StormSurge

What to write about?  I know I want to write about the 2600 but I just don't know where to begin.  Do I talk more about the iconic woody console or the Junior model?  I don't have much to say about controllers because it's either paddle, driving, keypad, or more joystick designs than anyone could fathom.  Games?  Do I talk more about games that I have managed to pick up since my last post?  I might have to think on this a bit more.  While I'm thinking...
As I sit here writing this there is a 2600 Junior model sitting in front of me.  Recently acquired in unknown condition I spent the better part of a day taking it apart all the way down to the motherboard and gave it a good cleaning.  Wondering why I couldn't get bubbles off the chrome strip I finally discovered that the protective covering had never been taken off.  Nice surprise.  So I removed it.  I couldn't let all that moisture remain trapped and ruining that beautiful chrome strip.  It still has some color issues I have to work out but is functional otherwise.
Since I'm here, and more Atari games have been added to my collection, I'll do a bit of an updated version of my favorite cartridges.  Keep in mind these are personal favorites solely based on two factors...they are favorites and played the most.  Let's get started.
Favorite Black Label Carts

I have two black label favorites.  Video Chess and Yar's Revenge.  Yar's Revenge was a 2600 title I could have seen as a Saturday Morning cartoon show.  It wasn't until a recent Squad Challenge that the true nature of this game proved to me just how challenging Yar's could really be.  Because of that, and the few years I've been biased about the 2600 in general, that this game moved up the ranks as a favorite and played often.  It's arcade-style game play is rock solid and sure to give the joystick a workout.
Video Chess is my go-to black label game when I want to play a relaxing game.  I still haven't managed to beat the computer but I enjoy playing Chess and don't really have a human opponent to go up against.  I'm not a pro at the game but I enjoy this classic strategy game.  I have never found a perfect computerized Chess game either and the 2600 is not without its own flaws.  However the 2600 is a very strong opponent no matter which skill level you attempt at trying to win.  And it will always plan its next moves carefully but at times it seems as if its first few moves are preset.  Still fun, though.
Favorite Silver Label Cart

One of my favorite games on the 5200 is Vanguard so it shouldn't be no surprise that the 2600 port of Vanguard became a favorite.  I love the artwork on the label and surprised that it isn't the same one that was used on the 5200 as was often done.  Compared to the 5200 port Vanguard on the 2600 seems a bit more challenging and a bit more unforgiving.  One mistake can mean sudden death.  I also believe this is the only 2600 game I have that has a continue feature.  It's also the only one where the player can move diagonally while firing because you can't do that in the 5200 port.   Graphics in this game are absolutely stunning and the sounds are not much different from the 5200.  I do miss the music that plays during some of the vertical scrolling segments.  I also miss the Striped Zone that is absent in the 2600 port.  And I have yet to destroy the end boss before it takes me down.  Believe it or not, I never knew this was an arcade game for the longest time until I discovered an actual cab during the NES days.  Very well made 2600 port with very little to no flicker issues.  My favorite shoot'em up on the 2600.
Favorite Adventure Cart

For most other 2600 gamers Adventure might be their favorite adventure-style game but for me Dark Chambers has slightly taken an edge above Adventure.  I enjoy having to figure out the levels to find items and exits that are often hidden.  I also enjoy having to go through the level screens to figure out how to reach those items.  For this reason this game gets more play time than Adventure in my library.  I personally think it is even slightly better than the 7800 version.  That one looks better but, as NSG has mentioned, if only it would have taken the game play concept of hidden items to find the 7800 version might have been the better game.  But, alas, the 2600 once again shows just how well it can capture a gamer's attention and hold it when properly developed for.  And Dark Chambers is one of those games.  I've not been able to spend as much time with it as I would like to fully enjoy it but what little I have played of it I keep finding myself spending more time in every level trying to find items than what is probably required.  Seriously, I've spent about 15 minutes in some levels.
Favorite Pinball Cart

Again, it should be no surprise that Midnight Magic makes for one of my most played 2600 games.  I like Video Pinball but at times you just sit there waiting to do something.  Midnight Magic manages to capture some of the pure essence that makes pinball tables fun.  There are targets, bumpers, a spinner, kickbacks, dual flippers, rollover targets...this game has the basics that are perfectly placed and captures what made some of the early pinball tables memorable.  Knock down all the targets at the top and the game goes into double points.  The table also changes color and plays a short tune.  Knocking down targets again advances the multiplier all the way up to five times the points obtained.  Lose your ball, however, and it's back to single points again.  Do it right and the player can obtain extra balls.  Lose all five balls and the game is over.  Easy to pick up and play, no flickering, and it looks good.  I'm also a little partial to this game because when I got my very first paycheck the NES and Sega Genesis were on the market.  Instead of buying anything for either of those I picked up a new 2600 Junior, Jr. Pac-Man, and this game.  All for about $50.  I played Midnight Magic the most.
Favorite Arcade Cart

The 2600 got lots of arcade ports.  While the limitations of the system kept most ports from looking like their arcade parents the game play managed to remain intact.  Two arcade ports stand out in my collection.  Space Invaders and Gyruss.  Space Invaders was the very first Atari game I remember playing many moons ago on a store display.  Dangling from a chain I put the game in and quit playing only when it was time to leave.  This game was the one that introduced me to Atari, the VCS, and the only reason why I kept hoping for one.
Gyruss, on the other hand, was a game I remember playing in arcades and enjoyed it immediately.  I must have been sleeping when Parker Bros. ported this game over to various consoles.  Being fairly new to my collection Gyruss on the 2600 has quickly become a favorite.  It might not be graphically impressive but the game play is there and the music that constantly plays in the arcade was put in the 2600 port in all of it's 2-channel glory.  And it's really not all that bad.  Missing are the sound effects because the music constantly playing doesn't leave room for any sound effects.  A valiant effort that is a very worthwhile cart to play.  One of my favorite arcade games and one of my now favorite 2600 games.  Space Invaders and Gyruss.  What more could one ask for?
Favorite Dot Munching Cart

  Mouse Trap is an easy to pick-up and play dot munching game where the player controls a mouse.  The object is to eat all the dots in the maze of which I'm not entirely certain what they are suppose to be.  In each of the four corners of the maze are X's that change the player into a dog temporarily when the fire button is pressed.  This helps keep the cats chasing the mouse at bay.  A unique feature of this game is the ability to change the maze by opening and closing doors.  Doing this can help block cats from catching the mouse.  Originally released on the 2600 by Coleco of ColecoVision fame the cart I has is the re-release Atari did with a red label.  Still an easy game to pick up and play today.  This one and Jr Pac-Man get lots of attention but I find myself coming back to this one more often.
Favorite 3rd-Party Carts

Fast Eddie and Planet Patrol are great 3rd-party 2600 games.  I'm sure there are others but I have to base this post on games I have in my collection.  Something about Fast Eddie is addictive.  The ladders are vary in position with each game played, enemy characters are basic but challenging, and the only real thing the player has to do is collect things like hearts, tanks, fish, etc., to grab a key being guarded by the enemy at the top.  It's a bit of Popeye (the collecting hearts part) mashed up with Lode Runner in a easier format.  Very colorful game that is fun for hours on end.
Planet Patrol is another shoot 'em up on the 2600.  The only real difference is the changing of day to night, destroying enemies and reactors/power plants, and scrolling from right to left over left to right or vertically.  A bit unusual.  What makes this so appealing to me are the small details of this game.  Easy to pick up and play, takes a while to master.  I also love the chrome label, something rarely seen.  It's very attractive and I could see how eye appealing that package would have been sitting next to other games, fighting to be taken home.  It does that now in a large library of 2600 carts.  
Favorite Activision Cart

It's almost unlawful to mention the 2600 without thinking immediately about the first 3rd-party game developer known as Activision.  Activision literally pushed the 2600 as hard as they could and, in the end, it paid off.  Almost every title they released for the 2600 was an instant classic.  While I enjoy all Activision games in my collection the two that I go to the most are Enduro and Space Shuttle.  
Enduro took me completely by surprise in 1988 when I picked up a used 2600 with a bunch of games.  This cart was one of the games included and when I first plugged it in I expected it to be a Pole Position rip-off.  The next thing I know I had been playing it for over an hour and forced myself to stop when it was time for dinner.  I was in 8th grade then.  Enduro left such an impression that I would have an agonizing 24 hour wait time to return home to play it again.  To help with that I woke up an hour early to get a game in before having to get ready for school.  Space Invaders game me a reason to want an Atari, Enduro gave me a reason to hang on to one.  Enough said.
Space Shuttle.  Gee, where do I begin with this one?  You're a NASA astronaut and your mission is to dock with a satellite in space currently orbiting the Earth.  Sounds simple, right?  Then you give it a shot and wonder why in God's name you can't seem to leave the planet without killing you and your crew members.  Then you grab the manual for some pointers.  It is at this precise moment you realize what you have plugged into your 2600.  This isn't a game...this is a simulator.  The author wanted to capture as much as he could about space flight that he literally went to NASA and participated in learning everything the astronauts have to do and even used NASA's flight simulators used for training.  I would have to say that his efforts paid off in probably the only simulation game made on the 2600.  The amount of detail in unreal.  Every switch on the 2600 does something to the space shuttle.  There's a switch for running gear, brakes, deploying parachute when landing...let's see what else?...one to turn on ignition I think...it's unreal!  The instructions alone are like a shortened step into NASA's school.  The manual is thick and can take a lot of time alone to absorb.  But it is also probably the most expensive instruction book made for any 2600 game ever.  Full color, exploded views of an actual space shuttle, step-by-step instructions on what you are suppose to do.  And it's on the 2600 to boot.  I'm not very good at it but I keep finding myself coming back to this simulator because its visuals and sounds are absolutely amazing to me.  I consider this one of Activision's, and Steve's, holy grail.  If only today's games went this far.  I believe there was only one other game to do something similar but it was at least a decade after Space Shuttle.  For those that wanted to be astronauts but never did...here's your chance.  This is as close as it gets.
Favorite Paddle Game

The 2600 had plenty of games but it also had plenty of controller options.  I don't know how many times I would play a 2600 game without paying attention only to realize I needed paddle controllers.  For the longest time I felt the paddle controllers for the 2600 could have been better.  Once I found Warlords, however, that thought quickly changed.  It didn't take me long to realize just how comfortable those paddle controllers actually are.  And after hours of playing Warlords the design of the paddle controllers made sense.  What makes playing Warlords for hours on end a must on the 2600 is the fact it's a mix of Pong and Breakout put together and then shaken up with steroids in the mix.  The 2600 might not be graphically impressive but when it comes to game play it can strut its stuff like no other.  Warlords offers four-player game play either solo against three computer players or with a group humans be it they are friends or enemies.  And once the action starts it's hard to put down.  All you have to do is break down your opponents' barrier to their castle to hit the center of their castle with the ball.  That's it.  Yea...good luck with that.
Favorite Red Label Cart

Since I did my favorite black and silver label carts I might as well tell my favorite red label cart.  I kept wanting to put Solaris on this list but that game makes me rage quit so much that it could take me weeks to return to it.  Radar Lock on the other hand is a well done game, by the same author, using most of the same mechanics found in Solaris.  This is easily the 2600's answer to those needing an After Burner fix.  It looks good, sounds good, uses dual joysticks (one stick is used to select weapons), plays good, and is just all around fun for hours on end.  This on is probably one of the more rare red-label carts out there so if you find it I would suggest picking it up.  
Favorite Non-Game Cart

One cart in my collection that is not a game at all is Basic Programming.  The 2600 is interesting not only from a gaming point-of-view but also from a technical perspective.  It's hard to believe a game console designed to do strictly tank and pong games showed that it could do so much more, often times surpassing what it was originally designed for.  For the curious this cart would allow anyone with the enthusiasm and patients to write small programs for the 2600 to perform.  While it doesn't unlock the full potential of the 2600's inner workings it does give a taste of what it's like to program the 2600.  However, with the memory limitation, don't expect to write the next Adventure game as there simply isn't room.  Also, once turned off any programs you've written are erased.  Pencil and pad are your best friend.  I use this one often just to toy around with the system.  Kind of neat to see what can be done with it.
Final Thoughts
The 2600, no matter which model you own, has always been a small system with a big heart.  Even the almighty six switch models are not that large.  When taken down to just the heart of the system only a small footprint remains.  Big things do sometimes come in small packages and the 2600 has proven time and time again that it is very capable of entertaining for hours on end.  I still run across games that are just unbelievable in terms of what the developers managed to pull off.  Again, here is a console designed for simple Pong and Tank style games.  It was never designed to play Space Invaders, Galaxian, Gyruss, Pitfall!, or anything close to Space Shuttle...but it did those things and did them pretty well.  Truthfully, the video game genres we have today have their roots dating back to the 2600.  This is the console that started it all and it is still showing it can stand its ground against modern gaming hardware.  And that, my friends, is no small achievement.

