Rice with French Fries

My doctor will hate me for this but nothing beats the double starch. Bread plus more bread equals absolute win.

Talking things like the peirogi dumplings stuffed with potato and fried onion. Or throwing some potato chips on a ham and cheese sandwich. That always hits right after school or when you are high. There is a place in Pittsburgh, PA whose claim to fame is dropping fries inside your sandwich instead of on the side. I bet you can order them on the side but they give you a mean look and a record scratches in the background.

The zenith of double starch is Puerto Rican Chiness food. This cuisine is not much different than American-Chinese takeout style food save that it comes with fries. The standard plate is fried rice  (never white), the entree protein (there are no veggie stir fry or tofu options. The greensare in the rice you see) and then fries. That plate is both life and the ender of worlds.

The entree protein is only thing that alternates. I felt the most popular was Peppsr Steak which I am sure is an actual elegant dish in its native origins but in PR was a soupy slosh of green peppers and straps of cheap cuts of beef. The other big one was "al ajillo" which means "cooked with garlic." So anything just swimming in a garlic sauce. 

Note there was very little Chinese food delivery in PR so this was always a face to face experience. There are an estimated 450 Chinese restaurants in PR and i would guess 99% of them are the greasy pan cafeteria style heaven doling out fries with rice and orange chicken. These places also loved the word cream in them. I think one was also an ice cream place beacuse there was Star Cream and Star Cream II and my birthplace was known, among other midly interesting quirks, for having corn ice cream. At a place called Rex Cream. Served with cinammon dust I also think Rex Cream was always just an ice cream place but it somehow got the Cream moniker and it was confusing to me, at least.

I can't prove this story (can I any on the blog? Your trust matters most to me!) but in senior year of high school I broke put of my introverted shell and went on the semi organized senior beach weekend to Guanica, PR. I had no clue why save my mother insisted (so I could be just a bit more normal), another very introverted friend of mine was going (likely same reason as I) and there was a chance to see classmates in their swimsuits. Priyi and Marilyn were going and that was half of my HS hall of fame so for sure going! 

Here is where we drove by an abdoned Chinese place named, no joke, Kum War. The driver screeched to a stop and we took pictures blessed by both fluent English and adolescent asshattery. Did they know what they were doing!? No way! Someone said they would mail it to Maxim magazine, a sort of cheesier Esquire (The RC Cola to its Coke) that had a "Found Porn" mailbag column. The kind of place to send pictures of typos in local Penny Saver that read "Local ass saves the day" Not sure if he ever did. This being 2002ish would involve actually printing picture and sending a letter and that seemed a lot even for us quite privileged  (albeit we did not know it at time) high school kids.

There was a "better" Chinese food place my mother would order from called Kimpo Garden. That place delivered but it took hours (They move like an IV filled with road tar is what my mother would say. Sounds better in Spanish) and it did not have fries. But the lemon chicken came in whole deep fried breasts and actual slices of lemon so it felt elevated. If the place had a fish tank in the lobby then no way would it have fries. There was also Yum Yum Tree (apparently now closed) which was an Asian fusing thing that slung take out favorites and sushi. My mother and I loved sushi and would put away while bamboo boats of it. There she marveled at the front of house guy named Juan Chen who was "an Asian who can speak Spanish."

There is none around me but I will see the social media algorithm feed me stories of Puero Rican Chinese in the mainland states. You can recreat it at home. Get the local lunch special at the closets takeout place (Extra points if named something Cream) and then an order of fries from just about anywhere else save McDonald's because those fries are too thin and good for this. Burger King is food. Needs lots of heat and starch to let sauce entree do the work. No egg rolls needed.

Silent Alarm

 About two jobs ago, my cell phone got listed as the call number for the building's panic alarm. For the whole building so the daycare on the first floor, the revolving door business offices on second and third, and the travel agency in basement. It made great use of the glass window wells facing the outside adorning them with neon signs of palm trees and parrots. Whole pagodas and a hot pink flamingo wearing sunglasses. I worked for the building (changing lightbulbs and moving furniture around. Guiding trucks onto the small dock.) so I understood why someone volunteered my phone, but the only qualification I had was I worked there for more than two years. That seemed to be the cutoff.

I then subsequently left the job but they never changed the number. I would oddly get calls from the security company. "Is everything ok? Should we dispatch police?"

And I would have no answer save "Umm...not sure. I no longer work there."

Sometimes the agency would ask for a confirmation code. So, they could not send police. And I would also be at lost muddling in my mind for the passcode. Was it the name of the building "Altamira?" The number of the building? "3655?" The name of the owner and landlord "Millardo?" None of these worked and they would send the police for nothing. 

Someone accidentally bumped the plunger by the front lobby desk. Or a new hire wanted a chair on the left side of the welcome desk, instead of the standard right, and thought the white button was just some other geegaw to move around. 

It was always nothing. But, you never knew. Not in today's work world. I would text my former supervisor and remind him to change the number but he would ghost me. In my new job I once had to make a delivery to the third floor office (An adult GED center that took up basically the whole thing) and asked the teacher there if she knew of anyone. She did not and said she would ask her boss but that someone else took care of the business side. 

The last time they called I let is go directly to voicemail. I head the familiar voice "This is Northwest Security Service Solutions calling about a silent alarm." It was early afternoon and raining hard enough that water seeped through the weak seals of my windows. Must be something with the power like a spike or surge that caused it to spike. This time I imagined myself the hero. Cutting through the rain my black Honda Civic something much more predatory and menacing that would screech to a slide stop right by the big plate glass doors. Inside would be panic as people scramble for exits and winged villains try to snatch people away to fly through the skylight roof. There would be people fighting back. Those people I enjoyed working with or found charming. The lady on second floor (I think she worked in marketing for something. There was a print shop up there) with the long black braid and Lisa Loeb glasses would be there holding people back with a sword. Entering the fray I would not debate why I returned to some place that would not race back to me. 

A post I didn't write

"My final day at the magic shop, I stood behind the counter where I had pitched Svengali decks and the Incredible Shrinking Die, and I felt an emotional contradiction: nostalgia for the present. Somehow, even though I had stopped working only minutes earlier, my future fondness for the store was clear, and I experienced a sadness like that of looking at a photo of an old, favorite pooch."

-Steve Martin, from his autobiography Born Standing Up

Spooky Season 2023

 Every year I say it* but this year I am doing it. I am going to try and watch a spooky movie everyday between now and Halloween. Spooky season being abut September 15th to November 1st. I won't do a post per movie but here is a mega thread of the season. Its a long one!

Smile-Its The Ring, which was already a re-hash. It had a neat marketing campaign (what with the cardboard cutouts of smiling people placed in random places like MLB playoff games) but its rather paint by numbers. The one striking scene comes at the very end when the villain shows its true form in a direct full shot of an unusual sort of monster. Mid movie

Signs-Only thing gets under my skin more than aliens are living dolls. I remember being really spooked to see this one back in the day but my son is now all into the unexplained so we gave it a shot. I did not remember much save the one scene (the TV scene from Brazil) that is still excellent even when you know the result. It really drops off in later half once all tension is gone and becomes a sort of one room chase movie.

