I'm Not That [Not Funny]

Hello, my 4 Followers. I shall call you my Following 4. Or, just F4 for short. And anyone reading this who isn't a member of this site and doesn't follow me, you will be the Outsiders. But special nonetheless. Thanks for reading, y'all.

I just got back from a very interesting night of video gaming. It wasn't Halo or GTA or anything hardcore like that, just Mario Kart and Party for Wii.

Let me tell you a little bit about myself and video games...

I've never really been too big into them. When I was little, we had an original Nintendo system and games such as Duck Hunt, Super Mario Bros. 2 & 3, and Tetris, and over time we accumulated others like Kirby and this weird Sesame Street game. My dad was way more into it than I was, he would sit in the basement where the console was and play Tetris during his lunch break. I would sit upstairs and listen to the little boop-ing noises coming from the basement until he came back up and left again for work.

Then one day, I saw it in a ShopKo ad: the Sega Genesis system with LION KING game included. Screw the Sega Genesis, my eyes went straight to the LION KING game. You see, THE LION KING was my favorite movie in the whole world when I was 7. I saw it twice in theaters, which was a big deal for someone who had only spent 7 years on the planet. I went through a lion phase where all I wanted to do when I grew up was be a lion. I would go to sleep at night with my fingers curled in so that maybe they would magically transform into paws by morning.

I was a strange kid.

But anyway, the Sega.

I had to have it. I needed to play that game. That Christmas, I got that wonderful LION KING game with included Sega Genesis. That's how I saw it anyway.

You know how long it took me (and my sister, and many others) to conquer that game?

10 years.

And that was after we realized that, now that we were older and in a new age of technology, we had resources like the internet to give us cheats. So we applied the cheats and finally made it to the final level of this nearly impossible-to-beat-otherwise game and beat the shitaki out of Scar. It was the greatest (and most shameful) day of my life.

We also had the games Pocahontas, Toy Story, Pinocchio, multiple Power Rangers games, Football and Baseball games, and one day tried to rent the Beauty and the Beast game from Blockbuster, but our attempts to get past Level 1 were thwarted when Belle reached a giant (and random) boulder and no matter what we did (running, pushing, jumping, running start and jumping, AB Left Right up Down Start Jump Up Down AB X B A F), Belle could not get past that boulder. So, assuming it was obviously not our fault, we brought it back to Blockbuster, sad and disappointed.

I have never, ever been good at racing games. I can't master the whole 'steering' thing. I drive into walls, I drive around in circles, I drive on the grass, I slip on everything that is meant to be an obstacle that I am supposed to avoid. If it's there, somehow, I find a way to run right into it.

Which is where tonight comes in.

Not that this is a particularly great story or anything, so the 'whole one sentence paragraph for dramatic effect' thing is really quite pointless. But anyway. We're playing Mario Party, which is pretty simple, all you do is roll the dice and the thing moves for you. But when you have to play mini battles, get out of my way, because I'm probably going to run into you by accident and make you screw up before I fall off the ledge or something. I did learn one thing, though: Of the two battles that I won, I am apparently very good at making cakes, and I am very good at cranking. Which could be taken in any context of your choosing. Be creative.

So I lost miserably. But one thing I am very good at in video games is getting really, really into it. There was probably not literally one second where I was not grunting, screaming, crying or laughing during the entire game. I think it adds character and makes people pity me more when I lose. "Aw, she lost, but she tried so hard!"

On a completely different subject:

Apparently, I'm funny! I'm not sure if I mentioned this in any previous blogs, but I made the musical, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, as Rona, the host of the bee. The show involves audience volunteer spellers, so there is a lot of opportunity to improvise throughout the show, and one of my responsibilities as host is to give commentary on each speller as they are called up to spell. They have a list of suggested comments in the back of the script which I've been using up to this point, but I've been trying to come up with some of my own beforehand, or even during the show as I'm looking at the person, which is what I'm trying to completely work up to. So anyway.

Today one of our practice audience spellers had the last name of Godkin. So just before the run of the show began, I thought of a really great comment. When she was called to the microphone, I said, "Miss Godkin ran for class president under the slogan: 'In Godkin We Trust.'" She cracked up, and I got the loudest roar of laughter than any other comment I had made up to that point. "I can do improv!" I thought to myself.

Also, there is a moment in the beginning of the show where I am making introductions, and the line says that "the usual word pronouncer [has fallen ill]," and the reason for his absence can be ad libbed to fit something more local or currently in the news. The only thing I could think of that was in the news was pretty obvious, so this is what came out of my mouth during the run:

"Unfortunately, our usual word pronouncer, Superintendent Spriggs, is still recovering from the results of the recent election, so please join me in welcoming Vice Principal Doug Panch...." and that got much laughter as well.

So I guess I'm funny. Go me.

Well, once again, it is getting a little late. My apologies for not sticking with my recent plan to blog about music. But guess what, I haven't heard any new music in the last 2 days, and, I actually had things to write about, so why not write about them? Oy.

That's all for now, folks. I'm watching NICKTOONS! (Rocko's Modern Lifeeeee)

Peace.