Picnics and Games: Tips and Tricks

It's Memorial Day on Monday, which means that over the weekend, many gamers will be forced into the sunlight to enjoy the company of their family. One tip: wear sunscreen. We all know that we gamers burn like toast when somebody left the toaster on setting 6.

Beyond this general tip, gamers, I have a few other suggestions. Memorial weekend is a big cook-out weekend, involving BBQs and pot-lucks. Popular foods are macaroni salads, doused in salad dressing and filled with fresh vegetables; meats (in my case, it would be tofu) soaked in savory-sweet marinades; potato salads full of potatoes, eggs, and smooth mayo, touched up with mustard. Now I've made myself hungry. Anyway. One thing that all of these foods have in common is that it's incredibly difficult to game while eating them.

Your main rules are as follows:

• Phone and iPod games are your friends. You're going to be touching those two things anyway, so who cares if they get smudgy?
• Another friend is your DS or PSP. You can bring it with you, it cleans easily, is practically made to be smudged, and is beloved.
• Avoid the computer. If you aren't in love with your computer, I'm not sure you're a gamer. Do not let soda near it-- and all picnics have soda. Do not keep it out in the hot, sunny picnic area. Leave it at home and miss it fervently, but still leave it.
• Use a fork whenever possible. If necessary, skip the bun on the hot dog and/or burger and eat the damn thing with a fork-- wherever you physically hold a piece of food, there is a greater possibility of covering yourself with sticky ketchup and being forced to *gasp* put down your game.

These are your main rules to live by in a picnic setting. Additionally, I've heard of this retro thing that people do on Memorial Days sometimes. They play games on the yard, with horseshoes, or this game called cornhole which involves throwing a sack of corn into a hole for points. There's also this... badminton thing, which suspiciously resembles tennis from the anime Prince of Tennis. Someone is obviously ripping the Prince of Tennis people off. Anyway, your family might want you to play these... games. Are they still games if there isn't a microchip involved? I am not convinced. Try them and let me know what you think of these... non-video games.

What a strange concept.