Little House Syndrome

I got a call from my real estate agent yesterday--a pleasant woman named Shelly--letting me know that an apartment I'd been interested in a few months ago was back on the market and that the seller was now, in her words, "very motivated."

As with all real estate fantasies, I'd enjoyed a brief, torrid affair with the apartment in my mind, but had since moved on to other fantasy apartments and concerns. Or, had I?

I woke up this morning thinking about the apartment, obsessing over it, wondering if I would be happy there. I thought about the cats. What would they make of the place? I wondered if the kitchen would need to be renovated before I moved in. Were there smokers in the building? Particularly on the lower floors? I'd once lived above a smoker in Brooklyn, which led to a conflict, which led to several months of misery. I certainly didn't want a repeat of that episode. I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

I also thought about the future. Could I invite people over for dinner? If my parents visited, would they be comfortable sleeping in the downstairs area? And, if I ever did meet someone who could love me and, by extension, my rich and varied eccentricities, could we possibly co-habitate there together?

Yet, what I wondered most was this: Could I play videogames there?

Let me clarify: One can ostensibly play videogames anywhere. Upstairs, downstairs, inside, outside, etc. But some spaces are better suited for gaming than others. For example, the apartment I currently live in receives an abundance of sunlight in the summer months between the hours of 3 p.m. and 9 p.m. And when I say "abundance," I mean that it feels as if the sun itself pulls up outside my building and parks in front of my windows for six straight hours like the Eye of Sauron. And, since the apartment I live in, in another instance of real-estate jargon, is "open concept" (translation: it features the fewest amount of walls possible), any chance of either watching anything on TV or playing games is erased by that blinding, angry glare.

Which is all very nice, if you enjoy the sun. Which I do. Mostly. But it's far from nice if you've got a 20-hour survival-horror game set in an underground network of pitch-black caves to get through before the morning. How I've cursed the sun in these moments. I.M. Pei could not have designed and built more impressive structures out of couch cushions and afghans and throw pillows than I have, all in the name of creating a small patch of shade and, therefore, being able to glimpse even a fraction of what is happening onscreen in Cave Horror Party 4: Still Caving.

Of course, you're no doubt thinking, "Jesus, Jones, just go out and buy some curtains." Fact 1: I have blinds. Fact 2: Unfortunately, they are the sort of blinds that are sheer, and allow in light, but prevent people from seeing any of the untoward things I might do while nude (eating Pringles, using my fitness ball, watching Footloose on cable, sewing my woman suit out of human skin, etc. etc.). In Vancouver, where, for eight months out of the year the sun peeks over the horizon each morning only to say, "Oh, the hell with this," before going down again, curtains/blinds are not something anyone here wants to invest in.

But the apartment I woke up fantasizing about this morning? It's not the usual wall-of-glass condo-type apartment typically found in Vancouver. This place is all brick and wood beams. The windows are small (well, small-ish). Direct sunlight is so limited that the average houseplant wouldn't last more than three weeks in that place. In other words, the apartment would make for an ideal gaming space.

Probably the most ideal game-friendly dwelling I've ever seen is the house that Bilbo lives in in The Fellowship of the Ring. Look at those low ceilings, the alcoves, the little nooks. Every gaming space should be outfitted with at least two (x2) alcoves and four or five (x4-x5) nooks. I also love the sense of warmth that the place has, and the feeling that the cupboards are forever stocked with delicious food items.

Another great gaming space, and one that I still think of often for reasons that have never entirely been clear to me, is the tiny house where Rudolph, Yukon Cornelius, and Hermie spend the night at the start of their long journey in the 1964 stop-motion holiday special, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I particularly remember the fabric of the curtains hanging in the house's diminutive window. Snow is falling outside, the Abominable Snowman is roaring in the distance, and the camera pulls out to show the impossibly small house--which is really no bigger than the period at the end of this sentence--lost in the center of a sprawling, snowbound landscape. Despite the surreal, enjoyable journey that the three wind up going on together, part of me always wished at that point in the story that they would have simply stayed in that house. Namely, because I think that's what I probably would have done: stayed there, where it was safe and warm, with those tiny curtains drawn against the dangers ahead.

True story: After graduating from college, I was enduring a couple of restless months living back at home with my parents--for those who are regular readers, yes, this is the time when I was working as the mall Santa Claus--when a friend phoned and asked if I'd be interested in housesitting for him for six weeks or so while he was away. My friend lived in a renovated one-room school house on a couple of spare, wind-blown acres in the hills outside of town. It was a chance to enjoy some privacy--the first true privacy I'd had in my entire life. Of course, I couldn't say the word "yes" fast enough.

I saw the six weeks, and the privacy, as an opportunity to do some serious writing. I was trying to be a serious writer, and this is what serious writers did: they went to the woods and wrote in solitude great works of literature. My plan was to produce an entire novel in six weeks. I'd be crowned der wunderkind of the literary world. I imagined how I'd be introduced at the 92nd Street Y before my first reading: "Here is a brave man who holed up in a one-room schoolhouse located on a couple of spare, wind-blown acres in Upstate New York and wrote his first novel in a mere six weeks. Would you please welcome to the stage der wunderkind... WRITER SCOTT JONES."

But after a few miserable days of trying to write--honestly, is there anything worse than the trying-to-write state?--I gave up and drove to a local department store and purchased a Super Nintendo for $199. My second order of business: drive to a porno store a few towns over called ADULT WORLD--which was a window-less barn--and purchase the first pornographic movie I ever owned: a $29.95 VHS copy of Andrew Blake's Night Trips, starring Tori Welles. Tori would go on to star in other films such as Shaved and Dangerous, Breast to Breast, and Butts Motel 2.

