Random Update 3/27/13, the birthday edition

On 03/27/2013 at 02:35 PM by Ranger1

It was a busy week for everything other than gaming, it seems.

Birthday: Started the morning out by going to visit my boss at the park and picking up my keys. "Little brother" Michael gave us both a pint of the maple syrup he and the next door neighbor boiled down. Later, Jason came over and took me out to dinner at our favorite Thai place and got me oreo cheesecake for dessert. He also gave me a book and a $25 gift card to Good Will. UPS dropped off a package and when I opened it, I found Enslaved: Odyssey to the West in it, courtesy of CroniclsofLauren. Thank you Lauren!!! I went to visit family in New Hampshire for the weekend, partly because I wanted to see my grandmother and partly because there was a concert I really wanted to go to that was about half-an-hour from where she and my mom live. All three of us went and we had a great time. Sunday, we had a little celebration for my birthday, gramma took us out to lunch at a local diner and gave me a $25 Amazon gift card and mom gave me a piece of art made from old silverware. I left on Monday and stopped in to see my niece and her husband, then had dinner with some friends who live ten minutes from my niece's house.

Music: Anna Coogan was the performer on Saturday. I really like her music and it was a small venue, about 25 seats. Apparently, I'd come from the furthest away and was one of the few people in the audience that she didn't know from her childhood and I got greeted at the door by name. It was funny, because Gramma asked me how long I'd known Anna and where we'd met, lol. I also ordered myself a birthday present on my birthday: my friend Jed just released a new CD on St Patrick's Day. It was waiting in the mailbox for me when I got home Monday night. I'm working on an interview with Jed for a future Folk Music Friday entry, by the way.

Games: I played through the first chapter of Enslaved. I like it so far. I also bought three new tables for The Pinball Arcade (PSN). Genie and Attack From Mars I like, not so sure about the ST: TNG table. I used to play Attack From Mars at the local pizza place when I lived in Portland while we were waiting for our pizza. Speaking of pinball tables and arcade machines: the independent comic book store in Portland (Maine, not Oregon!) just added one of these:

PlayChoice 10

I haven't been in to check it out yet, but it has Goonies 1, Metroid, and TMNT on it that I know of.

Hope I didn't put anyone to sleep with my boring life.

mothman

03/27/2013 at 03:05 PM

Happy birthday to Yoo-oooh..... etc.

Sounds like you had a fun day. Enjoy your prezzies. :)

Ranger1

03/27/2013 at 04:24 PM

I think I've spent that Amazon gift card several times over in my head already.

03/27/2013 at 06:55 PM

Funny how we do that isn't it? Amazon cards of infinite spending ftw!

03/27/2013 at 07:00 PM

I told my gramma that half the joy of getting a gift card is how many times you can spend it in your head, lol.

Matt Snee Staff Writer

03/27/2013 at 03:18 PM

I've played that Attack from Mars pinball game! They had it in a place in Pittsburgh I hung out in for a bit.

Wow, happy birthday! Sounds like you had a good one. IT's cool you have an interview set up for your blog. That's a little out of my range I think but I wish I could do that. Let me think about it though, maybe there's someone low key enough that might answer my questions.....

Enjoy Enslaved. I almost won it but got distracted... like all of my games! The story and characters are good though. It's a nice universe.

03/27/2013 at 04:26 PM

About the interview: it's pretty low-key. I send him a question by Facebook message and he answers it when he has time. It's good to have friends who are willing to do things like this.

leeradical42

03/27/2013 at 03:23 PM

Happy birthday hope it was awesome and your life is action packed compared to mine lol!!!!

03/27/2013 at 04:27 PM

I don't mind things being boring. That was actually a pretty bust week for me.

Chris Iozzi Staff Alumnus

03/27/2013 at 03:29 PM

I used to play Goonies 1 on a Play Choice at Chucky Cheese's back in the day. For a while I couldn't remember where I played Goonies 1 and friends insisted it didn't exist. They almost convinced me until I saw another machine years later and the memory came flooding back. I knew it was Chucky Cheese's because I remember playing SMB on it and that you could pick other games. Happy Birthday :)

03/27/2013 at 04:28 PM

Thanks, Chris! Yeah, Coast City Comics made abig deal about being able to play Goonies 1 on that cabinet.

Homelessrook

Man I played the fool out of Goonies back in the day. I am glad you had a good Birthday.

03/27/2013 at 04:29 PM

Thanks, Larry! The best birthdays are spent with family, but you already know that.

V4Viewtiful

03/27/2013 at 03:30 PM

I'd love a cabinet with X-man vs Street fighter, one of my favourite memories as a child. I wish there where more arcades in Britain luckily though there's fewer they are bigger (sort of).

Happy birthday.

03/27/2013 at 04:30 PM

Arcades are dying out around here, too. Coast City Comics has a few cabinets and a bunch of pinball tables, but before they started up, there wasn't much around.

BrokenH

Enslaved is beautiful looking and really fun to boot. Lauren is a peach for sending it to you. It's very under-rated! They really handled the characters well too. I ended up caring a lot for all of them,even Pigsy who's a weird perverted hermit. Trip ranks as one of the most beautiful,resourceful,and likable gaming females of all time for me personally. (Minus the whole exploding collar blackmail control scheme she pulls on poor Monkey! That went a bit too far.)

03/27/2013 at 04:31 PM

Lauren is a peach. I think I'm going to get back to Enslaved when I finish typing this comment. Either that or go fishing in River King. Haven't made up my mind yet.

Aboboisdaman

03/27/2013 at 05:03 PM

Happy Birthday Tami!!! If you do play that Play-Choice 10, I wouldn't recommend TMNT. It's horrible lol. You'd be much better off sticking to pinball.

