Operation

Pick up the tweezers and keep your hand steady. Touch the sides and - BUZZZZ! - Cavity Sam's red nose lights up.

Poor Cavity Sam has a lot wrong with him. Writer's Cramp. Water on the Knee. Butterflies in the Stomach. And, of course, that troublesome Funny Bone.

Your job is to remove the little plastic pieces from Sam with a pair of metal tweezers without touching the sides. Sounds easy enough, but then the tweezers hit the metal edge - BUZZZZ! - Sam's red nose lights up, everyone knows you missed, and your turn is over.

Operation was introduced in the 1960s and turned a simple steady-hand electrical game into something a lot more memorable by making you a surgeon. The openings are just tight enough that getting the pieces out really does take a pretty steady hand.

The silly names were a big part of the fun. You weren't removing an ordinary bone from an ordinary patient. You were fixing a Broken Heart, dealing with Butterflies in the Stomach, or trying to get that little Wish Bone out without setting off the buzzer.

Operation was a pretty regular go-to game around our house and neighborhood in the 1960s and 1970s. The game moved quickly, there was a lot of action and noise, and lots of subtle pushing or jiggling the table when someone else was trying to make a difficult extraction.

The Operation game is still around, and Cavity Sam still has that same worried look on his face. Which is reasonable, considering you're about to operate on him with a pair of tweezers.