And You Won’t Even Throw Your BACK Out!

These days you can’t throw a gaming console in a video game store without hitting a game about shooting aliens or racing cars or playing sports. Also, you can’t throw consoles in a video game store because it’s probably not allowed. Also, you should be staying at home anyway because of Corona. Also, its way easier to download games instead of buying them in stores.

That’s what I did- via Xbox Game Pass; I downloaded a game, and it wasn’t about shooting aliens in the face, or driving cars that cost more than my house, or playing sports (remember sports? Bunch of dudes getting paid stupid amounts of money to play with a ball and give each other Corona virus? Ah, memories). Nope, this was a game about throwing video game consoles.

And other pieces of furniture. In Moving Out, you run into houses, grab pieces of furniture, and pull them onto a truck. Or throw them, if they’re small enough. And if you break a few windows along the way, or vases, so what. This is a video game, for crying out loud (although I would not be surprised in the least to find out there’s an authentic furniture moving simulator out there, with different levels of difficulty, from helping-a-friend-and-drinking-beer all the way up to professional-international-transport engineering-and-drinking-beer).

It’s a race against the clock, of course. Jump through the living room window, grab the L-shaped couched, drag it through the back door, then go back and grab the video game console, head upstairs, throw it from the second floor bathroom, and then toss one of the beds off the balcony. Do it fast enough, and you get a gold star. A gold star for throwing a mattress off a balcony! This is, like, training for how to have fun at parties! (Remember parties? Bunch of people getting stupid wasted while listening to obnoxiously loud music and giving each other novel Corona virus?)

Houses are repeatable, so you can achieve extra, disparate goals, such as “Finish a move with no windows broken,” or “Finish a move with all windows broken,” or “Pack the pink flamingos too.” Also, there’s a gnome on every level, I think, although I don’t know what to do with those yet. I didn’t touch them on the few houses I played. Gnomes freak me out.

If you have Xbox Games Pass and nothing to do, go ahead and download Moving Out and play it for half an hour, see if you like it. Or, I don’t know, go make a Tik-Tok video and throw some real furniture. You’re probably not a doctor or work in a grocery store, so nothing you do really matters these days anyway.

And if you ARE a doctor or work in a grocery store, a sincere thanks.

Home is Where The Beer Is

…and a book and a place to sit and enjoy them.

I was just going to take a picture of my house, but my wife said “That’s too easy. You should take a picture of a lawn chair with a beer and a book.” Which reminded of this photo I posted on Instagram a few years ago.

I was planning on getting all fancy with my DSLR and Lightroom- but sometimes the simple pictures are the best.

A photo posted by Jason Edwards (@bukkhead) on

NaBloPoMo Day 2: Your Passion

When you’re in love with a beautiful woman… you watch your friends…

A photo posted by Jason Edwards (@bukkhead) on

I’m 43. I don’t know if I have any passions. Or if I do, I have lots of little ones. Beer is one. I really like beer. Am an I alcoholic? Well, I’m certainly trying to be one. It’s tough though… I like beer, but I can’t drink it every day. Maybe one or two a week. Of course there’s Tuesdays, when I hang out with friends at a bar. I can manage two beers then, usually.

We sit at a table and they order food (I usually cook something with the wife before I give her a night to herself in the house) and we talk about the stupidest things. And we laugh. The waitstaff know us. We’re good tippers. The owner knows us. He bring exotic beer samples.

I tend towards the Pale Ales, although I’ll down an IPA if I’m in the mood. I used to be strictly Lagers and Pilsners, but too few breweries get them right. But the ones that do? I’ll have three or four, please! Often I’ll go with a Brown Ale, and if I’m hanging with an enthusiast, I’ll share a Porter or a Stout. I even know how to drink sours and saisons: let ’em get warm.

