Passing Fads of My Youth #1: Pogs

Oh, how I loved pogs! So pointless, yet so appealing!
I think at the height of their popularity I had somewhere around 300, which is nowhere near the amount of the collection of some of my friends, which amassed in the multi-millions I'm sure. What I did possess despite my lack of Pog fortune which was truly great was my slammer, a bronze/bronze-colored/brazen (I'm not really that good with metals) beauty with a black widow engraved on the front, which read, "POISON," on the back. I won many a pog with Widow, my very imaginative nickname for my slammer. You had to have a creative nickname for your slammer. Otherwise, you just weren't cool.

For those of you who did not enjoy pop culture during the 90's, I will treat you to a condensed explanation of the game of pogs. Notice I didn't add the "purpose" of Pogs, because we all well know there isn't one.

First, what are Pogs? Pogs are silver dollar-sized pieces of circular cardboard with a “bodacious” or “sweet” picture on one side and a really boring company logo or motto or just plain cardboard on the other.
OMG Pogs!
The origin of Pogs is traced to nowhere, because nobody really cared enough to research the subject in depth.

Second,what do you need to play? Well, in order to "play" Pogs, one first needs to acquire, well, Pogs, and obviously in numbers reaching the near-thousands, because, frankly, only babies have only like twelve. You also need to get a sick slammer, which is usually a piece of cut metal pipe with an 8-Ball or unicorn engraved into it. A good slammer is the key to ultimate victory.
The catalyst to victory


Third, how do you play? You and a friend each combine an equal amount Pogs from your collection, and place them boring side up in a pile. Then, you each take turns throwing your slammer onto the pile. Whichever Pogs land awesome side up, those are now belonging to the person who threw the slammer. Game repeats until all Pogs are owned/reowned.

Essentially, Pogs is the most wasteful and pointless game ever to be played. It is roughly the equivalent of saying: "Hey, I got an idea! Let's each put fifteen (or thirty for high stakes games) quarters into a bucket. I'll go on the roof and dump them onto the ground. All the ones that land on heads, I get to keep."

win.


But despite it's absurdity and obvious fad-ness, Pogs will always remain a staple of my childhood, and they will always hold a special place within my heart of hearts.


Pogs: Turing children into hardcore gamblers since 1994.