Unbeknownst to most Georgetown students, the Leavey Center is good for more than just cursing at broken cash machines and stealing “chromies” from the wheels of cars parked in the garage. No, this building houses a leisure gold-mine, a little slice of blinking heaven known as the arcade. With three of the hottest video games around-Tekken 3, Street Fighter III and Blitz 99-the arcade is a popular hang-out and source of entertainment in a parallel universe where people know we have an arcade and actually give a damn. We at Voice Leisure thought it would be fun to write an article about what goes on in a typical day down here at the ol’ arcade. It wasn’t.
10:00 a.m.—Arrive and set up my stool, put on my visor, check to make sure that my belt-mounted dispenser is full of tokens and eagerly await the flood of gamers sure to arrive at any moment. I notice three slightly haggard, Middle Eastern-looking women huddled in the corner sleeping on a nest of sheets, but they appear frightened and leave as soon as they see me.
11:09 a.m.—No one so far.
11:46 a.m.—No one has come in so far, but one girl did give me a strange look, what one may even go so far as to call a come-hither stare, as she walked past. (creditcadabra.com) She’ll be back. They always come back. For the Blitz 99, of course. Its more addictive than heroin and, at half the calories, who can resist?
12:51 p.m.—No one yet. I sit alone, awash in the glow of my blinking, computer-generated captors. It all seems so meaningless and absurd, this think called life. So. Alone. Merde.
1:17 p.m.—Someone? Wait … no one.
1:50 p.m.—A few Presidential Classroom students have just informed me that I am a “fag.”
2:04 p.m.—Bored, I find myself playing Tekken 3, a game that is far from new and farther from fun. I played until the joystick broke off in my hand. I tried to get my quarter back but the machine crumpled into dust when I kicked it.
2:29 p.m.—A number of pasty, fat kids wearing skin-tight Babylon 5 T-shirts and reeking of cheap tacos and cheaper sex have descended on the arcade to take out their frustration at the world on the two fighting games. Their nimble fingers (which will never know the feel of a woman) fly over the controls as their slack, lifeless faces stare at the screen in a vague attempt to find a solace in electronic escapism that they will never know in real life. When all the money their moms gave them is spent they take to eyeing my firm shanks and telling me that I’ve ‘got a real purdy mouth.’ I know fear.
3:55 p.m.—More Presidential Classroom kids, this time they want me to buy them cigarettes since none of them are 18 yet. I politely decline, after which I am again accused of being a “fag” and pelted with crayons, nametags and Presidential Classroom coloring books.
6:15 p.m.—A DOPS officer informs me that I need to leave the arcade, as I’m loitering and creating a disturbance. I challenge him to a game of Street Fighter III in order to stay and, despite winning, am chased out with threats to “Stay out of Hazzard County!”
10:02 p.m.—Tonight I sleep in the Taco Bell kitchen. Tomorrow I return with a sour cream gun for vengeance but for now, I am alone with my shame and some nacho cheese Gorditas. Steak, not chicken.