In my first blog post here, I talked about how I wanted to use this blog to document so many of the wonderful memories I have of growing up.
In thinking about that, I've often wondered the best way to do that. By year? By topic? Some other way? I don't think there's a right or wrong way, but I think I've come up with an interesting way.
I'm going to sort them by the homes I've lived in & others that are special to me.
I'll be starting with my first home and end with my current. Along the way, there are a lot of others.
You'll probably learn a little more about me than you'd care to but hopefully you'll be entertained as well.
(Not my bedroom above. 😀)

In my first blog post here, I talked about how I wanted to use this blog to document so many of the wonderful memories I have of growing up.
In thinking about that, I've often wondered the best way to do that. By year? By topic? Some other way? I don't think there's a right or wrong way, but I think I've come up with an interesting way.
I'm going to sort them by the homes I've lived in & others that are special to me.
I'll be starting with my first home and end with my current. Along the way, there are a lot of others.
You'll probably learn a little more about me than you'd care to but hopefully you'll be entertained as well.
(Not my bedroom above. 😀)

It is no secret at all that one of my favorite franchises is the Terminator Flicks. NOTHING and I mean NOTHING will ever beat the original no matter how much people try to tell me T2 is a better film. The original had everything. SciFi, action, a bit of noir and a hint of the slasher element from horror films of the time. Most important the film had the  greatest villain (next to Darth Vader) in cinematic history, Cyberdine Systems 800 series Terminator model 1 0 1. A cybernetic organism with living tissue over a hyperalloy endoskeleton. And though it is the iconic metal skeleton that draws me to the character, the "Tech Noir" look will forever be the most iconic look for the Terminator for me. 

For me Arnold in the gray M65 jacket lined in chains and metal studs, gray pants and black engineer boots will always be what comes to mind first when I think of the Terminator. But what completes that look in my mind is the weapon most associated with that look, the .45 Long Slide with laser sighting and it was just a matter of time that I would seek to recreate that iconic weapon.
 
It all starts here in this box.

Most of the parts need to make this a reality are within.
 
The real weapon is based off of Colts famous model 1911 .45 pistol. My prop replica starts with this....
 
A cheap but somewhat accurate toy of a 1911 from eBay.

 
And a pile of 3D printed parts designed and created by my buddy Mike of IRMAO Custom Models

 
First task is to make the barrel/slide a few inches longer. Mike printed an extension and sleeve to help guide it in the right place.


 
Next is the laser sighting. 

 

 
The only part Mike was unable to design and print was the bracket that attaches the sight to the gun itself.
 
I found and printed a 1:1 image of the bracket on paper and 1 on heavy card stock to use as a template.

 

 
This is the only part I will need to fabricate and I am ok with that. One of my favorite parts of any build is finding things in the world that have a "look" and  repurpose it for my needs.  
 
I decided to go with this...

 
If you look at the bracket you will see the left grip is part of the assembly. I then looked at a window scraper and thought it had the right "look" for my needs. It is going to take a bid of cutting, grinding, epoxy putty and some resin to work it out but in the end, I think this should work just fine...
 
Thanks so much for having a look at the first steps in this journey and I hope you will be back to watch it all unfold. 
 

Chris
The Atari Creep
 

I'm just going to put this right out there without any introduction (I'll save that for another related article) and pick the 10 games I play most on the 7800 in the small collection I have which is now at 16 games.  We start with number 10.
10.  Centipede
Mom's favorite...but on the 5200.  She tried playing the 7800 version when I got the system and a few games for Christmas around 1990.  I have to admit that even though it gets more play time than others it doesn't quite capture everything I enjoy about the 5200 version.  Never the less the 7800 Centipede is a rock-solid title full of all the bug killing envy anyone would wish to do.  It's very colorful, sounds are OK, controls are done well.  Visuals are a bit different than the 5200 version but once the game play starts the difference is quickly overlooked.  And Spidey still needs to go decaf.
 
9. Dark Chambers
Dark Chambers was Atari's attempt at making a Gauntlet clone without having to pay for a license.  That's my opinionated theory about Dark Chambers.  This adventure game features levels that are lettered from A to Z giving the game over 20 levels to explore and conquer.  Graphics look good, sounds are appropriate, levels are colorful, controls are solid, and the enemies can be a handful.  Along the way the player gets to pick up items to help maintain health, increase weapon power, and a few other things.  No 7800 player should be without this game in their library.  This game is also on the 2600 and XEGS/A8 computers.
 
8.  Choplifter
I have to admit that my first encounter with Choplifter was with Sega's remake of the game for its Master System.  When I played Choplifter on the 7800 for the first time a few years ago I was taken by surprise how much more basic the game was.  But this is the way the game was originally designed and not the way Sega did it.  This game can be challenging and unforgiving to those who don't know what to expect.  Very colorful, sounds are awesome, controls are very responsive.  Watch out for those tanks while rescuing people, though, as they can take you down in no time.
 
7. Xevious
Xevious was originally not one of my favorites mainly because I had no clue what I was suppose to do or if there was an end to it.  But the more I played it the more I enjoyed the game.  And the only way I ever played the game was on the 7800.  Sounds are really good with great control options and visuals are impressive.  It's hard for me to not spend hours on this game once I decide I want to play it.  The only downfall is if the standard 7800 controller is the only controller option available Xevious can cause cramps in a matter of minutes.  For this game I recommend a game pad of some sort or even splurge on the 7800's EuroPad controller.  Those are way better options for this game than what the 7800 came with in the USA.
 
6.  Robotron: 2084
I'm just going to call it Robotron for short.  Robotron remains the one game on the system that can showcase its graphical power.  While it is a simple game there is so much going on that it can be considered a chaotic madhouse.  Seriously, there's all kinds of things going on to distract the player and yet the 7800 never slows down or breaks a sweat.  It is games like this that made the 7800 different from the other consoles of the time.  Sounds, graphics, and controls are spot-on in my opinion.  Great game.  Pick it up if found.
 
5.  Food Fight
Food Fight was one I questioned as soon as I unwrapped it that Christmas morning I got a 7800.  It was the last one I tried but easily became a favorite.  It would have had a lot more game play if not for the hand cramps caused by the standard 7800 controllers.  Even then it remains hard to put down.  There's something fun about throwing food at chefs.  It never gets old.  And if a round is played great the game treats with an instant replay.  The only game I know to do this.  I've also noticed that after playing a game it will use that instant replay for a demonstration until the system is turned off.  Good graphics, sounds, and controls are good.
 
4.  Commando
Out of the NES and 7800 versions of this game I prefer the 7800.  It simply performs better in my opinion.  It's also seems a bit easier to play than the NES version.  Graphics and sounds are amazing and the controls are responsive.  If there was a game made to showcase how much better the 7800 could be over the NES I would put this game on that list.  If this is missing from a 7800 player's game library keep an eye out for it.  This one should not be missed.
 
3.  Galaga
Some may question this game being high on this list but this is one of the most-played games on my 7800.  This was also the first game I tried that Christmas morning I unwrapped a 7800.  I prefer Galaxian over Galaga but I enjoy this game the most on the 7800.  The game play starts out easy but after awhile the game really speeds up which increases the challenge factor.  Graphics are good, sounds are OK, controls are good.  A solid 7800 title no 7800 owner should be without.  This is a common title so it should be easy to find.
 
2.  Ms. Pac-Man
Out of all of the ports of the queen of video games I've played the 7800 port of Ms. Pac-Man is probably the only one that is the closest to the arcade.  The sounds are amazing considering they are coming from the 2-channel limitations of TIA, even surpassing the same game on the 2600.  The colors are right, the graphics are detailed, the ghost AI is spot-on, and the speed is just right.  This is the only title on the 7800 I can enjoy playing using the standard 7800 controller without much fatigue.
And the most played game on my 7800 is ... (drum roll)...
 
1.  Asteroids
Asteroids on the 7800 is the most played game in my library.  I just can't get enough of those 3D-like boulders and the small space sounds that randomly call out.  And lots of memories playing this game on two-player with a friend where we would just fly around in every direction to see how long we could last without shooting anything.  We would always laugh out loud when we would collide with an asteroid flying full speed.  Who said you had to play by the rules?  I absolutely love the graphics and sounds in this game and it is a 40-plus year old concept that never gets old.  There's just something mesmerizing about blowing up asteroids and alien saucers.   
 
And that ends my top 10 7800 games.  I like every game I have for the 7800 but these are the ones I go to the most.  I'm not big on Donkey Kong or his son and I'm not that interested in sports although I find Hat Trick a fun, if not supped up, version of Pong even if it is suppose to be hockey.  And Ballblazer?  A LOT of fun with that game...I simply lack that game in my library.  I'm sure as I acquire more games for the system that what gets played the most may change.  But no matter what when I think about the 7800 I immediately think about Asteroids. 

Once a year one of the largest gaming events sets the stage of what's to come.  And XBOX has always put on a good showing with exclusives, releases of popular game franchises, XBOX firsts and much more.  This year the concept behind XBOX's E3 show seems to be more about finally bridging the gap between console and PC gamers.  But more on that later.  Here are the highlights I found most interesting ... so far.

Sega is bringing one of the most popular RPG franchises of all time to the XBOX One console and PC.  Phantasy Star originally started on the Master System decades ago and has since been declared one of Japan's best role playing games for a lot of reasons.  And most RPGs today got their influence from Sega's RPG franchise.  Unlike Phantasy Star releases before it, Phantasy Star Online 2 on XBOX One is getting released first in the western part of the world.  Offering cross-platform gaming between XBOX One and PC gamers Phantasy Star Online 2 looks to be setting the stage and standards for other RPGs to follow sometime in 2020.

Forza has been XBOX's response to PlayStation's Gran Turismo series since the original XBOX console.  It has since reached seven Motorsport releases and spawned four Horizon releases.  Considered one of the best simulated racing/driving games Forza Horizon 4 is getting a rather unusual expansion pack.  Forza and Lego have teamed up to offer the Forza Horizon experience on a Lego brick level.  Next week, Forza Horizon 4 gets a Lego expansion pack called Lego Speed Champions.  What impressed me about this was what was presented on XBOX's E3 stage during the expansion reveal.  Check out this image below.

That, my friends, is a life-size replica of a McClaren Senna that made it's debut appearance during the Forza Horizon 4 expansion pack revealing with working lights and doors open.  That's some impressive work.

Halo is coming back but not how you would expect.  Along with game releases XBOX revealed a new console code named Project Scarlett.  A video introducing the starts of Halo Infinite was shown.  A few more game trailers and then the new console was mentioned.  The new XBOX is slated for a holiday 2020 release with Halo Infinite being released with it.  While there may not be a new Halo coming to XBOX One there is one coming next year for those that plan to pick up the new XBOX next year.

The one reveal that I was waiting on the most was Gearbox's Borderlands 3 showing which showed more game play footage.  Revealed at the end of the trailer was final proof that turned a rumor into a reality.  Owners of Borderlands 2 (Steam) and Borderlands the Handsome Jack Collection (XBOX/PS) received a new DLC expansion called "Commander Lilith & the Fight for Sanctuary" that ties the story line between Borderlands 2 and the upcoming Borderlands 3 game.  This expansion DLC is available for free from now (June 9) until July 8.  The expansion includes a new weapon tier beyond Legendary and the character level cap has been upped to 80.  New players to Borderlands 2 will automatically be bumped up to level 30 to enjoy the new DLC.  Also, XBOX One owners can now get Borderlands Handsome Jack Collection for free.  What better time to dig into the Borderlands series than now?

