I recently learned something quite interesting about video games.  Many young people have developed incredible hand, eye, and brain coordination in playing these games.  The air force believes these kids will be our outstanding pilots should they fly our jets.  ~Ronald Reagan

Nicole, Mom & Ryan hanging at grams house 1984

This past Christmas Kyle got a PlayStation 3 (PS3), not that he needed an additional means to play more video games.  But just as expected, he was ecstatic over the purchase.  What really cracks me up, is he has the Wii with a boatload of video games and Wii Fitness, which he barely plays anymore.  Let’s not forget all the games he’s purchased on his iPod Touch, the computer and he still plays with his Nintendo DS.  I guess he has a game for any occasion and any location.

With the availability of this new console, my sister decided to encourage his already obsessive behavior by purchasing him his very own Burnout Paradise and a few other games.  Kyle LOVES that game.  Every year since the establishment of ‘Aunt Nikki and Kyle’s Week of Fun’ Kyle has practically mastered the game and dreams about playing that game every year before vacationing at Nicole’s house.  In fact, if he hears Paradise City by Guns N’ Roses, he’ll get in this almost nostalgic state and have a yearning to visit my sister to play.  No joke!  He’s actually said to me, “Aunt Heather now I really want to go to Aunt Nikki’s to play Burnout Paradise.”  Now Nicole and Kyle can play Burnout Paradise with each other in the evenings.  Since my sister is four hours away, this is kind of a neat way to hang out, through a video game.  I guess any excuse to spend time with each other is a good excuse.

Kyle playing his Nintendo DS.  T-shirt courtesy of Aunt Nikki c. 2009

Sometimes I wonder if the desire to play video games is an inherited behavior.  Ryan wasn’t really that into video games, he would rather be outside hunting and fishing or working on cars.  Playing every once in a while, I can say I’m not really big into video games myself.  I would rather be reading, snowboarding, running or hiking.  My sister, although I would never constitute her as a gamer, does like to play video games more than any of us.  My dad, forget it.  He’s never touched a computer and the only Wii game he’s ever played was Cabela’s Hunting.  Probably because we have a plastic gun type of accessory to house the Wii remote control, giving it that kind of hunting feel.  Mom will sit and play a Wii game if Kyle pleads with her to do so.  She tries, but the games are a lot more complex than they used to be and her eyesight isn’t all that great.  Let’s not forget her reflexes aren’t what they used to be either.  How do I know?  Mom had the potential to be a modern day gamer.

Way long time ago, in the 1980’s, when Atari came out, my parents purchased us the console and a few games.  Prior to, we had a very basic game called Pong.  Not too exciting but was enough to stimulate us for a while.  Now, when the Atari arrived, it did catch our attention, at least initially.  We had Frogger, always one of my favorites and still is.  As a matter of fact, I downloaded it to our Wii console but the desire to play it isn’t there anymore.  On a side note, Seinfeld did an episode on Frogger.  It was great!

Another game which logged a lot of hours was Combat.  This one required two players and dad owned it!  Within Combat, there were different games such as tanks or airplanes.  Basically you shot each other up until someone was out of ammo.  That was up dad’s alley, not really my bag.  Ryan on the other hand loved Pole Position!  This was his cup of tea.  It was a racing game whereas you viewed the screen as if you were really driving the car.  You needed to avoid other drivers, maneuver around curves and avoid crashing.   It was fun picking the different courses.

I can’t remember Nicole having a favorite game, but I’m sure she did.  A few other videos we owned included Q-Bert, Space Invaders, Pitfall, Missile Command and Donkey Kong.  There were many more games to purchase, but we didn’t get new ones just because we wanted them, only for special occasions, unlike kids of today.

This is what our Atari console looked like! Love the 80’s!

Intentionally, I left one game out of the list because it is the spotlight of my rant.  The one the only, the original Pac-Man!  I look at Pac-Man as the Angry Birds of our present day.  Coming as part of the Atari console package, along with Combat, Pac-Man was the game!  There was even a cartoon made to continue the phenomenon.  Being a relatively simple game, your yellow Pac-Man guy had to eat these dots or pills in the maze without being attacked from Blinky (Red), Inky (light blue), Pinky (Pink) and Clyde (Orange), the ghosts.  Naturally there were opportunities to power up and gain additional points.  Each level became faster and faster and the mazes changed slightly, becoming increasingly difficult.

