 All violence! Sporty Kid is a title I definitely can't relate to. Oh, cause you're lazy? Haha, no. That's not the case. Most of the time. I used to play sports a lot in my younger days, but I found that nothing ever clicked, if that makes sense. Like, I enjoy playing a lot of sports such as soccer, and I did that all throughout school, but I was very uncoordinated. That actually happened. How about netball? Fricket? Tennis? Track and field? Hi, mommy! I think you get the point. But with all that being said, I want to introduce you to my lounge room. Oh, she's definitely lazy. Stop! This very lounge room has been the home of many sports. It's the place where this unathletic blob of a girl became the Olympiad of the country! Within this humble lounge room, I had the most memorable and enjoyable experiences with sports. And here's how. Lounge room soccer! This is where it all began. Soccer, football, whatever you want to call it. First though, let me give you a brief rundown of my lounge room. It's important for context, trust me. This odd-looking half of a hexagon is my lounge room. Here on the left, we have a single sliding door entrance. Along this wall, there's a long and tall cabinet that had one of those ancient box TVs, and also my mom's useless knick-dacks. Woo, knick-dacks. And they're useless. Next, we have two more sliding doors here. And there's a small cabinet directly opposite of the single door. These two areas were the soccer goals. I'm not kidding, I wrote soccer in the script! Oh yeah, we're not maniacs. It wouldn't be a lounge room without stools! We had lounges over there, okay? Don't worry. I don't know, it just feels like we're missing something. Ah yes, the soccer ball balls. If we actually used a real soccer ball, I wouldn't be alive to tell you this story. So instead, we used a small soft soccer ball. But when I tell you that if you boot these things with all your strings, it would sound like this. RIDEO! ENOUGH! We played the No Outs rule, meaning that the entire room was inbound, so we could rebound off the walls, cabinets, lounges, the TV, even my head at times. Landroop Soccer became a crowd favorite so much that whenever we had visitors over, we would be playing many games almost immediately. Since my brothers and I played this game so much, my mom would actually have to fix the ball sometimes with a needle and a pick when it would start to tear apart. Repairs weren't needed too often though, because we could get a new ball in August every single year. Why August you ask? Daffodil Day! Yeah! Jazz Hands! Daffodil Hands! I know Daffodil Day is a thing in many countries, but here in Australia, the Cancer Council come out with a line of merch annually to raise money for cancer research and sells it at our schools. And it almost always included one of these soft soccer balls. As the years went on and we got older, Landroop Soccer would continue to make appearances here and there. There was a period of time where we completely forgot about it…until… I remember being so shocked at how small the ball now seemed. It was so much fun that I… MY EYE! The next thing I knew, I had a big black eye. Yay! It would be the only thing I'd hear at school for the next week. Things like… How did it happen? Should I ask? You should see the other guys. Minus the black eye though, I definitely rate this sport an 11 out of 10. Landroop Bid Balls! This one is pretty iconic. Basically, we would set up two little empty bins on either end of the lounge room and we would use this small basketball. It was much more solid than the soccer balls, and I think we got it from Burger King back before Australia rebranded those stores to Hungry Jacks. Binball was like on-ground basketball. I mean, basketball players don't float in the air, that's not what I'm saying. Something that was really satisfying was if you threw the ball at a certain angle, it would spin around the rim of the bin all the way to the bottom. Magical. It reminds me of those spinny coin donation points you'd find in shopping centres. Exhilarating. This one was a heap of fun, deserving a high score, so let's say 9 out of 10. Landroop Golf! This one probably only lasted a day, but it's still worth mentioning. We happened to find a cheap $3 plastic golf set and target once and figured, let's try switching things up a little. This high quality pristine set consisted of a driver club, a wedge club, a putter, a flagpole, and can't forget the golf balls. Instead of using different clubs for various shots like actual golf, one of my brothers, or both, I wouldn't be surprised, created a rule where we could only be assigned one club each for the whole game. I think I got scammed. Because the clubs were so short, we had to kneel down on our knees to play this one. We got bored with it pretty fast, and after a few holes, it somehow turned into a pelting ball competition at each other. Not sure why there was always pain involved. I would rate this Landroop sport a 3 out of 10. It was both boring and painful. Landroop Cricket! Somehow we stumbled upon a miniature cricket set, but it wasn't one of those plastic made for kids ones. It was made out of wood, had grip, and was super sturdy. The wickets were also wooden, small, and very cute. The ball though, however, we could not use. It was an itty bitty tennis ball, but it weighed a ton. So you can imagine what would likely happen. Luckily enough, we had a good replacement. A KFC stuffed cricket ball. Running from the wickets in the base was crazy, and wow, the cupboard birds killed. After a session of Landroop Cricket, we would come out with our knees looking like this. With that being said, I would have to rate this one a 7 out of 10. Landroop Brandy! Yay! More violence! Yay! This one was the scariest one out of them all. So it begins with someone being it, and they would have to peg balls at the others to try and get them to be the new it. My mum hated this game because of all the noise and screaming. RIDEO! We would run around the entire Landroop for this, and an array of softballs would be scattered all over the place. Mostly the Daffodil Day ones, but there were also some more damning ones that were painful when thrown at full speed. Hello, squishy basketball. We meet again. Your dead mate, come at me! One fateful day though, it all came to an end. We had a rule not to hit each other in the face, so I know he didn't mean to, but… Let's continue. Yep, that was brutal. The reason why it was so bad is because this boy literally got teeth surgery only probably a few weeks before this occurrence. So, there was blood everywhere. 5 out of 10 for this one. Landroop Hacky Sack! I don't know what to call this one. Back in the primary school days, my brothers were given these Milo Hacky Sacks from one of their friends. I need answers. This guy had a heap of them, and I don't know where he was getting them from, and I'm still curious to this day. Why was he a Milo Hacky Sack dealer? I need answers. This game pretty much had the same concept as Landroop Soccer. Same goals too. However, we would have to crawl in the ground and hit the hacky sack with our hands instead of kicking with our feet. But, if you have a lack of coordination, smacking the side of your hand with a full force on the carpet hurts like a… scooter hitting your ankle. A very specific type of pain. I'm going to give this one an 8.5 out of 10. Landroop Ping Pong! I've left the best for last, and it's the most recent sporting obsession I still love to play to this day. For the longest time, the three of us would ask for a proper ping pong table for Christmas. We already had one of those mini 10-in-1 games tables of which table tennis was our favorite. Quick side note though, this thing had foosball, pool, checkers, ha! Tamping bowling, and even air hockey. Many years into the future, where we were much older, my mother was stuck on what to get us. How about that ping pong table? And just like that, we finally got one ladies and gentlemen! We got him! The plan was to place it outside on the patio. Haha, yeah right! It was around 40 degrees around Christmas and the last thing we wanted to do was place it out there and get heat stroke. We didn't really use the landroom as much anymore, so instead, the ping pong table lived in the landroom for only the summer. Haha, yeah right! It stayed there for almost two years straight. We played many games every single day, it was such a good present. There was even a day at school where I convinced my fill in teacher in art class so let me go home and work on my project. As soon as I walked through the front door, that's when I noticed my brother in the kitchen. I thought you weren't meant to be home today, shouldn't you be in school? I kid you not, I played ping pong almost every single day of the lockdown period. Ping pong is an obvious 100 out of 10. And there you have it, a history of sports in my landroom. I find it so funny that landrooms are meant for families to wind down and relax with some TV entertainment, but my siblings and I are out here using it to destroy each other. But I want to know, is this something that other people also did? If so, what games did you play and how did they work? Let me know in the comments below, I'd love to know all about it.