Yes, I'm Propositioning You

It's been over a week since I last filled this space.  It's a shame too, because I was averaging an all-time high in page views per day and when I disappeared, that fell off a cliff.

Where have I been?

If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you have some clue about how I've been filling my days without filling these screens with funny little characters that string together to form funny little words that mean something to us. If you don't follow me on either of those forms of social media, the briefest synopsis I can offer you is this: Work called.  I answered.  I'm going to spare you the details of most of it.  Let it suffice to say that the responsibilities of my day job temporarily far exceeded my time allotment for it.  It spilled over into everything else.  Those responsibilities grew like kudzu in the southern heat and I had to grab a machete and spend some time hacking it down.  Okay, so a machete and a flamethrower.  My writing related activities have been almost non-existent for the past week.  My sleeping related activities even suffered drastic cuts.  I can't help it.  I need my job and the money it provides us to almost-but-not-quite meet basic necessities every month.  But I'm back in the writer's saddle again.

One of the activities that forced me to unplug from the matrix for a bit was a camping trip.  Yes, the outdoor kind.  With tents.  And fire.  Ooooh, pretty colors.  Wait, what?  Sorry.  So, I went camping.  In a tent.   On the beach.  On the hottest day of the year so far in coastal North Carolina.  Believe me, it was definitely not by choice.  It was a work thing.  It was organized as a stress release by and for my colleagues and I.  It wasn't bad.  Compared to taking a knife in the eyeball.  It was hot.  There were lots of small biting insects that seemed to know how to squeeze through the netting on my tent.  There were a lot of people drinking tremendous quantities of alcoholic beverages (THIS is phenomenal with juice).  Did I mention that it was hot?

The whole trip did remind me that my wife and I used to go camping.  When we were younger, we'd load the tent into our van and drive to the mountains of North or South Carolina and spend a night or three.  Now, we've been thinking that we should do that again.  Except, our giant two room plus screened porch extremely expensive cabin tent is mysteriously missing its poles.  And an air conditioning unit.  Seriously, I can't figure out what happened to those poles.  I had to borrow a tent for the trip.

When I returned to the real world and plugged back into the matrix, I was reminded by a friend on Twitter that I had missed the release of some phone that came out last week.

For those of you who are regular readers, if any of you are left, you remember that I wrote some flash fiction for a couple of contests over the last few weeks.  I've decided that I'm going to be posting more fiction in the near future.  I am going to have to decide first what is the most appropriate venue for said fiction, but I will be sharing more of my writing with you as soon as I figure it out.

Here are my three options:

1. Continue posting fiction here.  This allows it to be seen by a larger number of people who visit here, but tends to crowd out the other content (news about that will be later in this post).
2. Start a fiction blog.  This option allows me to get a clean start for a blog, but will require setup and design work, as well as the marketing work to get people to go there and read.  I'm not sure I have the time for that effort.
3. Start an online fiction magazine/community/blog beast.  This is my favorite option.  If I could find a few other aspiring writers who want to share writing duties on a fiction blog/online magazine, it would be a great opportunity (I think) to get short fiction out on the web for people to read and critique.  It might also give some other new writers a chance to get some exposure and confidence.  I wouldn't mind designing a wordpress (NOT Blogger) site to host this.  I just don't have the money for the hosting or domain name right now.  The basic premise would be that a group of writers, myself included, would each retain administrative access to the site and each of us would post one piece of short fiction (typically 1,000 words or less - but if it runs long, hey it would be our site, damn it!) each week (serial works are also acceptable).  We would also invite others to post their original works to the blog (as guest writers), showcasing original talent.  I'm not attached to setting up/maintaining this, so if someone else has a burning desire to do that, it's fine, but I'd be more than happy to do it, allowing others to just be responsible for their writing.

Please give me feedback on the above ideas.  If you are interested in #3, please let me know!

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I also have a proposal to throw out into the void of cyberspace regarding this wonderful place I call Geekcentricity.  I think that the wide variety of interests and pursuits that are geekcentric offer an excellent opportunity to cover more aspects of geekdom than I can possibly cover alone with my interests and limited time (remember, I'm in the "Learn My Craft" phase of my very own Operation: Awesome, so I need to have time to write other projects - my game, The Broken Veil, has suffered a horrible lack of attention of late). 

