Sometimes Life Works Hard to Imitate Art

Monday October 13, 2008 • Howard Tayler

I got the following email from reader Norman Baker:

So there I was, playing laser tag with a bunch of people. Mostly kids in their early teens, but a few people my age and a couple families, too. Since most of the people teamed up with their friends; logic says that it would be the best strategy for me, too. (Turns out that I did way better as a lone agent, second round, but oh well.) After a few minutes of recruiting, there were about six of us, in addition to myself. We were hunting down the other teams, and someone commented on the number of people we had that "this seems excessive..." My response, of course, was to cite rule 37. (There is no "overkill." There is only "Open fire" and "I need to reload.") In the sort of comedic timing that will never happen anywhere else, ever again, right as I was finishing the last words, we rounded the corner, nearly bumping into one of the families that was sticking together. Flowing just as smoothly as a practiced and rehearsed conversation, one person on my team instantly called out "Open fire!" and the first person hit responded "I need to reload!". I cracked up so hard that I was useless for the rest of the tagging.

As a long time reader, I know that Schlock's eyes are grown on trees. I was on honeymoon this past week, in Northern Ontario, near Inglis falls, when I noticed a strange plant.