One thing that XBOX has been committed to for a while now is creating a friendly online gaming experience no matter how or what you play whether it be a computer game or on an XBOX console.  XBOX Game Pass is XBOX's way of getting to play games without having to pay for each game.  Similar to how Netflix relates to movies Game Pass allows XBOX owners to download and play over 100 games through a subscription service.  If you like the game and wish to purchase it while it part of the Game Pass service you can at a discounted price.
This year at E3, Game Pass is now available for Windows PC so PC and XBOX gamers can play together in a cross platform atmosphere.  $15 per month nets a Live Gold, XBOX Game Pass, and XBOX Game Pass for Windows all in one package deal.  Not a bad price considering just the Game Pass alone on XBOX is $10 a month.
Other highlights include a new Minecraft spin-off called Minecraft Dungeons.  From what footage I watched it seemed like a Diablo-style game done in the art style of Minecraft.  Up to 4 players will be able to join a co-op and go exploring.  For those that like scary games there was footage shown on a new game called Blair Witch.  Too scary for me.  And Keanu Reeves made an appearance to showcase a game he is in called Cyberpunk 2077 which looked like a lot of fun!
Those were my favorite highlights of E3 on June 9th.  If you watched it be sure to share your favorite highlights as I would love to hear your thoughts and favorites about what was shown.

I already had Monday, October 29, 2018 circled on my calendar. It had been for months. That was the day for me to cash in my birthday present from 5 months prior. Tickets to see Metallica in concert, 26 years after I saw them for the first time. No band I had seen since then has been as good live (and I saw a lot, working as an usher in an arena, but that's a story for another day).
I woke up at my normal time, a little after 7 AM. Before getting out of bed, I checked my email and hopped on social media to see if anything interesting was going on. It turns out there was! There were thunderstorms nearby and looking at the current radar, one may possibly hit me!
Now, if you couldn't tell by my username, I'm a weather junkie. I've always been fascinated by crazy weather. The more extreme, the better. Hurricanes are by far my favorite type of weather, mainly because they're so rare by me. (Gloria in 1985 was my first, followed by Bob in 1991, lots of teases since then, with a couple of tropical storms in 2011 & 2012.) After that are blizzards & any kind of good snowstorm. Thunderstorms are also up there but I never see any real good ones.
I've lived near the ocean for the majority of my life, Long Island Sound specifically. LIS does weird things for weather. In the winter, the ocean water is warmer than the air over the mainland and that warm air usually helps to keep snow amounts down. In the summer, the ocean is cooler than the surrounding air and that helps to remove instability, which translates into "no, or weak, thunderstorms". I'll watch storms on radar move over Connecticut & look like they're headed right for me. As soon as they get close, the marine influence destroys them. I'm usually lucky to hear a rumble or two of thunder.
Now that I'm on an island in the middle of the sound, surrounded by water, these negative influences are magnified.
As with anything, there are exceptions. If a snowstorm takes the right track & keeps me on the cold side of a storm, we can get a lot of snow. If a thunderstorm approaches me from the ocean rather than from land, the storms can hold together and pack a punch. 
Back to that October morning. I headed downstairs to prepare to get my dogs up and feed them, it started to thunder a bit. Then it REALLY rained. I stood by my picture window watching the rain runoff roll down the street like a river. I wasn't about to take the dogs out in that, so I went back upstairs to lay in bed for a bit.
About 5 minutes later, my pager went off. There was a fire alarm activation at a home about a mile and half from me. Not a surprise, as I've learned in the past year as a volunteer firefighter, that any power disruption from a storm or anything else, tends to trigger fire alarms. I was already dressed, so off I went to the firehouse to respond.
While I was there waiting for another member to join me (we only roll the trucks with two or more people) ANOTHER call came over the radio for the same thing. That struck me as VERY odd, seeing as we average one fire call per week. To have two calls within five minutes of each other was strange, but nothing that made me be overly suspicious.
Someone else showed up and away we drove. We were responding to the first call, which was on the east end of the island, which is the private end. As we passed the gate house, the attendant stopped us to say that a neighbor of the home we were headed to had called down to say that her home had been hit by a tornado and that there were trees down everywhere.
As someone who has been following weather phenomenon for a long time, I knew that anytime people see tree damage from a thunderstorm, they almost always say they were hit by a tornado, when in reality, it was a downburst, microburst or just really strong winds. That doesn't make the storm any less destructive, it's just not as sexy as saying you were hit by a tornado. Tornados are rare, ESPECIALLY where we were. In my 40+ years, I don't ever recall a tornado hitting my part of Connecticut (southeastern), let alone Fishers Island. So needless to say, I was quite dubious, even after we arrived at the house and saw all the tree damage.
We quickly called off this call as a false alarm and tried to make it to the other home, which was also on the east end. The road I was going to take was blocked by downed trees. We tried to take a different road but that road was also blocked. Another member of the fire department was able to make it to the home and cleared that call as well.
However, it was obvious that we had been hit pretty hard by that storm. Once I returned the fire truck, I headed back to where the initial call came in to survey the damage on foot and take some pictures.
I had been in contact with a meteorologist from a Connecticut news station via Twitter. I let him know that there was significant damage on Fishers, but again, a tornado wasn't even a consideration at that point.
I began walking east, over the downed trees that made the road impassable for us in the fire truck. There was some other damage, including a wooden fence knocked over & a garage door blown off, but nothing too spectacular. 
Then I noticed a very large tree uprooted and more trees down. At this point, all of the trees had fallen in the same direction, which again had me thinking that this was straight line wind damage. And then I began to look up, at the tops of the trees.
There, I could see just the tops of some trees damaged, while the rest of the tree was intact. That now had me considering the possibility of a tornado, as that damage was different than what I had seen earlier. (Again, I'm an untrained eye, just someone who was very excited.)
The road I was walking eventually comes out onto the main road that spans the island. I stayed on that road, headed east, when I ran into the utility company. There were wires down and a pole snapped. It was pretty remarkable and when I stopped to talk to the president of the utility company, he said it was worse farther up. We hopped in his truck and went to check it out.
Once I saw that damage, I was no longer firmly in the not-a-tornado camp. There was little doubt in my mind. There was a stand of trees that had been shredded completely. It looked exactly like footage from a midwestern town that had been hit by a tornado. There was a shed that had been destroyed and just so many trees down. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. 
I tried to update my meteorologist friend, but cell service out there was spotty. I couldn't wait to fill him in. I knew he would be just as excited as I was.
The National Weather Service paid a visit to the island the following day and determined that we had in fact been struck by an EF-1 tornado. By that point, we all knew it, as a video capturing it had surfaced. Of course, I was in Albany for the concert, so I missed my chance to follow the NWS around while they checked out all the damage. However, I was happy to have been one of the first to realize what happened and grateful that I was on the island for it. My poor luck usually results in me missing something like this.
Oh yeah, Metallica kicked ass again. 🤘
----------
Fishers Island's Tornado News Report
Some tweets as they happened in real-time, followed by some of my damage photos.
 

I already had Monday, October 29, 2018 circled on my calendar. It had been for months. That was the day for me to cash in my birthday present from 5 months prior. Tickets to see Metallica in concert, 26 years after I saw them for the first time. No band I had seen since then has been as good live (and I saw a lot, working as an usher in an arena, but that's a story for another day).
I woke up at my normal time, a little after 7 AM. Before getting out of bed, I checked my email and hopped on social media to see if anything interesting was going on. It turns out there was! There were thunderstorms nearby and looking at the current radar, one may possibly hit me!
Now, if you couldn't tell by my username, I'm a weather junkie. I've always been fascinated by crazy weather. The more extreme, the better. Hurricanes are by far my favorite type of weather, mainly because they're so rare by me. (Gloria in 1985 was my first, followed by Bob in 1991, lots of teases since then, with a couple of tropical storms in 2011 & 2012.) After that are blizzards & any kind of good snowstorm. Thunderstorms are also up there but I never see any real good ones.
I've lived near the ocean for the majority of my life, Long Island Sound specifically. LIS does weird things for weather. In the winter, the ocean water is warmer than the air over the mainland and that warm air usually helps to keep snow amounts down. In the summer, the ocean is cooler than the surrounding air and that helps to remove instability, which translates into "no, or weak, thunderstorms". I'll watch storms on radar move over Connecticut & look like they're headed right for me. As soon as they get close, the marine influence destroys them. I'm usually lucky to hear a rumble or two of thunder.
Now that I'm on an island in the middle of the sound, surrounded by water, these negative influences are magnified.
As with anything, there are exceptions. If a snowstorm takes the right track & keeps me on the cold side of a storm, we can get a lot of snow. If a thunderstorm approaches me from the ocean rather than from land, the storms can hold together and pack a punch. 
Back to that October morning. I headed downstairs to prepare to get my dogs up and feed them, it started to thunder a bit. Then it REALLY rained. I stood by my picture window watching the rain runoff roll down the street like a river. I wasn't about to take the dogs out in that, so I went back upstairs to lay in bed for a bit.
About 5 minutes later, my pager went off. There was a fire alarm activation at a home about a mile and half from me. Not a surprise, as I've learned in the past year as a volunteer firefighter, that any power disruption from a storm or anything else, tends to trigger fire alarms. I was already dressed, so off I went to the firehouse to respond.
While I was there waiting for another member to join me (we only roll the trucks with two or more people) ANOTHER call came over the radio for the same thing. That struck me as VERY odd, seeing as we average one fire call per week. To have two calls within five minutes of each other was strange, but nothing that made me be overly suspicious.
Someone else showed up and away we drove. We were responding to the first call, which was on the east end of the island, which is the private end. As we passed the gate house, the attendant stopped us to say that a neighbor of the home we were headed to had called down to say that her home had been hit by a tornado and that there were trees down everywhere.
As someone who has been following weather phenomenon for a long time, I knew that anytime people see tree damage from a thunderstorm, they almost always say they were hit by a tornado, when in reality, it was a downburst, microburst or just really strong winds. That doesn't make the storm any less destructive, it's just not as sexy as saying you were hit by a tornado. Tornados are rare, ESPECIALLY where we were. In my 40+ years, I don't ever recall a tornado hitting my part of Connecticut (southeastern), let alone Fishers Island. So needless to say, I was quite dubious, even after we arrived at the house and saw all the tree damage.
We quickly called off this call as a false alarm and tried to make it to the other home, which was also on the east end. The road I was going to take was blocked by downed trees. We tried to take a different road but that road was also blocked. Another member of the fire department was able to make it to the home and cleared that call as well.
However, it was obvious that we had been hit pretty hard by that storm. Once I returned the fire truck, I headed back to where the initial call came in to survey the damage on foot and take some pictures.
I had been in contact with a meteorologist from a Connecticut news station via Twitter. I let him know that there was significant damage on Fishers, but again, a tornado wasn't even a consideration at that point.
I began walking east, over the downed trees that made the road impassable for us in the fire truck. There was some other damage, including a wooden fence knocked over & a garage door blown off, but nothing too spectacular. 
Then I noticed a very large tree uprooted and more trees down. At this point, all of the trees had fallen in the same direction, which again had me thinking that this was straight line wind damage. And then I began to look up, at the tops of the trees.
There, I could see just the tops of some trees damaged, while the rest of the tree was intact. That now had me considering the possibility of a tornado, as that damage was different than what I had seen earlier. (Again, I'm an untrained eye, just someone who was very excited.)
The road I was walking eventually comes out onto the main road that spans the island. I stayed on that road, headed east, when I ran into the utility company. There were wires down and a pole snapped. It was pretty remarkable and when I stopped to talk to the president of the utility company, he said it was worse farther up. We hopped in his truck and went to check it out.
Once I saw that damage, I was no longer firmly in the not-a-tornado camp. There was little doubt in my mind. There was a stand of trees that had been shredded completely. It looked exactly like footage from a midwestern town that had been hit by a tornado. There was a shed that had been destroyed and just so many trees down. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. 
I tried to update my meteorologist friend, but cell service out there was spotty. I couldn't wait to fill him in. I knew he would be just as excited as I was.
The National Weather Service paid a visit to the island the following day and determined that we had in fact been struck by an EF-1 tornado. By that point, we all knew it, as a video capturing it had surfaced. Of course, I was in Albany for the concert, so I missed my chance to follow the NWS around while they checked out all the damage. However, I was happy to have been one of the first to realize what happened and grateful that I was on the island for it. My poor luck usually results in me missing something like this.
Oh yeah, Metallica kicked ass again. 🤘
----------
Fishers Island's Tornado News Report
Some tweets as they happened in real-time, followed by some of my damage photos.
 