The Neon Demon-Snoozy movie that thinks it has a lot to say but is quite predictable. Thinner, Black Swan, and Suspira with just better looking people. Lot of neat people in it and wow Jenna Malone is topless in one scene. 2003 version of me would have loved that. Look at that!

Friday the 13th: Part 2-These movies have such a complicated lore that always forget this one is a very clean direct sequel. Same movie as the first. I always think best part is five ten minutes with the apartment scene and several fake out scares. Then the title card the explodes. I literally LOL

The Host-my exposure to Korean media has been this movie, Squid Game, Parasite, Pororo the Penguin, and Tayo the Little Bus. I remember this movie getting a lot of hype back in the day. The monster effects are dated and less of a monster film than a horror of our sick sad world. 

Critters-The video store back home had a big cardboard display movie promo thing of this in the back and holy shit was I scared of that section. Watched this with my children who laughed at the monsters which are beyond the wall goofy. 

The Cabin in the Woods- A rewatch albeit have not seen it since it came out. I am very glad this movie exists and how it homages and lampoon so many tropes. If you have never seen it then come in with no background,  please! 

Also, holy smokes, Anna Hutchinson is in this! In a lead role! She was Lily the Yellow Power Rangers in Jungle Fury! Did not realize that until now.

No One Will Save You- It's cottage core Signs. The heroine even wears a flowing frilled night gown as she runs from aliens in the misty moonlight. Sincerely enjoyed this film even with the tacked on B plot. No jump scares instead relying on a clear cut dread. Also it's about an hour and ten minutes before anyone says anything in this movie.  It's all grunts, moans and screams (phrasing. It's not that kind of movie) for most of this. Fire in the Sky vibes also which scares me endlessly as a youth.

Goosebumps (Hulu 2023 version) I adored the book series as a youth. Every time that Troll or Scholastic book order form came to our class I scanned to get the newest one. When the original show came on I was hyped. And the material never was solid, even by YA standards, but I you are reading this blog it is because I wrote my own Goosebumps fan fictions and knockoffs on sheets of loose leaf paper. 

Anyway, this series (A cheat, I know. Not a movie) is great. Its not ashamed of its source material (like the 2017 Power Rangers movie) but does bring it to modern TV sensibilities. Its an anthology with Elm Street vibes (The sins of earlier generations visit their children) and not too scary. Its also...wholesome but in United Colors of Beneton way instead of Family Circus kitsch. 

Note: I did not realize this was a series releasing episodes weekly. So I watched as many as I could be 10/31/23

Five Nights at Freddy's: Ok, so, I only know about this because its some sort of horror game popular with kids and a previous job I had involved being a digital admin for a K-8 school. We had this program that sat on the student's Chromebooks and let us see their viewing and browsing history. A lot of FNAF stuff. Lot of hentai and ASMR as well.

 Even my own children knew about it and we had to see it! I truly felt at my most old man watching something I had no clue about save "haunted Chuck E Cheese."

Anyway...this movie is bad. Maybe if I played the games but it can't stand on even hackneyed plot points. The animatronic puppets, which seem like they were done in practical effects, do look good. And Matthew Lillard is in it as a villain!

Skinamarink-This movie made me angry. I had the same feeling I felt after leaving Blair Witch Project and asking my friends Bernie and Germain (Bernie had a car and Germain was the friend who was part of another friend group tangentially connected by Bernie) if we had just been tricked. This movie would have been much better had it been 10 minutes. Instead its an hour of...nothing. It could be something but in theory I could do a standing triple back flip! And just because I can't does not make me somehow an auteur gymnast. I am glad they made this movie and it has its hype but not for me. 

Texas Chain Saw Massacre-Never seen the OG one and aside from the Leatherface mask and chainsaws don't know much. Ill be damned it does not lose a beat. It would have been wild to see this in the 70s. It had to have the feeling you were watching something truly beyond comprehension. I was most shocked by how content it was in its wanton weirdness. The dinner scene with just every bonkers prop on the table. Grandpa and how he is both the world's worst and somehow most terrifying vampire. 

*To no one who can listen.

The Lamest Time Travel

I'll sometimes find myself shocked to a freezing stop because I imagine "where was the last time I experienced this? or "what was my life like last time I was here?" I'm worried time will snap back and Ill go to the last time I had chocolate covered jalapenos (A snoozy double date at Huntington Beach in Bay Village, Ohio) and have to re-live my whole life from that moment. With all the knowledge of the past but the same resources, people, and places as the original time. Dare I reset the timeline and try to change it? Or just re-live the time spent between high and low moments? 

One time my oldest cat got out and spent most of the day circling the hours and lingering in the low sightlines of our ranch home. She eventually came to the front door and batted at the glass bottom panel of the half screen door. Our other cat, a chubby black tomcat, lost his mind. He puffed up and snarled and hissed, all in defiance of his usual loopy doopy manner. If our life was Peter and the Wolf, then he would be the kazoo. Maybe she spent so much time outside that she got another scent? The smell of another animal? To him, this was a whole new cat he was meeting for the first time all over. No clocks moved back or forth but that is my feeling. My fear.

Any self serving person would hate to go back to high school. I car less and overweight, even with the cumulative knowledge of 30 plus years, would still seek solace in books and cable TV. Let me read all the other things I didn't focus on. The hackneyed thing to say is that I would try to get with girls with another shot at it. But, honestly, I would try to stop the cringe inducing embracing things done and said to try and impress the 25 or so girls in my HS class. I'll never meet these people again. . I know that because the time gods sent me back when I thought of last time I made an Oedipus Rex reference (9th grade Spanish). Not worth it and risk embarrassing my self in a whole new way.

If I went back to college then I would take the two more classes to graduate with a minor in art history. And not sell my Magic cards in the funky LGS above the used bookstore for $200. Which was a killing back then but the memories are worth more now. 

In adult hood, I hope the time snap takes me back to meeting people for first time. "Oh, here are your copies. I think you left them on the machine." Those memories are Cinco de Mayo ones. The gaudy beaded stylized Mariachi hats the Mexican place makes you wear on your birthday.  I drove by a shuttered pizza place yesterday (which was previously a failed yoga studio) which was also a coffee shop we used to stop at when my son was very young and we pushed him around the neighborhood in his stroller. Those memories are fall leaves and black forest cake.

A lot of these are food related. Makes sense since it is so connected to our mind and our very need to seek nourishment. But they are also run of the mill. I'm in a thrift shop and see a mustard corduroy jacket and I think of last time I wore corduroy. It was in junior year of college when I was at my skinniest and I am helping my girlfriend mover into a summer sublet. A place with a submarine slice of a kitchen with a manual gas stove called Martha Washington. 