With this in mind, I am initiating my own contest. More like an open call.  Here's the deal: If you have an interest in some geekcentric topic (video games - console/pc/mmo/whatever, board games, ccg's, pen & paper rpg's, photography, technology - phone/computer/whatever, geek-related pop culture, whatever - the possibilities are staggering) and a desire to share your knowledge/passion/expertise with the wider world, then I have an opportunity for you!  Here's what I need:

1. Comment on this post and tell me that you would like to write for Geekcentricity (it is totally voluntary for you, just like it is for me - I have no money to pay anyone). 
2. In your comment, include the type(s) of topic(s) you are interested in writing about.

That's all!  I will contact you and we will decide on a topic and when the post will be finished and ready for posting.  I will retain editorial control (but will let you know in advance about any major revisions) and will set up access for you to post your content here as a guest blogger.  If it works out and you enjoy it, then we can talk about continuing the process, but writing a single post in no way obligates you to any long term commitments.  The way I see it, if you're interested in geeky stuff and enjoy writing, this gives you the opportunity to share that with others without having the responsibility of coming up with daily content or dealing with the setup, marketing or maintenance of your own blog.  It also helps Geekcentricity gain more content and the perspective of fresh minds and voices.  Have a video game that you loved/hated?  Have an rpg you want to pimp?  Got a book you want to tell people about?  Cool iPhone app whose features you want to share?  Awesome new video card coming out that you think would be perfect for gaming?  Want to share the joys and trials of raising a little geek in today's world?  All of those things and more would be perfect!  What do you think?  Is anyone interested?

Okay, there are some things I need your feedback on peeps!  Help me out here.  Drop me some comments.  I'm waiting with bated breath.  Or at least a trickle of drool on my lip.

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May the 4th Be With You, But I Need a Fifth

I know that I wrote a post only a few days ago that was basically a link dump, but here I go again.  I wish I had time for more today, but this is going to be one of those weeks where time is at a premium for me and I'm choosing to spend a good chunk of what little writing time I have this week working on the crunchy bits for the still-untitled tabletop rpg I'm developing.

My starting point for those rules is a framework called Fudge (which used to be called FUDGE, but is now "new and improved" with fewer capital letters - by "new" I mean about 10 years ago).  You can follow the link above to see what Fudge is all about.  I'll be using the Fudge SRD as my jumping off point (actually, I'm using this PDF of the SRD) and completely customizing Fudge, a bit like the guys over at Evil Hat did for the excellent looking new Dresden Files RPG, but I'll be going in a much different direction (they created a new system based on Fudge called FATE).  You can do that with Fudge, since it's more like a framework than an actual ruleset.  It allows you to build a ruleset out of that basic framework without tying you down.  A huge bonus is that it is royalty-free and completely OGL compatible, thus easy to license and customize.

As far as the game goes, I am still sans title, but otherwise, things are rolling along rather smoothly (other than my huge lack of time to write - damn that day job!)  Yesterday, I received some awesome fan art from someone I've been gaming with for a long time.  I also exchanged emails with someone about potentially doing the art for the game (I know that's a long way down the road, but it felt right).  Hopefully it will work out because she's really good, likes where I'm going with this game, and I'm giving her a free plug right here.

Since art really has the power to set the mood for a story, or even a game, I went looking for some art that I could share here that captured my "shift-world" of Morior.  Here is one to get you in the mood (wink, wink):

http://www.flickr.com/photos/subzeroconsciousness/ / CC BY 2.0

Tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo, which I think is Spanish for "get really drunk" and is somehow in direct competition with St. Patrick's Day, which is Irish code for "get really drunk."  That means today is that very special holiday known as Intergalactic Star Wars Day. So, "May the 4th be with you."  Which, coincidentally is Geek code for "get really drunk."  Happy holidays, everyone!  Please check out the posts on my game development and keep the feedback coming!

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A Geekcentric Guide to Twitter

Since I started using Twitter again about a month ago, a bunch of people (and when I say a bunch, I mean a staggering 3 or 4 people at least) have been asking me questions about it.  After I got past the obvious ones, like "Why in hell are your tweets so boring?" I actually got down to some good questions about the nuts and bolts of using Twitter.