I steeped myself in Super Mario World--the SNES's terrific pack-in cartridge--playing the game with a level of obsession and drive rivaled only by my obsession/drive for Tori Welles and Andrew Blake's Night Trips. I gamed with zeal, with passion. I believe this was the first real gaming--and by real gaming, I don't mean just fooling around with a game; I mean engaging the game in a see-saw battle of dexterity and patience and tenacity and wonderment--that I'd ever done in my life.

And when I wasn't gaming, I was watching my new porno movie and masturbating with wild abandon, blowing huge, copious loads all over that one-room schoolhouse.

If I'm going to be honest with myself, I wouldn't exactly say that I was happy during this period. But I wasn't unhappy, either. I was mostly somewhat disappointed in myself, I guess--which, little did I know back then, would be the state I'd basically stay in for the rest of my life. I was out on my own for the first time (college didn't count; there were chaperones and roommates and dining halls, and a medical clinic). I couldn't blame anyone but myself for not writing, and for not becoming the person who I wanted to be. Here was a chance--my first real chance--to do something truly constructive with myself and my life, and what did I do? I jacked off like an escaped zoo chimpanzee, played Super Mario World until dawn, and did not write a single word.

One night, exhausted from gaming and self-pleasure, I climbed up into the sleep loft in the schoolhouse and covered myself with a great many quilts. The temperature had dropped severely over the last few hours. Snow had been falling since the afternoon. It was still falling, accumulating on the eave of the tiny, octagonal window in the sleep loft.

On the verge of sleep, I heard a sound outside the house. I recognized it as a car engine, rumbling by. It was strange to hear a car out here, out this far, at that hour. In all my time at the schoolhouse, only a half dozen cars had ever passed this way. People rarely came out that way. The only reason to come out that way was if you lived out there.

The car engine faded in the distance. I reshuffled the quilts and was on the verge of drifting off again when the car, to my surprise, returned. This time, it slowed and stopped outside of the schoolhouse, its wheels crunching in the snow. The engine idled steadily. I peered over the edge of the sleep loft. I could see, through the schoolhouse's side windows, the red glow of the car's taillights. I thought, I am alone here in the middle of the night. I thought, Did I remember to lock the door? I thought, Maybe if I remain quiet and keep still whoever is out there will go away.

The car idled on. I held my breath in the dark. I could feel my heart pounding in the tips of my ears. An chill spread through my abdomen and down through my hips. I was as afraid as I've ever been in my life.

I began to chastise myself. Why did you come out here? Why the hell didn't you stay at home, where it was safe?

Where there was food in the cupboards.

Where my parents were snoring in their room down the hall.

Where my father built the fire in the wood stove each morning.

I listened to the car. I watched the taillights. I waited. A few minutes later--it's difficult to say how much time had elapsed--the car finally drove off. It didn't return. I never learned who it was, or why they'd stopped there, outside an old schoolhouse in the middle of a snowy night on a remote backroad. It was probably just some kids drinking, or maybe a randy couple looking for a place to make out. Whoever it was, and whatever their reason for stopping, that moment has always stayed with me.

After that, the spell of the schoolhouse--the head-spinning pornography and gaming and privacy and safety and free time--was broken. My fantasy of staying there, right there, forever--though I knew that, realistically, I could not (my friend would be returning and reclaiming his house soon)--left that night along with that strange, idling car.

I've done a lot of brave things in my life. And I've done a lot of cowardly things, too. No matter what I was doing, I kept playing games, and kept trying to find safe, small, comfortable dwellings to live--and game--in. I realized--after a recent conversation with fellow writer, Chris Plante--that what I'm doing, what I've always done, is I'm trying to somehow get back to the safe, small, comfortable places of my childhood.

Of course, I can't get back there, not literally, not anymore. The house I grew up in has been sold, and, as I learned on my last trip home, sold again. What I can do is create--or recreate--approximations of those places in my adult life.

Recently, on a rare, snowy afternoon in Vancouver, I sat on my couch playing a videogame. My cat, Bee, had climbed up into my lap, where she likes to curl up and fall asleep. I paused the game and sat there feeling Bee's small cat breaths--in, out; in, out--and listening to air whistle through her small nose, while looking out the windows at the falling snow. It was really starting to come down now. A hush was coming over the city.

I don't remember what I was playing. BioShock 2? Demon's Souls? What I do remember is feeling about as happy as I ever feel in my life.

My 100 Things List Blares Its Air Horn, Rolls On

I was trying to write something this morning, but couldn't get anything going, so I decided to change my pants, see if that might shake anything loose. Change your pants, change the way you look at the world. At least that's what I always say.

The days seem to pass so quickly and painlessly right now that I often wonder where they're going. I wake up in the mornings, drink coffee--one cup, black as a Castlevanian sky--spend a not-unpleasant hour or two at my desk either fooling with crossword puzzles or trying to write something coherent, and occasionally changing pants.

Then I walk to the studio, passing through what have to be Vancouver's least-desirable neighborhoods just east of Gastown where scenes of wrack and ruin occur on a 24-hour basis. True story: Once, while taking a cab to the office, I spotted a woman walking along Hastings Street who was wearing no pants. When you find yourself walking along Hastings without pants, or underpants, or shoes, something has gone wrong for you and your day. The train has clearly left the tracks at some point.

