A Productive Game for Fun in Hard Times

My good friend and I are highly competitive, and we know how to have good clean fun.  She and I decided to start a long-term trading competition, and invited our friends to join us.  It started on her birthday, and will end on mine.

Participants each trade their starter object with someone else for a better object, and continue the swapping process until the end date.  This year's starter object is a simple hair tie band, the kind without decorations.

There are nine rules for this competition:

1. Participants must start with the starter object, and must begin trading only at or after 1:00pm on June 30th, 2009, Pacific Coast time.
2. No other objects, favors, sums of money, or anything else may be used to augment the starter object or any subsequent trade.
3. Participants may not trade with one another.
4. If a participant receives multiple items during a trade, all of these items must be put into the following trade.
5. Trading for cash, checks, gift cards, or other forms of money are not allowed.
6. No participant may make two subsequent trades with the same party - there must be at least one trade with a different party between two trades with the same party.  (The only exception to this rule is an "undo" trade wherein the objects return to their original owners before other trades are made.)
7. Trading must cease at or before 1:00pm on October 25, 2009, Pacific Coast time.
8. Any rule disputes are to be settled via a consensus between myself and my good friend who started this competition with me.
9. These rules must be honored in spirit, not just to the letter.

We created a Facebook group, and attached an event page to it.  Six of us, including my good friend and I, will compete for four months to see who can be the most productive barterer.  This blog will follow our competition.

Happy trading!

-The Egg