I actually had a Twitter account a few years ago and found it incredibly annoying and practically useless.  First, the format as a pain in the ass.  I had to say something meaningful in how many characters?  To quote a friend of mine (bitemeNsuckit - you should follow her, she's wicked funny and is going to be a great Twit once she gets used to it) who just joined Twitter, "I have more characters than that in my head."  My other huge failing was not following the right people.  "Wait" you say, "There are 'wrong' people to follow?"  Yes.  There are wrong people to follow.  There are also wrong reasons to follow people.  The person who lays out some of those wrong reasons better than just about anybody else is Wil Wheaton.  He also mentions another of the dangers I ran into in my first Twitter-go-round.  I had the updates of everyone I was following sent to my cell phone as text messages.  My cell phone battery had an average daily life of about 3 minutes.  Actually, it was about 4 hours, but you get the idea.  So, my first venture as a Twit was doomed to fail.  I stopped using it after only a few weeks.

This is where I take one for the team.  If you've never used Twitter, or barely used it and haven't really been able to "get into it," then LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, BOYS AND GIRLS, STEP RIGHT UP and learn from my failures (and my successes).  I hereby present to you...

A GEEKCENTRIC GUIDE TO TWITTER

First off, if you have an Android, Blackberry or iPhone (my Tweapon of choice), you should find a good app that delivers your tweets not just to Twitter, but also to Facebook or whatever social networking platform you use.  I use TweetDeck and love it.  TweetDeck isn't perfect, for examply, it makes it a bit difficult to quickly look up your list of followers or followees.  So, I also have Twitteriffic on my phone for circumstances when I want to do something that TweetDeck doesn't do well.  For anything else, I just use the Twitter site.

As for the 140 character limit for each of your tweets, think of it as learning to write more concisely.  Challenge yourself to say things creatively, but please... PLEASE for the love of all that is holy, don't use so many abbreviations and/or "leetspeak" (if you don't know what that is, then I revoke your Geek credentials) that your tweets require a translator to read.  Also, you should use a link shortener to make your links fit into your tweets without using up all of your 140 characters.

That said, there are some necessary abbreviations, commands and acronyms you should learn.  Here are what I consider the bare minimum:

• @ - This directs your tweet "at" someone.
• RT - retweet.  If you like something that someone else tweeted, then by all means share it with your followers.  Just please remember to give credit where credit is due and attribute it to the original Twit.  The best way to do this is to preface it with RT @[original poster's name here].  That way, the original author knows that you found value or humor in what they tweeted and, most importantly, attributes their intellectual property to them.
• D or DM - direct message.  This is a private message that only you and the intended recipient receive.
• # - hash tag.  This is a meta tag used to group tweets about similar topics.  For example, you could hashtag any tweets about this blog as #geekcentricity.
• #FF - Follow Friday.  This is a Twitter meme where Twits share people that they enjoy following with others.  Fridays are a great time to recommend some of your favorite Twitterers to other people.

That leaves the biggest question of all:  Who am I supposed to follow on this thing?  This single question can make or break your Twitter experience.  The short answer is to find people you are interested in and follow them.  

If you're into shallow celebrities, then by all means follow Britney Spears,  Kim Kardashian, or Lady Gaga.  If that's your thing, then go right ahead.  I won't be joining you.

Since this is the Geek's Guide to Twitter, here are some suggestions of people for you to follow (in no order):

• Wil Wheaton - He's more than the guy who played Wesley Crusher and Gordy LaChance.  Actually, before you follow him, you should read why it will disappoint you. 
• Larry Hryb - XBox Live's Major Nelson.
• Grant Imahara - from Mythbusters.
• Kevin Smith - Yep, THAT Kevin Smith.
• John Kovalic - The cartoonist who writes/draws Dork Tower.
• Levar Burton - Another ST: TNG alum.
• Bill Amend - Writes/draws Fox Trot.
• Berin Kinsman - RPG blogger.
• Jane McGonigal - Game designer.
• Brent Spiner - Yet another ST: TNG alum.
• Neil Gaiman - Author.
• Stan Lee - Comic book genius.
• William Shatner - Actor from the original Star Trek.
• Leonard Nimoy - Another Star Trek cast member.
• Zachary Quinto - Different actor, different Star Trek.
• Sheldon Cooper - From Big Bang Theory.  Yes, he is a fictional character, but his tweets are hilarious.
• Johnn Four - From RoleplayingTips.com
• Steve Jackson Games - Venerable game company.
• Robin Laws - Gaming author.
• Gameplaywright - A gaming/writing site.
• Todd McFarlane - If you own action figures based on comic books, he probably designed them.
• Monte Cook - Writer, game designer.
• Jim Butcher - Author of the Dresden Files novels.