Another true story: Once, while walking along Cordova on my way to work, I spotted what appeared to be a drug deal happening. (I've seen every episode of The Wire, so I know a drug deal when I see one; thank you David Simon.) One of the participants paused, mid-deal, lowered his hoodie, looked at me and said--no kidding--"Hey, Reviews on the Run, I love that show!"

I picked up the pace and hustled away from the guy and his crime-in-progress, while saying what I almost always say when people recognize me: "Thanks for watching!"

Once I arrive at the studio, I usually have a couple of quick meetings with the show's producer, Rob Koval, while stripping down to my underwear before getting into my suit. It's a bit strange how comfortable Vic and I have become with undressing around one another and other people. Colleagues roam in and out, delivering mail and scripts and games, etc. and I'm standing there in my old, moth-eaten Fruit of the Looms (I can't seem to throw out old underwear for some inexplicable reason). Whatever self-consciousness I might have felt when we first started changing into suits at the office has packed its bags, moved to a nearby town, and left no forwarding address.

Then we shoot the studio portion of the show for a few hours, goofing around with our steady-camera guy and the producer. Then more meetings. Then lunch. Then we shoot the outdoor portions/reviews segments in some picturesque and inevitably rain-soaked location around downtown Vancouver. Then I try to get in a quick gym visit in the late afternoon, eat a decent meal--it's not easy to cook for one, though I manage--pay attention to the cats for 10-15 minutes. Then I game for an hour or two (or three, depending on how good said game is), maybe watch an episode of Dexter or Breaking Bad or something of quality. Then I read for awhile. And that's it. Boom, day over.

Mondays morph into Fridays at an almost alarming rate. Of course, there is some variation on occasion. Last week, for example, we carpooled to the Nintendo offices here in Vancouver and spent an hour fooling with the 3DS. In the last week alone, I've seen the following movies: The King's Speech, I Am Number Four, Cedar Rapids, Beastly, Unknown, and Drive Angry 3-D. Vic and I also find time to make regular appearances on other TV shows like this one.

There's always some place to be, something to do, something to consume. And next week, we fly down to San Francisco for the annual Game Developers Conference at the Moscone Center. That means airports, hotels, and more on the road-style surreal moments.

If I'm feeling a bit more chipper than I have lately, credit my on-going 100 Things That I Just Love project. Or maybe it's the pair of pants I changed into at the start of this post. Either way, here are some more things that I just love.

69. Miller's Crossing. The Coen Brothers best movie by a long shot.

68. Women, by Charles Bukowski. You will never read anything funnier or more offensive, or more unapologetically raw than this book.

67. Ham On Rye, by Charles Bukowski. A painful coming-of-age story. Makes for a great companion piece with This Boy's Life.

66. Born Into This, a terrific film by John Dullaghan about Bukowski. [And that brings us to the end of the Charles Bukowski section of the list. I promise.]

65. "My Life Is Sweet," by Simon Joyner. Seven minutes and 16 seconds of pure amazing.

64. Moon, Duncan Jones's excellent sci-fi film. I only saw this once--in a theater last year--but I can still recall the entire film, moment for moment. Now that's power.

63. Judd Apatow's The 40-Year-Old Virgin, which had the soothing effect of making me feel a whole lot better about my life.

62. The $8.95 Indian buffet at the Jackson Diner on 74th Street in Queens. (Take the F or the E train to Roosevelt Avenue. If you're in midtown Manhattan, you can be there in less than 15 minutes. It's worth the trip, trust me. Go. Go now.) (And if it's too busy, try the Taj Mahal, which is only a few doors down, and lacks the decor of the Jackson Diner, but the food is as-good, if not better.) (Also: Farts are guaranteed.)

61. 2004's Ninja Gaiden, from Team Ninja, for the Xbox. It's seven years old, which is about 4,152 in videogame years, but it still stands tall as one of the best action games I have ever played. Even as I type this, I want to go play it.

60. Hoop Dreams, Steve James's great 1994 documentary about a pair of Chicago area basketball prospects, is, like all great documentaries, about far more than that.

59. Friday Night Lights TV series, in its entirety.

58. "The Pine Barrens" episode from season 3 of The Sopranos.

57. Lynda Barry's entire body of work. There's a reason Matt Groening perpetually refers to her as "Funk Queen of the Galaxy." Read her books and you'll understand why.

56. 2007's BioShock. Old time-y music playing in a life size underwater fish tank = Pure magic.

55. Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings, in its entirety. Think the third movie was too long? Fuck you. I spent the duration of it all sobbing like a baby into my (empty) bag of popcorn.

54. 1991's The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES era).

53. Eating a hot dog in New York's Central Park next to the ice skating rink while snow is falling. Note: These are the only conditions under which I will agree to actually consume a hot dog.

52. "33," the best episode in the Battlestar Galactica series.

51. Warren Zevon's "Tenderness on the Block" from the 1978 album Lawyers, Guns and Money.

50. Waking up in the early morning, before anyone else is awake, and sitting at my desk in the dark with coffee, and realizing that the entire day is before me, and that something good might happen.

49. "Brownsville Girl," by Bob Dylan (from Knocked Out Loaded). All 13 glorious minutes of it.

48. Step Brothers. Adam McKay's best film so far.

47. "College," from season one of The Sopranos.

46. The great true crime documentary produced by HBO: Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills.

45. The terrific follow-up to Paradise Lost, Paradise Lost 2: Revelations. See both movies this weekend. (They're available on DVD.) Trust me, your head will be blown clean off.

44. Undeclared, Judd Apatow's short-lived follow up to Freaks and Geeks. 17 short, sweet episodes of glory. Yes, it died an early death. Yes, it's on DVD.

