2000-12-20 - Night
When I first heard that Dave and Buster�s was coming to San Diego, I was scared. When the Union-Tribune described it as "Chuck E. Cheese for adults," I got really scared. When I was informed that it was just one of a number of humongous corporate food/entertainment complexes metastasizing through the U.S. from its home base in Dallas, I got really, really scared. (In my experience it's mostly the obscenely stupid and frightening things that come out of Texas--big poofy hair, the pluperfect hell on earth that is DFW, our next President, etc., etc.) When I learned that the organization I belong to was having its next event there, I left Scared behind and headed straight for Turning My Colon Inside-Out With Terror.
Well, dip me in shit and plant flowers on my chest. That was just about the funnest place I�ve been to in a long time. It�s like every arcade you used to go to when you were a kid, times 100, with alcohol. Lots and lots of alcohol.
God knows, the place oozes wrongness from every corner--from the sheer size of it (48,000 square feet of ecologically sensitive wetlands paved over so San Diegans can play video games and get drunk) to the whole sprung-fully-formed-from-the-marketing-department-of-Zeus atmosphere. And I just know that one day I�m going to turn on CNN and find out that the CEO gives money to the Phelps Family or the Baader-Meinhof Gang or the Illuminati or all three. But you know what? I don�t care. Call me a capitalist tool if you will, but if I can�t play Ms. Pac Man I don�t want your revolution.
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Saw a preview screening of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon tonight. Afterward, thoroughly blown away (GO SEE THIS FILM! AS SOON AS IT OPENS! DO IT!), I sat meditatively in the elevator and somehow managed not to gut-punch the film-school dweeb standing next to me who was saying, "Well, now, I really could have done without about 2/3 of the fighting."
Huh? OK, so it was beautifully filmed, too, and the (nicely understated) love stories were well-done. But clearly this is a man unclear on the concept. Any Chinese women out there willing to teach me how to float through the air and kick dudes like this in the teeth from 50 feet away? Miguelito is hiring.
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