There is no power in this form of time travel. It would be random but controlled by the triggers of the everyday. 

The last time I laid down painter's tape--Painting my son's nursery an electric blue

The last time I struggled with an exterior dryer vent--a soggy house we rented for four years after we barely escaped the mortgage of our first (and only) home. The rental had a history of clever "non-code" solutions by the landlady's dead husband, including what had to be a whole addition done just with lots of pluck. 

Every time I zip up a windbreaker I think how that was my shtick in high school---to wear this grey and black and yellow (Batman colors!) wind breaker even though it was always 80 degrees and sunny. I should wear less windbreakers save I go back armed with just more archival knowledge and smattering of who wins the Super Bowl. 

Autumn Colors

Autumn has a lock on its brand. The changing leaves, pumpkin patches, sweater weather, and apple cider. This transcends all weather and biomes so that someone in San Diego looks for the same signs as someone in Erie, PA. 

I did not grow up with Autumn. To me, autumn memories began in late teens in college in upstate New York. That is quintessential fall-y place. The local used bookstore, anchoring a pedestrian shopping district, was even named Autumn Leaves. 

To me, a sign of fall is on highway roadsides. That is when the dips between road berm and private property line bloom with the goldenrod, New Englad Aster, milkweed, and Queen Anne's lace. Fall is gold, purple, green, brown, and white. 

Goldenrod is the main character. It's dozen of varieties, differentiated by nuances like number of leaves or how flowers are arranged, dominate the landscape below the changing trees. Their paintbrush flowers sway back and forth as the cars swoosh past. 

The brightest is New England aster. It's neon hum purple feels out of place. Sometimes tiny white fleabanes pop out from under looking like first drafts of daisy flowers.

Milkweed either looks unassuming or just loud. When loud it can be gross. Are the leaves covered in the frass scat of Monarch caterpillars? Milky sap from leaf joints pouring out? Are the pods about to burst or have them spent themselves throwing thousands of prayers into the wind? They are brown and pale green looking ready for the long sleep.

I like when the Queen Anne's lace balls back up into a fist. The flowers dry up and curl unto themselves to wave menacingly at the creeping chill.

Phrases I've Taught My Friends

Never pulled off any great cons but I got a whole group of people, spanning family and coworkers (present and past), to call sparkling waters "fizzy waters." And just through natural charisma! 

Or pity. Or boredom. 

My children drink fizzy water at same clip I do. Our house files with rhe slithering hiss of them popping a can right before bed. We will sit in our wood paneled basement with the built in bar and hi fi stereo (Long defunct, set by a guy named Bud, the former owner) and full the air with opening cans. Save it's not shitty dad beer but generic fizzy water. 

Never seen a pineapple fizzy water. That would make my son happy. For fall I once got a set of pumpkin spice fizzy waters. Those really crystallized all the hate fizzy water get save when you "scream peach through a desk fan in other room" you still can maybe get some taste of peach. The PS H20 had all the flavor of snorting pumpkin pie spice without any sweetness. My mom used to put pieces of pumpkin like bay leaves in her beans. Only the green Puerto Rican pumpkin mind you. The quintessential orange pumpkin did not exist there even imported. 

There was also Puerto Rican lettuce, a frilly leafy kind grown hydroponically on the island. That one company had the lock on the market and it became the island lettuce, romaine or a head of Foxy always imported. Puerto Rican lettuce, the old ladies said, would make you drowsy.

I've also fooled people into Mami stories. These are tales of my mother solving problems and being an absolute bonkers person doing so. 

"Do you have any more Mami stories?!" I would get from women too beautiful to be talking to me. Men too interesting to be seem with me. 

One Mami story is more of a repeating moment, sort of a family meme that repeats itself over and over. Sometimes Mami would have the pressure cooker and be frying something on the stove at the same time! She would have a pot of rise going in background also beacuse why not?

To my mother (And to me. All ghoulish jokes aside I will never own one due to the fear. And it being 2023. Mostly fear, however) pressure cookers were death dealers. The Nazgul from Lord of the Rings? A pressure cooker for sure had to be one of those dark riders. 

She would seal the lid and then let it cook while the spindle on top hissed and wheeled. 

"Don't get close!" She would say if you got in even a four foot sight line of it. It tasted fear and sensed movement, a terrifying pastiche of several villians. 

Only scarier thing than a pressure cooker was frying something. Which my mother did quite often. Porkchops (chuletas) or bistec empanado  (breaded fried steak) or tostones, arañitas, or sorrullitos (fried plantains and or corn meal) or, rarely, almohabanas (rice meal cheese buns made with cake flour)....always something frying. 

"Get out!" She would scream as she flung thawed meat and plantains into the amber oil. My mother resued oil until it was the color of Tang. And then it would pop and gurgle and belch grease. "Watch out" she would yell even if I was two rooms away.

But sometimes she would have both going. She would make this culinary version of Scylla and Charybdis and dare us to thread the needle if we wanted a glass of water or get to the backyard. 

"Be careful!" She would then take a sharp suckimg breath like the gasp of air after seeing someone take a stumble "No, don't get close! Go away!" Talk to my mother and you would be safer in the core of Three Mile Island. Stuck 10 feet below the summit of Everest. Anywhere but in that kitchen.

Stickers

When I worked at a school, teachers loved handing put stickers. This doesn't seem too odd to us aging Millenials and Gen Xers. We literally sometimes got gold stars on graded homework. Or, if lucky, a scratch and sniff one with a cartoon marshmallow next to a campfire that says "Hot Stuff" It always smelled chemical like synthetic wave sweetness. 

But these were decent stickers. The vinyl kind that you could slap on the side of a water bottle. 

These came in random huge lots from Amazon. "Can I get these?"they would send me in an email and I never said no*.

But they, upon arrival, would need to ve checked. Like Halloween candy. They often came with random and very not K8 friendly things. These seemed designed by a graphic design AI that watched Porky's five times in a row.

A real wild one was a vintage roller skate with looping text on the side that said "Girls in bikinis on roller skates" 

One was a plate of spaghetti that said "Send noods" in saucy red font like a splatter of marinara.

"Nice melons!" next to an other wise cartoon vinyl still life of a watermelon, honeydew and cantaloupe.

If not thirsty then they could be oddly deflating

"It's ok!" said one that my daughter got. Each letter alternating autumnal colors. 

"It's ok" is what you say when the kitchen messes up your order. Or when you have nothing left to say to console someone. Your wife says that to you after an argument. "There there" must have been too many letters.

"It will get better" said another in neat pink letters hemmed by a chasing comet. 

Why would you want a sticker of that? It has to be ironic like the sign that reads "Another day in paradise" over the nurse's station. Note that "Another day in paradise" is also in the manic sticker bag and yes it has palm trees.