I already had Monday, October 29, 2018 circled on my calendar. It had been for months. That was the day for me to cash in my birthday present from 5 months prior. Tickets to see Metallica in concert, 26 years after I saw them for the first time. No band I had seen since then has been as good live (and I saw a lot, working as an usher in an arena, but that's a story for another day).
I woke up at my normal time, a little after 7 AM. Before getting out of bed, I checked my email and hopped on social media to see if anything interesting was going on. It turns out there was! There were thunderstorms nearby and looking at the current radar, one may possibly hit me!
Now, if you couldn't tell by my username, I'm a weather junkie. I've always been fascinated by crazy weather. The more extreme, the better. Hurricanes are by far my favorite type of weather, mainly because they're so rare by me. (Gloria in 1985 was my first, followed by Bob in 1991, lots of teases since then, with a couple of tropical storms in 2011 & 2012.) After that are blizzards & any kind of good snowstorm. Thunderstorms are also up there but I never see any real good ones.
I've lived near the ocean for the majority of my life, Long Island Sound specifically. LIS does weird things for weather. In the winter, the ocean water is warmer than the air over the mainland and that warm air usually helps to keep snow amounts down. In the summer, the ocean is cooler than the surrounding air and that helps to remove instability, which translates into "no, or weak, thunderstorms". I'll watch storms on radar move over Connecticut & look like they're headed right for me. As soon as they get close, the marine influence destroys them. I'm usually lucky to hear a rumble or two of thunder.
Now that I'm on an island in the middle of the sound, surrounded by water, these negative influences are magnified.
As with anything, there are exceptions. If a snowstorm takes the right track & keeps me on the cold side of a storm, we can get a lot of snow. If a thunderstorm approaches me from the ocean rather than from land, the storms can hold together and pack a punch. 
Back to that October morning. I headed downstairs to prepare to get my dogs up and feed them, it started to thunder a bit. Then it REALLY rained. I stood by my picture window watching the rain runoff roll down the street like a river. I wasn't about to take the dogs out in that, so I went back upstairs to lay in bed for a bit.
About 5 minutes later, my pager went off. There was a fire alarm activation at a home about a mile and half from me. Not a surprise, as I've learned in the past year as a volunteer firefighter, that any power disruption from a storm or anything else, tends to trigger fire alarms. I was already dressed, so off I went to the firehouse to respond.
While I was there waiting for another member to join me (we only roll the trucks with two or more people) ANOTHER call came over the radio for the same thing. That struck me as VERY odd, seeing as we average one fire call per week. To have two calls within five minutes of each other was strange, but nothing that made me be overly suspicious.
Someone else showed up and away we drove. We were responding to the first call, which was on the east end of the island, which is the private end. As we passed the gate house, the attendant stopped us to say that a neighbor of the home we were headed to had called down to say that her home had been hit by a tornado and that there were trees down everywhere.
As someone who has been following weather phenomenon for a long time, I knew that anytime people see tree damage from a thunderstorm, they almost always say they were hit by a tornado, when in reality, it was a downburst, microburst or just really strong winds. That doesn't make the storm any less destructive, it's just not as sexy as saying you were hit by a tornado. Tornados are rare, ESPECIALLY where we were. In my 40+ years, I don't ever recall a tornado hitting my part of Connecticut (southeastern), let alone Fishers Island. So needless to say, I was quite dubious, even after we arrived at the house and saw all the tree damage.
We quickly called off this call as a false alarm and tried to make it to the other home, which was also on the east end. The road I was going to take was blocked by downed trees. We tried to take a different road but that road was also blocked. Another member of the fire department was able to make it to the home and cleared that call as well.
However, it was obvious that we had been hit pretty hard by that storm. Once I returned the fire truck, I headed back to where the initial call came in to survey the damage on foot and take some pictures.
I had been in contact with a meteorologist from a Connecticut news station via Twitter. I let him know that there was significant damage on Fishers, but again, a tornado wasn't even a consideration at that point.
I began walking east, over the downed trees that made the road impassable for us in the fire truck. There was some other damage, including a wooden fence knocked over & a garage door blown off, but nothing too spectacular. 
Then I noticed a very large tree uprooted and more trees down. At this point, all of the trees had fallen in the same direction, which again had me thinking that this was straight line wind damage. And then I began to look up, at the tops of the trees.
There, I could see just the tops of some trees damaged, while the rest of the tree was intact. That now had me considering the possibility of a tornado, as that damage was different than what I had seen earlier. (Again, I'm an untrained eye, just someone who was very excited.)
The road I was walking eventually comes out onto the main road that spans the island. I stayed on that road, headed east, when I ran into the utility company. There were wires down and a pole snapped. It was pretty remarkable and when I stopped to talk to the president of the utility company, he said it was worse farther up. We hopped in his truck and went to check it out.
Once I saw that damage, I was no longer firmly in the not-a-tornado camp. There was little doubt in my mind. There was a stand of trees that had been shredded completely. It looked exactly like footage from a midwestern town that had been hit by a tornado. There was a shed that had been destroyed and just so many trees down. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. 
I tried to update my meteorologist friend, but cell service out there was spotty. I couldn't wait to fill him in. I knew he would be just as excited as I was.
The National Weather Service paid a visit to the island the following day and determined that we had in fact been struck by an EF-1 tornado. By that point, we all knew it, as a video capturing it had surfaced. Of course, I was in Albany for the concert, so I missed my chance to follow the NWS around while they checked out all the damage. However, I was happy to have been one of the first to realize what happened and grateful that I was on the island for it. My poor luck usually results in me missing something like this.
Oh yeah, Metallica kicked ass again. 🤘
----------
Fishers Island's Tornado News Report
Some tweets as they happened in real-time, followed by some of my damage photos.
 

I thought it may be interesting to share what happens when my pager goes off for a fire call.
Thankfully, I've only had false alarms to respond to, aside from two minor car accidents. (Since October 2017).
We average one call per week. Thankfully, most of them are during the day, but there have been the occasional middle of the night calls. (The pager also goes off for any ambulance calls, which I only assist if the EMTs need help lifting the stretcher onto the ambulance boat.)
Technically, I only need to respond to every call while officially on call (we're split into teams that are on call for two weeks at a time, eliminating the need for 20 people to show up for a false alarm), but because I live so close to the fire house and that I want the practice of putting my gear on & driving the truck, I make it a point to go to every call. (Again, there's not that many calls, so it's no big deal.)
The pager tones don't sound like Station 51's tones but it's still pretty startling when it goes off.
Anyway, here's the video. Let me know if you have any questions!
 

The FPS/RPG series Borderlands has become a favorite modern game with my wife and I.  In anticipation of Borderlands 3 coming in September I decided to do a video series on Borderland 2 to revisit the game and to showcase the game in its raw form.  There is no commentary as I lack the equipment to capture both at present time.  The first of this series starts in the video posted below.  More will follow when time allows.
Parental Warning:  The game play presented in the video below has been rated M for Mature by the ESRB.  It may/may not contain content inappropriate for young viewers.  Parental guidance is advised.  
 
The second part of this series is being figured out how to present.  Over an hour of the game I captured has the game's audio missing.  Instead the software switched on me to capture the mic instead.  Because of the copyrighted content it captured from the living room TV I may just have to do a text commentary of what happened.  I can't go back and capture it again and have it match up with the rest because of the random nature of the game.  Loot is never the same in the loot crates.  Any suggestions appreciated.

As a young kid spending time on Fishers Island (my current home), I was fascinated with the natural history of the island. The main focus of my attention was on the area of the island that used to be the home of Fort H.G. Wright. 
Fort Wright was part of the coastal defense network & protected the eastern part of Long Island Sound. It was active from 1898 through 1947. 
I loved playing in and around the gun pits (the cannons were long gone) and other buildings, including lookout towers, etc. I REALLY became interested when I saw old photos and postcards of the same buildings I saw now back when they were in their heyday. 
Since that time, I’ve collected those old postcards & photos. A good friend of mine gave me a photo of Officers Row (the top photo in the below comparison). 
Officers Row is extra special to me as the first house I ever stayed in on Fishers was one of these houses. 
After the fort closed, the US government sold off many buildings at reasonable prices, with the condition that they must be restored (or at least made presentable). A decade of neglect had many of the buildings in disrepair. Sadly, a lot of buildings fell to the wrecking ball. 
My father’s brother in law & his brother purchased one of the houses (located on the right side in the photos below). By the time I was born in 1973, the house was restored & this is where we stayed when we visited. In fact, one of the very first memories I have, period, was sleeping in a crib in this house. 
Anyway, here’s a comparison of a photo taken sometime in the 1910s and taken from the same spot today, April 19, 2019. 
And if you want to know what my uncle’s house looks like on the inside, here you go: https://shuttersandsails.com/listing/parade-grounds-cottage/ (my father’s brother-in-law ended up selling his share to his brother & moved on to bigger & better houses on Fishers (stories for future blog posts), but his brother (my uncle by marriage) still owns the house today.)
**I forgot to mention that the house on the far left in the top image was either demo’ed or burned down years ago. I’ve never laid eyes on it. 
I have a good story about the house that's straight-ahead in the photos. When I was young staying next door, the woman who lived there made THE BEST vanilla milkshakes. She was an author & you may recall my story I shared with @VicSage about a woman who was an old-time radio personality.
http://fishersisland.net/memoriam-patricia-hosley-kibbe/

As a young kid spending time on Fishers Island (my current home), I was fascinated with the natural history of the island. The main focus of my attention was on the area of the island that used to be the home of Fort H.G. Wright. 
Fort Wright was part of the coastal defense network & protected the eastern part of Long Island Sound. It was active from 1898 through 1947. 
I loved playing in and around the gun pits (the cannons were long gone) and other buildings, including lookout towers, etc. I REALLY became interested when I saw old photos and postcards of the same buildings I saw now back when they were in their heyday. 
Since that time, I’ve collected those old postcards & photos. A good friend of mine gave me a photo of Officers Row (the top photo in the below comparison). 
Officers Row is extra special to me as the first house I ever stayed in on Fishers was one of these houses. 
After the fort closed, the US government sold off many buildings at reasonable prices, with the condition that they must be restored (or at least made presentable). A decade of neglect had many of the buildings in disrepair. Sadly, a lot of buildings fell to the wrecking ball. 
My father’s brother in law & his brother purchased one of the houses (located on the right side in the photos below). By the time I was born in 1973, the house was restored & this is where we stayed when we visited. In fact, one of the very first memories I have, period, was sleeping in a crib in this house. 
Anyway, here’s a comparison of a photo taken sometime in the 1910s and taken from the same spot today, April 19, 2019. 
And if you want to know what my uncle’s house looks like on the inside, here you go: https://shuttersandsails.com/listing/parade-grounds-cottage/ (my father’s brother-in-law ended up selling his share to his brother & moved on to bigger & better houses on Fishers (stories for future blog posts), but his brother (my uncle by marriage) still owns the house today.)
**I forgot to mention that the house on the far left in the top image was either demo’ed or burned down years ago. I’ve never laid eyes on it. 
I have a good story about the house that's straight-ahead in the photos. When I was young staying next door, the woman who lived there made THE BEST vanilla milkshakes. She was an author & you may recall my story I shared with @VicSage about a woman who was an old-time radio personality.
http://fishersisland.net/memoriam-patricia-hosley-kibbe/

As a young kid spending time on Fishers Island (my current home), I was fascinated with the natural history of the island. The main focus of my attention was on the area of the island that used to be the home of Fort H.G. Wright. 
Fort Wright was part of the coastal defense network & protected the eastern part of Long Island Sound. It was active from 1898 through 1947. 
I loved playing in and around the gun pits (the cannons were long gone) and other buildings, including lookout towers, etc. I REALLY became interested when I saw old photos and postcards of the same buildings I saw now back when they were in their heyday. 
Since that time, I’ve collected those old postcards & photos. A good friend of mine gave me a photo of Officers Row (the top photo in the below comparison). 
Officers Row is extra special to me as the first house I ever stayed in on Fishers was one of these houses. 
After the fort closed, the US government sold off many buildings at reasonable prices, with the condition that they must be restored (or at least made presentable). A decade of neglect had many of the buildings in disrepair. Sadly, a lot of buildings fell to the wrecking ball. 
My father’s brother in law & his brother purchased one of the houses (located on the right side in the photos below). By the time I was born in 1973, the house was restored & this is where we stayed when we visited. In fact, one of the very first memories I have, period, was sleeping in a crib in this house. 
Anyway, here’s a comparison of a photo taken sometime in the 1910s and taken from the same spot today, April 19, 2019. 
And if you want to know what my uncle’s house looks like on the inside, here you go: https://shuttersandsails.com/listing/parade-grounds-cottage/ (my father’s brother-in-law ended up selling his share to his brother & moved on to bigger & better houses on Fishers (stories for future blog posts), but his brother (my uncle by marriage) still owns the house today.)
**I forgot to mention that the house on the far left in the top image was either demo’ed or burned down years ago. I’ve never laid eyes on it. 
I have a good story about the house that's straight-ahead in the photos. When I was young staying next door, the woman who lived there made THE BEST vanilla milkshakes. She was an author & you may recall my story I shared with @VicSage about a woman who was an old-time radio personality.
http://fishersisland.net/memoriam-patricia-hosley-kibbe/

So recently I was in talks with a fellow maker, he had asked if I would be willing to make a trade once I finish one of my soon to come figures. I looked over his shop and noticed he sold one of his figures in a kit form. I inquired about maybe doing a toy art swap where I sent him a raw casting of one of my figures and he would send me one of his. Here is the build video of that trade.
 