If you have any other Geekcentric names to add to this list, please let me know and I will edit the list.  My disclaimer here is that I don't follow all of the people above because I would suffer information overload and my brain would explode, spewing flaming chunks of my gray matter around for someone to clean up.  Also, there are other Geekcentric Twitterers that I follow, but I won't list them here without their permission, in order to save them from being flooded with followers.  If you really want to know who I follow, feel free to check in on me and follow my tweets.

I hope this helps you neophyte GeekTwits... or is that Tweeks?  If you have any more Twitter related questions, please ask.  In the near future, look for a Geekcentric Blog Reader, with some blogs I follow.  Until then, you can find many of them on the right sidebar.  Also, pt. 2 of my RPG building series is on tap soon.

I'll see you around the Twitterverse, my fellow Tweeks.  Yes, Twitterverse sounds as bad as Blogosphere.  Later.

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The Encumbrance of Ethereal Lycanthropy

One day, many years ago, actually it must have been almost 20 years ago (yes, I'm old as hell, now get off my lawn!), my wife and I were in the middle of an extremely long drive home (and we may have only been dating at the time) from visiting her family when we decided to play a little game.  It was just one of those silly little games parents often used to play with kids to stave off boredom on long drives.  Except we didn't have kids.  We were just trying to keep each other awake and alert on the long drive, and maybe keep our own boredom at bay.

DISCLAIMER: Because I'm old as hell, this was in the days before mp3 players and handheld gaming systems. Our first car didn't even have a CD player, so we were at the mercy of whatever radio stations we could pick up along the way.  Or the passenger could read to the driver.  Or we could play games.

I don't know the name of the game we played that day, but I remember the rules.  It might have been called "Picnic."  The first player started by saying, "I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing along a(n):" and then named an object that started with the letter "A."  The next player repeated the phrase, along with the first player's "A" object and then added one starting with "B" and so on.  So, the fifth turn might sound something like, "I'm going on a picnic and I'm bringing along an abacus, a banana, a cucumber, a dalmation, and an.... ummmm.... elephant."  The game was won when the other player forgot one of your items or couldn't come up with an item that started with the appropriate letter.  If you've never tried it, trust me.  "Q" is a bitch.

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Super Size It! A Tale of Electronic Devices and Theme Parks

This seems to be the week for larger versions of popular technology.

This past Sunday, Nintendo launched the DSi XL, an oversize version of the DSi.  It has exactly the same features as the DSi and exactly the same look, just... bigger.

Today is the launch of the iPhone XL, also known as the iPad (except you can't make calls with it, so I guess it's more like an oversize iPod Touch).  Is it a giant iPod or is it a netbook-sized tablet PC?  I am firmly in the giant iPod camp.  It is definitely not a technological feminine hygiene product (though I tried to say those last three words once and it came out as "Feminine Hygiene Project" which I still think would be the coolest band name ever).

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Finally... An Actual Post About HDR Photography

Not that you were eagerly awaiting it, but on a couple of different occasions I've tried to write about my interest in, and the general awesomeness of, HDR photography.  During the first attempt, I was beaten over the head with a broken PS3.  The second time, the great owl god swooped in and pecked my eyes out as punishment for the murder of one of his subjects.

Or, I just got sidetracked.

This time, in honor of April Fools' Day (which I abhor), I present you with something serious.  Oh, the irony...

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Let the Games Begin!

Last night, I got one of the most concise Facebook messages I've ever received.  A friend who lives several states away who is a friend on XBOX Live sent it.  Actually, since he doesn't have a Facebook account, his wife sent it on his behalf.  It reads, simply: "My husband doesn't think you play enough video games."

I was flabbergasted.  I was outraged!  Is there a more damning indictment for a self-described geek?

I was... not playing enough video games.  It's true.  I think I've turned the system on as much for Netflix in the past few months as to play games.  I've played a good bit into Bioshock 2, but that's about it other than some guilty pleasure games (no, not that kind of games), like MLB Front Office Manager (I'm a statistician at heart) and World of Outlaws Sprint Cars (one of my first career choices as a kid was race car driver).  I really haven't played video games much in 2010 at all.

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"The Play's the Thing"

I love toys.