Manic sticker bags also dance right past copyright into "fuck it. It will cost them more to sue us" territory. They are nice unofficial versions of EVERY pokemon. Even lame ones like Feebas. Steve and Alex from Minecraft in every pose with every item and weapon. Axolotls in pink, blue and gold. The Fortnite piñata. Kirby and Kinge DeeDee with carnival hammers. 

Finally there are just the straight up vice ones. All centered on alcohol. Here the stickers are similar looking, but legally still ambiguous enough, to their name brand counterparts. That is as sticker of a bottle of Fireball whiskey. As obvious as they are in the tub at the gas station. Doesn't say Fireball but those swirls kind of look like that cartoon devil. There is also a sticker of a bottle of wine and once the Assistant Principal pulled out a "Yes way Chardonnay" sticker from a bundle.

These manic bags have loose quality control and just goblin mode.

*Some would say I was too nice. Some said I was a sucker for anyone even tangentially cute. What I will say is it was an easy win for an otherwise hard job they had to do. Stickers? Yeah no problem.

The post is full of spiders

There are spiders so large in the space between the shower and the interior wall that they make shuffling sounds. Sounds like a deck of cards being manhandled. When your family really gets into Uno for one weekend or one long power outage and it's that bite of cardboard on cardboard. That is the noise the spiders make.

They peer into my shower and notice everything with their eight eyes. The Sudsy Bear soap that smells like Florida Citrus Grove. And the matching Herbal Essence Rosemry shampoo and conditioner. 

I'll share a secret. I don't use the shampoo. I just use the Suday Bear. The bottles are there in case a lady friend spends the night. Also have one set of fresh towels to never be used in case of that. The bottle of generic 9 in 1 body wash is for bachelor's of the plebian variety.

Another secret? Don't have many lady friends visiting. Just big noisy spiders.

I told my landlord about the spiders. He lives above me in my Lakewood duplex on Hickory Avenue. "They are so big that they need shoes!" 

He dismisses me. "No way. It will be winter soon and they will all die" 

I'm setting the news alert on my phone right now. The terms are "ohio," "spiders," "death" I'll hear one day how big spider kills Doug the landlord. Just strangled him with the hairy wiry legs that each must be size of a pool noodle. The spider won't move into the apartment. It will hard shuffle back into the walls.

I sleep at night under mosquito netting. It'd an interior canopy of gossamer meant to discourage the spiders. I imagine them dropping down from celliling like a Muppet from sixth circle of Hell and push through the fabric. Not enough to break it but enough to push the balled cloth and its wiry brittle knuckle down my throat. I stop snoring and gag to try and throw it off. Stab at it with the Bic pen for my dream journal. When I get up I'm coveted in yellow green ick and the spider curls inward in its dying throws. Got one. I hear shuffling. I swear it sings "Hello my fucking rag time guy" and now there are more.

Hatchet Coming

 Getting up each morning now involves a minimum of three wheezes and an audible groan along with the clickety-clack of some knee. A random ankle. Left or right? It varies. As I end up on the wrong side of middle aged I am still alternating between personalities. My friends have locked into personalities.

The bourbon guy with endless $80-dollar bottles of brown that he will never drink.

The technologista guy talking about crypto and AI.

The vintage gal able to find lovely dresses and kitchenware from the leftovers of the Rust Belt.

The motorcycle guy.

The positive affirmation lady. I cause good things and good things will come to me.

The collector. You pick what but just waiting for the market to turn on XYZ thing. 

I don't have a locked in personality save the anxious guy. The fussy guy. My wife tells me "You seem to only operate when you can worry."

I dabble in all of the above. Maybe not affirmation but I try to get that "heart" reaction on chats with friends and colleagues and always searching for that high. 

Recently, I found myself sharpening my hatchet. Which, considering I own a hatchet and varying small knives rated from everyday to kick ass, along with a sharpening block, that maybe I am a knife guy. A blade master. That sounds bad ass. But, I suck at sharpening. Another fine motor skill lost on my stubby hands. I am able to get big burrs out and I guess they are sharper but I want the immediate bite against my thumb as I feel* the blade and have them slice through the newspaper all the knife gurus have laying about their workspaces.

My hatchet lives in the trunk of my car. Which contains many items I consider "emergency needs" but could also quickly pivot into "enterprising serial killer"***.

There is the hatchet. 

Then the wrecking bar. Not a crow bar as its not hook but a solid shaft of iron painted deep October goldenrod yellow. It has a bladed wedge tip on one end and then a slight curve at the other end. 

Then two sets of jumper cables. A portable tire pump that runs off the car's cigarette lighter** and two pairs of work gloves. There is a roll of paper towels and armor all wipes. A roll of duct tape. A bag of N95 masks and sand paper squares A 50 foot extension cord and then the tool box. In the tool box got the usual stuff plus a headlamp I stole of a low voltage electrician, wire strippers, Sharpies, extra strength sticky squares, electrical tape, utility knives, voltage testers, random screws and a can of WD40. 

In my previous line of work I bounced between sites and it was nice to have tools at the ready. I did find use of all of these in a K-12 EDU setting even the hatchet which the trio of fifth grade boys deemed "awesome." 

To, I guess, my credit, all these items have helped at some point. I did once help jump someone's car in a random lot out on Green Road on east side of Cleveland suburbs. The wrecking bar helped with moving furniture and prepping for bulk pick up day. That is my tool box now. Our normal one buried under boxes yet unpacked from our last move. Its a handy little space in the back of the Honda Civic.

Maybe  I am the problem solver guy. Always worried.

*I wanted a stronger verb here but everything I came up was too suggestive even in context. Caress? Finger? Stroke? 

**I can't call it anything but that even knowing it is not the power port.

***Listing it all out for the post it really is suspicious. I am one pair of women's underwear and pair of heavy rubber gloves from being rolling probable cause. 

A Job

 I don't dream of labor. The ideal job would be writer. But, that ship sailed. I look at the news and realize I am supremely fortunate to have landed where I am professionally. Its ok. Some say good. And it could for sure be worse.

I do want the physicality of moving around. The warehouse job where you actually did something. But, then a chance to just take a break. Stacking pallets? Loading carts up with derelict and leaky UPS batteries? That is a young man's game. I was just helping for a sec. But, I got some important emails to write. 

I don't want to rely on others and chase people down to help. "When will you make it to this client? They called and were upset." "Sorry to chase via email but I need you to sign this agreement!" I don't get hit with the "not my job" very much anymore* but no one has enough time or energy to put out all the fires. Meanwhile I need to stay in my cube.

How nice it is to be emotionally separated from work. It is 5pm and the day is over! Check emails after hours? Who do I look like, the President. But, what do I do know? My therapist will say I was "addicted to chaos" and I pay her to be right. 

