All the players should sit in a circle. The basic idea is to go round the circle, counting upwards from 1. The loser is the person who says '21'. To start, the first player says 'To my left (or right, depending what direction they want to go in), one'. The player on their left then says '2', and so on. However, if a player says two consecutive numbers, ie '3, 4' the direction is reversed. If a player says three consecutive numbers, play continues in the same direction, but skips a player. So a typical four-player game might go:

•Player 1 - To my right, 1
•Player 4 - 2, 3
•Player 1 - 4, 5, 6
•Player 3 - 7, 8
•Player 2 - 9
•Player 1 - 10
... and so on, if the players were numbered in a clockwise direction.

If (or when!) someone makes a mistake - speaking at the wrong time, hesitating, or saying the wrong thing - the game starts over. The player who fouled up should get a forfeit of some kind. The player who last said a number (correctly) should re-start the game at 1.

When you finally get to 21, the player to say '21' gets a forfeit - usually a drinking penalty. They also make up a new 'rule', which replaces one of the numbers. For example, 7 could become 'fish', in which case the sequence would be '... 5, 6, fish, 8, ...' or it could become an action, like 'touch the floor' or 'run to the bar and back'.

The game ends when everyone is well and truly fed up with it.