(Related to Friday’s post.) At the game store, my boys got interested in some water-sports game on some unknown-to-me console system. But I spotted old-school Super Mario Bros. on another monitor, so I gravitated over to it.

The first few tries I made at the old game showed that I’d lost any skills I once might have had with it. I just right sucked at it. But after a few minutes, and about half a dozen deaths, I managed to make my way in the world. Soon Calfgrit7 (he turned 8 yesterday, but that’s another post, tomorrow) noticed my game and left his little brother to float around in the water game.

CG7 asked to play and I let him. I told him the object of the game and how the controller worked, and he took right into it. It took him less time to get the hang of the game than it did me to get back into the hang. He was stomping Goombas and Koopa Troopas left and right.

Once I saw how impressed he was with the old game, I told him that I had this game at home. He was immediately interested. “Really!? Can we play it!?”

So when we got home that night, after baths were finished and pajamas were on, I took out my old Super Nintendo and plugged it into our TV. I was mistaken when I told CG7 I had Super Mario Bros. I have Super Mario Kart — but that’s even better for our situation. With SMK, both boys can play at the same time instead of waiting for turns.

I explained the game and controls to both boys and let them loose on the first basic race track. They *loved* it! At first, though, CG7 was frustrated with figuring out how to drive the karts on the track. He moaned and complained “Why can’t I get off this wall? Why am I going the wrong way?”

I got him to calm down for a moment and said, “Now think about it for a moment. There’s no hurry for you — Calfgrit4 is just going in circles — so take your time and think about how to work the controls.”

He took a big breath and calmed down. Within a few more seconds he had it figured out and was racing. Of course, he was just racing himself, as CG4 continued his circling the starting line.

I let them play two races — CG7 won both, of course — and then I took over for CG4. I won the next two races, easily, but not without having to try. CG7 knew what he was doing by then, and if I started screwing around on the track, he’d pass me and I had to work to get ahead again.

I gave the controller back to CG4 who again lost a race. But it didn’t matter to him that CG7 was running circles around him, (as he ran circles around himself), he just liked controlling the character on the screen.

By the way, Calfgrit7 likes Donkey Kong, and Calfgrit4 likes Luigi. We all three had a ball with this old game for over half an hour. Afterwards they made me promise we’d play it again sometime soon.

The play of the game holds up well after all this time — originally produced in 1992 — but the graphics are absolutely abysmal by today’s standards. It’s really shocking to go from any modern console or computer game and then watch this thing. It’s amazing what our minds ignore or fill in with the old, simple graphics of the old games.

When I’ve always thought back on these games, I can picture in my mind’s eye, vivid details and smooth colors. Looking at Mario Kart on the Wii doesn’t look different than what I remember, in my mind’s eye, of the Super version. But actually looking at the 1992 graphics, wow, nostalgia paints a much more beautiful and detailed image than reality.

But that’s the technology we had in the day. And still, the game play was and still is superb. I’m looking forward to playing this some more with my boys. By the end of our half hour of play time, I had just started introducing the special abilities — shells, banana peels, speed mushrooms, etc. — so our next races should be even more exciting.

Bullgrit

Me and my boys were at a shopping center today, and Calfgrit7 asked if we could go into the video game store. I don’t know why he wanted to go in, and I don’t really know why I agreed, but the three of us entered. We don’t have a console system, and the only computer game I’ve played lately is World of Warcraft.

This made me realize that I’m not really much of a video gamer anymore. I’m more of a has-been video gamer. Since the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis of the early ’90s, I’ve played very, very few console games. Past, say 1995, I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve played a console system. Although, I still own my old Super Nintendo (with only the Super Mario Cart game cartridge) and Sega Genesis (with only the Shadowrun cart.), sealed up in boxes at the back of my closet. [I pulled this out for my boys after our trip into the video game store — I’ll write about this experience for Monday.]

