Laser Tag

I mentioned to my friends that Google was doing some sort of Capture the Flag tournament. However, it looked like they were going to play on an open field, rather than a stealthy obstacle-filled course. I like sneaky & stealthy over speed-is-of-the-essence games.

That let to some reminiscing about laser tag when we were kids. And then we realized that there was nothing stopping us from getting together a group and playing laser tag again. Thus, six of us (me, Forrest, Jerry, Ben, Paul, and Josh) went laser-tagging tonight. :)

We had initially thought it would just be us in the arena, as a private party. But that's not what we had reserved, and anyway only six people isn't really enough for a proper game of laser tag. So we played with some randoms.

In the first two games, there was that one annoying player that always seems to be at laser tag places: the really good shot, who follows after you relentlessly shooting you four times in a row, just waiting until your five-second "reprieve" time is up so they can shoot you again. Really frustrating, and it doesn't seem all that "sporting," either.

But the third game, that guy went home, and it was more fun. Then the fourth game was awesome, because most of us ended up allying against the dozen or so other players. We defended one area against all the other players, plus Josh from our group who remained a lone gunman rather than join our team. And sometimes Paul shot us and then we would shoot him, because he was the "traitor" (an in-joke from playing Betrayal at House on the Hill and some zombie board game).

I definitely enjoyed the cooperation of the teamwork, being able to trust others, and being able to more easily do things together than you could have done alone. We had each others' backs, literally. I think I'd like to get together another South Bay game after we move, but this time explicitly with teams.

Pancake Burger

After our four surprisingly tiring games of laser tag, we were starving and descended upon the nearest Denny's. Although I had burned off enough calories that I could actually "afford" to order a real entree from Denny's (where nearly everything is fried), I ended up ordering a relatively light dinner. You see, I was carefully reserving calories for dessert (which I normally have to skip for calorie or full-stomach reasons).

Forrest, Jerry, and Paul also ordered an unusual dinner: Slam burgers, with pancakes replacing the hamburger bun. The waitress barely batted an eyelash, which was awesome. They did get charged for a short stack of pancakes, but that seems fair. After we finished eating, the cook came by to ask how it was. She said it was a "weird" order. Understatement. But they all praised the pancake burger.

I'm still dubious.