So a few weeks ago, my car flunked its smog test, despite having very low emissions, by having the “check engine” idiot light burnt out.  This annoyed me because I’d have to pay for a retest after changing a light bulb.

Fortunately, in its Infinite Wisdom, California enrolled me in a program to get a free repair and retest, as long as I used one of their authorized repair places.  So I did.  They changed my idiot light (and did a couple of other minor things, like replacing my old vacuum hoses and futzing with the ignition timing), and retested the car.  It passed again, easily, though oddly the emissions were about double what they were in the earlier test.  And they billed the state almost $500.

I guess I should be happy, since I didn’t have to take apart my dashboard and I saved $60, but I can’t help but think perhaps my tax dollars could be better spent.

I wonder why the state has a budget crisis.

I played Braid this weekend.  It’s good.

At first glance it looks like any platformer, like Mario on LSD.  Most of the game has you running, jumping, and bopping monsters on the head.

Despite appearances, however, it’s more of a puzzle game than a reflex game.  The levels require planning, and thought, and ingenuity.  And, as promised, there is no filler — each level is truly new, so you’re not doing the same things over and over with different graphics.

Our protagonist in search of his Princess can manipulate time.  Mostly this means he can rewind time to undo actions, not unlike Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. But there are other gimmicks, too, like a slow-down ring, a shadow-self that repeats the action you just did while you do something different, or levels in which you control time with your own movement (right moves time forward, while left moves it back).

It’s intriguing, and fun, and interesting.  Some levels were hard enough that I moved past them and returned later, when I’d given the matter some thought.  The official walkthrough says, “Don’t use a walkthrough.”  And sure enough, one isn’t necessary, and it was satisfying to find the solution to some of the more infuriating levels without aid.

Most pleasing, and hard to explain, is the mood of the game.  The music is… dreary isn’t quite the word I’m looking for, but close. And our hero’s futile attempts to find the Princess seem somehow pointless and counterproductive.  In a good way.  I thought this game was commenting on games, but it’s really commenting on life in general.

I’ll be thinking about this game for a while.

Also:  The Princess is in another castle.

One of the more noticeable features of the ranch at Three Meadows is that we have a rope hanging from the cathedral ceiling in our living room.

We installed it because our little monkey children wouldn’t stop climbing the curtains, so a substitute that was less fragile seemed in order.  Now Mira always wins the pullup competitions in her class every year.  Go figure.

We installed a bell at the top, so a fun thing to do is to climb the rope and ring the bell.

I don’t know why everybody with a cathedral ceiling doesn’t have a rope hanging from it.  It’s cheap, easy, and endlessly entertaining.

One of the weekend activities was for the guests who read this blog to get a recap of a couple of recent posts.  Some of my girlfriends took me into the back room and dressed me in the infamous pants and put on eyeliner.

Note:  A great way to inspire envy in one’s male friends is to disappear into a back room with a bunch of hot women and come back wearing different clothes.

I haven’t seen pictures yet (if there are any), but I can’t help but imagine that I looked pretty darned gay.  But you know what?  I never mind being mistaken for a homosexual.  That’s flattering — everybody knows they’re better looking than straight guys, right?

What I think we straight guys really worry about is being mistaken for someone who gives a crap what he looks like. I’m always happy to wear whatever ridiculous thing my female friends pick out for me, as long as I don’t have to have any input.  Input implies choice, which implies caring, which implies a level of narcissism that just doesn’t seem manly.

But hey, if the chicks dig it, then whatever.

We tend to have a gathering at Three Meadows on Easter and Thanksgiving.  A few friends come over to spend the night, and we eat, chat, and hang out while kids run around underfoot.  It’s always a delight.

Starting last year we seem to have kind of given up on keeping the number of guests reasonable.  The ranch has lots of nooks and crannies, and we can actually bed perhaps a dozen overnight visitors pretty comfortably.  Nice!

Saturday we had at least 33.  It seems that everyone found a place to sleep, though I have no idea how or where.

You can have an awesome number of guests as long as they’re awesome guests with a sense of adventure.

For some reason somebody thought it would be a good idea for me to try on a pair of Mary’s pants. (They didn’t really fit, but they zipped as long as I sucked in and didn’t move.)

That led to this embarrassing photo. I have no idea what’s up with the shirt.

Sorry about the quality — it’s from somebody’s crappy mobile phone.

Back in the day, my partner Timmer and I used to clown on the weekends to relieve stress from long hours of coding all week. Full face paint, juggling, magic, balloon animals, and so forth.

It turns out I was never able to get all my makeup off around my eyes, so on Monday it always looked like I was wearing blue, um, eye makeup. (Eyeliner? Mascara? I’m not sure what it’s called.)

Oddly, I always seemed to get more female attention on Mondays, too. I don’t know if it’s because guys with eye makeup are sexy, or guys with eye makeup are probably safe to talk to.

Hey, I have clown makeup in my desk…

Sometimes I teach people to juggle.  Most people learn the basic jug in about 15 minutes.  It took me about 6 months.  I like to think that this shows that I’m a good teacher, and not an incomparable klutz.

I always recommend that people not bother to learn to juggle more than three balls. It’s much harder to do four, and nearly impossible to do five.  And it turns out, if you learn to do five (which I can’t), you know what the first thing a spectator asks when you juggle 5?  “Can you juggle 6?”

A layman has no difficulty naming a number of balls you can’t juggle, no matter how good you are.  (And he usually saw some guy on TV who could do even more.)

Instead, learn tricks.  They don’t have the terminology to name tricks you can’t do, so all they can do is be amazed.  Which is the point, right?

My friend Maria taught me a trick this weekend that probably everybody in the world already knew but me.  (No, not that. Sheesh.)   If you microwave chocolate chip cookies (and presumably others) for a few seconds, it turns them back into the warm, chewy, fresh-out-of-the-oven form that you always wanted in the first place.

And earlier this year I learned that you can microwave stale tortilla chips to make them un-stale.

Technology to the rescue!

Years ago, when Tod was an intern here, Mira loved playing Dungeons and Dragons with him (and the family), so we wanted to recapture some of the fun on his brief vacation visit.  We didn’t have much time, though, so we played Puppies! The Role Playing Game.

If we’d done it two days ago, it would’ve made an excellent fake Amazon purchase link, huh?

Our heroes are four puppies living in a pet store.  The conflict?  A mysterious woman who comes every single day to purchase a new puppy. Rumors abound in the puppy pen that she must be cooking them up for dinner.

Each puppy is unique.  Günther (who has Schwarzanegger’s accent) is fierce, but terrified of cats — and the kittens in the next pen.  Goldie can pee at any time — but also tends to piddle whenever reminded of it.  Gracie can open her eyes wide and look ridiculously cute, but her klutziness is legendary, and Bunzhole’s smart, but a bit cowardly.

Moments of hilarity included Goldie atop the puppy pyramid, getting the height to get free from the pen, when somebody at the bottom says, “Whatever you do, don’t pee!”  — triggering, naturally, a golden shower.  The stoned store clerk fails to notice a floor covered with bouncy, bouncy balls, and at one point Gunther is trapped in a flipped-over cardboard box.  And the chase scene through the mall is a classic.

Good times.