43. The Godfather trilogy, in its entirety. (Yes, I don't mind number three.)

42. The Office, BBC version, in its entirety.

41. David Garza's great song, "Disco Ball World," which my friend John Galvin claims should be included on every mix disc ever made. (He is correct.) (As usual.)

40. Rome. The HBO show. In its entirety.

[Here are the first and second sections of the 100 list, in case you missed them the first time around. I'll post the final portion ASAP. Stay tuned, wonderful people.]

100 Things That I Just Love So Much Pt. 2

The overall mood here at the The Jones Report offices (current number of employees: three, counting the two cats WHO ARE USELESS BY THE WAY) has improved remarkably since I touched the bottom of the proverbial pool in January. For readers who expressed their concern over my dark mood, 1. thank you, that's very sweet of you, and 2. dark moods are a part of life--well, my life, anyway--and I don't necessarily fear them, or loathe them entirely. They are what they are, nothing more.

But I do firmly believe that when you are in a dark place, down at the bottom of the old pool, it's your responsibility to figure out how to get back to the surface.

So, when the Global Game Jam organizers asked me to come out and talk to the Game Jam participants last week at the British Columbia Institute of Technology on either Friday night or Sunday night (my choice), I responded by saying: "Hey, Game Jam Organizers, let me completely blow your minds AND COME OUT BOTH NIGHTS."

It turned out to be a terrific idea, too. A bunch of people were split into teams, then challenged to make a game, or some semblance of a game, in 48 hours. There were many high points, as well as many fine people to converse with. The sole low point came during my "talk" on Friday evening. I took the microphone, not realizing that the event's organizers expected me to expertly expound on a topic. Instead, what I did was ramble on like I'd recently endured a severe head trauma, with my only strategy being this: the less I had to say, the louder I'd go ahead and say it.

Finally, looking out over a room full of Game Jammers anxious to start coding and "jamming" and doing what Game Jammers do, I said, in the loudest voice possible: "OK, SO WHO HERE WATCHES THE SHOW?" Referring, of course, to Reviews on the Run, the show that I host with Victor, and which airs on CityTV across Canada at least 97 times a day.

It's the dead of winter here in British Columbia, with temperatures hovering around the 0 degrees celsius, so it is far too cold for crickets to be alive this time of year. But in that moment, looking out across that vast, suddenly silent room of people, I'd swear I heard one. Or two.

Chirp. Chirp.

Apparently, no one watches the show, or, if they do watch it, they were not willing to admit to it in a public forum.

The opportunity to listen to a man speak IN A LOUD VOICE on nothing in particular for 10 or possibly even 11 minutes was probably not the dual lightning bolts of energy and personality--shazam, energy! shazam, personality!--that the Game Jam's organizers were looking for to launch the event. (Colin, my camera man for the evening informed me afterward that it did seem as if I was "grasping around" during my loud speech-talk. He actually used the word "grasping around," which makes me think now that I delivered the oratorial equivalent of someone spending 10-11 minutes searching for a lost contact lens.)

Anyway, the Game Jam was a ball. And the "jammers" made some incredibly cool stuff in the 48 hour time frame. This game, called Dino Fling, was my favorite. Did they make that in 48 hours from scratch? ANSWER: THEY DID.

But the rain returned to metro Vancouver this morning, and it appears to be dropping anchor in the city for the foreseeable future. Which brings me back to my 100-Things project.

To re-cap: A few weeks back, while feeling particularly low, I started an endeavor I'm calling the 100 Things That I Just Love So Much project. (You can read the first installment here.)

And so, it continues.

90. Resident Evil 4 - Shinji Mikami's 2005 masterpiece. I've finished it at least five times.

89. "Game of Pricks" by Guided By Voices; possibly the most exhilarating 1:33 of music ever.

88. Jesus's Son - Denis Johnson's short story collection

87. The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters - Seth Gordon's terrific documentary

86. A medium-rare filet and a Pilsner at Keens Steak House on 36th Street in Manhattan. Sit at the bar at around three in the afternoon. The universe will suddenly make sense in this moment.

85. Eastbound and Down on DVD - Watch the show, then watch the 13:05 extra titled "All The Times Someone Fucked Up." You will be happy. Very, very happy.

84. The NY Times Crossword puzzle (Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays only) (I'm not sharp enough to handle the rest of the week.)

83. "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot. If you memorize only one poem in your life, make it this one.

82. Super Nintendo - circa 1991

81. David Simon's The Wire, in its entirety.

80. The Quitter by Harvey Pekar.

79. My DVD box set of the original Star Wars trilogy, signed by George, that says, "Scott, Find a way to tell your story."

78. American Movie - Chris Smith's superb 1999 documentary about one man's quest to make a horror movie.

77. Track 14, titled "Peanut Brittle" off the Paul F. Tompkins album, Impersonal. You. Will. Laugh. Trust me.

76. Hearing Jenny Lewis sing the word "fuck." Examples: "A Better Son/Daughter" by Rilo Kiley/Jenny Lewis; "Spectacular Views" by Rilo Kiley/Jenny Lewis. Seriously, hearing her say "fuck" can turn a whole day around.

75. Shadow of Rome (PS2) - Motohide Eschiro's effort is one of the best games no one has ever played. So, you know, sad face.

74. Fieldrunners for the iPhone. So long, downtime! Hardly knew you!

73. "The Pugilist At Rest" by Thom Jones. I re-read this short story at least once a year.

72. Any album by the now deceased comedian Mitch Hedberg.

71. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. One of maybe five books that I've read compulsively in my life.

