The Goodluck Boy

Last night was a good night. Since it's getting dark so early and the mosquito's are as thick as penguins, the kids and I went down for an hour of fun. (Note: I've got no idea what "thick as penguins" means!)


85,060 is not quite my best score ever on my Top Score (I'd gotten over 100,000 6 months ago when we first had it), but it's pretty good. I had a sweet 2nd ball where I had all of the bonus credit "balls", and spent about 2 minutes trying desperately to hit the "score bonus" and racking up points. If I'd have hit the "score bonus", I'd probably been over 100,000.

Unfortunately, the free credits aren't working - there's no "knock" or credits register. Matches "knock", but there's no credit register. 2 things for me to fix - someday.... once I figure out the schematic.

Anyway, how did I score so high? My little Goodluck Boy wanted to play and help out.


I set up a stand for him by my left arm, and showed him how to hit the button. He helped with a few flips, but mainly wanted to race his Lightening McQueen car and hit the glass. But, either way, he got me back in the groove. :)

"Grape KoolAid Party Night in the Basement"

When I was a kid, a mini family tradition was to make popcorn and grape Kool-Aid and watch a movie together. As an adult, my wife makes fun of me for this, but indulges my nostalgia (and taste in Kool-Aid.)Friday Night, my daughter asked for a "Grape KoolAid Party Night in the Basement", and we complied. I set up our new MacBookPro to play out on our Gateway 31" monitor, and fired up "Blades of Glory" (funny!)

We didn't get through more than 5 minutes before most of the popcorn was consumed by the William monster, and Will Farrell and Napoleon Dynamite were beating each other up. And so, the movie went off, and it turned into game night.

I got half a man on the Green Beret before the kids wanted to me to play. Jenny played the 6 credits left on the Top Score. I sat on the floor and played and watched Jenny "work" the machine. Damn, she got a 58,000. I haven't gotten that high for months. She was cooking. Nothing sweeter than your woman playing some serious pinball when she's in that "stance". :) (You know what I'm talking about...)

Anyway, so, when she ran out of credits, it didn't take long for me to work on the bad switch I have on the credit unit with the "credit card" trick. (I've been too lazy/scared to try to readjust the bad switch, as it's been readjusted a few times already before I owned it, and the metal seems ready to break.) Nothing like having a good reason to do some tech work, eh? Had to get that "stance" back!

All in all, my son and I stacked a lot of blocks with my daughter, she even played a little pinball, and we had a great night. Once the kids were in bed, I went down and played a few games before I shut everything down. My best at Top Score was 26,000. I only got 34,000 on Green Beret. I'm out of practice. *sigh* So, I shut them off and went up stairs to finish the rest of the movie with Jenny.


Even with the bad scores, Friday was a good game night. :) Thanks Grape KoolAid!

Family night in the basement.

Cool, only took 6 days this time to get back to the basement.

After a few crazy days of Parent's as Teachers meetings, errands, going to Seattle, recovering from Seattle, going out swimming, frozen banana pops, etc. ... well, it was time to have some family fun.

Jenny actually decided to pop some popcorn, cue up the Tivo, and come down and visit the basement with me and the kidlets. That meant I had a little time to work on the Lock N' Chase (see next blog).

Here's her and my daughter playing my Top Score pinball.


That's the Konami Jail Break cabinet in purple behind them. The circuit boards (PCB's) and Priority Mail boxes you see stacked everywhere, from left to right, are

• a Konami-JAMMA adapter,
  
• a Yie Ar Kung Fu, Scamble,
  
• a Time Pilot '84,
• a Combatribes (JAMMA), and
  
• an Amidar.
  

Note to self: I really need to figure out a storage method for my boards.

Of course, I almost got to play a complete game on everything!

• On my half-MAME'd system, I got in 1 man of Wizard of Wor in before my daughter wanted to play hide and seek.
• On my Green Beret (Rush N' Attack), I got my son to play a little, and then got 2 men in for myself, before he ran to where I haven't baby proofed.
• On my Jail Break, I got half a man before my daughter said she wanted to play pinball with me.
• On the Top Score (see above), I got 2 balls in against my daughter (she was winning), before Mom decided she wanted to play.
  

...and that's when my son wanted to watch pinball, and I found out he had a poopy diaper. Since it was his bedtime, I snapped the shot above, and took him for a fresh diaper and to read him his night book (Duck on Holiday).


*ah*, such is the life of the Cheap Daddy Arcade Blogger.