Hearts Anonymous

Hello, my name is Karen and I have a problem. It came with my computer. It's Hearts and I can't stop playing it. I do limit my playing time and use it as reward for goals met in my writing. My true problem arises with Pauline, Ben, and Michele--the other players (computer generated). I think they look into my hand sometimes. How else could they know I hold the queen of spades alone and then play a spade for me to suffer the consequences of having to play it and be penalized?

I find myself talking to Pauline. She seems to love to take all the tricks and leave the rest of us with 26 penalty points. "That wasn't nice, Pauline...You already played the ace of hearts--didn't you?"

Of course Michele always wants to send me the queen of spades when she has it along with the king and ace. That would be fine if I had all the high cards in the hearts suit. Then I could be like Pauline and take all the tricks. Michele's very sensitive though and I hate to yell at her.

Ben just sits there and chuckles at us girls but we get even with him every so often. We gang up on him and let him take the queen of spades along with all but one of the hearts. "Gotcha, Ben. It's not so funny when it happens to you, is it?" Of course if we do it too often his penalty points add up and the game ends sooner.

Do you see my problem? Instead of talking to myself, now I'm talking to computer generated card playing friends. I think I'm safer going back to talking to myself. It's a little more conventional.