These are co-workers. That you like. But, not brothers and sisters like the warehouse job. Not people you are emotionally invested in. That sucks that Deb in Finance is made at me but it is what it is. At the other places? When I was younger? I would be devastated.

I am glad to not give it all my emotions. My love, my anger, and all of my sorrow** But, I want to. Open up and be raw and exposed. To then lash out when it just guts you and leaves you driving back home in silence. No music or nothing. 

*Have worked with custodians who don't clean. Truck drivers who do not back up their trucks. Volunteers who asked to be paid. And school nurses who refuse to take temperatures. 

** G Gundam reference for those in the know. 

Cringe

Today, I spoke for a solid minute into the headset mic asking a question during a group call to then find, I was on mute. And, no one said anything. No friendly "Oh hey, you are on mute. Can you say that again?" Everyone ignored that purple ring around my sullen avatar. 

It made me think of grating horrible and awkward moments. The ones that make you get up at 2:45am and wonder "How did I say that!? How did I survive?" The ones seared into your mind.

Here is one. A true story. My sister is much older than I. By, about a decade. By the time she was out of college and beginning her adult life I was in early high school. One time, she brought down a boyfriend to visit the family on the old island of Puerto Rico. The guy (Real nice guy. Ended up marrying him) wanted to learn Spanish and write down phrases to practice. He asked to go to a drug store and get a notebook. I overheard this and said "Oh, I have one you can use." I ran to my desk and found a tiny spiral bound notebook and scanned the pages. They were all clear. Which, was good as I had one notebook where I would write the most purple prose. Star Wars fan fiction (The Adventures of Kryat Squadron) and then narratives to myself of pretty girls in high school and how they would, of course, adore me. I once noted how Marilyn M wore her volleyball uniform all day (That was allowed if you were on a team) and how that was awesome. How Rachel H dressed up as Supergirl for Halloween and the wind hit her skirt just right sometimes to get a peek at her underwear. Did I tell you this is cringe?

But, this notebook? No, it was clean. I double checked it and gave it to to the guy. As I walked back to my room I heard him say "Is this a love poem?" and then I ran and locked myself in the space. I turned on the window AC and made it blast along with the stereo so that I could pretend to ignore any rings. "Let me see," was last thing I heard my sister say as I ran way to bury myself. Hours later they went to dinner and I snuck into his room* and scanned the notebook and...fuck...there was a poem there. About Irma A and how she was formed from all the elements into this goddess and it had to be dealt with ASAP. I ripped the page to pieces and flushed it in separate waves down the toilet. They never brought it up. Maybe they forgot? Or maybe they were too kind but this is the only record. To be read by the few eyes that see this.

Here is another cringe one. It also involves my sister save we are much younger and in the countryside of the hilly interior of Puerto Rico. I don't remember the town but the scene is something out of Sound of Music save everything is tropical. But yeah the rolling hills and open gullies set by wood framed country homes. We are there because a neighbor of ours (Who was Basque. What an Inception of the historical losers. A Basque guy living in Puerto Rico!) would take us to this big Basque party up there and we just went because it was one of those things your parents dragged you to. My childhood is lots of parties sitting on chairs or in corners trying to find a tv to watch. My sister was there playing with other young girls. She was always more outgoing and she and three other girls (I assume somehow Basque? There could have been maybe one Basque guy and he just had the gift of too many friends) playing Monopoly.

"Can I play?" I asked. They said sure. And I rolled some number and landed on the rail road. "What does that mean?"

"Oh you get on a train and have to leave the game. Thanks for playing" They all said.

And I believed it! Fuck! I just walked away to walk around the grounds and wait until Mami said it was time to go home.

This blog could be cringe but I think it can be too sincere sometimes for it to be too awful.

*My mother being Mami made sure to keep the adults in separate beds as they were not married. But only because "What would his parents think?" And, I don't know. They were not there. 

Lost messages

Scrap of paper fluttering between the carts of the Kroger on Nagelwood Road

"Bird seed

Prime Energy drink

Salami for the cat

Kale

Apples

Vegetarian oyster sauce

Ibuprofen

Baby carrots

Duck eggs

Heavy cream

Pale ale

Snickerdoodle Poptarts"

Found in the first drawer of a desk at the abadoned TRW facility in eastern Cleveland, OH.

"One thing I never said is I love you. I realize you likely knew that and I can imagine you rolling your eyes when reading this. If, for some reason, you didn't then there it is. Ill miss working with you and this place."

From a performance review, leaked when a junior project manager left their tablet on the bus

"I adore May. If she were to ask me to jump then I would ask "How high?" With my whole heart. But, whole heart, means a whole view as well. And yeah, she can be a "mean girl" to those she doesn't like working with. It really does feel like high school sometimes over in Project Services."

From a pooly written IEP in the Lakewood school district 

"Devon shows am ability to read good words and phrases when supported. Needs to build reading stamina without aide aid"

Graffiti scrawled over the rightmost urinal of the Parallax Bar's men's restroom.

"There are no secrets this year"

From the Stardew Valley reddit

"I'm afraid to marry one of the bachelor's. I play on a shared tv and my parents would wonder why I'm courting Alex (I just love his himbo self). Is there a way to hide the heart indicators when you give gifts. Playing on Switch if that helps.

Little Rhythms

If there is a globe then I must spin it. To just see if it works. 

There. It works! 

Let's play that game where we spin the globe and then you jab your finger at it. Wherever you land, that is your next vacation!

Splash! 

It's always the ocean. The big extra empty part they put the legend on. 

If there are tongs then I must clickity clickity click them. Make sure they work!

The door frame above room 305? It's slightly higher than all thr others. This used to be a drama classroom with a sunken stage. The "Glorietta" as they called it twenty something years ago. But it's gone save for the oddly hidden dips and bends of the floorboards. The door frame is higher and swear every freshman boy has to slap the thing on the way in. Cut it out, Jose! And Parker and Devon. Stop it. You will ruin the paint.

Speaking of kids...they drew hopscotch on the sidewalk. If I'm walking and they have drawn a hopscotch course then I must do it. My ankles! The ears of everyone in the whole damn neighborhood after they hear me scream "Oh my body!"

If we are ending service for the night and the manager tells me to clear out the bus trays...I'll kiss every roll of bread before tossing it. That is the body of Christ.

Fan Service

Content warning: This post is extremely and awkwardly "gushy." If you have read this blog then you know I have a penchant to day dream and imagine everything in a cinematic way. I would not have put this key to paper but the image has stuck in my head for weeks and no one reads these posts. And, noting that, the content warning seems moot, but, still wish to be considerate. The whole post has a fan zine solo hype post vibe. Which is rather appropriate what with the origins of this blog.

That all said...

I want my heroine to save the day. To flip over cubicles with grace and strength and hold the people stopping me from meeting my KPIs at the end of a fist. I previously worked at a school and she would settle the angry parents and the people who would not file sub plans. She fixes everything changing via a magical transformation. This all happens set to my action music of previous posts. Big synth scores to set a sword fight.

