We usually shy away from talking about gaming, dear reader, because in my mind most of you can live without this particular topic. Certainly I don’t rest my fingers on the pulse of the readership every afternoon, vainly trying to calculate the exact average of all your wants, but we tend to stick with real-world subjects.
Hip. Urbane. Slightly geeky. Hot. These adjectives–this will be the only compliment you receive this quarter, so cherish it–fuel the anatomy of the typical reader, and in doing so they preclude the very notion of shouting at polygons. Quick, what choice words come to mind when video games are mentioned?
Twinkies.
Twinkie wrappers.
Everquest.
Twinkie wrappers surrounding a fat, unwashed, pockmarked dork given to inopportune voice cracks while commanding his guild of dark warlocks in search of elven uniques.
There is stigma, yes, though that won’t stop us from talking about Counter-Strike: Source. Sometime last month I bid you farewell because I wanted to sample this game. I installed it, finished it, and although it didn’t transport me to new levels of enlightenment I’d play it again.
Now that I’m connected to the webiverse, however, I haven’t gotten around to a second time through. I’ve been logging into Counter-Strike instead, one of the multiplayer components of Half-Life 2, and its pick-up-and-play mechanics are very endearing. The game pits counter-terrorists against terrorists in an eternal struggle across thousands of servers worldwide, with objectives such as defusing bombs and rescuing hostages. Sounds like fertile grounds for escapism, right? It would be perfect, were it not for the children and Steam.
If you play the game, make sure to turn off microphone support. I can see professional clans making full use of this privilege, but players generally abuse it. Excessive vulgarity abounds and, in an expected twist, the vulgarities come from the mouths of 13-year-olds fighting their own losing battles against puberty, terrorists be damned. The players who don’t cuss enjoy spitting commands into their mics, affirming in their minds that, indeed, they could lead a platoon through Basra right after dinner.
Steam is Valve Software’s controversial stab at digital distribution. It’s also a certifiable pile of shit. I tried running Half-Life 2, legitimately this time, and the game brought my outdated computer to its knees, whereas my pirated version ran pretty well. I’ve also caught the bugger downloading things on its own volition, and for all I know it could’ve crammed a Bulgarian hamlet, piece by piece, into my computer. My guess? Steam is really a mound of washers secreted away in a barn somewhere.
These things are easily overcome, so that’s enough bellyaching. Let me know if you play as well. Perhaps we can shoot each other in the head.
See me, typing at you from the comforts of home? It’s truly a modern miracle, easily comparable to the toaster or WD-40, and it’s a convenience I won’t soon renounce. Now that we’ve gotten the important stuff out of the way, let’s adjourn for the evening.
Or let’s not adjourn.
There is an epic struggle for power in our office building, faithful reader, an eternal battle against a property manager hellbent on collecting our bathroom keys. The manager seems reasonable enough, with his garish yellow jacket and confident stride, but he is drawn to these keys like a crackhead. A crackhead set on snorting all our keys. Let’s call him the Keymaster.
Were an outsider to view the efforts of the Keymaster, she would have no choice but to conclude our bathrooms are actually troves glutted with the sacred treasures of King Midas himself. No, that’s not a urinal, you filthy Philistine, it’s an ancient sacrificial pyre nailed to the wall. Toilet paper? I believe you’re looking at rolled parchment. Garbage can? Royal hat.
This is the twisted tango we dance. Someone goes to the bathroom. Unlocks the door with a key. Returns to the office without the key. The Keymaster reclaims the key as if it were a lost child, shuttling it back to its heavenly host while cooing soft admonitions in its ear. Eventually a co-worker will simply go in the drinking fountain. That last part was a lie.
The Keymaster does this to keep the unwashed masses unwashed, such is his way, such is the way it has been for thousands of years. Besides, what right do outsiders have to sneak into our bathrooms and flush our toilets, use our soap, our water? They seem content with leaving surprises in the stairwell, after all.
Speaking of that fateful January day, the offender was identified. A local bum who bears an uncanny resemblance to Dr. Zaius was loitering in the stairwell shortly before the explosion, and I am going to spend some bandwidth to make this more vivid for you.
“Zounds, did I just soil my ship? Quickly, to the cooling pond!”
There’s the 170-pound gorilla, boys and girls, and I’ll tell you something else. One buddy theorized he took a swim at the local Y after the incident. Some theories are meant to be squelched immediately, wouldn’t you say?
What happened to our discussion on Friday? I must’ve tossed it out the window while driving to work, gentle reader, and it landed near the side of the road where, by my estimation, it probably exploded. The same thing nearly happened to today’s conversation, mostly because I have a pounding headache right now. We welcomed a colleague to our department this morning, all four of us, and at the close of the meeting we were asked to share sage words of advice.
“Go outside, dig a hole, and crawl into it,” I offered as my first tip.
I’m beginning to suspect this is the only option for Mondays, especially since the snow would’ve saved me the trouble of replacing the dirt. But then I wouldn’t have a chance to converse with you, would I? That would be a shame, of course, because today is a special day. This evening marks the end of an era, an age in which I write you every day after work.
A few weeks ago I subjected myself to some negative reinforcement for staying late. Well, no more. I’ve got the Internet now, which means I can talk to you at any time of the day. 8 PM. Maybe even 4 AM. The convenience is simply amazing, and I’m glad to have reclaimed it. Does this mean we’ll talk on weekends? Absolutely not.