My Aviary Addiction.

Fellow members, my name is Mark Rothman, and I am an addict.
Not to any drug.
Or anything alcoholic.
Or an abusive lifestyle.
Well, perhaps it contains elements of all three.
It is a game.
And there is no athletic benefit to it as there is to Wii Boxing.
Just a game.
A very simple game.
Called Angry Birds.
I while away far too many idle moments of my life playing Angry Birds.
Making those moments even more idle.

Angry Birds is a game that has been embraced by the youth of America.
And as far as I know, the world.
This makes it one of the few things I have in common with the youth of America.
And as far as I know, the world.

Angry Birds is compelling.
I play it on my IPhone.
For the uninformed, what you do is you hurl birds of various sizes and degrees of dexterity with a slingshot towards stationary pigs of various sizes and no dexterity.
When the Angry Bird lands on the pig, or on the piece of construction that lands on the pig firmly enough, the pig is destroyed.
When all of the pigs are destroyed in the same round, you proceed to the next level.
The birds all make very angry sounds, and the pigs all make laughing grunts.
I really don't want to hear the very angry sounds, or the laughing grunts.
This is because it is annoying, and it tips my wife off to the fact that I'm wasting my time playing Angry Birds.
So I turn off the sound.
As the birds are on my side, I never get angry at the birds.
Only the pigs.

You're playing this game in the hope that you get to see pigs die.
Growing up in a semi-kosher home, this is virtually a natural rooting interest.
Each level is a sort of clever geometric puzzle, where you try to figure out how to obliterate all of the pigs with the few birds you have.

The frustration is when you try and try and can't obliterate the pigs.
The fun is when you do, and go on to the next challenge.
You always want to get to the next challenge.
Many times it is easy.
Some times it seems near impossible.

When I had my Blackberry, my addiction was Brickbreaker.
That was a pretty good game.
The main order of business there was to try to beat your personal high score.
But it wasn't really all that creative.
Nor did it make all those angry noises and laughing grunts.

Technology has improved since then.

A free app was offered on my IPhone for Angry Birds, and I downloaded it.
After a length of time during which I became thoroughly addicted, and went through all the levels, I was offered the pay version.

See? That's how they get you.
Just like a Coke dealer.
I had to shell out 99 cents for the upgrade.
I bit the bullet and shelled it out.
I went through all of those levels.

Then I was offered "Angry Birds Rio".
Another 99 cents.

I see more on the horizon.

Eventually, it's going to break me.

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My new book, "Mark Rothman's Essays", ones that were culled from the blog and are no longer there, along with a surprise bonus, is available for purchase.
Please e-mail me at macchus999@aol.com for more info.


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