Website Wednesday

The seasons have a lot of holidays even without holy days. Ancients celebrated the first buds of spring and the harvest which follows.

Probably, some ancestor scratched his head while living in cold climes and, during winter, thought: Another dreary day. We need a festivus.

Whatever the reasoning and spurred on by the rise of capitalism, holidays were born, presents were bought and nerves got frazzled.

So, in this season of frenetic buying in the U.S. (possibly the last before our frenetic depression), I offer a quiet relief in fun and games:

http://www.freeworldgroup.com/

For serious gamers, there are much better sites out there with thousands of gamers who comment and help with the more difficult puzzle, adventure and escape games. However, sometimes I find many of these games exercises in frustration where I, and many others, flounder until someone throws us a lifeline in the form of cheats.

Free World Group offers all types of games. Types of games include: puzzles, strategy, sport, multiplayer, card, adventure, arcade, brain teaser, board.

Each game lists its objectives and controls so you can skip that time-consuming "Instructions" link within the game. Well, you can skip it at your peril, of course.

Under Brain Teaser, I played Entangled where you have to rotate tiles so the random lines on them form closed shapes. No time limit and brain worthy - heaven!

Games are mouse or key controlled, or both. Adventures seems to be key controlled, (who can forget the wickedly difficult Pharaoh's Tomb?) and Word and Puzzle, among others, mouse controlled.

Some of the games only have a certain number of levels before you have to buy to continue. Some of the games look lame pretty fast. But there are enough games for some fast clicking around. You'll find something you like.

An interesting bonus is Travel Stories. These are short stories written about different parts of the world. For example, Ebonyi Tales is written by a man who left banking to teach in Nigeria. That's something you don't find on game sites.

As with almost all Internet site, children should be monitored here.

So give it a try. It will give you some relaxation in this hectic season.

And now, excuse me, it's my turn in Puzzle Freaks II. I can't be sure but I think that my computer opponent is getting all the easy puzzles to solve.