Good Ideas

I'm eating Dunkaroos.  Yes, the little snack that was unhealthy and packed with deadly sugar but you still loved as a child.  Or at least I did.  Enough to become fat (more on that later).  A friend of mine found them and bought a box for me to indulge.  To her I could not be more grateful.  Mostly to have another opportunity to live in the 90's again.  Which, by the way, reminds me of the great thing Teen Nick has decided to do.  In an effort to, I suppose, just give up on making any new material, they brought back the classics of 90's nick.  Which is fine by me for two reasons:

1).  90's Nick made life okay.  It brought me up into the wholesome human being I am today (along with probably a few other things).
2).  The stuff they were showing on there before they got the bright idea of replaying old shows in their 11pm-1am time slot was trash.  Sorry.

I don't blame you, Teen Nick.  I do not blame you.  So, to that, I give the head nod of appreciation.  It's the highest form of flattery from me.  You should consider yourselves geniuses for the decision you've made and retire somewhere nice.  Some place with palm trees.  That's just my preference.  I'm sure you've got some good ideas.

All right.  With all of that said and put behind us, we can get to the sweet juice of this post that I've been grinding in my mind all day. 

Pour.

Honestly, though, I really don't have a whole lot to report.  Some cool news that just went down today is that the intership I've been doing at Chalice Press will now become a part time gig with pay.  I'm darn excited.  So, I'll be serving not only the tea lords but also the publishing world.  Hopefully soon it will all lead to something else...like me living in Portland.  It's the next logical step.  Become the west coast beat poet I've dreamed of turning into.  Do hipster things.  Eat organic food.  Wear "vintage" clothes.  Make friends with hip musicians in indie bands with names like, "Collin" and "Tanya".  Yeah man, this whole publishing thing is sure to open some doors to let out my inner yuppie.

Interjection:  I'm wearing some sweet fuzzy pj pants.  They're no match to my Tyrannosaurus Rex/Jurassic Park pjs I had when I was but a tot, but they are stinking comfortable.  I have had them for nearly a year.  I suppose there could have been a better time to mention them in the past, but now you know I have some extremely comfortable pajama-jam pants.  I recommend investing in some.  And if I ever owned a business, fuzzy pajama pants would be mandatory.

"Look Earl, I know it's your first day, but khaki slacks?  Come on, man, chill out.  Throw on these fuzzy pajama pants.  Yes they're clean, smell them.  Yeah, Snuggles soft with a hint of mountain breeze scent.  Now you're ready to get 'em, tiger.  Go out there and power point the pants off them.  But not their pajama pants.  Their metaphoric pants.  We want to keep these people comfortable."

Either that, or we all wear kimonos.  Kimonos and fuzzy pajama pants.  Wow, that's fantastic.  You know you want to work for me now.  Too bad, you have to apply first.  Then there's this thing we do with new folk who want a job: Interview.  And after that is the survival test.  I open the trap door, you land in the room with the t-rex with bear arms and a shark tail that breathes fire.  If you outwit it, we may give you a call back.

Cool.  Well, I'm going to bed.  No, you can't come.  That's  really weird.  Plus Mike Lee is his own man and likes to flail and roll about in his bed.  He needs all the room for his unpredictable sleep movements. 

Take care, take care, take care.  See (or write) you somewhere on the other side.

Should I Give Up My Childhood and Move On?

Lately, I've had this frightening urge to get rid of the Super Nintendo. I say lately, but actually, come to think of it, I've had this feeling for several years now. Part of me says, "Mike, the 90's are long gone. Get over it, and walk forward, through the dark curtain of the future." Another part then says, "Mike, what joy will you have in this world when that console and all the games are gone? What if one day, a few months down the line, you want to play Super Mario All-Stars, or Dave comes into town but there's no TMNT IV: Turtles in Time? And your children, think about your children! You want to bring them up right, with a knowledge of a better time, forcing them to relive your childhood by watching Ren & Stimpy and The Adventures of Pete and Pete, and feed them Dunkaroos." Then the negative side says, "Mike, you're kids won't give a crap. These 3-dimensional HD graphics take sprite images and mash them until their nothing but juice. 16-bit graphics are dead, Michael. And you need to accept that. Plus, there will always be Zelda and Mario Kart. Just not...your idea of Zelda and Mario Kart."

The 16-bit age offered a lot of challenge. To be rather honest, I had (and actually still have) more difficulty playing old SNES games than these new PS3/Wii/XBox 360 games. Such as a little game called Super Ghouls and Ghosts. Probably one of the most difficult 16-bit games I ever invested time into. Never made it to the third level. Well, maybe once. But the game only had about 10 levels. That's it. No side missions. No online multiplayer. Didn't have to collect all the secret beans to get the ultimate sword. Yet, somehow, it provided hours of entertainment (and frustration). AND TETRIS! Incredibly simple concept. I put so much time into that game on the old big gray brick Gameboy (Pokemon and Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening also stole many hours of my life). SNES and Genesis were so simple. They had like 8 buttons, yet there was so much strategy and timing involved.

I do believe that we should give a nod to Wii for at least making the attempt to retrieve all that once was. Thank you for making playing cartridge games on a next gen game console possible.

Ah. And multiplayer used to be more intimate. There was a time when the person you were against would be sitting in the same room, no more than three feet from you. Now they can be hundreds of thousands of miles away. The internet has made a lot possible. You can play almost any game with anyone around the world. Only thing is, you can't slap the controller out of their hand as you're playing Mario Kart. Ah, childhood.

Okay, enough reminiscing. I feel like an old man. And I'm not.

You hang around a little longer Super Nintendo. The day you finally die will be the day I release you from servitude. Or more acurately, our friendship. We've had a good 16 years. I hope we can have 16 more.