In the transformation  I am the camera and spin slowly around as spindly arcs of light crackle around her. Starting from the top, she will cock her head to the side and close her eyes and streaks of neon pink and electric blue ribbon through her hair. The clothes on her flash away to be instantly replaced by the costume. The onyx gleam of a black leotard lined with the same pink. Her arms glow with same pink and blue glyphs until they end at her fingers and form into twin swords. They are short and broad machete like. All black with neon glow along the edges like something from Tron. She crosses them and presses to her chest. My eyes, the whole scene, keeps moving around and from her hip  the same glyphs run down her legs. From those patterns her boots form, wrapping from her ankles into neat slips. We then start spinning back up across the back of her legs and back until we end at her eye level. She pulls the swords down to her side. With blades akimbo she opens her eyes and inside it is blue comet fire and whole hearted resolve. The whole scene radiates warmth and power like seeing a cosmic moment. A ship on fire across Saturn's rings. A stone rolling down Olympus Mons. The arclights of my heroine ready to save the day. To slay, as the kids at said school used to say. 

Favorite Video Games #1

 Dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig, dig.

I can tell you the first time I ever played Dig Dug. It was the early 90s and I found myself at an urban amusement/theme park called Felicilandia. Note that Felicilandia sucked. Large and ungainly it was a county fair made permanent by the tropical latitudes. The sort of rides they truck in to the fairgrounds every summer? Those were held down by cinder blocks at this park. It had an open air arcade with rows of cabinets, their backs to each other, under a high zinc roof. There I first played Dig Dug. I don't remember anything happening or "clicking" in that moment but it is the only game I can remember exactly where I was when first playing it.

DigDug is a maze game, like PacMan*, except you make the maze as you dig through the brightly colored strata. There is a satisfaction in clearing away the level albeit that is challenging as the game eventually sends the enemies into a frenzy and speeds them up.

How you defeat your enemies? Will you poke them and then you blow them!** But, seriously you pump them up with air until they pop.

A great feeling in Dig Dug is finessing killing two enemies on both sides of you by flippings the joy stick left and right pumping one enemy and then flipping to the other before the first deflates. You are able to shuffle them back and forth until you are out of a jam.

You can always go deeper in Dig Dug save that not much changes save the color of the digital dirt. Your level is signified by a flower on top Roman numeral style. Each little tulip is one level and then big spindly one is ten. 

Dig Dug is the only game I can see I am somewhat good at. And good in the way of netting high scores. Not anything to specifically brag about. The world record is in the millions but I can get to 75,000 which is enough to hold it down on the arcade side. This is the oldest game on the list (1981) and it is one where you can memorize patterns and "get gud." The first few levels are all muscle memory save when you want to have fun and mess around. Clear all the spaces and try to crush four monsters at once with a rock. 

It is GREAT to crush enemies with a rock. You can kill them by pumping them. When there is only one enemy left, the last one freaks out and runs away meaning you can always leave one survivor. Crushing with a rock? Now that is classy. It is using a semi colon appropriately. It is satisfying like pulling a long seam of painter's tape off the baseboard. Two enemies at once with a rock! Just lovely. Three? Its Babe Ruth calling a home run blast. Four at once?! Pure power!

Dig Dug reminds me of The Happy Dog bar in Cleveland and playing for hours with out of town friends on the square table stop cabient. Your look down into the game and can set your drink on the glass! Later that night...we had an early Halloween party and told everyone we were expecting our first child. 

There is a Dig Dug port on the arcade game at work. One (the best) of the 5000 games on it. I swear no one plays the thing save for me (Dig Dug) and someone deep down the hall who plays Tetris. More digging for me. 

*Made/owned by same company and the DigDug characters are canon in the PacMan lore. Whether the lore is in the original games I doubt (Ms. PacMan had cut scenes) but the later games had something.

** I know that is not the exact quote but too good to turn it down

Favorite Video Games #2

 My daughter's first day of kindergarten began in her room on a Chromebook that I had, years ago, bought and provisioned for children that were now likely second graders. This was right in middle of the Covid-19 pandemic and remote learning. And her teacher was holding the morning meeting Zoom call letting everyone know the rules even though we were all, using the parlance at the time, asymmetrical. I recall her teacher, who, at the time was also a coworker, being everything on the screen, highlighting her freckles and curls "We are going to teach each other. I know a lot about letters and numbers and animals. I don't know a lot about Roblox or Fortnite or Minecraft, but I bet you do"

Minecraft. Yes, my kids knew a lot about it. Minecraft is likely the game I have played the most in my entire life. Xbox did this thing where during its 20th anniversary it sent reports of hours played and Minecraft came in at close to 800. And in vanilla* Minecraft. Note, my children shared my account, but yeah its a lot. I spent many early morning evenings during the work from home period just going endless in Minecraft.

This is a favorite video game because it is game I played with both of my children who have dressed as Steve, the "hero" of the game, and then an axolotl. Which is not from Minecraft originally but my kids know what it is because of the game. 

Minecraft is the biggest video game of all time. It is likely the most successful (over 100 million copies sold. We own five different versions of it on multiple platforms) albeit there is debate that Tetris beats it. It is so big Microsoft bought it from the original developers and now its licensure is integrated into bundles of licensing for Windows, Word, etc.

Trying to talk about it is akin to trying to talk about an entire country. A good writer would struggle and this is just a blog I write to be read by a lonely bot on the shores of Lake Baikal, Siberia, Russia. So I will talk about things that impressed me about the game and why I played it so much.

Minecraft is a sandbox game. Everything is block and the world is made of distinct biomes, inspired by real world and fantasy locations, that are randomly generated when the game save launches. The game has a decentralized lore where the word is live in (There are monsters** and people but you are the only person that has any impact on the world). There is no reason for you, the player, to be here.

And when you begin a new world (Seed in the game's nomenclature) you are just dropped into it and that its. There are no tutorials or in game prompts. Just go. Build or survive. I always played survival which is the more arcade style element where you have health and hunger and enemies can damage you. The other is creative where every block (feature) is available and you can fly/float in every direction and you can make anything. But, fuck, I did not know that and I sucked when I began. I am not ashamed that I, as a "noob", did not know how to make a bed and spent the first in game week (about 40 minutes in real time) awake, never saving, and being attacked by the mysterious Phantom monster. That only comes out when you don't sleep. 

My children, at the time 5 and 7, had to tell me, having learned the lore and mechanics from YouTube. How do you make redstone work? How do you get to the end? How do I tame a wolf? How do you make glass? TINTED GLASS!? These are all things they taught me like I helped teach them brush their teeth and make toast.