I like beer after a long run (or a short run, I won’t lie). While the ball game’s on the radio and I’m burning something on the grill. In between mowing the front yard and the backyard. A beer during Christmas dinner is nice. My wife and I like to vacation in tropical places, and a tall frosty glass in a little place with a deck by the beach… it can make up for a whole year of heart ache.

Can’t really drink beer when I’m playing video games (I forget and the beer gets warm) or when I’m reading a book (I got idle hands and I drink the darn thing too fast) or if I’m at the computer doing some writing (I’ll lose my train of through If I get dragged to the bathroom too often). So, beer’s not my only passion.

But it’s one of them. And it’s Mariners at Astros in 10 minutes. Perfect timing!

Archaeologists Speculate that Beer Was Instrumental in the Formation of Civilizations

“Archaeologists speculate that beer was instrumental in the formation of civilizations.”

-Wikipedia entry for “Beer.”

Beer. When was it invented, why, how, who knows. Actually, I’m certain quite a few people know. Probably know the exact day, the very minute. Some monk sitting in a chilly monastery, hands cupped reverently, holding a beautiful brown heap of barley. Ah.

beer at toronado

This bar is a monastery, the glass in front me a chalice, an icon of worshipfulness. I have a slight buzz. It’s quiet in here, middle of the day. Dark. The smell of stale beer from the floor, a sweet smell, a little sour, as familiar as the sweat on the back of my neck, rapidly cooling. I walked here, for a beer, and I’ll walk back home again when I’m done. What’s a few miles. Monks balanced kegs on the backs of donkeys and walked further to get that golden stuff to their other brothers in other monkeries.

This table where I sit almost every Tuesday. That waitress. No, we call them servers now. Jeans and a t-shirt with the bar’s logo on it, hair in a pony tail, toothy grin. Probably in college. No, probably dropped out of college. No, probably never went. Why bother. A few roommates, a three-a-month novel habit, discounts on bar-burgers. It’s not a bad life. I’m not jealous. But as I hold that cold glass in my hands, consider the bubbles rising, consider the deep yellow, I think, I could do that. I could work in a bar.

Over there in a booth a guy and a girl are in deep conversation over a plate of French fries. He looks too old for her. A dozen scenarios run through my head. He’s her older brother, and they’re trying to figure out what to do about Grandma. He’s her lecturer at the university, they’ve been dating for two semesters, and they have to end it, his wife is getting suspicious. He’s her boyfriend’s best friend from college, and they’re planning an intervention. I take a sip of my beer.

Scratch that: gulp. More like a quaff. My glass is empty. Sunlight manages to negotiate a few clouds and the tinted windows, coats the foam left behind.

At the bar itself, fella in sweats, sweaty, running-shirt, sweaty, ball cap, sweaty. After he finishes his beer, when he gets up to hit the head, that bar stool is going to be sweaty, too. I know this from experience. I’ve run to bars before.

Never ran from one, though. This is no biker bar, there will be no fisticuffs here. It’s quiet, old Sub Pop concert posters on the walls. No pool tables, a menu full of foodie food. And pulls too hip for townies but not redneck enough for hipsters. My server comes over, points at my glass. I just smile. She smiles back and takes the glass away.

Behind the bar, the owner, big fella, pear shaped until you get to his head, that beard, those black-rimmed glasses. On a Tuesdays if the server’s not there, he serves me himself. When I’m done with one, he’ll say, how’d you like that IPA? And I’ll sort of nod and smile and say something like, I hope you’ve got more.

Another beer appears in front of me. I watch the server walk away. She stops at the booth with the couple. They look up at her, almost startled. I can’t hear what they say, but she takes away their half-eaten plate of French fries. Must be serious, if you can’t even finish your fries.

My phone makes a noise in my pocket. I fish it out. Text message from the wife. Grocery store on the way back home. Milk, bread, eggs, something. I quaff once more. Before I leave, I drop too many bills on the table. Maybe it’s a four-a-month novel habit. I don’t want to assume anything.