Even the day’s political news has a comedic air to it, as today is the anniversary of the 2008 vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin. (Although I’d much rather see Groucho go head-to-head with Lucy from Peanuts.)

Of course, it also made me think of the many times that my parents told me how lucky I was… and the times that I heard my grandmother explain to my dad how lucky he was.

It’s amazing to remember that color TV was an optional luxury when I was a kid, that changing channels involved reorienting the antenna, and that “channel hopping” meant seeing what was on the three channels we could usually pick up, plus the fourth that came in if there weren’t any thunderstorms.

Likewise, every time I look at an iPhone, my mind reels with the thought that my first experience on a computer involved typing BASIC code from a book into a teletype that punched paper tape, dialing the local corporation’s mainframe computer with the school’s rotary phone, shoving the handset into an acoustic coupler, and feeding my tape through the reader… all in hopes of seeing the computer print “Hello world!” on a piece of paper.

Wow. Just wow.

Well, at least I can rest in the knowledge that the iPhone will NEVER read paper tape — ever. Ha!!!

(Note — Some of the language is a little rougher than I usually post here. You won’t pass out or anything, but I wanted you to know before you shared it with others.)

————————

MEMO

To: The spoiled under-30 crowd
From: The over-30 crowd

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning….

Uphill.. barefoot… BOTH ways….. Yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they’ve got it!

But now that… I’m over the ripe old age of thirty, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today.

You’ve got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia!

And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don’t know how good you’ve got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn’t have The Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!

There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter – with a pen!

Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take, like, a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!

Child Protective Services didn’t care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere was safe!

There were no MP3s or iTunes or Rhapsodys! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn record store and shoplift it yourself!

Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We’d play our favorite tape and “eject” it when finished and the tape would come undone. Cause – that’s how we rolled, dig?

We didn’t have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal, that’s it!

And we didn’t have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn’t know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn’t have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like ‘Space Invaders’ and ‘Asteroids’. Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen… forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel! NO REMOTES!!!

There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I’m saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rats!

And we didn’t have microwaves; if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

That’s exactly what I’m talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You’re spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn’t have lasted five minutes back in 1980 or before!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd

It was Game 1 of the World Series, and Cleveland Indians batter Vic Wertz stepped to the plate. He connected with the pitch, driving the ball 450 feet. Mays snagged the ball in a running catch with his back to home plate. Baseball fans and historians widely regard it as the greatest catch ever made.

The BSF Lowdown: Looney Labs scores another hit with their newest version of Fluxx, Martian Fluxx. You must own it – and unless you’re wearing a Tin Foil Hat, our Mind Control Transmitter will compel you to buy a copy. So there.

In Martian Fluxx, Looney Labs bounces their classic Fluxx playing system off Mars and then sends it back to Earth again by casting players as invading Martians bent on inflicting their will upon a world filled primarily with pathetic humans and cows. The game plays up the sci-fi Martian theme brilliantly. It keeps you completely engaged and leaves you laughing your head off (or whichever body part a Martian laughs off, that is).

The game uses all of the classic Fluxx card types, such as Goals, Keepers, and ever-changing New Rules. It borrows the Creeper card concept from Zombie Fluxx, but now the Creeper Cards are humans. Just like they did in Zombie Fluxx, the creeper cards prevent you from winning the game unless you draw a particular goal.

Martian Fluxx contents

The Martian Fluxx cards include a lot of classic Looney humor. References to Looney Tunes cartoons appear on cards like Human Season and Space Modulator, because what would a Martian invasion game be without a nod to the classic Looney Tunes character Marvin Martian? Looney included a little bit of self reference as well with the card Martian Chess.

The game also includes a couple of interesting twists with the Meta Rule and the Ungoal.

The Meta Rule card comes into play at the beginning of the game if all players agree to it. In this case, the Meta Rule puts a random time limit on the game, adding a sense of urgency to play. The Ungoal works just like a regular Goal, except when the conditions of the Ungoal get met, then the players lose the game. In keeping with the theme of Martian Fluxx, accomplishing the un-goal means that the humans win by throwing the Martians off the planet.

Several of the cards stand out. Favorites of our gaming group included Mars Needs Women, Grab That Cow, Humans Without Hats, and the ever popular Skloozmo (which, according to the card, is an untranslatable expression that roughly means “keep your tentacle on the Space Modulator”).

The Talk Like a Martian card easily wins my heart as a personal favorite. When this rule comes into play, players begin speaking in their best outrageous Martian-sounding voice. Players get to draw an extra card simply for using their outrageous voice, but if they maintain the accent and keep the voice going between rounds, they get to draw a second card. (I’ll let your imagination go with the thought of what voices our gaming group came up with.)

Like all versions of Fluxx, individual rounds of the game can be very unpredictable. Sometimes the game lasts 10 to 20 minutes; other times it ends before you even get your first turn. But that’s just part of Fluxx. (After all, if the game ends immediately, that just gives you more time to play again.)

If you want a fast-playing game that’s suitable for the whole family, then you need Martian Fluxx. It’s the best of classic Fluxx combined with a brilliantly executed Martian theme.

Kudos to Andrew Looney and the rest of the team at Looney labs on their new game. They outdid themselves once again!

Actor Patrick Swayze, whose turn as a smoldering dance instructor in “Dirty Dancing” made him one of the iconic film stars of the 1980s, died on Monday after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 57. –
Dirty Dancing star Patrick Swayze dead at 57 | U.S. | Reuters

Hobby stores can jump on the bandwagon as well with media outreach, in-store “parent training sessions” on how to hold a family game night, and demonstration events for popular board games. Get going, folks!!

Responding to moms’ rising interest in more affordable entertainment activities at home, Walmart is featuring a new “Family Night Center” in all stores this month. The area aims to help customers find new ideas for memorable family time activities and savings on popular items from Hasbro and Disney among others in a convenient “one-stop” area. — Walmart Adds “Family Night Center” in All Stores

Now that the Nano plays music, shoots video, and tracks my steps through the day with a pedometer, I’m seriously thinking of adding a Nano to my life. If it just worked with Rhapsody… (I know, I know… and I wish for a pony and a milkshake, too.)

I wonder how the folks at Flip will react to the announcement? The new Nano shoots about the same video (640×480, 30 frames per second) as their basic cameras, but delivers a lot more memory and functionality at the same price. The Flip made its mark for portability, simplicity, and easy uploading, and it might still hold its own there. We shall see. Regardless, it looks like there’s a video war heating up in time for the holidays.

iPod nano now comes with a built-in video camera that lets you spontaneously shoot video wherever you are. Yet it’s still the same ultraportable size. — Apple – iPod nano – Music player, movie player, and video camera.

Like most families of the 1960s and 1970s, my family spent a lot of time watching television. We ate dinner to the local and national news, wiled away evenings with sitcoms and variety shows, and learned about the world through various National Geographic specials. Most of it slipped from my memory since then (probably on the same night that I originally watched it), but some things remain.

Among those memories, I distinctly remember watching Walter Cronkite.

Dad called him “Walter Crankcase” sometimes, for reasons I never knew. As a child, he was like the grandfather I never had, telling me things that I needed to know and reassuring me that, despite everything, the world was fundamentally okay. I remember him reviewing the casualty rates during Vietnam, telling me about the moon landing, and sharing all kinds of other stories, from fun to sad to dramatic.

He did it all with a calm power. I knew that I could trust him. I just knew.

Those nights listening to Walter’s newscasts probably impacted my desire to go into journalism, although I didn’t know it at the time.

Even thought I turned off the TV many years ago, I’ll miss you, Mr. Cronkite. For me, you were the grand gentleman of the news.

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