Once briefed by my in house advisors the world was mine. My favorite thing was just to walk/sail for hours (literally) and, as I move, setup small base camps and cairns (lit with torches). I would find a unique spot where the landscape seemed unique and make an ersatz castle from the materials there. Then, after that, would hike back to my original starting point and my original home. Then, I would repeat this, going in another direction. Eventually I would stumble on old camps and bases and recall a specific time or memory. Here is the home I made by the swamp where I first saw a Witch. Here is the mine where I first found some diamonds. I named it Big Hole Country. There are spots by rarer biomes (Mushroom forests and Jungles) and a spot where I dug an underground and underwater tunnel uniting two islands across a digital bay. 

I never achieved the holy grails of Minecraft (beating the Ender Dragon) and never found a Woodland Mansion but that world is still there. 

*Unmodified. Most games, especially BIG games, have modding communities that let you tinker with the code to make things look a certain way, sound a certain way or get really out there. Way beyond me. 

**The iconic Minecraft monster, the Creeper, needs to be up there with Goombas and the PacMan ghosts as iconic video game villains. Their wonky yet menacing blocky look and their tendency to just sneak up to you and then EXPLODE really makes you feel worry from the curls of your toes. You are digging underground and constantly turning around to make sure that soft whisper isn't behind you.

Favorite Video Games # 3

 You ever see that meme where someone is holding a sign that says "Your music saved me!" and then the next panel it is something like "Never Going To Give You Up" or "Cotton Eye Joe"?

Stardew Valley, number 3 on the list, has that same vibe save that it is sincere with no hints of irony.

Stardew is a farming simulator where you build up an abandoned farm from nothing but packs of turnip seeds and rusty gardening tools.

Stardrew is a slice of life simulator where you live in a small port town and meet, and possibly romance, close to 20 distinct non playable characters (NPCs).

Stardew is retro pixelated top down combat simulator where trying to get to the bottom of Skull Cavern is as hard as any better known dungeon crawler. 

Stardew has a fishing mini game (a tricky one but once mastered you never want to stop) which is a lock for making me love any game*

Stardew also have a classic video game vilian, a time limit, with each 24 hour day (about 15 minutes of in game time) being your chance to water crops, feed animals, buy seeds/supplies, harvest your artisanal products (You can make wine, beer, cheese, etc.), chat with your NPCs, fish, chop wood, mine, and then go sell your items. And there is a wizard and cat that sells hat. Oh, and doing all this helps you save a run down community center beating out a global conglomerate (Joja Mart) and their threat to small town life!**

And, while I didn't need saving,*** this game is loaded with a vibing and wholesome community of people who say how it cured their depression. How it made them good cry.**** How it winds them down after a long day. It cures their anxiety. It makes them feel accomplished. They bonded with their spouse over a shared game. 

The game was also made primarily by a single guy, Concerned Ape, who is sort of tech bro we THOUGHT we were going to get when unboxing our first PCs.

You hear all this and the game is not overwhelming. You can play at your own pace and if you don't want to mine (and fight goofy cartoon monsters) then you don't. You don't want to fish? No problem. Sure, you don't get to see every cut scene and check every box but that is ok. And, if you are completionist, then this is the game for you. And a diverse set of things to track down, make and find. Not just more of the same in a huge map. When I found the enigmatic Prismatic Shard I screamed "OMG A Prismatic Shard, yes!" and my wife laughed from the neighboring room. "What a nerd!" This game can be many things and it can also provide satisfaction to us elder millennials who dream of maybe owning a home in a walkable community and saving the world with our sustainable agriculture. Get friendly enough with Shane, the surly town drunk NPC, and you save him for suicide in probably the darkest scenes in the game. SDV firmly makes you the hero of your own story.  

With so many options you can sink hundreds of hours into the game and then start a new save and have a distinct experience, particularly with the dating/marrying option. I don't have the heart to start a new save so it is just me and the local sculptor, Leah, and our kids on Ironhoe Farm. 

*Does your video game have a fishing mini game? Then you automatic get 8 out of 10. Does it have women holding swords? 9 out of 10. Women have neon pink/blue, etc hair? Fuck! 10 out of 10. Must buy!

**UNLESS you got the Joja route and buy a membership and instead just repair the community center with money. Doing this nets same in game effects save the forest spirits (Yeah they help fix the community center when you offer them crops) have to exile themselves. This is the bad choice and controversial among fandom. 

***At least, not that I know of. If any game will save me it will have a fishing mini game in it. 

****In the early part of the game you are given a choice to adopt a dog or cat and name it. It is common for people to name them after childhood pets often long deceased. And eventually, if you pet and feed the animal every day, the game will prompt you with a text that says your pet loves you. And its sweet and cut like a knife. 

Favorite Video Games #4

Between 2006 and 2010, I spent most of my time looking for jobs. And not the kind off job hunting memed in young professional memes and reels. Not looking for something better if not just looking for something. I spent this time not necessarily always unemployed but under employed. PT hours and gig jobs. I got paid in a 100 Target gift card once. 

But, when at home, I played ROMS of Gameboy games. ROMS being bootleg rips of games you could play on an emulator program on your machine. Your laptop could be a Gameboy (or anything if you have the right specs) and play for free any and all games. 

Here I played Pokémon: Crystal which was the second Pokémon game but this was years after its release.

Now, original Pokémon? Red and Blue. Oh yeah I played the hell out of that and lived the schoolyard memes (Missingo hack, etc) but just stopped playing once I went to college. Pokémon went on. And on and on.

Those games in 2008 (now some one firmly in kid 20s) were a return and hint at everything new. The new starters. The goofy look of Wooper and how adorable Mareep evolves into beady eye Ampharos. Here I got wrecked by Whitney's Miltank, a brutal battle in games now known for ease of access.* It made me love the franchise all over again even, almost 30 years from the first, it hasn't moved much beyond animated gifs slamming into one another.

I used to work at a school and my knowledge of most Pokémon from generations 1 through 6** was always impressive to the children. I have this art nouveau styled Umbreon shirt that I would sometimes wear on Fridays, which is when the already casual dress code rules*** were even slacker, and be the envy of all the middle schoolers

"What is this shirt that is making all the seventh grade girls go crazy!?" asked a teacher pulling me aside in the hallway. I felt truly small and pathetic hearing that exact phrasing. 

I'm talking less about the game itself and more the experience. This is an intergenerational franchise with manic adult fans and kids. It makes oodles of money because of that as compared to say a Power Rangers fandom, which is for kids but is held up by adults. But, yeah, we knew the Team Rocket anime saying by heart and I spent a vacation trip to the USVI desperately hunting for batteries for Red and Blue games on the OG Gameboy. The seeds for this were already laid when I downloaded those roms and reconnected in Johto, Generation 2/Pokémon Crystal's home continent. Crystal got re made in the mid 2010s onto the Nintendo DS as Heart Gold/Soul Sliver and damn those games are amazing. In color and popping with a neat gimmick of the Poke Meter. It was a pedometer shaped like a white and red Poke Ball that could take to the game via likely RFID or some infrared connection. So drop your Pokémon in the Pokemeter and go for a walk and it gains levels, finds gear, even other Pokémon! I worked a warehouse job then so getting 12K steps a day was nothing. My pokes were yoked!****

I have bought every Nintendo handheld (The DS allowed for cross play from older Gameboy Advanced games so that helped me with Ruby and Sapphire) so I can play these games and its my turn with the Switch when Scarlet came out! Out of the way kids. 