70. 1999's The Matrix by the Wachowski Brothers. Only referring to the original here. The sequels were horse shit. Confession, the ending of this movie, when Neo realizes his potential, this moment of personal reckoning, always makes my eyes a little moist.

[I'll keep posting in the coming days. And if you've got your own 100 TIJL lists, I'd be interested in seeing them. Link to them in the comments below.]

You Don't Know The Meaning of Life Until You've Stared a Pants Full of Shit in the Eye

Sometimes our bodies do something so shocking and unexpected that one's outlook on life is often forever changed by it. What you are about to read is an account of one of those moments. [Side note: This is something that happened a few years ago, back when I was still living and working in New York City. And if this story sounds familiar, that's because I've told it before. Regardless, enjoy.]

Last Tuesday morning I was in the men's room here at the office having a pee when I felt a bit of gas trying to work itself out. It suddenly became clear that the gas was more than gas, and before I could take any preventative measures, boom--pants filled.

I locked myself into one of the stalls and tried--in vain--to get myself back together. Went through two rolls of TP. And my underwear was completely shot. I stepped out of them, tossed them into the waste basket.

Whole time I'm in there, I'm kind of in shock, laughing a little, unable to believe this was even happening to me. Muttering "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus," to myself.

I washed my hands about a million times and looked at my embarrassed face in the bathroom mirror.

My day clearly couldn't continue without underwear. There's a 24-hour Duane Reade downstairs which has a small Hanes section (I love drugstores in New York; they literally have everything), so I pulled my jacket on, took the elevator to the street.

I tried the double doors of the store, but they were locked for some reason. I peered through the glass. I could see people inside, but they weren't customers--they were all employees. That's when I noticed the handwritten sign taped to the doors: REGISTER SYSTEM DOWN--CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.

Unbelievable. In the seven years I've worked here never once has this Duane Reade been closed. Not one goddamned time.

Suddenly, my plight for new Hanes had taken a kind of Kafka-esque turn. The sky was low and gray and looked like impending doom; it might snow at any moment. I stood in the middle of the sidewalk on Park Avenue, in the cold shadows of nearby buildings, underwear-free, people pushing past me, despairing as much as I've ever despaired.

There's another Duane Reade over on Lexington, about three blocks away. I struck out for there....

Thankfully, this one was open. I was unfamiliar with the layout of this particular store, so I had to do a fair amount of hunting before I found the Hanes section (it was under a sign that read HEALTH, BEAUTY). I also bought a travel-sized pack of Huggies and a box of Imodium. I realized as I set these items down on the register counter--Hanes, Imodium, Huggies--I might as well have had a sign taped to my forehead that read YES, I HAVE SHIT MYSELF.

For some reason the woman running the register chose to squeeze these items into the smallest, least opaque shopping bag Duane Reade offers. "Don't you have any of those bigger shopping bags?" I asked sheepishly.

The woman was clearly more interested in the Chaka Khan song playing on the store sound system than she was in tending to me. "We ain't GOT no more shopping bags," she said. End of story.

Back at my office, I locked the door, then proceeded to change into my new Hanes. Mid-change, I suddenly realized I was standing half nude in my office, something which had never before happened in all my years of working here. How many occasions does one have to get nude in his office? Not many. I felt terribly vulnerable; a slight chill ran up the backs of my legs. I quickly stepped into not one but TWO brand new Hanes. (I reasoned it would be best to "two-ply it" for the rest of the day. Call the second pair a form of insurance.) I pulled my pants back on, ate a couple of the chalky-tasting Imodium, then tried to go about my day, business as usual....

...But it became clear that I couldn't function in any sort of normal capacity any longer. The day was over for me. The trauma of the whole shit event had derailed me. And I worried, quite honestly, that I might smell a little. There was nothing to do but go home.

I couldn't imagine trying to explain this to anyone, and I really didn't feel like making up some lie about my stomach or something (I'd taken a phony sick day just the day before), so I bolted, just shut down my computer around 2 and headed for the train. Nine out of 10 times, I reasoned, no one would even notice I was gone....

Went home, showered, changed, was relaxing, recovering, feeling better, when my telephone rang. I didn't pick up. No message. A few minutes later, it rang again. Again, no message. When it rang a third time, I decided to *69. The calls, to my dismay, were all coming from the office.

Around 5:30, voice comes on my answering machine. It's Mr. Traverson--the company president--from work. "No one knows what happened to you," he said. "I've been trying to reach you all afternoon. You'd better have a VERY good reason for leaving, or else I'm going to be really upset with you. Call me as soon as possible. I need to know what happened."

Getting a call from Mr. Traverson at home--a man who I rarely ever see, and rarely ever speak to when I do see him--was an event. This was obviously getting serious. It struck fear in my heart.

I tried to put the whole thing out of my head, kept telling myself that I'd deal with it in the morning. Took me two hours to realize that I couldn't do this, that I was far too preoccupied. I phoned my co-worker Hal on his cell, to ask his advice. Told him what happened, the shit, the Hanes, the whole deal. He started laughing. "That happens to everyone," he said. "It happened to my father once at hunting camp..."

"Really?" I said. It was a great comfort to hear this.

I said, "You know, nine out of 10 times no one would have even noticed I was gone."

"Well, this was the 10th time," Hal said. "Today wasn't your lucky day." Hal told me that Mr. Traverson was indeed very angry with me. "The thing to do is call him at home," Hal said. "If you want to save your job, that's what you have to do. Call him."

"Call him at home?"

"Yes, call him at home."

"When?" I asked.

"Right now," he said. "He's probably just sitting there, watching some dumb TV program..."