STRONG LANGUAGE!
 
 

I thought it may be interesting to share what happens when my pager goes off for a fire call.
Thankfully, I've only had false alarms to respond to, aside from two minor car accidents. (Since October 2017).
We average one call per week. Thankfully, most of them are during the day, but there have been the occasional middle of the night calls. (The pager also goes off for any ambulance calls, which I only assist if the EMTs need help lifting the stretcher onto the ambulance boat.)
Technically, I only need to respond to every call while officially on call (we're split into teams that are on call for two weeks at a time, eliminating the need for 20 people to show up for a false alarm), but because I live so close to the fire house and that I want the practice of putting my gear on & driving the truck, I make it a point to go to every call. (Again, there's not that many calls, so it's no big deal.)
The pager tones don't sound like Station 51's tones but it's still pretty startling when it goes off.
Anyway, here's the video. Let me know if you have any questions!
 

I thought it may be interesting to share what happens when my pager goes off for a fire call.
Thankfully, I've only had false alarms to respond to, aside from two minor car accidents. (Since October 2017).
We average one call per week. Thankfully, most of them are during the day, but there have been the occasional middle of the night calls. (The pager also goes off for any ambulance calls, which I only assist if the EMTs need help lifting the stretcher onto the ambulance boat.)
Technically, I only need to respond to every call while officially on call (we're split into teams that are on call for two weeks at a time, eliminating the need for 20 people to show up for a false alarm), but because I live so close to the fire house and that I want the practice of putting my gear on & driving the truck, I make it a point to go to every call. (Again, there's not that many calls, so it's no big deal.)
The pager tones don't sound like Station 51's tones but it's still pretty startling when it goes off.
Anyway, here's the video. Let me know if you have any questions!
 

I thought it may be interesting to share what happens when my pager goes off for a fire call.
Thankfully, I've only had false alarms to respond to, aside from two minor car accidents. (Since October 2017).
We average one call per week. Thankfully, most of them are during the day, but there have been the occasional middle of the night calls. (The pager also goes off for any ambulance calls, which I only assist if the EMTs need help lifting the stretcher onto the ambulance boat.)
Technically, I only need to respond to every call while officially on call (we're split into teams that are on call for two weeks at a time, eliminating the need for 20 people to show up for a false alarm), but because I live so close to the fire house and that I want the practice of putting my gear on & driving the truck, I make it a point to go to every call. (Again, there's not that many calls, so it's no big deal.)
The pager tones don't sound like Station 51's tones but it's still pretty startling when it goes off.
Anyway, here's the video. Let me know if you have any questions!
 

This may seem like a strange topic to start off a blog that focuses on my appreciation for my childhood but it's a subject that I tend to dwell on a lot. The year I foolishly gave away my entire toy collection.
 
First, a little background.
 
I was born in 1973. My parents divorced when I was six. I stayed with my Mom during the school year and visited my Dad every other weekend and school vacations, including the summer.
 
I REALLY enjoyed visiting my Dad. Yes, he spoiled me (I'm still spoiled to this day) but it was more than that. I think the infrequency of the visits made me appreciate my time there more and where he lived was just so cool. He lived in a condominium complex that had a playground, a basketball court, tennis court, pool but most importantly, lots of other kids.
 
On the Friday's or Saturday's that my Dad would pick me up, he'd usually have a gift for me. Nothing extravagant, but nevertheless awesome. A 2600 game, a Star Wars figure, a Matchbox car.
 
Over time and with a few Christmases thrown in, I amassed quite a collection of toys and games.
 
I obviously had an Atari 2600. Looking back, I didn't have a lot of games, but living in the moment, it felt like I did. We probably had 25-30 games. (I can't say for certain because the lines between "owned" & "borrowed from a friend" have become blurred over the years.)
 
I was (& am) a huge Star Wars fan. My collection began before my parents divorced and only grew in the ensuing years. I had a cardboard box that was about 3 feet high & 3 feet across FILLED with vehicles, playsets and action figures. I can absolutely nail down exactly what was in my collection and what wasn't to this day.
 
In 1983, GI Joe entered my life. Over the next two years, I built up a pretty decent collection. Not as large as my Star Wars collection but still significant.
 
In addition to all that, I collected baseball cards (along with some other sports cards), Matchbox cars, some He-Man & Transformers figures and many, many board games. I had A LOT of stuff.
 
In the summer of 1985, my main focus was becoming baseball cards. I had bought enough packs of Topps cards that I was able to send away for a complete factory set. Once I received that, I figured, why do I need to keep all my doubles for? So I gave those away. Of course, in subsequent years, some of those cards (Mark McGwire & Roger Clemens rookie cards) went for hundreds of dollars. (Thankfully, the value has since decreased drastically, easing the pain a bit.)
 

It didn't end there though. In 1986 & '87, I had purchased a lot of Fleer basketball cards & Topps hockey and football cards. As my baseball card collecting passion grew and non-baseball cards didn't have a lot of value at the time, I gave those away too. Those prices haven't dropped. (The Michael Jordan 1987-88 card sells anywhere from $75 on up and I had a lot of those.)
 
However, the decision to give away other things hurts worse.
 
I forget the year exactly, but I would guess the summer of 1987. I was 14. I had an NES. I had an interest in girls. We were four years removed from Return of the Jedi. Once again, I foolishly thought "Why do I need all this stuff? I never play with them anymore."
 
Two young boys lived four condos down from me. I gave them my entire 2600 collection. My father was good friends with another neighbor who had a 7-year-old son. I figured Derek would enjoy all my Star Wars stuff and other action figures. So I gave them to him. Plus my Matchbox cars. (I'm guessing I had close to 100 of those.)
 
As for my other items, such as board games and other toys, they all disappeared, I'm assuming when my father remarried and we moved out of the condo in 1989.
 
Sigh. It pains me to even write those words. I would do anything to have them back. Looking back, I suppose it was a nice gesture for 14-year-old me to give that stuff away but what a stupid decision.
 
I have no idea who the kids are who received my Atari. Thankfully, I was able to reacquire nearly my entire collection I had during the mid-90's fairly inexpensively.
 
I'm still in contact with the family I gave my Star Wars stuff to. They moved twice and no longer have anything. Before the prequels hit, I was able to pick up a few figures I had but nowhere near what I used to have.
 
It does make me happy to see that Derek's children are now Star Wars fans and I like to think I played a part in that.
 
So, if anyone comes across a Bespin Luke figure with his right hand missing (I rubbed it along the pavement to make it more screen-accurate) at a yard sale, pick it up for me.
 

My apologies in advance for this post. You may think this is a strange place for this but I can't think of another outlet for it and I can make an Atari connection.
 
My stepfather is dying. Quickly. I'm not even sure if he's technically my stepfather, but he might as well be.
 
Growing up, I hated him. I realize hate is a strong word but I HATED him.
 
Now, I'm pretty devastated by this.
 
My parents divorced in 1979, when I was six. My mother remarried a true a-hole a year or two later. I'm not certain of the exact date but it was in my 2600 heyday. Those were not good times for me but that's not even worth sharing. They would be divorced by 1983. That's when she met the subject of this post.
 
She was working for the local newspaper in the classified department and he was the local dog warden. He would place ads for dogs they rounded up and they hit it off.
 
The summer before I started sixth grade (1984), they moved in together. (This would be my fifth different elementary school since kindergarten.) My disdain for him was immediate.
 
He had a son and daughter from a previous marriage. The daughter lived with her mom & would visit every other weekend. The son was a year older than me but we didn't get along that great.
 
He was ridiculously strict. It honestly felt like I was in prison. No candy, no soda, being sent to bed super-early, etc. There was one TV in the house & we had to watch whatever he wanted. (A vivid memory is me coming home from school, finding a cartoon to watch or even an afternoon playoff baseball game (Cubs/Padres), him driving in the driveway, eventually sitting down in his chair in front of the TV & snapping his fingers, demanding the cable box. He would promptly change the channel & eventually settle on some horrible kung fu movie.) My Atari, which I used to shuttle back & forth between my father's house & my mother's was no longer to be connected to the TV.
 
I remember him arguing with my Mom about my father. Things like the child support check, or him calling to talk to me, etc. Stuff that made me super uncomfortable.
 
The best times would come from when he would go play cards with his friends. I'd have a few hours with him not in the house but he would come home drunk. If everything would work out, I would be asleep before he came home.
 
My mom never married him but I'm not sure how the common-law marriage thing works in my state. Regardless, they never split up. He was present in my life until I graduated high school.
 
I learned quickly to keep my mouth shut & do whatever he ordered me to do. Chores, eating every last bite of foods I despised (I haven't eaten a pea in 25 years and I never will again.) He never hit me, although there were times I wish he did so I could find a way to leave. I used to fantasize about walking the 85 miles to my father's house, while not being exactly sure how to get there.
 
I do remember blowing up during my senior year of high school. I had a girlfriend (SHOCKING!) and he would limit my time on the phone with her. I don't remember exactly what happened but I remember being in my bedroom with the door shut and hearing him outside complaining about something. I threw a Trapper Keeper (or something similar, it was a notebook/folder) at my dresser, which left a mark. The details are hazy now, but I remember just finally yelling back at him. I knew my days of being under his thumb were almost over.
 
My escape from him was visiting my Dad every other weekend, vacations & summer. I can't even begin to describe how amazing it felt to be picked up on a Friday after school or Saturday morning. And the feeling of dread I had when I had to return...
 
Once I graduated high school, I went to a college close to where my Dad lived and I never looked back. To this day, I hate visiting the town where my Mom lives and I'm pretty certain it all stems from these experiences.
 
Since I left, I would visit my Mom & him on holidays, etc. He would always give me $100 for Christmas and our relationship became amicable. He seemed to love my daughter and she had no problems with him. Things were fine.
 
This past February, my Mom called me during the middle of the day, which was bizarre. I assumed it was bad news about her Mom, my amazing grandmother, who has Alzheimers and isn't in good shape. It wasn't that. Howard has cancer, it's aggressive and the doctors give him six months to live.
 
I was shocked & saddened but I wasn't sure how to respond to that news. As much as I hated him, I certainly didn't want this to happen. And I was heartbroken for my poor Mom, as now she has to deal with this.
 
Since the diagnosis, I've only seen them one time, around my birthday in May. I kept saying that we'd do some things during the summer but it never worked out.
 
Just this past weekend, the pain of chemotherapy and everything else became too much for him. He decided to stop fighting and is now in hospice care.
I'm going to visit him tomorrow. I'm not sure if my daughter or wife (not my daughter's mom, that will be a WHOLE other series of blogs ) will join me but I'm going.
 
Again, the feelings I have are so conflicted. How can I be so upset about someone who caused me so much pain? Yet, here I am, extremely upset. Part of it is pain for my Mom, imagining how she must be feeling. When the calendar turned to 2016, everything was fine in her world. Now, before Thanksgiving, completely turned upside down.
As I spend time thinking and reflecting, I'm continuing to remember things that weren't so bad. How he attended my Student of the Month ceremony in seventh grade when no one else could. How he coached my Babe Ruth teams. How he took me fishing & camping.
 
It's so strange, so bizarre and so painful. I apologize if this isn't the proper use of the blog but I consider myself amongst friends here and I don't feel like going back to a therapist. I have no interest sharing something like this on Facebook, so here I am.
 
Thanks for listening to me ramble.

My apologies in advance for this post. You may think this is a strange place for this but I can't think of another outlet for it and I can make an Atari connection.
 
My stepfather is dying. Quickly. I'm not even sure if he's technically my stepfather, but he might as well be.
 
Growing up, I hated him. I realize hate is a strong word but I HATED him.
 
Now, I'm pretty devastated by this.
 
My parents divorced in 1979, when I was six. My mother remarried a true a-hole a year or two later. I'm not certain of the exact date but it was in my 2600 heyday. Those were not good times for me but that's not even worth sharing. They would be divorced by 1983. That's when she met the subject of this post.
 
