What makes a man?

I was into surprisingly average and pedestrian stuff as a kid. Surprising, you see, because I am now such an eccentric genius. Although my mother would certainly take offense, I have fond memories of being raised by the television. I loved Mister Rogers and Sesame Street. I started to like Scooby Doo and Thundercats, and have since moved to Myth Busters and porn. A pretty obvious progression, I think.

I’ve never been much of a pleasure reader, but in my youth I enjoyed Choose Your Own Adventure books and Encyclopedia Brown. Presumably, I still would. Since finishing school, I’ve tried to read more (some Dan Brown, some Dean Koontz, the Harry Potter series) but I have way too nice a tv to waste time on that crap.

My favorite toys were Construx. They were a Fisher-Price building parts set with beams and connectors instead of traditional or locking blocks. They discontinued production in ’88, eventually sold the rights to Mattel, and Matter relaunched them for a couple of years in the ‘90s without a lot of success. Apparently, there is a vocal group of people who also loved these things, as evidenced by the surprising web presence. And the surprising web geeks who have pictures of shit they have made lately out of Construx. I would have posted a picture from this dork’s site, but I respect that he wrote “copyright” at the bottom of his page. I am considering putting in an eBay bid on one of the dozens of sets available. Also, I am considering moving into my parents’ basement and wearing a Star Trek uniform all of the time.

But the most formative influence on me in my youth was almost certainly the one-two punch of athletics and an athletically superior older brother. Those who know me might agree with the statement that I am competitive. This stems directly, I imagine, from playing sports from an early age. Luckily, back then it wasn’t okay to lose. We kept score, we knew if we got our asses kicked, we knew who the worst team was and we didn’t want to be it. This translates from the obvious competitions (gloating about sales statistics posted in the restaurants where I worked – and belittling the rest of the staff) and into a curious habit that I (and several of my friends) have of finding a way to make everything a competition. Remember when I tried to eat 5 pounds of cheese in an hour? On two different occasions? How about the hours spent in Schoen’s garage using a hockey stick to fire a tennis ball past a “goal keeper” (see also: drunk guy with a baseball mitt and canoe paddle)? WE ARE ADULTS! And yet, I am currently trying to talk the guys from Tuesday night basketball into driving to Elmira to challenge my brother’s team. I figure that now that he has had both knees reconstructed and is awaiting the birth of his second child, I can finally take him. If not, I’ll tell mom he cheated and he’ll get in so much trouble…