he’s exactly the kind of player you want involved when your season is on the line. Houston knows this well, having built a 3-2 series lead against the Warriors thanks to Paul’s gutsy play and then having dropped the last two games of the series in his absence. On the one hand, Paul’s tendency to pick up injuries clearly works against him. On the other, Paul is still operating at such an incredible level that some missed time is tolerable. You make do when a player is operating this close to an MVP level, even if he misses 24 games along the way.

Paul earns this standing with the way he picks apart opponents. What a miserable thing it must be to step up, as a big man, against one of Paul’s pick-and-rolls. React to any of Paul’s feints and he’ll rock back into an easy mid-range jumper. Try to play it cool and he’ll drive past you, winding around the court in search of any vulnerability. Paul is such a high-level passer and defender that his one-on-one brilliance somehow went unnoticed. No more. Houston’s offense reached its historic heights in part because Paul can almost always get his, a genuine rarity among guards his size. Even though he plays alongside another great passer in James Harden, only 15% of Paul’s field goals last season were assisted.

It was because of that creative strength that the Rockets could stagger the minutes of their two best players, overwhelming opponents with 48 minutes of offensive pressure. Paul’s approach is quite different than Harden’s, but he runs similar lineups to great effect. For one, he scored as much on a per-minute basis as at any point in his career – even while barely getting to the rim or the free throw line. More important is that Paul always seems to know which levers to pull for the best possible result. Houston’s system relies on Paul ability to generate offense for himself, but he’s always at his most comfortable orchestrating for others – guiding his teammates into scoring positions and mismatches that best fit the moment.

There’s no real substitute for that level of situational awareness, which enables Paul to function effectively in any lineup and in any style. There is no matchup on earth that could play him off the court, or even make him a mark. Target Paul at your own risk. This is a guard who can hang with Kevin Durant on the block in a pinch, and who can go shimmy for shimmy with Steph Curry. No matter the challenge, Paul is game to compete.

- Top 100 NBA Players of 2019, SI.com, September 10, 2018.

2. Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason has discussed the current status of Roger Waters’ relationship with the band in a new interview with Relix Magazine.

The article follows Roger Waters’ recent condemnation of former bandmate David Gilmour for not allowing the promotion of his solo work via the Pink Floyd website.

Waters, who left the band in 1984, contended this was unfair to fans.

Mason, who may not have been privy to Waters’ comments at the time of the interview, was optimistic about Roger’s future involvement with the band.

“I don’t think that David and Roger are game to do anything together anytime soon,” Mason notes. “But I would love Roger to come back and do something else with us, and I would be very happy to go and do something with him.”

“Neither of us wants to be in each other’s band, though,” Mason adds. “We want to do things our own way – maybe just get together for bits and pieces. I don’t think we’re about to reform a band to go and do anything.”

The drummer also reflects positively on Waters’ 2019 guest performance at a New York concert of current group Saucerful of Secrets.

“He was great,” Mason enthuses, “he absolutely, inevitably, just picked it up and ran with it.”

In addition to this, Mason sheds light on Pink Floyd’s decision to cease touring following the 1990s.

“I don’t think there was a formal decision,” he reveals. “What happened was that, between ‘87 and ‘94, we did an awful lot of touring, and they were long tours. And we reached a point – particularly with David – where he did not really want to go out for another year.”

“The problem is that,” he explains, “with big tours, you tend to have to go out on quite lengthy runs to justify your expenses. I like touring, but not to the point where all home life disappears – and, by the time you get home, your wife’s left you and your children have left home.”

“But things have changed,” Mason adds. “Touring was so linked to album releases, and now studio albums have become less a part of the mainstream music business. With streaming, pirating and everything else, the real activity is now in the live realm.”

- Pink Floyd Drummer Nick Mason Weighs In On Waters-Gilmour Dispute, CosmicMagazine.com.au, May 27, 2020.

3. If you know anything about North West, you know that she loves to tease her mom Kim Kardashian. North West isn’t afraid to push her mom’s buttons or poke fun at her, and she kept the tradition going with her birthday gift for Kardashian.

Kim Kardashian, who turned 44 on October 21, received a gold and diamond necklace from her eldest child on her birthday. Sounds gorgeous, right? Kardashian-Jenner kids don’t just give handmade cards to their parents; they give them diamonds. But there was a catch! Instead of a sweet message engraved upon the gold bar, West wrote “Skibidi Toilet” on the jewelry. Yes, you read that right – she gave her mom a necklace that said “Skibidi Toilet.”

If you’re not familiar with the phrase, it’s a popular one for tweens like West and comes from a massively popular animated YouTube series called Skibidi Toilet. Kids have also begun using the word “Skibidi” as slang. “You love Skibidi Toilet!” West said in Kardashian's now-expired Instagram Story video of the gift. “I do?” asked Kardashian.

The necklace itself is really lovely, with the gold bar hanging from a diamond chain, and West did leave a sweet message on the back of the necklace, writing “Love, North” and the date on the back of the gold bar. Will we see this necklace on Kardashian in the future? That’s a big TBD, but then again, this is Kardashian we’re talking about, and she’s not afraid to take a fashion risk – not to mention she’s always game to wear a personalized gift from her kids.

- North West’s Skibidi Toilet Necklace Gift to Kim Kardashian Is Peak Prankster, TeenVogue.com, October 23, 2024.

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About the author:

Zhang Xin is Trainer at chinadaily.com.cn. He has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.

（作者：张欣）