She was working for the local newspaper in the classified department and he was the local dog warden. He would place ads for dogs they rounded up and they hit it off.
 
The summer before I started sixth grade (1984), they moved in together. (This would be my fifth different elementary school since kindergarten.) My disdain for him was immediate.
 
He had a son and daughter from a previous marriage. The daughter lived with her mom & would visit every other weekend. The son was a year older than me but we didn't get along that great.
 
He was ridiculously strict. It honestly felt like I was in prison. No candy, no soda, being sent to bed super-early, etc. There was one TV in the house & we had to watch whatever he wanted. (A vivid memory is me coming home from school, finding a cartoon to watch or even an afternoon playoff baseball game (Cubs/Padres), him driving in the driveway, eventually sitting down in his chair in front of the TV & snapping his fingers, demanding the cable box. He would promptly change the channel & eventually settle on some horrible kung fu movie.) My Atari, which I used to shuttle back & forth between my father's house & my mother's was no longer to be connected to the TV.
 
I remember him arguing with my Mom about my father. Things like the child support check, or him calling to talk to me, etc. Stuff that made me super uncomfortable.
 
The best times would come from when he would go play cards with his friends. I'd have a few hours with him not in the house but he would come home drunk. If everything would work out, I would be asleep before he came home.
 
My mom never married him but I'm not sure how the common-law marriage thing works in my state. Regardless, they never split up. He was present in my life until I graduated high school.
 
I learned quickly to keep my mouth shut & do whatever he ordered me to do. Chores, eating every last bite of foods I despised (I haven't eaten a pea in 25 years and I never will again.) He never hit me, although there were times I wish he did so I could find a way to leave. I used to fantasize about walking the 85 miles to my father's house, while not being exactly sure how to get there.
 
I do remember blowing up during my senior year of high school. I had a girlfriend (SHOCKING!) and he would limit my time on the phone with her. I don't remember exactly what happened but I remember being in my bedroom with the door shut and hearing him outside complaining about something. I threw a Trapper Keeper (or something similar, it was a notebook/folder) at my dresser, which left a mark. The details are hazy now, but I remember just finally yelling back at him. I knew my days of being under his thumb were almost over.
 
My escape from him was visiting my Dad every other weekend, vacations & summer. I can't even begin to describe how amazing it felt to be picked up on a Friday after school or Saturday morning. And the feeling of dread I had when I had to return...
 
Once I graduated high school, I went to a college close to where my Dad lived and I never looked back. To this day, I hate visiting the town where my Mom lives and I'm pretty certain it all stems from these experiences.
 
Since I left, I would visit my Mom & him on holidays, etc. He would always give me $100 for Christmas and our relationship became amicable. He seemed to love my daughter and she had no problems with him. Things were fine.
 
This past February, my Mom called me during the middle of the day, which was bizarre. I assumed it was bad news about her Mom, my amazing grandmother, who has Alzheimers and isn't in good shape. It wasn't that. Howard has cancer, it's aggressive and the doctors give him six months to live.
 
I was shocked & saddened but I wasn't sure how to respond to that news. As much as I hated him, I certainly didn't want this to happen. And I was heartbroken for my poor Mom, as now she has to deal with this.
 
Since the diagnosis, I've only seen them one time, around my birthday in May. I kept saying that we'd do some things during the summer but it never worked out.
 
Just this past weekend, the pain of chemotherapy and everything else became too much for him. He decided to stop fighting and is now in hospice care.
I'm going to visit him tomorrow. I'm not sure if my daughter or wife (not my daughter's mom, that will be a WHOLE other series of blogs ) will join me but I'm going.
 
Again, the feelings I have are so conflicted. How can I be so upset about someone who caused me so much pain? Yet, here I am, extremely upset. Part of it is pain for my Mom, imagining how she must be feeling. When the calendar turned to 2016, everything was fine in her world. Now, before Thanksgiving, completely turned upside down.
As I spend time thinking and reflecting, I'm continuing to remember things that weren't so bad. How he attended my Student of the Month ceremony in seventh grade when no one else could. How he coached my Babe Ruth teams. How he took me fishing & camping.
 
It's so strange, so bizarre and so painful. I apologize if this isn't the proper use of the blog but I consider myself amongst friends here and I don't feel like going back to a therapist. I have no interest sharing something like this on Facebook, so here I am.
 
Thanks for listening to me ramble.

My apologies in advance for this post. You may think this is a strange place for this but I can't think of another outlet for it and I can make an Atari connection.
 
My stepfather is dying. Quickly. I'm not even sure if he's technically my stepfather, but he might as well be.
 
Growing up, I hated him. I realize hate is a strong word but I HATED him.
 
Now, I'm pretty devastated by this.
 
My parents divorced in 1979, when I was six. My mother remarried a true a-hole a year or two later. I'm not certain of the exact date but it was in my 2600 heyday. Those were not good times for me but that's not even worth sharing. They would be divorced by 1983. That's when she met the subject of this post.
 
She was working for the local newspaper in the classified department and he was the local dog warden. He would place ads for dogs they rounded up and they hit it off.
 
The summer before I started sixth grade (1984), they moved in together. (This would be my fifth different elementary school since kindergarten.) My disdain for him was immediate.
 
He had a son and daughter from a previous marriage. The daughter lived with her mom & would visit every other weekend. The son was a year older than me but we didn't get along that great.
 
He was ridiculously strict. It honestly felt like I was in prison. No candy, no soda, being sent to bed super-early, etc. There was one TV in the house & we had to watch whatever he wanted. (A vivid memory is me coming home from school, finding a cartoon to watch or even an afternoon playoff baseball game (Cubs/Padres), him driving in the driveway, eventually sitting down in his chair in front of the TV & snapping his fingers, demanding the cable box. He would promptly change the channel & eventually settle on some horrible kung fu movie.) My Atari, which I used to shuttle back & forth between my father's house & my mother's was no longer to be connected to the TV.
 
I remember him arguing with my Mom about my father. Things like the child support check, or him calling to talk to me, etc. Stuff that made me super uncomfortable.
 
The best times would come from when he would go play cards with his friends. I'd have a few hours with him not in the house but he would come home drunk. If everything would work out, I would be asleep before he came home.
 
My mom never married him but I'm not sure how the common-law marriage thing works in my state. Regardless, they never split up. He was present in my life until I graduated high school.
 
I learned quickly to keep my mouth shut & do whatever he ordered me to do. Chores, eating every last bite of foods I despised (I haven't eaten a pea in 25 years and I never will again.) He never hit me, although there were times I wish he did so I could find a way to leave. I used to fantasize about walking the 85 miles to my father's house, while not being exactly sure how to get there.
 
I do remember blowing up during my senior year of high school. I had a girlfriend (SHOCKING!) and he would limit my time on the phone with her. I don't remember exactly what happened but I remember being in my bedroom with the door shut and hearing him outside complaining about something. I threw a Trapper Keeper (or something similar, it was a notebook/folder) at my dresser, which left a mark. The details are hazy now, but I remember just finally yelling back at him. I knew my days of being under his thumb were almost over.
 
My escape from him was visiting my Dad every other weekend, vacations & summer. I can't even begin to describe how amazing it felt to be picked up on a Friday after school or Saturday morning. And the feeling of dread I had when I had to return...
 
Once I graduated high school, I went to a college close to where my Dad lived and I never looked back. To this day, I hate visiting the town where my Mom lives and I'm pretty certain it all stems from these experiences.
 
Since I left, I would visit my Mom & him on holidays, etc. He would always give me $100 for Christmas and our relationship became amicable. He seemed to love my daughter and she had no problems with him. Things were fine.
 
This past February, my Mom called me during the middle of the day, which was bizarre. I assumed it was bad news about her Mom, my amazing grandmother, who has Alzheimers and isn't in good shape. It wasn't that. Howard has cancer, it's aggressive and the doctors give him six months to live.
 
I was shocked & saddened but I wasn't sure how to respond to that news. As much as I hated him, I certainly didn't want this to happen. And I was heartbroken for my poor Mom, as now she has to deal with this.
 
Since the diagnosis, I've only seen them one time, around my birthday in May. I kept saying that we'd do some things during the summer but it never worked out.
 
Just this past weekend, the pain of chemotherapy and everything else became too much for him. He decided to stop fighting and is now in hospice care.
I'm going to visit him tomorrow. I'm not sure if my daughter or wife (not my daughter's mom, that will be a WHOLE other series of blogs ) will join me but I'm going.
 
Again, the feelings I have are so conflicted. How can I be so upset about someone who caused me so much pain? Yet, here I am, extremely upset. Part of it is pain for my Mom, imagining how she must be feeling. When the calendar turned to 2016, everything was fine in her world. Now, before Thanksgiving, completely turned upside down.
As I spend time thinking and reflecting, I'm continuing to remember things that weren't so bad. How he attended my Student of the Month ceremony in seventh grade when no one else could. How he coached my Babe Ruth teams. How he took me fishing & camping.
 
It's so strange, so bizarre and so painful. I apologize if this isn't the proper use of the blog but I consider myself amongst friends here and I don't feel like going back to a therapist. I have no interest sharing something like this on Facebook, so here I am.
 
Thanks for listening to me ramble.

My apologies in advance for this post. You may think this is a strange place for this but I can't think of another outlet for it and I can make an Atari connection.
 
My stepfather is dying. Quickly. I'm not even sure if he's technically my stepfather, but he might as well be.
 
Growing up, I hated him. I realize hate is a strong word but I HATED him.
 
Now, I'm pretty devastated by this.
 
My parents divorced in 1979, when I was six. My mother remarried a true a-hole a year or two later. I'm not certain of the exact date but it was in my 2600 heyday. Those were not good times for me but that's not even worth sharing. They would be divorced by 1983. That's when she met the subject of this post.
 
She was working for the local newspaper in the classified department and he was the local dog warden. He would place ads for dogs they rounded up and they hit it off.
 
The summer before I started sixth grade (1984), they moved in together. (This would be my fifth different elementary school since kindergarten.) My disdain for him was immediate.
 
He had a son and daughter from a previous marriage. The daughter lived with her mom & would visit every other weekend. The son was a year older than me but we didn't get along that great.
 
He was ridiculously strict. It honestly felt like I was in prison. No candy, no soda, being sent to bed super-early, etc. There was one TV in the house & we had to watch whatever he wanted. (A vivid memory is me coming home from school, finding a cartoon to watch or even an afternoon playoff baseball game (Cubs/Padres), him driving in the driveway, eventually sitting down in his chair in front of the TV & snapping his fingers, demanding the cable box. He would promptly change the channel & eventually settle on some horrible kung fu movie.) My Atari, which I used to shuttle back & forth between my father's house & my mother's was no longer to be connected to the TV.
 
I remember him arguing with my Mom about my father. Things like the child support check, or him calling to talk to me, etc. Stuff that made me super uncomfortable.
 
The best times would come from when he would go play cards with his friends. I'd have a few hours with him not in the house but he would come home drunk. If everything would work out, I would be asleep before he came home.
 
My mom never married him but I'm not sure how the common-law marriage thing works in my state. Regardless, they never split up. He was present in my life until I graduated high school.
 
I learned quickly to keep my mouth shut & do whatever he ordered me to do. Chores, eating every last bite of foods I despised (I haven't eaten a pea in 25 years and I never will again.) He never hit me, although there were times I wish he did so I could find a way to leave. I used to fantasize about walking the 85 miles to my father's house, while not being exactly sure how to get there.
 
I do remember blowing up during my senior year of high school. I had a girlfriend (SHOCKING!) and he would limit my time on the phone with her. I don't remember exactly what happened but I remember being in my bedroom with the door shut and hearing him outside complaining about something. I threw a Trapper Keeper (or something similar, it was a notebook/folder) at my dresser, which left a mark. The details are hazy now, but I remember just finally yelling back at him. I knew my days of being under his thumb were almost over.
 
My escape from him was visiting my Dad every other weekend, vacations & summer. I can't even begin to describe how amazing it felt to be picked up on a Friday after school or Saturday morning. And the feeling of dread I had when I had to return...
 
Once I graduated high school, I went to a college close to where my Dad lived and I never looked back. To this day, I hate visiting the town where my Mom lives and I'm pretty certain it all stems from these experiences.
 
Since I left, I would visit my Mom & him on holidays, etc. He would always give me $100 for Christmas and our relationship became amicable. He seemed to love my daughter and she had no problems with him. Things were fine.
 
This past February, my Mom called me during the middle of the day, which was bizarre. I assumed it was bad news about her Mom, my amazing grandmother, who has Alzheimers and isn't in good shape. It wasn't that. Howard has cancer, it's aggressive and the doctors give him six months to live.
 