The franchise for sure needs a refresh. We have Pokémon dogs based on cinnamon rolls right now and how many more horrible fish Pokémon can we get? But, it allows for a conversation with young and old and scratches that itch of cheerfully grinding for incremental advantage. 

And, my top ten, fwiw

1) Vaporeon (Poke Mermaid!)

2) Crobat (Lighting Bat!)

3) Litten (Fire Kitty!)

4) Mudkip (MUDKIP MUDKIP MUDKIP!)

5) Annihilape (Spooky King Kong)

6) Sandslash (BA Dirt Porcupine)

7) Raichu (Alolan) (Trippy Surfing Thunder Mouse, Go!)

8) Luxray (Lighting Kitty!)

9) Rockruff (Rock Puppy!)

10) Breloom (Punching Mushroom!)

*Gen 1 is brutal. The way stats were set up meant the psychic type gym was near impossible. Counter it with bug type moves? Well they all suck. Counter with ghost moves? Well all the ghost typed are also poison which psychic wrecks and Shadow Ball runs off attack Stat. Why?! Gen 2 was ok save for Milbank and Gen 3 is where we get a nice balance of hard the quality of life improvements. This isn't me being some Poke boomer. I appreciate not needing HM slaves and not keeping boxes free and sharing experience but damn did an all level 60 team feel great back in the day.

** Each game is a generation setting the tone for the show and Manga, etc. 30 years of Pokémon and nine generations so far.

***I once had a co worker bemoan that we allowed the Assistant Principal to wear ripped jeans. Could I do something about it? No, I had no business talking about the AP's pants.

****I promise to never say that again.

Favorite Video Game 5

 When Twitter died (for what seems maybe real albeit it has been over many times before), I moved to Mastodon. Mastodon is neat but in a DIY sense. The people on Mastodon remind of that one guy in 8th grade computer club who really liked Linux and our collective response was "What?" We were debating which of the Solitaire card backs in Windows was best. People on Mastodon have their houses wired with mini network rooms. 

At the time, the trend was to drop a hashtag and introduce yourself My Space style with favorites, dislikes, etc. And since it is the Mastodon fediverse there is no algorithm to glean your info. Instead it is left for people to find by searching the hashtag. Mastodon has an early 00s message board feel where you find certain people, chats, veins and then run with them. Its work but feels redeeming. I remember spending a lot of time trying to get stars on the Fish Lore or The Agony Booth to get that same feeling.

One of the intro hashtags was favorite video games. For this ask I always have my answers ready. Its an ice breaker that I have anxiously practiced over hundreds of times*

So, ill milk this for a series of posts to get those numbers up and those two sets of eyeballs reading.

And Number 5, is kind of a cheat. Sorry! Because its a category of a game. And, one I made up.

It's the Big Dumb Shooter.

First experienced in the aforementioned computer club when we played the first few levels of Star Wars Dark Forces from demo dics.

And then just honed to death in Goldeneye of which I was the generation that argued over people cheating by picking OddJob and the guy who insisted on Licenses to Kill (you die in on hit) and then Slappers only (there are no guns just people running around trying to karate chop each other). 

Not to mention arcade light gun shooters. I sank way too many quarters into Area 51 and Revolution X. The latter being a rail gun shooter (you cant do anything but aim and shoot. No moving through the area. All the arcade shooters are like this, making this aside somewhat moot.) where you fight a tyrannical rock and roll hating regime with CD shooting guns while being mentored by Aerosmith. There are super soldiers in rubber yellow and black armor running around on rollerblades and bug eyed ninjas throwing Nerf throwing stars at you. Other things in this game

• Steven Tyler tells you, dead to rights, "Music is the Weapon"
• Laserdisc are flaming CDs which deal even more damage
• You have to save hostages (The same bleached blond 90s California babe in a pink tank top) by shooting away the locks on their stripper cages. Note they are still dancing while there is a gun fight happening. That male gaze is something.

But, the first time I ever played a big dumb shooter and thought "Damn, is this is a game**" was Far Cry 3. That game is a banger with an open world (That doesn't feature that enemy scaling bullshit. No point in an open world if there are areas you are wink wink not really allowed to go to) and a real sense of clawing your way back. The premise?

You and your friends are partying in a pictaresque Indian ocean archipelago and get kidnapped by pirates save for you (who escape) and then have to shot and stab your way to save them. You have to craft weapons, gear to carry more weapons, and then medicines from the animals and plants on the islands. This is all pretty reductive save to say that the world felt alive (Still empty. There are people there but, like an shooter world, its either shootable or not) particularly with the animals. You will be running away from enemies after messing up some stealth attempt to take down an outpost and also waiting for the game to let you heal*** and jump into a pond. And then, there is an alligator in there and you are WTF! You are lining up to take a long sniper shot and the familiar hiss of a Komodo Dragon pops up and you are No no no no, fuck!

The game also sets up umpteen sequels (all just derivatives of FC3) that add more features (In FC6 where you fight in a fictionalized Cuba you have a backpack that shoots rockets and a cock fighting rooster that can kill people) but its just lots of fluff. The core formula works so well that they have set it to run in Paleolithic time (Primal) and cyber vector punk futures (Blood Dragon), then Nepal (4) an Montana (5 and New Dawn)

Far Cry 3 also has an overpowered bow and arrow weapon which can one shot guys in armor. The developers weaken this in later games but damn is it satisfying to plunk people with it. Lets me say "bend back your bow" which is a lovely phrase.

Next one (and all the next ones) are less violent so don't worry. This is as dude bro as it gets.

*As an introvert (The last time I did a Myers Brigg I was INFJ If that helps you contextualize) the worst thing with icebreakers is not the questions themselves but going first. For this, I have many canned responses and quirky facts. I enjoy the lesson teaching semi woke ones meant to make you think. These feel better in an 8th grade classroom but fuck yeah can I name 10 countries in Africa. 20, 30, 40, 50. Bring it on! 

**Note that there are many great games I have played but arne't on the list. Not a knock on them just that if you tell me "Hey, no way you would ever be allowed to play these games again." then I would be quit sad, indeed.

***Big douche daddy shooters like Call of Duty and Battlefield (I actually like the B3 soundtrack fwiw) popularized the "hide behind a crate and heal" motif. Far Cry does that save that the game lets you start a manual heal. Which then involves varying scenes where you characters heals by pulling a shark tooth out of their hand. Or shoving a bundle of matches into a wound to cauterize it.