I started laughing.

"What's funny?" Hal asked.

"I'm laughing because you're right, that is what I have to do," I said. "And I'm laughing because I can't believe I'm going to actually do this. This is surreal."

"It's really for the best," Hal said, then gave me Mr. Traverson's private cell phone number.

I dialed. Took several deep breaths. He answered on the third ring. "Hello?"

"Mr. Traverson," I said, my voice shaking a little. "Sorry to bother you at home.... It's Scott. From Editorial."

"We were all wondering what became of you today," he said ominously.

"That's why I'm calling you, Mr. Traverson. You see..." I said, pausing momentarily to gather myself. "I was standing at the urinal peeing this morning. I felt a little gas moving along, and before I knew what was happening, I'd shit my pants. And that's why I left. I ran out of the office because I was too embarrassed to try to explain this to anybody."

Mr. Traverson didn't say anything. A space yawned between us, for one second, two seconds, three seconds. I felt it my duty to fill these empty moments with nervous chatter of some sort, but I managed to restrain myself, counseling myself with the thought that I'd said my piece, now let it stand, and let him react to it however he was going to react to it.

Finally, he spoke. "This is obviously a delicate matter," he said. "You know you can always come to me with these...private things. You can trust me. But the bottom line is, we're running an office here. Communication is the key. We need to know where everyone is at all times, or else the whole system breaks down."

"I know," I said. "You're right. I'm sorry."

"Well," he said, "I'll see you in the morning." And he hung up.

I hung up the phone. I was exhausted on a core level. I couldn't believe all the shit--literally--I'd been through the past 12 hours. What a day. What a motherfucking day. After I got off the phone, I drank. To use one of John Galvin's favorite phrases, I moved through all the beer in the house. The beer helped. It burned off some of the tension, calmed me down a little.

I can tell you this much: I've become much more respectful of my bodily functions. And the simple act of peeing is slightly more stressful than it once was. I'm doing it with a great deal of caution these days.

A week has passed since this happened. "Today's your one-week anniversary," Hal wrote in an email this morning. He suggested I celebrate by buying myself a brownie.

Everyone's a smart-ass, I guess.

January Got You By the Short Hairs? Read This.

It's always dark when I get home at night from the studio, and dark in the morning when I wake up. Right now, and for the foreseeable future, my days are literally bookended by darkness.

The blinds in my apartment--blinds are more masculine than curtains--have not been touched for months now.

This short-days-long-nights dynamic is, of course, commonplace in North America. But it's even more pronounced here in the Pacific Northwest thanks to the never ending rain. Yes, it's raining now--right this very second, even as I type this. I can see it falling in great streaks against the dark windows in my kitchen. And I have to go out into it shortly, to get to work. (The photo in the upper left was taken at the time of this writing.)

Piss.

Maybe I'm getting old, but this January seems to be putting up more of a fight than previous Januarys. I feel like I'm always trying to get to the next day--If I can just get to Thursday, I'll be fine, I tell myself--same way that a climber scaling the sheer face of an ice wall is focused on trying to find a place to put his right crampon-wearing foot.

Obvious metaphors aside, I'm feeling really pretty low these days. Maybe not exactly depressed. Depressed implies that I need professional help. I don't think I'm there. Not yet, anyway.

Once we stopped shooting the show in December and Vic went on vacation for a couple weeks, I holed up in my apartment and drank beer and covered myself in cats. I stayed away from Twitter and tried to avoid contact with anyone who I would normally have contact with. Low point: one night I watched The Human Centipede on Netflix. All of it. Even when the Japanese man is crying and apologizing because he is defecating in the middle piece's mouth.

For decades now, I have been attempting to perfect the Activity Formula (A.F.) for holiday breaks. If the previous paragraph was a scientific experiment, that combination of elements--cats, beer, The Human Centipede--would have caused an explosion that would have destroyed my entire laboratory as well as several surrounding city blocks.

I went to visit my family on the East Coast a few days before Christmas, which basically always requires me to take this byzantine flight path across the country, praying the entire time that whatever mosquito-sized airplane I am in doesn't get blown out of the sky by Old Man Winter. Once I arrived, my parents picked me up at a deserted airport, and I sat in the backseat of their mini-van the same way I did when I was 12 years old. My parents argued and bickered and played Christmas music in the front seat while I drew penises in the frost on the inside of the car's back window.

Ah, Christmas traditions. I wish Normal Rockwell was still alive to paint mine.

On Christmas Day, we drove to Utica where we had our usual Christmas dinner at 2 p.m. sharp at my Aunt Barbara and Uncle Tony's house. I do enjoy the dinners--I always sit next to my Aunt Barbara and make terrible jokes and she laughs. But the Christmas dinner table has gotten dramatically smaller over the decades. Cousins who now have their own families are too busy to show up. A few people, like my grandparents, have died, creating more vacancies. My own brother stopped coming to this dinner years ago, in the name of starting his own holiday traditions with his family (which usually involves him drinking a 30-pack and trying to assemble my niece's toys). We press on with the dinner--there's ham and turkey, and I insist on sampling the flesh of each beast--and make the most of it. We have some laughs, because I sincerely enjoy my aunts and uncles. Let me tell you, there's real warmth at that table.

Yet I can't help but feel like there's something more than a little pathetic about me being there. Or rather, still being there. I've been coming to these dinners all my life. It's just me and a handful of my dad's gray-haired siblings, and the one cousin who is a year or two older than I am and who still lives at home with Aunt Barbara.