Back in the day, mom was our master Pac-Man master.  She really was, without question.  Presently, we relive this tale of how the most unassuming member of the family, who stood on the sidelines watching everyone take their shot at the title, turned into a Pac-Man powerhouse behind closed doors.  Yes mom, kicked all of our butts!  I’ll never forget the day we realized mom rained supreme with this simple Atari game.

Mom doesn’t look like she’s having a nice day… 1980’s

It happened on the most ordinary of days.  Upon filing into the house after coming home from school, we naturally ran to the Atari console to challenge each other to a game, letting our hair down and relaxing before homework.  One of us, either me, Ryan or Nicole plugged in the Pac-Man game.  The high score glowed throughout the room, blinding our eyes and taunted us like a cruel joke.  We seriously didn’t say anything at first and just kind of stared at each other wondering who accomplished this feet without everyone knowing, and when?  Just then, mom walked into the living-room sporting a huge grin on her face, as if proud of herself for kicking her very own flesh and blood’s scores to the curb, in a single day!  Mom’s master craftsmanship of game playing was done in one day, while we were at school and dad at work.

Remaining stunned and in complete shock, we challenged mom to a game of Pac-Man, but alas it was a futile attempt at reclaiming our place, ever.  For the duration of the Atari gaming system in our household, mom was undefeated.  We sincerely tried, all of us.  We also had our cousins up, but alas the damage had been done.

Mom played Pac-Man so much her wrists would even flare up and bother her, but she would push through the discomfort for the thrill of the game.  Sometimes we would have mom play just so we could watch her and learn the next levels in case one day we would make it that far.  Mom was seriously fast with her ninja-like reflexes.  It’s almost like she was using The Force to guide her through the mazes.

What was mom’s top score?  Seriously, I don’t even remember and neither does she, but I do remember it was always better than any score I’ve ever seen on any free standing Pac-Man machines found in the arcades and any friends Atari console.  Mom doesn’t really play anymore but she still lives the memories of her gaming days through this story.  Kyle doesn’t really understand, even though he knows what Pac-Man is, we had a Plug & Play containing old Atari games.  But I can tell he really can’t visualize what I’ve witnessed and what we lived to tell the tale.

Looks like mom was the Piper family’s original gamer!  Look out Kyle if you ever decide to challenge Gigi to a game of Pac-Man, you will be rudely awakened!

At the height of laughter, the universe is flung into a kaleidoscope of new possibilities.  ~Jean Houston

Kyle sledriding infront of mom & dad's house with his deloved Angry Birds Hat. 2012

Sometimes a spontaneous conversation about nothing is the funniest!  After all it worked for Seinfeld, the show that went from 1989 to 1998.  His show was based on nothing, they even did a show on that very theme.  To this day, people still quote and remember Seinfeld and the gang.  Can’t go through Christmas and not bring up Festivus and the “pole” or the “man hands”.  Being a fan of the show, I still catch a re-run every now and again, but I don’t think they ever had a show based on a goat.

If the show was being produced then Kyle and I would have the best “nothing” story for them.  First of all, it seems that most of my stories revolve around swimming lessons.   I’m not sure why, I have Kyle on other days too, but it seems like things just unfold with us during that time.  We were on our way to his lessons and I looked down off the side the road to a field.  I never noticed it before but there were goats.  All I said was, “Kyle look at the goats.” and he looks and said nothing.  As we continued toward our destination my mind started to go toward, “nothing” and I kinda laughed out loud.  Well, Kyle wanted in on whatever was churning in my brain.  Then I posed a question, “Wouldn’t that be the funniest thing ever to get Gigi and Pap Pap a goat, just to give it to them to see their reactions?”  Kyle and I started to laugh, and so started the conversation, really about “nothing”.

First we started talking about goats in general.  Kyle asked, “How do they eat everything?” and I explained their stomach acid is potent and can break down all sorts of things.  I said, “They can even eat a barbed wire fence.”  Then Kyle chimed in saying, “Ya wouldn’t that be funny if you tied the goat to your fence, then you wouldn’t have a fence anymore?” and I added, “You would just have posts sticking up out of the ground.”  We both envisioned that one and laughed out loud.  He asked very intuitively, “If they eat everything how do you keep them in a fence?”  My response was, “I guess you put them in an electric fence.  Then when they go to touch it, they would get zapped and say ‘Baaazzzzip’.”  We started laughing so hard.  We couldn’t control it.