It's true.  I never really grew out of playing with toys... or accumulating them.  I'm pretty sure that almost every geek in the world can identify with my condition.  We're a bunch of postmodern Peter Pans and if growing up meant that it would be beneath our dignity to collect or play with toys, then we would just refuse to grow up.

"Where does he get those wonderful toys."
                     - The Joker, Batman (1989)

Except that we did grow up.  We just kept our toys.  We also replaced them with newer, flashier, more expensive toys.  We traded in our toy cars for real cars filled with more toys, like GPS systems, satellite radio, integrated hands-free communication, and docking stations for our iPhones.  Some of us have traded in the bicycles of our youth for Harley-Davidson motorcycles (also with lots of onboard gadgets).  We buy (or build) the best computers we can find.  We graduated from our NES or N64 to a Playstation 3 or an XBox 360.  We are suckers for the latest and greatest gadgetry.  As soon as we find out about that new game or gadget is being released, we reserve it.  We stand in line at midnight to be among the first to own it (or some of us wait until the second or third generation is released and all of the bugs are fixed).  I'm not ashamed of this.  I revel in it.  I love the feeling of having a new toy and the anticipation I feel as I bring it home to set-up, plug in, or slip into my drive tray.  Go ahead, admit it.  You love it too.

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Geekcentricity and De-Bugging Life

I don't have a full-fledged post tonight, but I do want to share a few things.

First, thank you for your patience with my broken code.  The site has been having major issues since I changed the format.  I hope to have it fixed in the next 48 hours.  I have enlisted outside assistance.

EDIT: I now have a slightly new site design that at least features working code.

Also, I just finished recording my guest spot on the De-Bugging Life podcast.  You can visit Pete's blog through the link on the sidebar or the link above.  Just click on "Podcast" and listen to our chat.  He should have the editing finished at some point tomorrow.  If you prefer, you can go on itunes and search for De-Bugging Life.  They should have this episode of the podcast available for download sometime tomorrow.

EDIT: The podcast is now available.


Thanks everyone to making Geekcentricity's first week of existence a success with over 200 hits.  I have lots of great things in store for the future.

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Stand By Me

When I was growing up in New Jersey, my family used to spend summers at a campground in the mountains in the northwest corner of the state.  We had a travel trailer permanently set-up on a site there with all of the comforts of home. This was not roughing it. Our last few summers there, we had the biggest and best site in the entire campground.  We were the closest site to the entrance, at the top of a large hill, right across the street from all the campground's public areas.

It was paradise for a kid growing up.  The public areas across the street included a huge park, a pavilion that hosted lots of activities, a general store, and my two favorite attractions: a swimming pool and an arcade. During my years there, the arcade consisted of pinball machines, a jukebox, an air hockey table and a pool table.  There were no video games... for the simple reason that video games were just not a common thing then. Sure, Pong consoles were in arcades in some places, but they were not regular fixtures in most arcades. In our little corner of New Jersey, there just weren't any video games to be found.  Back at our house, my brother and I had a Magnavox Odyssey, but we weren't allowed to bring it to the campground.  I have to admit, we rarely ever played it.  It was a novelty with about 8 Pong-like variations built in, with terrible controls.  At the campground, we did all the stuff kids did at campgrounds. We went swimming in the pool, rode bicycles and skateboards, played the pinball machines in the arcade, played with toys, and went exploring.  We had miles and miles of campground and beyond to explore.  Sure, our parents set boundaries for us and gave us specific times to be home or at least check-in at home.

"It happens sometimes.  Friends come in and out of our lives like busboys in a restaurant."
                                                                                                      - Stand By Me

 I had some great friends at the campground during those summers.  During the school year, when we were all back in our own towns, at our own schools, we never contacted each other. We were summer friends, the kind of friends you make at places like that campground.  When we were in that place, we were inseparable.  We did everything together. We traded baseball cards, played at each others' trailers, went swimming, played in the arcade, and roamed the hills and fields together.  We were brothers.