I have a shelf under my desk with at least half a dozen computer games — off the top of my head, I can think of Diablo I & II, Half-Life 1 & 2, Far Cry, F.E.A.R., DOOM 3, Guild Wars, and World of Warcraft plus it’s two expansions. But since I started WoW three or four years ago, I haven’t really played much of any other computer game. WoW takes a lot of time, and you never really “finish” it.

Before starting WoW, I’d play a game for a few months — finishing it and replaying it at least once — then I’d get another game. I played at least two new games a year. I know some would call that “barely a gamer,” but computer gaming was not my life, it was just a hobby for occasional escapism. (Table-top gaming had a deeper claim on my life.)

But now, other than the WoW expansions over the past couple of years, I haven’t bought or played a new computer game. And even at my most intense, I played WoW only twice, occasionally thrice, a week, for about 3-4 hours at a time. And now, even with getting the new Wrath of the Lich King expansion in November, I’ve maybe played it a total of 4 hours (outside riding around and exploring the world with my sons).

My main WoW character is still only level 70, and my new death knight character is only level 56. A couple of weeks ago, I canceled my subscription to WoW, and my time paid runs out this weekend. Now, I’ve canceled my account before, after reaching the top levels in the game, and I ended up back in the game after 3-6 months. But this is the first time I’ve canceled it before “finishing” it as a solo player.

Over the past year, I’ve done very little computer gaming at all. One of my friends loaned me Fallout 2 about three weeks ago, and I haven’t played 10 minutes of the game — I’ve really only installed it and started it to see what it looked like.

When I first came to this realization that I’m not doing any computer gaming lately, I felt a little saddened. What’s happened to me? I thought. I used to be “a computer gamer geek.” Computer games were part of my personality and character. But once I considered what has “happened” to me, I realize I’ve made a choice: to write (and work) on this web site every night instead of playing computer games.

And after thinking seriously about it for a while, I’ve come to realize that I like the choice I’ve made. I’ve really enjoyed writing (and working) on this web site. Not only am I doing something I enjoy doing, but I feel a sense of accomplishment looking back through the logs of this site that I never felt looking through the boxes of completed games on my desk shelf.

I do feel a sense of loss, though, over not playing computer games anymore. I’ve definitely “given up” something that has always been a part of my life — as far back as ZORK on my Commodore 64. But I guess I need to accept the fact that I’m no longer, currently a “computer gamer.” I’m just a “used to player.”

Do I have to turn in my membership card? Or can I just be put on reserve status?

Bullgrit

Late 1983, I was 16 years old. I had discovered a condom vending machine in a local gas station restroom.

I and my best friend of the time decided we really needed to have a condom for the opportunity that we knew would inevitably arise, soon. It’s always good to be prepared, and first sex was not a situation we wanted to find ourselves in unprepared. The two of us discussed it, and we made a plan.

The restroom was located outside the station, around on the left side. We’d drive into the parking lot (using our freshly earned driver’s licenses) via the left entrance to the parking lot, and park right in front of the restroom door. We’d both get out of the car together, but only one would go into the restroom at a time. The other would hang outside the door keeping watch.

The one inside would put in his two quarters, turn the dial, and get his condom pack. He’d come out and take watch for the other to go inside. We’d then both get in the car and drive away, out the left exit from the parking lot.

Our biggest concern was that the ladies room was adjacent to the men’s room — what if a woman walked up to or came out of their door? We’d have to be fast so to reduce the chance of that happening.

At the time, we were very serious with our plan. We were shy, 16-year-old boys secretly acquiring something that only adult men with mustaches needed. Having a condom was the first step into the Playboy mansion, we thought.

We also believed, without actually saying it aloud, that just having a condom would increase the chance of having that first sex experience. I mean, if you’re prepared, it’ll give you confidence to pursue that first experience. Right?

We drove away from the gas station a little faster than we should have, but we both had our treasure. The package was a thin square box with the brand name on it (not Trojan) and the fine print instructions and warning that no one actually reads. Neither of us had actually seen a condom “out of the box,” but we weren’t about to waste ours by opening it prematurely. We were confident we could figure it out when the time came to use it.