03/27/2013 at 05:38 PM

I rarely play video games in arcades. I lose my money too quickly!

jgusw

03/27/2013 at 05:31 PM

I wish I had that Goonies 1.

Happy Birthday Tami!

03/27/2013 at 05:39 PM

Come visit Maine. Then you can play it while I entertain your kids in the park.

Cary Woodham

03/27/2013 at 07:19 PM

Happy Birthday! Have a power pellet!

I have a lot of good memories playing those PlayChoice 10's in arcades. You could only play Goonies 1 on them, and I played Mario 3 on one months before it was released in stores.

03/28/2013 at 09:56 AM

Thanks, Cary! I'm going to hold on to that power pellet until next week when I start work again.

03/27/2013 at 08:42 PM

I want to play Stargate and Sinistar both of those I sunk alot of quarters into oh and of course the first streetfighter

03/28/2013 at 09:57 AM

I have no idea what games are in that Play Choice cabinet, as I haven't actually seen it in person yet.

Travis Hawks Senior Editor

03/27/2013 at 09:28 PM

That small, intimate concert sounds really cool - especially bringing your grandma to it.

I dig the PlayChoice-10 machines, but especially the ones with dual screens. Although those are best used as Punch-Out!! or Arm Wresting machines, PlayChoice-10 is acceptable especially with The Goonies available.

Happy Birthday!

03/28/2013 at 10:00 AM

Travis, I'm really lucky. Most of the concerts I go to are house concerts like that. And they're usually cheap, averaging around $15. And it's fun taking my gramma.

smartcelt

03/27/2013 at 10:00 PM

I'm gonna have to get that new Jed Marum music from iTunes. Sounds like you a great birthday. That game is definitely cool,one I want to get. That arcade machine looks like the one they have at Gardner's books. A place close to our office at work. I do miss arcades. But I guess it was something that outlived it's purpose,like Blockbuster.

03/28/2013 at 10:04 AM

You can download Jed's new CD through CD Baby, too, and I think he gets a bigger cut of the money from them than he does iTunes.

03/28/2013 at 12:12 PM

Okay,I will go that route. Gotta support the artists who give us great music.

Vice's Assistant

03/27/2013 at 10:12 PM

Happy Birthday. I never seen an arcade machine like that before or heard of the goonies as an arcade game.

Super Step Contributing Writer

03/28/2013 at 12:00 AM

Your boring life? You kidding, all I did was go to my favorite pizza place for my birthday with family, no concerts or homemade maple syrup, nor new arcade finds. lol That's not to undermine my own birthday, I had a great time and great gifts were received, but yours certainly doesn't sound boring. lol

Happy belated birthday and I look forward to that Jed interview!

03/28/2013 at 10:06 AM

Oh! PIZZA!!! I would have loved to have gone out for pizza! But yeah, my birthday wasn't boring. It just didn't include much gaming.

03/28/2013 at 12:47 PM

Mine either. lol

Surfcaster

03/28/2013 at 09:45 AM

That sounded like a pretty awesome birthday to me! And a Playchoice-10 encounter to top it all off!

Happy belated.

03/28/2013 at 10:07 AM

I didn't actually encounter said Playchoice-10 myself, the pic was in my Facebook feed.

03/28/2013 at 10:55 AM

Ah, sorry. I misread it! I've always wanted to try one of them out, myself, but I've never seen one. I remember when I was a kid I was so confused by the movie The Wizard, because they were clearly playing arcade machines, but the games were NES titles. It wasn't until I was an adult that I found out they were playing Playchoice-10s and what they were!

03/28/2013 at 12:15 PM

And your life does not sound boring at all. I envy you being out in nature with your work. At least I'm not trapped in the bowels of a hospital. I get to drive around to different towns all day. Some of the things you do at work sound like really hard work. From the tales you have shared with us,that is.

03/29/2013 at 10:53 AM

I love my job, can't wait to start work on Tuesday. To me, it doesn't seem hard. Maybe because I've been doing it since I was 18. Some things are more physically demanding than others, and then the challenge is to work smarter, not harder. The hardest thing I do is to keep my sarcasm to myself. It's a good thing people can't hear what I'm thinking...

angelfaceband42

03/28/2013 at 11:34 PM

Happy Birthday!! Sounds like you had a great weekend with family. I come from a small one, my brother lives up North so we don't see each other much. Consider yourself lucky!

I loooved The Goonies game. I also really liked TMNT. It was kind of a love/hate thing at the time lol.

03/29/2013 at 10:55 AM

I have a large extended family, and I love it. The best part is living just faraway that I don't see everyone every day, but close enough that I can be there in a few hours.

As for those two games, I've never played either one. My first Nintendo platforms were my GBA SP and my Game Cube.

Casey Curran Staff Writer

03/28/2013 at 11:42 PM

Happy birthday. That was really nice of Lauren to send you that.

03/29/2013 at 10:56 AM

Thanks. And yes, it was incredibly nice of Lauren to send me that game. She's an incredibly nice person.

03/29/2013 at 01:19 PM

I listened to some of Anna Coogan's songs on her site. She has a fantastic voice, I liked her rendition of "The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald" . My favorite song by Gordon Lightfoot. Will have to get some of her music as well.

03/29/2013 at 01:35 PM

CD Baby has 'em all!

Chunopo

03/30/2013 at 08:42 AM

Happy Birthday Tami! How does it feel to be 21?

03/30/2013 at 08:45 AM

LOL. Thanks, Adam. Try 44 . But I don't feel any different than I did at 21...

Coolsetzer

03/30/2013 at 12:48 PM

Happy belated birthday. The arcade machine looks really cool. I wonder how much one of those cost?

03/30/2013 at 02:43 PM

Thanks. I have no idea. I can ask the guys at Coast City Comics next time I go in, though.

PixlBit