After dinner, as usual, we say goodbye to everybody, then make the hour-long drive back to my brother's house in the woods over snow-covered roads. My parents sleep on an air mattress down in the basement next to the pellet stove. I sleep upstairs in the guest bedroom--yes, I offer to trade with them each year, but they insist that they like it down there--quietly trying to level up in Cave Story on the DS before dozing off.

The holidays aren't easy, or restful for me. I look forward to them. But once they arrive, and worse still, once they pass, I without fail wind up feeling completely duped. There is no peace and no rest to be had during this reportedly peaceful and restful time. It's hell trying to travel back and forth across 3,000 miles--6,000 total for me--during the most terrible travel time of the year, all in the name of being one of two last people (me and the aforementioned cousin) who aren't married and have no families or holiday plans or traditions of their own or anyplace else to go. Worse still, it's painfully clear that neither of us have any prospects for any of those things in the near future.

For godssakes, I should be on my second goddamn marriage by now. I should have at least one divorce behind me, and a couple of adolescent kids who are forever reminding me that I have completely ruined their lives and that they hate me and need to borrow money. Instead, what I have are two semi-indifferent cats who I celebrate the holidays with each year on December 23rd by playing Christmas music on my laptop while waving their bird-fling toy at them until they collapse in wheezing heaps on the floor from exhaustion.

You don't have to tell me it's pathetic. I know.

Which is why I've decided to start my One Hundred Things That I Just Love So Much project. Here are one hundred things that have given me enormous amounts of pleasure over the years; one hundred things that, should they suddenly vanish from the planet tomorrow, my world, my life, would be a far drearier place without them.

The recipe for this list is as follows: wake up early each morning and sit at your laptop and come up with at least two or three items that you can add to the list. And, over the span of a few weeks of following this routine, voila YOU'VE GOT ONE HUNDRED.

The only downside is that if robbers ever broke into my apartment they would know exactly what to steal. Note to potential robbers: Nothing on the list has any real-world value. Most sane, well adjusted people probably wouldn't even want most of the things on this list.

One more thing: if January has you by the short hairs too, I suggest you follow suit and make your own list. Before you know it, February will be here. No, I don't have a plan for how to get through February just yet. One month at a time, people.

100. Portal - Valve first-person shooter/adventure/synapse-blowing game.

99. This American Life on NPR (any episode; http://www.thisamericanlife.org/)

98. Blood on the Tracks - Bob Dylan's 1975 album

97. First Person - a two-season TV series produced and directed by Errol Morris (If you see only one episode, make it "Leaving The Earth" with DC-10 pilot Denny Fitch.)

96. Superbad - Greg Motolla's 2007 movie

95. "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" - Joyce Carol Oates's 1966 short story

94. Freaks and Geeks - Paul Feig's short-lived 18 episode TV series

93. The Wall - Pink Floyd's 1979 album

92. Spicy Miso Ramen with chicken at Motomachi on Denman Street

91. Ball Four - Jim Bouton's incredibly funny 1970 baseball memoir

[I'll post the rest of the entries in increments in the coming days. Stay tuned.]

That Glasses-Wearing Pig Can Go F*** Himself

The hardest, most challenging, most pain-in-the-ass-difficult game of 2010 was without a doubt Donkey Kong Country Returns.

Oh, the first few levels are peppy, brightly colored, old-school fun. Bananas fly everywhere, secrets practically reveal themselves. And the collectible K-O-N-G letters dangle like low hanging fruit.

But then things take a turn.

The cursing began for me probably around level three or four. The praying at level five. The despair at level six.

During each absurd jump in difficulty, I told myself, This won't last. I've played enough games over the years to know that developers typically include sharp difficulty spikes before giving way to breezier portions of the game. Yet each spike in difficulty in Donkey Kong Country Returns [DKCR] only led to subsequent, even steeper spikes in difficulty. In all my days, in all my years of enduring you've-got-to-be-kidding-me games, including every installment in the Ninja Gaiden series--which I adore, by the way--I have never been so emotionally, physically, and spiritually beaten down by a game the way that I was by DKCR.

Then, just when you think things can't possibly get any worse, a nude, glasses-wearing pig appears, waving a small, white flag in your direction. He is, of course, offering his "super guide" services. Which, from what I understand, consists of short how-to videos showing you how to do what you, according to the pig, cannot do. I looked at the super guide once and only once, in the name of research for this post. What happens is this: A white-haired version of Donkey Kong appears on the screen. Perhaps his hair has gone white from the sheer terror of the level he is about to demonstrate for you. He proceeds to do all the incredible things that need to be done--spectacular jumps, last-minute leaps, mine cart hops, enemy circumventing, etc. And then he vanishes--poof--as abruptly as he had arrived.

Now, Joe DiMaggio could rise from his grave, grab a bat and ball, and hit a 400-foot home run over the cemetery fence. "Good one!" I would say to the reanimated corpse of Joe DiMaggio. Yet that would bring me, personally, not one iota closer to possessing the ability to be able to hit a 400-foot home run. I could watch a video of an extremely smart person taking the SAT. Yes, he seems to be writing a lot, I would note. Yes, having a second sharpened pencil was a terrific idea. But watching the smart person would not improve my score on the SAT.

How merely watching White Donkey Kong do what you cannot do is supposed to help you, in a tangible way, is beyond me. Which leads me to believes that the super guide is included solely to make you feel even worse than you already do. Think you can't feel any worse right now? Super Guide says. Well, watch this video of an albino kong making it all look incredibly easy! See? Wasn't that helpful? It wasn't? Huh. That's strange. It was supposed to be helpful. But it wasn't helpful for you? Hrmm. Well, do you feel 10-percent worse about yourself after watching the super-guide video? You do? THEN MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!!!!!!