I don’t know what my friend did with his, but I hid mine in my bedroom. I had a big stereo system (a hand-me-down from my dad) with an 8-track tape player. I didn’t own any 8-track tapes — I only had vinyl records — so the tape player was useless, mostly. It became the treasure chest to conceal my condom.

The first couple of weeks after buying the condom, I would carry it with me, in my jeans pocket when I went out to the mall. But soon, I all but forgot about it. It just stayed in the 8-track tape slot all day and night, every day and night.

A few months later, when I came home from out somewhere, my mother met me in the kitchen. “What’s this?” she asked, holding up the thin, square package.

I stammered incoherently for several seconds. “Um,” I at last managed to squeak out, “where did you get that?”

“Your brother found it in your room,” she said.

Through the embarrassment, I thought, Why did he look in my 8-track tape player slot? It still, to this day, confounds me, what made him look in my 8-track tape player slot? Why would he even look in it? It’s just a slot in my stereo system.

I was sent to my room. Sitting in my room, on the edge of my bed, I was trembling with embarrassment. I was also strongly angry at my 11-year-old brother for nosing through my room enough to find the condom in the perfect hiding place.

My mom never followed through with anything on the situation. I figure she thought the embarrassment was enough. My older step-brother told me, a little while later, that he had suggested to my mom that it was probably something passed around on the school bus, and I just ended up with it. My mom seemed to accept that as an explanation, and I never disabused her of that idea.

But then I didn’t have a condom available if the need for one came about. I sure as heck wasn’t going to buy another one any time soon. And without feeling prepared for the occasion, I lost my false confidence (it was a confidence I felt only when no girls were in sight) for pursuing my first experience.

My mom had taken away my mojo. And it was all because my brother was friggin’ nosing about in my room. Damn being a teenager, with an attentive mother and a nosy little brother.

Bullgrit

When I was in high school (grad 1985), my friend’s older brother somehow got a hold of
a bunch of STP stickers. When I say “a bunch,”
I mean at least a hundred.

He spent a whole school year sticking these stickers up in numerous and various places throughout our town: road signs, buildings, convenience store gas pumps, school windows, sidewalks, dumpsters at the mall, etc., etc., etc.

It was a cool secret for those of us who knew where these stickers were coming from. In big cities, kids used spray paint to tag their nicknames on buildings. In our small town, it was one kid with a box of oil treatment promotional stickers. Hey, at least they didn’t damage what they were put on — they could be taken off, in theory.

Some of these sticker placements lasted for years. There was one stop sign near my friend’s house that sported this STP logo for at least a decade. I haven’t been around that way in a long time to see if it’s still there.

I never heard if any authority figure learned who put out the stickers. I never heard of my friend’s brother getting in trouble over it. I hope he didn’t. He never put a sticker on anyone’s car or other really personal property, so it was just some juvenile fun. It was better than when some kids at my high school went out playing mailbox baseball.

* * *

Back several weeks ago after I set up my Cafepress store, I ordered a few items to ensure they were going to look good. The t-shirts are good — I have a black, long sleeve one, and Cowgrit wears a white, short sleeve one to bed. The stickers are good — I have a GOB on my laptop computer at work, but my BULLGRIT is sitting on my bookshelf, as yet unstuck.

I’ve been trying to think of where to stick the BULLGRIT bumper sticker, but no really great place has come to mind. Of course, it’s a bumper sticker, so the obvious place would be on my bumper. But I feel it would be over doing it to have a BULLGRIT sticker on the same vehicle that I have a BULLGRIT license plate. (Yes, my license plate is that cool.)

I could put it on Cowgrit’s van, and that will be where I’ll stick it if I can’t think of anywhere more interesting (read: entertaining). I’d rather put it somewhere more original. Somewhere where it would get attention, without violating vandalism laws.

So I’m open to ideas and suggestions. Where do you think I should stick this sticker?

Bullgrit