Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Pokemoning OKC pt. 1







Pokemoning Okc: The adventure and exploration.


"It's over there!"

"where?!"

"over there" I point to a back yard along the side of the road.

"oh I see it!" My friend, Steven whips out his phone and aims it at the back yard.

"did you get it?!" I ask grabbing his shoulder and turning him slightly towards me so I can see his screen.

"No." he said "I ran out of pokeballs"

"How? I have like 200 of them?!"

That's how it started, that's how my getting off work at 4am turned into an adventure of exploration. The plan, was to drive Steven to a few pokestops and get him some items what it turned into. Was so. Much. More.

We head towards my house as the sun began to rise and decide to head out on foot. I needed to pick up some smokes from a gas station down the road that have them for 75 cents off. If I'm going to get lung cancer. I'm going to get it as cheaply as possible.

I live between midtown, the Asian district and the Plaza. That should give you a pretty good idea of the area. We walk a ways before coming to our first pokestops. We loot it greedily preparing to head to the next stop.

Except we don't. We ourselves stop and look inside the record shop that isn't open yet and take a glance around.

"I've been meaning to come here and see if they have any Ray Charles records for my daughter, she loves Ray Charles but I haven't gotten around to it yet"

The place in all honesty, is a mess of old albums and records. Someone has attempted to put order into the chaos but it looks like chaos is gaining the upper hand. There are piles and piles of old record and one of those bass drums kids play in marching bands. Everything is old and you know if you walked in it'd smell of dust and cardboard. We take a few more seconds to glance around before we start heading down the street again.

We don't go far before hitting another pokestops. This time it has a picture of a trolley.

"why is there a trolley here?" I ask as I look around. To me this has just been the bus stop I see people sitting at when I leave for work. That's when we notice the plaque.

I stand and narrate as fast as I can the tail of the trolley that use to be on this side of town that would take students from here to the school that was north of us. That's when I notice the metal framed trolley art price that's slightly covered by bus stop and bushes.

"huh... That's weird, I never noticed this before" we take a quick gander and went about our way.

We make it to the gas station where they keep the more affordable death sticks. I pay and begin our walk again. We are headed to a park that looks similar to a dog bone Nintendo controller. I start to head for the cross walk but before I know it Steven is walking across the road.

"What are you doing!?" I exclaim as I go to follow him confirming my mother's suspicions on if my friends jumped off a bridge, I would also jump off that very same bridge.

"I bike everywhere dude, I don't have time for cross walks" Steven speaks as he meanders to the other side of the street with my inexperienced jaywalking tail trotting behind him. That's right, I'm a rule breaker now. No pokemon are off limits. I am a trainer that can't be trained. What next!? Going into a store with no intention of buying Anything!? Jumping a fence!? This was getting exciting.

Tuesday, July 12, 2016

5 Reasons You Might Want to Check Out Pokemon GO

Be Social: Pokemon Go compels you to talk with someone you normally wouldn't probably a LOT of someones. And it's a brilliant icebreaker. Seriously. You'll end up having a 10-minute conversation with someone you'd have little to no reason to say hello to, even in friendly Oklahoma. I've met more of my neighbors in the past three days than in three years and I'm damn outgoing.

• Engage with the world: When is the last time you really explored your neighborhood? I live in a historical area and It's a huge, wonderful world out there. Go explore it.

This is the Pokemon you always wanted: Seriously, the tech has finally caught up with the original spirit of the game, which is awesome.

Get off your couch: You have to actually move to make the game walk. Car rides don't add kilometers. Walking does, so does bike-riding. It makes me proud and happy to see my ENTIRE neighborhood out and about in the evenings. That's pretty magical. 

• The world needs more things that bring us joy: In light of the past week? There's plenty of bad news. I'm not saying that the bad news should be ignored or dismissed. I'm saying that in the absence of any positivity despair thrives. Don't let it. Find something that brings you joy and pursue it with wild abandon.

• Bonus Round: It's ridiculously fun. You never lost that love of a good scavenger hunt. This is an epic, global scavenger hunt. That's pretty fucking cool.

Once you join in, come find me in The Paseo. I'll be hunting Pikachu until he's mine!