The one true way to survive the hell-on-earth experience of DKCR is not to view smarmy guides showing you how to do it. You must devote yourself to DKCR like a zen buddhist. You must forsake all worldly goods. You must end any current/on-going relationships with any women/men. You must draw the blinds, shut off your cellphone, forego personal hygiene (yes, you will grow a beard that will eventually make you resemble an Early Man exhibit from the Museum of Natural History), and laser focus all of your gaming powers on this single, solitary pursuit.

And even then, after all that, there's still a chance you might not make it.

I wantonly blew threw thousands of Kongs during my time with the game. I began referring to Donkey Kong Country Returns as "the one-up wood chipper." That's what it felt like some days: like I was simply feeding one-ups--Kong after Kong after Kong (after Kong)--into a buzz saw. Near the end, I wouldn't bother attempting a level unless I had more than 50 one-ups in the tank. Whenever I'd run low, I'd return to the game's early levels, "harvesting" bananas and collecting Koins to blow in Kranky Kong's stupid shop, all in the name of stocking up on one-ups.

Do I sound obsessed? Oh, I was.

And at least a small percentage of the blame for my obsession must be attributed to that flag-waving, f***-faced pig. I remember at point point, as I endured an especially trying stretch in the game, after yet another period of embarrassing failure, F*** Face showed up and frantically began waving his f*** flag at me. That is when I said the following words aloud, in my living room: "Eat shit, you piece of shit-eating shit."

Let me repeat that: "Eat shit, you piece of shit-eating shit."

Yes, DKCR inspired me to come up with that beautiful line of poetry (and countless others). Not since God of War's "would you like to change your difficulty setting to EASY" offer have I been so angered by a game's offer to help me, and by extension, so motivated to finish the game without any of the game's help at all.

I hauled the Wii to New York City with me over the holidays--I made room for it in my overstuffed suitcase--in the name of furthering my obsessive pursuit. Finishing the game, enduring the experience, had become the gaming equivalent of Ahab's white whale. I needed to see this journey to completion, no matter the cost to my well-being.

Yes, I finally finished Donkey Kong Country Returns. No, I didn't bother collecting the orbs in the bonus sadist levels. And by extension, no, I did not press on into the Golden Temple. Enough was enough. This game had already taken enough of my life away from me.

The game's final, brief cut-scene is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Not because it is beautiful. At all. It is brief and efficient and largely unsurprising. It's beautiful because the final cinema, symbolically, meant that the experience was finally over. I'd spent so many hours, and so many Kongs, in this borderline-futile pursuit, thinking that this moment might never come, despairing in the truest sense of the word. And when it did finally arrive, I felt like a man stranded on a desert island, one who'd long given up hope of ever being rescued, who had just spotted a rescue boat on the horizon with a topless Cheryl Tiegs at the helm, waving her bra in my direction. In my metaphoric fantasy, I would fall to my knees on the beach, tears streaming into my unkempt desert-island beard, thinking, "It's over. It's finally over."

I finished DKCR, but I can't explain exactly why I finished DKCR. Why did I expend all of this energy? Why did I subject myself to such--there's no other word for it--punishment? How did I become so obsessed? Why, frankly, did I bother at all?

It's hard to say.

Sometimes games come along and get under my skin, and stay under my skin, in a way that catches me off guard. Part of it, no doubt, is my allegiance to Rare's original on the Super Nintendo. I played the living shit out of that game for years, finishing it multiple times. So, a small percentage of my unhealthy pursuit can be attributed to pure nostalgia, to hearing those old songs again (what a soundtrack in this game!), to rocketing around in barrels, and to seeing characters again that I've been fond of for nearly 20 years now.

But a larger percentage, if I'm going to be completely honest, is that I sort of began to enjoy the sheer masochism of it all. I saw Danny Boyle's 127 Hours recently, which was alright, but wasn't the gut-wrenching, transcendent experience people had promised me it would be. I've never understood those people who are into climbing mountains and engaging in "extreme" pursuits, and as a result, I never have any sympathy for the people who, for example, die on Everest. You had a good idea of what you were getting into up there, folks. I have friends who are climbing Kilimanjaro next month. I've told them both, point blank, that if I have to go up there to claim their skeletons I will be beyond pissed off.

Maybe games like DKCR, in some ways, are small-scale versions of extreme pursuits. It's simply fun and satisfying to occasionally do something, to subject yourself to something, that most people can't do, or won't bother to do.

I admit, I did feel a little depressed after DKCR went back on the shelf. I moved on to Super Mario Galaxy 2, which I'm currently trying to complete. I'm at 70 Power Stars and counting. I've been a bit disappointed--in comparison to DKCR--by how easy it is. It's not an easy game by any means. Yet each time I locate a new Power Star these days, I think, So that's it?

I miss having my dexterity and, beyond that, my patience pushed to the limit. Stranger still, I've come to realize that I miss the despair of it all. Or maybe that's not quite right. It's not the despair that I miss. What I miss is the extreme degree of unadulterated, heart-squeezing elation I'd experience whenever I would do something as simple as making it to a subsequent checkpoint, or in extreme cases in the final levels of the game, simply making it through two or three seemingly impossible jumps.

I'd get there, arriving at a destination I thought I'd never arrive at, palms sweating, knees shaking, and I'd think: Now that's entertainment.

All of which can only mean one thing: that I have an upcoming date with the notorious Demon's Souls.

Cheryl Tiegs Rescue Boat: Looks like I'll be seeing you again, real soon.