Minger cards

For his 23rd birthday, Ben received a most entertaining gift. A set of 'minger cards'.

Now I know it's not very kind or very PC to laugh at people, but these were entertaining.

You may have heard of Top Trump cards, the cause of very many heated arguments in playgrounds across Britain, as swapping deals go tragically wrong and irate mothers complain bitterly that some nasty bully has conned their dear little innocent child into handing over his very best Top Trump to Connor, or Wayne, or whoever.

These cards feature items ranging from cars and airplanes, to footballers. They come with sets of statistics and you win them by beating your opponents statistic. I'm not actually sure of the rules, but do know I had several packs of confiscated Top Trump cards in my teacher's drawer when I cleared it out to start my new non teaching life.

'Minger cards' are cousins to these Top Trumps. As well as a photo of someone who is facially challenged (and sometimes bodily challenged as well) they have five ratings on each card in the following categories: Special Skill, Style, Odour, Ugly-o-meter and Minger power. Each category has a number after it. The rules state that 'the first player looks at the top card in his hand and chooses a rating to play. You call out the rating you want to use as you lay the card face up on the table. Your opponent looks at his corresponding first card and lays it down whilst disclosing his score. The highest rating wins and the winner takes the two cards that were played. The winner is the person who wins all the cards.' Not exactly rocket science.

What I want to know is how do you get the job of thinking of the descriptions for each category? What a great job! I want to do it.

Here are some examples. You'll have to imagine the photo.

There's Emma Biggits, whose special skill is 'uncertain blinking' and whose odour is 'cake'; and Cath 'Freaky Cath' Brown whose special skill is 'weasel hunting', her style is roadwork warnings and her odour is 'gin'. Other odours are badger bait, drip tray, wet mittens and train tickets. Lucy Plug's special skill is 'counting to ten'.

The categories 'ugly-o-meter' and 'minger power' do not have a description, just a rating number.

There's one thing that puzzles me. Who agrees to pose for the photos? And would it be possible to be flicking through them and find your own face peering back at you with a caption for special skills such as 'benefit defrauding'.

Anyway, the joke was on me because Ben found an old passport photo of yours truly, and made me my very own minger card. My special skill was 'fat finger typing'; my style was 'expert in writing Inglish' and my odour was 'old red wine'. My name was 'Sandra Winer Stopit'.

I suppose I deserved it really.