Cyberball was just about the only football game that I ever enjoyed. Mainly because instead of using real players your humanoids were replaced by robots. Robot football, that's a winning proposal right there. Real football but with robots. Awesome. 

The deal with the game was that you played under somewhat standard football rules except instead of downs you had to cover 50 yards of the field while the football went from cool to critical. When it reached critical status it would explode if the player holding it was tackled. 

One of the cooler features of Cyberball was that the game was like two cabinets connected together so that two folks could play at the same time either against each other or together as teammates. That's where my story begins.

I was at the airport arcade and I was rocking the Cyberball like never before when this kid came up and popped in a quarter, challenging me to a match! I was doing well that and was totally up for some competition. The kid was decent but I was so on the ball that day that I was trouncing him and having  a great time doing so. 

There is nothing better then beating someone that you don't know at something he must have been sure that he was going to beat you at. I mean, why else would he have challenged me if he didn't think that he was going to beat me down?

Me and the kid went at it feverishly we dumped quarter after quarter into the machine while I waited for the plane. We didn't talk outside of a little back and forth trash, nothing major just a little "how you like me now?" or " In yo face!" that sort of 80's trash talk stuff. 

I never asked him where he was from or where he was going and he never asked me either. We were into the game. I felt like I was representing California against this upstart from who knows where? I had a vivid imagination when it came to competition. I saw every game I played against someone else to be of similar importance to the 1976 Olympic basketball finals.

A full game of Cyberball took six quarters. That was a lot at the time. That's still a lot for me to spend on an arcade game but for the sake of competition I was down to do whatever it took to win. Even spend a 1.50.

The game between me and the kid wasn't even close and I wanted to win pretty badly but as the game got close to the end my dad came barreling into the arcade because our plane was about to board. I was ahead at the time and felt that I should be declared the winner because my reason for leaving was completely out of my control. 

Of course the kid didn't see it that way. He thought that since I was leaving he should be declared the winner and in my wise old years I have come to think that he was prolly right. I was tapping out. Sure I HAD to tap out but I was tapping out nonetheless. I wasn't so enlightened back in the day and argued as intelligently as I could at 15 that I was ahead at the time and since I had no choice about leaving it wasn't my fault. That's the ultimate excuse of the young. It wasn't my fault. In your own mind it absolves you of anything.

My dad was patient but the he knew that the plane wasn't. He gave me as long as he reasonably could (4 or 5 secs) before yanking me along to our terminal. Man, I can still remember that. I was so bummed. Beating a stranger at a video game is the lick and it didn't really happen to me all the time. Hardly ever really.