The summer that I was nine years old, we were having one of our typical summers, playing baseball in the park, swimming every day, mastering our favorite pinball games, biking, skateboarding, and exploring, until one of my friends, Mike, came to us with some news.  He told us that one of the other campgrounds "a few miles away" had gotten a new addition to their arcade... something none of us had ever seen before.  It was a video game console with a revolutionary new game called Space Invaders.  Those words contained such mystery for us.  What was it like?  What were these "Invaders" and what did they do?  We all believed in strange aliens and spaceships that visited our planet and watched us. We knew that they were really out there, these "Invaders" and we needed to know what to expect.  We needed to be informed.  Most of all, we needed to see a "video game console" and play it and find out what it was like.  This console became our holy grail that summer.  It grew to mythic proportions.  We talked about it for days.  We wondered what it would be like.  Finally, we planned and schemed. We had to find it.  We had to experience it.  It wasn't looking at a dead body, it was a video game, and it was a journey we had to take.

Our plans were meticulous.  Mike found out where the campground was.  Billy found a map in his dad's truck.  We pored over the map; debating the best routes, planning what day and what time to leave, deciding what we would to bring and how to get it.  Our target was miles away, far beyond our range of exploration, far beyond where we were allowed to go.  Once we got far enough away from our campground, there would be no checking-in at home.  We would miss all of our check-in times.  We carefully gauged how long we could miss them without our parents worrying enough to start looking for us.  Rodney got a backpack from one of his older brothers and we all started hoarding change and snack food.  Finally, we set a date.  We needed to be up early. We figured that we had to be on our way by 7:00 a.m.  We packed our supplies the night before and found a good hiding place for the backpack, which was loaded with food and jugs of water.  We brought our pocketknives and Billy even brought a set of wire cutters.  We coordinated the stories we were telling our parents about where we were going to be during the day.  Mike was the only one of us who regularly wore a watch, so we made him the time keeper.  We assigned times for each leg of our journey.  We determined how much time we had to spend at the arcade.  We knew what time we had to leave. We even decided when we had to abort our journey for each stage if something went wrong.  We had everything covered.

"We knew exactly who we were and exactly where we were going.  It was grand."
                                                                                                    - Stand By Me

We met at the appointed time just down the hill from my site and started up the long road that sloped up  toward the back of our campground.  When we got to the top of the hill we reached the back of the campground, used our wire cutters to cut through the bottom wire of the barbed wire fence that ran along the back of the campground and entered the great world beyond.  When we slid through the fence, we were on the grounds of what we just called "the reservoir."  We knew that the reservoir property was the fastest route to where we needed to go; the quickest way to our grail.  We also knew that the guy who lived in the shack out by the reservoir was crazy.  All of the older kids had stories about him.  We had heard the harrowing tales of kids far bigger and braver than us who had dared trespass on reservoir land.  They told of being chased, screamed at, shot at, and even captured and held for the police if he caught them.  We crouched low to the ground and moved as slowly and quietly as we could. We made it past the building and moved as quietly as any kids can move along the edge of the water.  We made it almost to the far end of the reservoir when we heard it. There was a man's voice shouting at us.  That was it.  We were finished.  Our journey would come to an end before we were a mile outside of the campground.  The consensus decision was to make a run for it.  A crazy old man couldn't outrun a fast group of kids and surely nobody shoot us... we were just innocent kids out for a long walk.

We made it to the edge of the trees on the far side of the reservoir before we heard the buzzing sound and the shredding of leaves above our heads.  I can hear that combination of sounds in my head even now.  That sound came before the loud crack of gunfire, or at least it seemed that way.  We ran as we had never run before. We ran under the trees and up the hill towards the road; up the hill towards our escape; away from the crazy old man with the gun.  When I think about it know, I feel sure he was shooting to miss.  As crazy as it sounds, he was firing shots all around our heads, but just over our heads, to scare us off of the property.  At the time, I was sure that the next shot would plant itself between my shoulder blades and I would die on my face and my parents wouldn't know where to find my body.

Miraculously, we made it to the road.  As we cleared the trees, we saw that the only thing between us and freedom was one more barbed wire fence.  We had no time to cut it, since there was a madman with a gun on our heels, yelling and shooting.  He was surely a killer of children, possibly escaped from some institution.  We had to go underneath.  It was a tight squeeze, even as small as we were, but the fear of the barbs was less than the fear of being shot, so we did it as fast as we could, one after the other, sliding head first under the wire and running across the empty road.  Finally, we walked far enough that we could no longer hear him. We had escaped.  We didn't even give a thought to our having to come back the same way.  We had survived and our adrenaline-fueled thoughts turned to killing alien "Invaders" from space.  We made up stories as we walked. We laughed and joked and enjoyed the journey.  We stopped in a field of some kind of grass that was much taller than our heads, where we ate most of our meager food supply and lounged in the shade.  Billy practiced saying the entire "Peter Piper" tongue twister rhyme in a single belch.  All the while, Mike kept time for us; silently tracking our journey.  He was conscientious... and he had a good watch.