I was shocked & saddened but I wasn't sure how to respond to that news. As much as I hated him, I certainly didn't want this to happen. And I was heartbroken for my poor Mom, as now she has to deal with this.
 
Since the diagnosis, I've only seen them one time, around my birthday in May. I kept saying that we'd do some things during the summer but it never worked out.
 
Just this past weekend, the pain of chemotherapy and everything else became too much for him. He decided to stop fighting and is now in hospice care.
I'm going to visit him tomorrow. I'm not sure if my daughter or wife (not my daughter's mom, that will be a WHOLE other series of blogs ) will join me but I'm going.
 
Again, the feelings I have are so conflicted. How can I be so upset about someone who caused me so much pain? Yet, here I am, extremely upset. Part of it is pain for my Mom, imagining how she must be feeling. When the calendar turned to 2016, everything was fine in her world. Now, before Thanksgiving, completely turned upside down.
As I spend time thinking and reflecting, I'm continuing to remember things that weren't so bad. How he attended my Student of the Month ceremony in seventh grade when no one else could. How he coached my Babe Ruth teams. How he took me fishing & camping.
 
It's so strange, so bizarre and so painful. I apologize if this isn't the proper use of the blog but I consider myself amongst friends here and I don't feel like going back to a therapist. I have no interest sharing something like this on Facebook, so here I am.
 
Thanks for listening to me ramble.

Nintendo's shock of announcing a miniature NES with 30 games built-in a few weeks before I wrote this article seems to have been met with mixed feelings. With all of the clone systems on the market based on the original NES, that perform well but might have mistakes here and there like a few colors wrong or sounds not quite right, it makes one wonder why Nintendo didn't think of it sooner. After all, Atari, ColecoVision, Intellivision, and Sega, have had remakes of their consoles on the market for a while now. So, with so much love for the NES by the people that remember it, enjoy it, treasure it, why the mixed feelings?
 
For the most part the NES Classic has been getting positive feedback already. However no one has seen the thing in action yet so I can only imagine what others are thinking. Is it possible that Nintendo would go out of their way to produce a product that is not 100% accurate in what it is trying to mimic? I really don't think so. Nintendo's reputation will be on the line with this product as the NES remains one of the most popular consoles today. The NES still has a rather large fan base and for good reason as many of its games were revolutionary and a step forward from the games Atari, Mattel, and Coleco were bringing to the console market. Mega Man, Castlevania, Mario Bros., and Zelda have continued on for many generations long after their initial NES debut. And that only touches all the game titles the NES is famous for.
 
If one plays those games long enough it becomes common to build expectations of what the game is "suppose" to do. Mario should change to a red and white outfit when he picks up a fire flower. What would happen if that color scheme was off? Or try this...hum a few bars of the Super Mario Bros. theme. Go on ahead...I'll wait. . . . . . OK, time's up. Now imagine that same theme that is played too fast or too slow. Basically, place a 45 RPM record on a turntable and play it at 33 RPM or 78 RPM. Yea...some emulators have been known not to be 100% accurate in this department when emulating the NES hardware. It's also been true with the flashback consoles made by ATGames.
 
One thing to realize is that, no matter how well received a Nintendo product has been received, Nintendo has always put quality in their hardware. And since the introduction of the GameCube Nintendo has been revamping the NES games slowly like Metroid on Metroid Prime as an example. So if any company has had experience in emulating their own products it would have to be Nintendo. And it is possible that the NES Classic is going to be emulated but it might also be using real hardware or the same virtual console found on the Wii and Wii U.
 
Just for the games alone the Nintendo NES Classic is worth the $60 price tag. If a collector, gamer, what have you, were to hunt down those games in their original cartridge form, just the carts, any two of the games in the 30-game list would easily cost $60 depending on where you looked. Mega Man 2 alone can fetch $40 or more. And only the most popular NES games seemed to make the list, too. So you have literally hours upon hours of gaming, good, wholesome, quality gaming, in one little package.
 
Once again, though, if anything is even slightly off, it can ruin the whole deal. So I really hope that Nintendo does the original NES and the 30 games they have included justice. As for now the NES Classic is scheduled for a November 11th release and I am excited for it. I already have money set aside to pick one up on release date and will do another review on it once I get it. In the meantime I'd like to hear your thoughts on Nintendo's surprise console.
 
(Image used: http://www.nintendo.com/nes-classic )

The Atari 2600 is the undisputed king of game consoles. And in the short amount of time that I have owned an Atari 2600 4-switch wood-grain model the amount of 2600 games I owned has been growing fairly well. With that being said I thought I would do a post on what my top 10 most played games were that just happen to also be my favorites. This list is based on games I own a physical copy of and not on emulation. Therefore as I pick up more 2600 games this list will change and may expand to include more favorites. For now, here is my 10 favorite Atari 2600 VCS games. Enjoy!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
#10 California Games
 


California Games is one of three games that Epyx would release for the 2600. While I am not a huge fan of sports video games I find the variety of games included on this cart interesting. Epyx also did a decent job on making the graphics easy to visually understand what you was looking at. Sounds are good with my favorite being the Louie Louie playing at the Title Screen. The real reason I continue to play this game is for the BMX race. I will purposely have the biker go as fast as he can before a large jump just for him to fly through two or three screens and crash. It's simply hilarious!
 
#9 Breakout


Breakout has its charm and is an easy paddle game to pick up and play. Simply bounce a ball between your paddle and a wall of bricks until the ball smashes away all the bricks or manages to slip past your paddle. There's nothing more exciting than getting that ball trapped for a few seconds above the wall of bricks and watching the ball bounce back and fourth, removing bricks and racking up points as the ball tries to find a way free. A simple concept that stands up well in the library of 2600 games.
 
#8 Othello


I enjoy a good fast-paced, arcade action game just as much as any gamer. But there are those times when I want to play a game that I can be relaxed at the same time. And Othello is one such game I enjoy playing on the 2600. It's down-to-basics nature captures this board game and makes it one of the better board-game conversions done on the 2600. Playing against the computer is very challenging at any skill level and the VCS doesn't take near as long to figure out moves like it does in Video Checkers and Video Chess. 
#7 E.T. -- The Extra Terrestrial


We all know the history of E.T. on the 2600 by now so there's no point in going into that over and over again. However, I will say that what was pulled off in 5 to 6 weeks time is not as bad as most reviews claim. E.T. can be difficult with normal settings but lots of patience and practice can pay off. This is one of my go-to titles when I want to play a relaxing game of a different genre. I will change the difficulty to three and guide E.T. to find the items he needs to return home. A fun game! 
#6 Warlords


Warlords is the only game I know of that is four players on the 2600. Then again I have never tried to play Super Breakout or Breakout with more than one player either. Warlords is a great party game alongside Combat. Even playing against three computer players is a fun challenge and, unlike the arcade, if your castle gets destroyed the game is not over instantly. The 2600, while the graphics are simplistic, captures the game play the arcade is known for very well. In some ways this port is a bit more friendly than the arcade in my opinion.
 
#5 Gravitar


This is not one of my normal go-to games but when I do play it I am still amazed at what Atari pulled off. Having gravity against you constantly is a huge pain in the butt but also makes for an enjoyable game play experience when you can navigate some of the most bizarre maps, or mazes if you prefer, I've ever seen in a 2600 game. Even without the gravity against you some of the levels are hard to navigate. Hair pulling action at its finest!
 
#4 Amidar


Amidar is a go-to title for me that provides a pleasant balance between fast pace and relaxed game play. I know that sounds sort of contradicting but their are times when this game can put you in a hypnotic trance to where you are so involved with the onscreen action that nothing else matters. By the time the game is over and you return to reality you feel rested and ready to go. Actually, the game is great fun and captures the arcade well. It would have been better with the arcade bonus rounds.
 
#3 Enduro
 


Enduro is simply, in my opinion anyway, the best racing game on the 2600, period. The way you can adjust the speed to cruise along a road, passing cars, going from nice weather to snow and then fog, from mid day, through sunset and night fall, watching the sun rise only to do it all over again is some of the most impressive 2600 programming I've seen. The concept is simple...pass the required number of cars per round before the next day begins. In the first few rounds it is not so hard...later rounds get so difficult that you better not mess up even once.
 
#2 Solaris


Solaris is a very well made space game that seems to capture a bit of Star Raiders in its programming. The graphics, sounds, and game play of Solaris on the 2600 are simply incredible and should not be missed. I go to this title often when I'm ready for some serious space action/adventure challenges. I have yet to figure out my way to the planet Solaris but I am working on it.
 
#1 Space Invaders


When Atari released the 2600 I was entertained with the few visits to the in-store display were I would play a few games of Combat or some other game hanging on a chain. Then Space Invaders came along for the 2600 and I immediately wanted both. This game continues to be my number one go-to title for some classic 2600 fun. The game play is solid and there is no flicker that most 2600 games have issues with. And with lots of variations in how the game is played keeps this version of Space Invaders from being boring. There's so much to do with this simple game concept on the 2600 that it doesn't get old quick.
 
Well...that's my top 10 favorite 2600 games so far. I hope you have enjoyed seeing what games I find my favorites on the 2600. I look forward to comments as always and will be doing more top favorites across other consoles soon.

This may seem like a strange topic to start off a blog that focuses on my appreciation for my childhood but it's a subject that I tend to dwell on a lot. The year I foolishly gave away my entire toy collection.
 
First, a little background.
 
I was born in 1973. My parents divorced when I was six. I stayed with my Mom during the school year and visited my Dad every other weekend and school vacations, including the summer.
 
I REALLY enjoyed visiting my Dad. Yes, he spoiled me (I'm still spoiled to this day) but it was more than that. I think the infrequency of the visits made me appreciate my time there more and where he lived was just so cool. He lived in a condominium complex that had a playground, a basketball court, tennis court, pool but most importantly, lots of other kids.
 
On the Friday's or Saturday's that my Dad would pick me up, he'd usually have a gift for me. Nothing extravagant, but nevertheless awesome. A 2600 game, a Star Wars figure, a Matchbox car.
 
Over time and with a few Christmases thrown in, I amassed quite a collection of toys and games.
 
I obviously had an Atari 2600. Looking back, I didn't have a lot of games, but living in the moment, it felt like I did. We probably had 25-30 games. (I can't say for certain because the lines between "owned" & "borrowed from a friend" have become blurred over the years.)
 
I was (& am) a huge Star Wars fan. My collection began before my parents divorced and only grew in the ensuing years. I had a cardboard box that was about 3 feet high & 3 feet across FILLED with vehicles, playsets and action figures. I can absolutely nail down exactly what was in my collection and what wasn't to this day.
 
In 1983, GI Joe entered my life. Over the next two years, I built up a pretty decent collection. Not as large as my Star Wars collection but still significant.
 
In addition to all that, I collected baseball cards (along with some other sports cards), Matchbox cars, some He-Man & Transformers figures and many, many board games. I had A LOT of stuff.
 
In the summer of 1985, my main focus was becoming baseball cards. I had bought enough packs of Topps cards that I was able to send away for a complete factory set. Once I received that, I figured, why do I need to keep all my doubles for? So I gave those away. Of course, in subsequent years, some of those cards (Mark McGwire & Roger Clemens rookie cards) went for hundreds of dollars. (Thankfully, the value has since decreased drastically, easing the pain a bit.)
 

It didn't end there though. In 1986 & '87, I had purchased a lot of Fleer basketball cards & Topps hockey and football cards. As my baseball card collecting passion grew and non-baseball cards didn't have a lot of value at the time, I gave those away too. Those prices haven't dropped. (The Michael Jordan 1987-88 card sells anywhere from $75 on up and I had a lot of those.)
 
However, the decision to give away other things hurts worse.
 
I forget the year exactly, but I would guess the summer of 1987. I was 14. I had an NES. I had an interest in girls. We were four years removed from Return of the Jedi. Once again, I foolishly thought "Why do I need all this stuff? I never play with them anymore."
 
Two young boys lived four condos down from me. I gave them my entire 2600 collection. My father was good friends with another neighbor who had a 7-year-old son. I figured Derek would enjoy all my Star Wars stuff and other action figures. So I gave them to him. Plus my Matchbox cars. (I'm guessing I had close to 100 of those.)
 
As for my other items, such as board games and other toys, they all disappeared, I'm assuming when my father remarried and we moved out of the condo in 1989.
 
