Monday, February 04, 2008

mad skillz

I haven't had internet for days. Days! I'm going a little nuts. But I do have some stuff to tell.

For one, I got the Best Camera Ever. It meets all my requirements:
1.It's tiny, so I can carry it all around with me. This means less phone shots.
2.It has a macro setting AND a super macro setting. So so so so useful when a girl makes as much fine jewelry as I do and needs to see details.
3.In addition to the other 20 or settings, it has a setting specifically for fireworks. Have you seen my fireworks pictures?
4.It also has a self-portrait mode, for taking pictures like this:



Photobucket

5.It has a super big, clear LCD screen to view the awesome pictures it takes.
6.It takes awesome pictures.
7.It's blue. Blue is fun. In fact, the blueness is what drew Jason's eye to it, and he is what drew my attention.

The camera was purchased on Friday, which turned out to be among the Best Days Ever. There was this thing called a "snowstorm" so Jason couldn't make the hour and a half drive to work. Damn shame, that. So we had a nice relaxing morning with a yummy breakfast, then set out for adventures. We ended up at Dave and Buster's, which it turns out is the Best Place Ever. It's a bar / restaurant AND a giant arcade. They have regular video games and the kind that gives out tickets. We played for a while on the machines that have coins in a big pile, and as you add coins, a shelf pushes them, and when any fall over the edge you get tickets. That was fun for a while, and then we saw the Jumprope Machine.

The Jumprope Machine is basically a big lighted disc with a mat in front of it. Colored lights give the appearance of spinning around like a jump rope. When it gets to the bottom, you jump over it and the mat senses whether or not you virtually trip over the rope and fall flat on your face. Now a little background on me. When I was a kid, I was jumping rope at every recess. My elementary school had a jump roping team. I was on it. There was a jump-a-thon for heart disease. I did that and kicked heart disease's ass. I won a special award for jumping even with a sprained ankle. I knew all the tricks, like double- and triple-unders. Double dutch? I was a pro. You give me a rope and I could jump over it.

So of course I wanted to show off my mad skillz (and make sure I still had them). The first round, I jumped my darndest and won some tickets. I think I inadvertently cheated because the ticket-giver was jammed, which means I'm pretty positive that I got some tickets that the people before me should have gotten but were too impatient to call over the maintenance guy. But whatevs.

I went back for more, after a break. This time, I won. I jumped and jumped and didn't make any virtual mistakes. Then all the machine's lights went off. Then they all came back on, flashing and making noise and generally causing a ruckus. I heard someone behind me yell Winner! and applause, and I turned around. Suddenly there appeared behind me about 15-20 people that were definitely not there when I started. I raised my arms in triumph, and turned back to the machine to hide the fact that I was laughing in astonishment at the magical crowd. It took a few minutes for my hundreds of tickets to pour out of the machine, but not as long as some lady that had "played" another game* and was receiving tickets for seriously 45 minutes straight.

We checked out the options for our bucketful of tickets and weren't incredibly thrilled with anything, so we decided to save them for another day. We had originally planned to go see the Djangofest in Downtown Detroit, but apparently had spent several more hours playing videogames than either of us had realized, so we ended up missing the start of the show. Our fallback plan is always karaoke, so we headed there. I think I had spent all my little energy jumping like a madwoman (besides the fact that I had only eaten nachos, so there wasn't much energy to expend in the first place) so I wasn't really feelin the karaoke. That didn't stop me of course, but my Stray Cat Strut and Crazy Little Thing Called Love weren't my best works. However, Jay repeated his performance of Big Balls, and finally got the reception he deserved. I've said it before, that boy can put on a show.

In between songs, we made a few new friends. One was Alison, wearing a tank top and baseball cap and doing "fagulous!" She, like everyone, said that Jay and I are absolutely gorgeous, so that won her over in our favor. Then she realized that we are cool people in addition to being really really ridiculously good looking and bought us a round of drinks and a pitcher of beer. The drinks went drunk (maybe a mistake on my part) but the pitcher stayed put.

On our other side was Lonely Jennifer. I officially gave her that name, but she practically gave it to herself by the way she was acting. She confessed that she never goes out, and was drawn to Jay and I because we are so "young and good looking." She was a nonstop talker, and even called us out on it when we were discussing this point amongst ourselves. At one point she made me feel her hair. (Creepy!) We were about to ditch her when our old friend from New Year's, Magic Dave, appeared. He showed us a new magic trick and we thanked him by giving him our untouched pitcher of beer and introducing him to Jennifer. Then we left the bar, speculating on what would happen between Lonely Jennifer and Magic Dave.





* I say "played" because neither Jason nor I nor anybody else ever saw her actually playing. She was just standing there while tickets flew out. We wondered if maybe the same thing happened to her that happened to me at first, where she got other people's tickets in addition to hers. But it went on for so long we figured she must be just that good.

10 comments:

LittlePea said...

I love that picture- so cute. So did they hook up or what?

I lurvvv cameras. Don't be stingy with your photos :O)

Amy Jo said...

New cameras make me happy by association, so thanks des, queen of jump ropes!

super des said...

The shiny new camera will ensure many pretty photos, I can promise you this.

mar said...

hey, you're back!
great camera, great pic, great story!

super des said...

Thanks mar! I missed y'all!

SUEB0B said...

It sounds like a great day. Des, Jumprope Champion of the World!

Arlene said...

Great camera Des, enjoy it!

Suzanne said...

Such excitement in the wings of the Motor City! I am glad you regained your jump rope title.

Anonymous said...

Very cute picture.

You aren't wrong with the ridiculously good looking label.

super des said...

thanks everybody!
*big smile*

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