We didn't have to dodge any trains or swim through any leach infested waters that day.  Almost getting shot was enough for us.  We finally reached the campground that played host to our goal.  When we went into the arcade, we just stood there and stared for a moment at the glorious object in front of us.  Soon, we were all taking turns pumping quarters into the hungry slots on the front of the cabinet; taking turns, learning to kill those little aliens, those invaders from space.  When it wasn't our turn to play, we watched or played the nearby pinball machines.  We were lost in our moment.  We were also going through quarters faster than imaginable.  At some point, one of us went to the snack bar and presented the clerk with a precious dollar bill to purchase some food item when she asked that dreaded question.  "What site are you from?"  He made something up that probably wasn't even close to an actual site number.  When she asked to see our visitor's passes, we knew it was "game over" and left the arcade, glancing back at the quarter gobbling machine as we made a hasty exit.  As we started to retrace our route, it seemed that our exit was timely, because the sky seemed to be darkening more quickly than we thought it should.  Mike assured us that we had plenty of time. He had the timing covered.  Still, as we walked, we repeatedly asked him the time.  It was getting dark fast.  There was no way it should be getting dark that early.

"Mike, are you sure you're watch is right?"

That was when reliable Mike made a universal gesture.  He raised his right hand, index finger outstretched, and tapped the glass of his watch face with three quick pecks.  At that moment, we knew we were screwed.  Before he even said the words, we knew his watch had stopped.  We gathered around him, berating him for being so stupid, cursing his watch, and trying to will it to work.  We were huddled there on the road out of that campground with its Space Invaders console when we became conscious of a car stopped a few feet in front of us.  We heard car doors.  My mom and Mike's mom were running towards us, yelling, crying, making angry mother sounds.  We were truly screwed.  We all knew it was Mike's fault.  He was the pariah for several weeks as we all served out our various sentences as consequences of our unauthorized journey.  We didn't know how they had found us until Rodney admitted that he had to tell one of his older brothers where we were going.  He was pressured into it, in return for borrowing his knife and canteen.  By then, we were over being angry about being caught and subsequently punished.  We were already reliving our grand adventure and telling everyone about it.  Mike was grounded for a week.  Rodney and Billy were grounded for two weeks.  As for me, I had never been grounded before.  My parents told me I couldn't leave our campsite without their permission.  They said I would be lucky if I was allowed to leave it before summer was over.

Bright and early on the first day of my incarceration, I pulled a chair up to the edge of the road that ran past our site and planted myself in it.  I stared off into space.  I was looking at freedom from my side of the invisible bars of my parentally imposed prison.  I stayed in the chair.  I refused to leave it.  I refused to eat.  Being grounded was terrible.  When my parents finally decided that I had suffered long enough, I immediately left and jumped on my bike.  I had been grounded for an intolerable four hours and now I was free at last.

That was the last summer we stayed at Kymer's Campground.  The following year, my dad retired and we sold our trailer and moved to South Carolina.  I only ever saw Billy again after that summer.  His family moved to Myrtle Beach about a year or so after we did, but we never hung out again after that.

Seven years after our geekdom rite of passage, a movie named Stand By Me was released.  It is still one of my favorite movies.  Every time I watch it, I think about our quest, not to find a body, but just to play a video game... something I can sit in my living room and do now.

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Beginnings and Endings

For most of my life I have been what most people would call a geek. 

Like some show pet, my mother trained me to read at a freakishly young age, and then I would get the "privilege" of showing off my reading skills to all of her friends, relatives and neighbors.

At the tender age of ten, some of my friends approached me to help them learn a new game that they were starting to play. Unfortunately, there were lots of big words in the rulebooks that they didn't understand, so they wanted me to read the books and teach them to play. I read the books, taught them to play, became the Dungeon Master, and dove into the deep end of the geekdom pool with my earliest forays into role-playing games, starting with Dungeons & Dragons. I've been playing rpg's ever since.

In high school, I earned the title of "band geek." I was a trumpet player in my high school and college bands, majored in Music Education, and even became a high school band director. I taught in the public schools for fourteen years.

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