The Skills to Pay the Bills

I was recently reunited with my dear old friend, Dr. Mario. We go way back, but our time together has been sporadic. We first met back in high school when I'd play this game with one of my best friends, Kelly. I loved the game and considered myself the champ. Which reminds me, I should warn you that when I talk about Dr. Mario and my mad skills at this game, I might come across as conceited. But rest assured, I'm aware of how obnoxious I'm being and for me part of the fun of Dr. Mario is the trash talk. Go ahead and trash talk me back - it just motivates me.

After high school it was years before I played the game again. Then one day, my friend Kristin and I were hanging out at our friend Jimmy's apartment when someone suggested we play Dr. Mario. Well, after just one night of playing, we became addicted. But since we couldn't be at Jimmy's all the time, Kristin bought the game, found an old Nintendo and started holding tournaments at her house. That summer we probably clocked about 1000 hours of Dr. Mario. We had four controllers so we'd invite friends over for tournaments, but mock their inferior skills. Most of the time the players who rotated in and out of the game were: Kristin, Abram, Garrett, Jimmy, Katherine, Brandi, and me.

Even though we weren't actually looking at each other (focused on the game!), we grew very close playing Dr. Mario. After staring at those pills long enough, we'd just start opening up about our lives. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was through playing Dr. Mario that Kristin and Abram fell in love (they are now married).

Well, that was years ago. Someone broke Dr. Mario (I'm pretty sure it was Abram, who was sick of feeling inferior, although I have no way of proving this). So after going through some intense withdrawal, we moved on with our lives.

Recently, Dr. Mario came back into my life. It was at Brian's movie night. Katherine suggested that I play but I was reluctant at first. I mean, I'd moved on with my life and maybe I wasn't good anymore. Turns out playing Dr. Mario is like riding a bike and I had no problem dominating that night (I'm sorry, playing this game makes me really sassy).

Then I found out my friend Emily has the game so we started playing too. She has greatly improved in the last couple weeks in skill, trash talk, and passion for the game (even throwing herself on the ground last night after losing). Even though I trash talk her like crazy, I think our friendship has grown stronger.

And this past weekend, I was able to play against one of my former opponents, Jimmy. He was in town for the weekend and invited some friends over to play games. Apparently his memory is bad because for some reason he thought he could beat me at Dr. Mario. Wrong! He claimed exhaustion from running a marathon that day, but pullease. Yes, he could barely move his body, but his fingers were still nimble.

As you can see, this game brings out my evil side. Usually the whole room ends up rooting against me, cheering for whoever my opponent is. But, you know, I guess it's always lonely at the top. It's just Dr. Mario and me.