Sigh. It pains me to even write those words. I would do anything to have them back. Looking back, I suppose it was a nice gesture for 14-year-old me to give that stuff away but what a stupid decision.
 
I have no idea who the kids are who received my Atari. Thankfully, I was able to reacquire nearly my entire collection I had during the mid-90's fairly inexpensively.
 
I'm still in contact with the family I gave my Star Wars stuff to. They moved twice and no longer have anything. Before the prequels hit, I was able to pick up a few figures I had but nowhere near what I used to have.
 
It does make me happy to see that Derek's children are now Star Wars fans and I like to think I played a part in that.
 
So, if anyone comes across a Bespin Luke figure with his right hand missing (I rubbed it along the pavement to make it more screen-accurate) at a yard sale, pick it up for me.
 

This may seem like a strange topic to start off a blog that focuses on my appreciation for my childhood but it's a subject that I tend to dwell on a lot. The year I foolishly gave away my entire toy collection.
 
First, a little background.
 
I was born in 1973. My parents divorced when I was six. I stayed with my Mom during the school year and visited my Dad every other weekend and school vacations, including the summer.
 
I REALLY enjoyed visiting my Dad. Yes, he spoiled me (I'm still spoiled to this day) but it was more than that. I think the infrequency of the visits made me appreciate my time there more and where he lived was just so cool. He lived in a condominium complex that had a playground, a basketball court, tennis court, pool but most importantly, lots of other kids.
 
On the Friday's or Saturday's that my Dad would pick me up, he'd usually have a gift for me. Nothing extravagant, but nevertheless awesome. A 2600 game, a Star Wars figure, a Matchbox car.
 
Over time and with a few Christmases thrown in, I amassed quite a collection of toys and games.
 
I obviously had an Atari 2600. Looking back, I didn't have a lot of games, but living in the moment, it felt like I did. We probably had 25-30 games. (I can't say for certain because the lines between "owned" & "borrowed from a friend" have become blurred over the years.)
 
I was (& am) a huge Star Wars fan. My collection began before my parents divorced and only grew in the ensuing years. I had a cardboard box that was about 3 feet high & 3 feet across FILLED with vehicles, playsets and action figures. I can absolutely nail down exactly what was in my collection and what wasn't to this day.
 
In 1983, GI Joe entered my life. Over the next two years, I built up a pretty decent collection. Not as large as my Star Wars collection but still significant.
 
In addition to all that, I collected baseball cards (along with some other sports cards), Matchbox cars, some He-Man & Transformers figures and many, many board games. I had A LOT of stuff.
 
In the summer of 1985, my main focus was becoming baseball cards. I had bought enough packs of Topps cards that I was able to send away for a complete factory set. Once I received that, I figured, why do I need to keep all my doubles for? So I gave those away. Of course, in subsequent years, some of those cards (Mark McGwire & Roger Clemens rookie cards) went for hundreds of dollars. (Thankfully, the value has since decreased drastically, easing the pain a bit.)
 

It didn't end there though. In 1986 & '87, I had purchased a lot of Fleer basketball cards & Topps hockey and football cards. As my baseball card collecting passion grew and non-baseball cards didn't have a lot of value at the time, I gave those away too. Those prices haven't dropped. (The Michael Jordan 1987-88 card sells anywhere from $75 on up and I had a lot of those.)
 
However, the decision to give away other things hurts worse.
 
I forget the year exactly, but I would guess the summer of 1987. I was 14. I had an NES. I had an interest in girls. We were four years removed from Return of the Jedi. Once again, I foolishly thought "Why do I need all this stuff? I never play with them anymore."
 
Two young boys lived four condos down from me. I gave them my entire 2600 collection. My father was good friends with another neighbor who had a 7-year-old son. I figured Derek would enjoy all my Star Wars stuff and other action figures. So I gave them to him. Plus my Matchbox cars. (I'm guessing I had close to 100 of those.)
 
As for my other items, such as board games and other toys, they all disappeared, I'm assuming when my father remarried and we moved out of the condo in 1989.
 
Sigh. It pains me to even write those words. I would do anything to have them back. Looking back, I suppose it was a nice gesture for 14-year-old me to give that stuff away but what a stupid decision.
 
I have no idea who the kids are who received my Atari. Thankfully, I was able to reacquire nearly my entire collection I had during the mid-90's fairly inexpensively.
 
I'm still in contact with the family I gave my Star Wars stuff to. They moved twice and no longer have anything. Before the prequels hit, I was able to pick up a few figures I had but nowhere near what I used to have.
 
It does make me happy to see that Derek's children are now Star Wars fans and I like to think I played a part in that.
 
So, if anyone comes across a Bespin Luke figure with his right hand missing (I rubbed it along the pavement to make it more screen-accurate) at a yard sale, pick it up for me.
 

This may seem like a strange topic to start off a blog that focuses on my appreciation for my childhood but it's a subject that I tend to dwell on a lot. The year I foolishly gave away my entire toy collection.
 
First, a little background.
 
I was born in 1973. My parents divorced when I was six. I stayed with my Mom during the school year and visited my Dad every other weekend and school vacations, including the summer.
 
I REALLY enjoyed visiting my Dad. Yes, he spoiled me (I'm still spoiled to this day) but it was more than that. I think the infrequency of the visits made me appreciate my time there more and where he lived was just so cool. He lived in a condominium complex that had a playground, a basketball court, tennis court, pool but most importantly, lots of other kids.
 
On the Friday's or Saturday's that my Dad would pick me up, he'd usually have a gift for me. Nothing extravagant, but nevertheless awesome. A 2600 game, a Star Wars figure, a Matchbox car.
 
Over time and with a few Christmases thrown in, I amassed quite a collection of toys and games.
 
I obviously had an Atari 2600. Looking back, I didn't have a lot of games, but living in the moment, it felt like I did. We probably had 25-30 games. (I can't say for certain because the lines between "owned" & "borrowed from a friend" have become blurred over the years.)
 
I was (& am) a huge Star Wars fan. My collection began before my parents divorced and only grew in the ensuing years. I had a cardboard box that was about 3 feet high & 3 feet across FILLED with vehicles, playsets and action figures. I can absolutely nail down exactly what was in my collection and what wasn't to this day.
 
In 1983, GI Joe entered my life. Over the next two years, I built up a pretty decent collection. Not as large as my Star Wars collection but still significant.
 
In addition to all that, I collected baseball cards (along with some other sports cards), Matchbox cars, some He-Man & Transformers figures and many, many board games. I had A LOT of stuff.
 
In the summer of 1985, my main focus was becoming baseball cards. I had bought enough packs of Topps cards that I was able to send away for a complete factory set. Once I received that, I figured, why do I need to keep all my doubles for? So I gave those away. Of course, in subsequent years, some of those cards (Mark McGwire & Roger Clemens rookie cards) went for hundreds of dollars. (Thankfully, the value has since decreased drastically, easing the pain a bit.)
 

It didn't end there though. In 1986 & '87, I had purchased a lot of Fleer basketball cards & Topps hockey and football cards. As my baseball card collecting passion grew and non-baseball cards didn't have a lot of value at the time, I gave those away too. Those prices haven't dropped. (The Michael Jordan 1987-88 card sells anywhere from $75 on up and I had a lot of those.)
 
However, the decision to give away other things hurts worse.
 
I forget the year exactly, but I would guess the summer of 1987. I was 14. I had an NES. I had an interest in girls. We were four years removed from Return of the Jedi. Once again, I foolishly thought "Why do I need all this stuff? I never play with them anymore."
 
Two young boys lived four condos down from me. I gave them my entire 2600 collection. My father was good friends with another neighbor who had a 7-year-old son. I figured Derek would enjoy all my Star Wars stuff and other action figures. So I gave them to him. Plus my Matchbox cars. (I'm guessing I had close to 100 of those.)
 
As for my other items, such as board games and other toys, they all disappeared, I'm assuming when my father remarried and we moved out of the condo in 1989.
 
Sigh. It pains me to even write those words. I would do anything to have them back. Looking back, I suppose it was a nice gesture for 14-year-old me to give that stuff away but what a stupid decision.
 
I have no idea who the kids are who received my Atari. Thankfully, I was able to reacquire nearly my entire collection I had during the mid-90's fairly inexpensively.
 
I'm still in contact with the family I gave my Star Wars stuff to. They moved twice and no longer have anything. Before the prequels hit, I was able to pick up a few figures I had but nowhere near what I used to have.
 
It does make me happy to see that Derek's children are now Star Wars fans and I like to think I played a part in that.
 
So, if anyone comes across a Bespin Luke figure with his right hand missing (I rubbed it along the pavement to make it more screen-accurate) at a yard sale, pick it up for me.
 

This may seem like a strange topic to start off a blog that focuses on my appreciation for my childhood but it's a subject that I tend to dwell on a lot. The year I foolishly gave away my entire toy collection.
 
First, a little background.
 
I was born in 1973. My parents divorced when I was six. I stayed with my Mom during the school year and visited my Dad every other weekend and school vacations, including the summer.
 
I REALLY enjoyed visiting my Dad. Yes, he spoiled me (I'm still spoiled to this day) but it was more than that. I think the infrequency of the visits made me appreciate my time there more and where he lived was just so cool. He lived in a condominium complex that had a playground, a basketball court, tennis court, pool but most importantly, lots of other kids.
 
On the Friday's or Saturday's that my Dad would pick me up, he'd usually have a gift for me. Nothing extravagant, but nevertheless awesome. A 2600 game, a Star Wars figure, a Matchbox car.
 
Over time and with a few Christmases thrown in, I amassed quite a collection of toys and games.
 
I obviously had an Atari 2600. Looking back, I didn't have a lot of games, but living in the moment, it felt like I did. We probably had 25-30 games. (I can't say for certain because the lines between "owned" & "borrowed from a friend" have become blurred over the years.)
 
I was (& am) a huge Star Wars fan. My collection began before my parents divorced and only grew in the ensuing years. I had a cardboard box that was about 3 feet high & 3 feet across FILLED with vehicles, playsets and action figures. I can absolutely nail down exactly what was in my collection and what wasn't to this day.
 
In 1983, GI Joe entered my life. Over the next two years, I built up a pretty decent collection. Not as large as my Star Wars collection but still significant.
 
In addition to all that, I collected baseball cards (along with some other sports cards), Matchbox cars, some He-Man & Transformers figures and many, many board games. I had A LOT of stuff.
 
In the summer of 1985, my main focus was becoming baseball cards. I had bought enough packs of Topps cards that I was able to send away for a complete factory set. Once I received that, I figured, why do I need to keep all my doubles for? So I gave those away. Of course, in subsequent years, some of those cards (Mark McGwire & Roger Clemens rookie cards) went for hundreds of dollars. (Thankfully, the value has since decreased drastically, easing the pain a bit.)
 

It didn't end there though. In 1986 & '87, I had purchased a lot of Fleer basketball cards & Topps hockey and football cards. As my baseball card collecting passion grew and non-baseball cards didn't have a lot of value at the time, I gave those away too. Those prices haven't dropped. (The Michael Jordan 1987-88 card sells anywhere from $75 on up and I had a lot of those.)
 
However, the decision to give away other things hurts worse.
 
I forget the year exactly, but I would guess the summer of 1987. I was 14. I had an NES. I had an interest in girls. We were four years removed from Return of the Jedi. Once again, I foolishly thought "Why do I need all this stuff? I never play with them anymore."
 
Two young boys lived four condos down from me. I gave them my entire 2600 collection. My father was good friends with another neighbor who had a 7-year-old son. I figured Derek would enjoy all my Star Wars stuff and other action figures. So I gave them to him. Plus my Matchbox cars. (I'm guessing I had close to 100 of those.)
 
As for my other items, such as board games and other toys, they all disappeared, I'm assuming when my father remarried and we moved out of the condo in 1989.
 
Sigh. It pains me to even write those words. I would do anything to have them back. Looking back, I suppose it was a nice gesture for 14-year-old me to give that stuff away but what a stupid decision.
 
I have no idea who the kids are who received my Atari. Thankfully, I was able to reacquire nearly my entire collection I had during the mid-90's fairly inexpensively.
 
I'm still in contact with the family I gave my Star Wars stuff to. They moved twice and no longer have anything. Before the prequels hit, I was able to pick up a few figures I had but nowhere near what I used to have.
 
It does make me happy to see that Derek's children are now Star Wars fans and I like to think I played a part in that.
 
So, if anyone comes across a Bespin Luke figure with his right hand missing (I rubbed it along the pavement to make it more screen-accurate) at a yard sale, pick it up for me.