Then I brought up the time when Pap Pap had a goat.  I was told that it kept jumping the fence and he would have to go get it.  From the story that I was told, the same as I’m telling Kyle, when the goat would be on one ridge, dad would be on the opposite.  Then as dad got to the opposite ridge, the goat would have moved.  That alone did it for us.  Me and Kyle were completely tearing up picturing my dad chasing a goat in the woods.  Kyle asked, “What happened to the goat?”  I said with much difficulty only cause I couldn’t catch my breath.  “He shot it.”  We both lost it!  We were in hysterics!  Then I calmed down enough to explain, “We’ll Pap Pap couldn’t catch it and it kept getting out anyway, well and you know Pap Pap’s fuse is a short one, just like mine.  So he shot it, and I guess ate it.”  As soon as I got the words out, we were shot with laughter again!

At this point, the conversation had a life of its own.  Then I went back to my original thought, just getting a goat and just showing up to give it to them.  I said, “Could you imagine how funny that would be? Pap Pap would be ok with it and would instantly want to put it up in the woods to eat the brush.  But Gigi on the other hand, would not be happy.”  Kyle, always thinking, “Ya we could put it in the garden to clean down the weeds so Pappy doesn’t have to.”  As we continued to laugh over this imaginary goat, we continued with our fictitious stories.  Kyle said, “What if it ate Gigi’s pants?”  I lost it, that was too funny!  I said, “What if we got it to clean the dishes?”  Kyle let out a such a gut stretching laugh that I think even took him by surprise.  Since he was laughing, that true hearty contagious laugh, I couldn’t help myself, I  joining in.

I was shooting photography at a TV Commercial c. 2011

We sobered up enough to start again.  Kyle said, “Do goats eat wood?” My response, “We have two dogs who think they are beavers, what do you think?” And the laughter started all over again.  I said, “Can you image the two dogs and a goat, how much wood they would go through?  We’d have so much sawdust, it’d be like a family of beavers lived there.”  Now at this point neither one of us could breath.  Then Kyle said, “We’d have to take the goat with us when we took the dogs walking.”  That did it, I was having a hard time driving.  That was too funny!  I said, “Ya we’d have to take me, you, the two dogs and the goat on a hike through the woods.”  Thank goodness for the seat belt or Kyle would have remained in one large contracting muscle ball on the floor of the car.  I said, “Could you image if someone drove past to see me walking a goat on a lease?”  I almost couldn’t get that one out.  “What would we do, get it a shock collar like Scooby and Seven and let it fraulic in the woods with the dogs?”  Kyle’s response, although very faint since he couldn’t talk, was crystal clear, “Ya and when it gets too far we call it back.”  I died!!  We couldn’t breath, we weren’t even expelling laughs, it was pure soundless air.

Then the minute we thought we were done, Kyle starts on how the goat could play with the dogs.  O no, not again!  And of course I had to add to this story by saying, “Ya Scooby would bark and growl at it and Seven would be like ‘I have a new friend to play with’ (in the dopiest dog voice imaginable)”  Kyle added, “Ya and can you imagine if the goat would ram Seven, he would be like, what was that!”  I said, “Ya but it probably wouldn’t hurt that tank and Scooby would be like, ‘Idiots, I’m going back to bed’ (in another dopy dog voice).”

So by now if we were making up a TV show, we had enough episodes to fill a season.  That night after swimming while Kyle was taking a shower, a.k.a. playing with a hippo washcloth in the shower, or an empty shampoo bottle used as a water launcher with his swim partner and taking 20 minutes to surface, I was still feeling silly and told my sister about the “nothing” conversation over a goat.  I was actually still reliving it with her, even though she laughed, she probably thought, ‘I have no idea what she’s talking about.’  I asked Nicole to, “Tell Kyle you have a really great idea, you want to buy Gigi and Pappy a goat!”  She laughed and said, ok.

Later, after the pruning settled in from the long shower, Nicole talked to Kyle and asked him about getting Gigi and Pappy a goat.  He just looked at me and smiled and said, “Ok”.  He was slightly amused, but silliness has passed.  I love it that Kyle has my sense of stupid humor.  Actually, not just mine, but my sister’s.  Nicole has always had that type of humor, after all she was the one who introduced me to Saturday Night Live when we were kids.  Although, Kyle also joins in stories and laugh right with you just like my mom.  When my mom starts to laugh no sounds can exit her mouth and she topples forward.  Sometimes I laugh even harder when I see that.  My brother and dad would laugh out loud not like the silent stupid laughs.  Ahhh I guess the family that laughs together…