Little Ballie Hell

I took this photo of the inside of a kaleidescope and it reminded me of the game I play on Facebook called "Chain Reaction." Now keep in mind I am a 47 year old college-educated professional woman who has far better things to do with her time than to sit and click and watch hundreds of little colored ballies explode for points. Sounds rather mundane and mindless, correct? Well add me to the list of gamers - perhaps not the ones that are so far gone that they've superglued the controllers to their hands, or the ones who's faces have melded into the computer monitor, or the ones who tear off their clothes, paint their bodies in an array of pastel colors and run screaming down their neighborhood street repeating over and over "IT IS NOT GAME OVER, IT IS NOT GAME OVER." Nah, I haven't even begun to spiral down into that kind of game hell. I am simply in little ballie hell. See, the manipulative Spock personality who created this game realized that in order to draw in as many losers like myself who would sit and play this game for hours and hours would have to create a "nice" game, with soothing, serene sounds (like waves lapping at the shore or birds singing in the morning or those other lovely wake up sounds that are on alarm clocks which cause people to grab and promptly throw out of the nearest window - you get the idea) - the gag me sounds. Well, the creator (or creators because I can't believe that ONE human being possessed the absolute power to realize the control under which we players would fall) used the 'ol "gentle breeze blowing through wind chimey" sounds to lure us suckers in. See, the object of the game is to place the first ball in a position where the little colored ballies (and there are a lot of them) can "hit" that first one and create a succession of explosions, hence the chain reaction tag. No, not THOSE kinds of explosions - there is no blood and gore, no maiming, no decaptitations and the likes thereof (c'mon - do you think I'd be playing that kind of game? What kind of psycho do you think I am???) And as the succession of explosions is created, thus the point total climbs. And when the ballies explode, I hear those "gentle breeze blowing through wind chimey" sounds. But THEN, oh yes, there is a then and there is a catch. See, if you don't complete the level - explode the correct numbers of little ballies for that level - there is this "dah nah" sound which I have come to the conclusion is really the encrypted voice of an institutionalized former Chain Reaction player - long gone insane - who is saying to us losers: "you suck." Listen closely to the "dah nah" sound. If you popped that sound into some CIA/NSA high tech sound decoder machine, it would read out in large blinking yellow neon lights the words "you suck." So here I am forced to listen to "you suck" at the end of each level I do NOT complete which of course renders my brain even more mushlike than it already is from playing the game in the first place AND causes my rage level of not being able to get those effing balls to ALL explode to ratchet up a few notches above madwoman level. My foot has a life of its own when I play this game -it raises itself up, points itself right at my monitor and it is only with sheer strength that I hold it back from launching itself right into my monitor - for destruction and elimination of Chain Reaction game purposes, of course. Not to mention the complete annilation of my computer. This is what this game has done to me. I've become a frenzied hair-pulling gaming monster who hunkers down at night trying to achieve - what? Points? Is that what I am doing this for? All for points? You bet your ass I am. It is all about becoming one of "them" - those people who have managed to score enough points in this godforsaken game to make it onto the sacred list of "Top Ten Scorers." I made the mistake of clicking on the list of top scorers and nearly had a Michael Jackson (oh did I just say that???) when I saw that some of the, ahem, "top scorers" (I'm gagging here) managed to achieve a point total of 99 million plus. Now either those gamers have figured out that the game is rigged and have managed to unrig it, or those are the people aforementioned - the ones who probably have a cattle prod attached to them and shocks them every time they attempt to stop playing Chain Reaction. My high score to date is 63 million plus. I am the No. 1 scored just amongst my friends. Woopee DOO!!!! A few nights ago I had about 28 million at the completion of Level 11. I racked up 49 million for Level Twelve and had one little ballie left to explode and what do you think happened? It managed to avoid the ball it was SUPPOSED to hit, I FAILED to complete that level and then I heard that sound "duh nuh" - you suck. I ended up with some lame final score and went to bed mad. This game is making me crazy. I actually played before I wrote this blog just to get me in the mood. Imagine what I can do if I end up with 99 million someday. But this game has got me in its clutches. I hear it calling my name when I turn on my computer in the morning and if I forget to turn it off before I leave or work, it calls to me from afar. I have somehow managed to avoid playing it at work and do not attempt to play before suppertime otherwise my son would starve, wither away to nothing and DSS would come and take him away and the funny farm people would haul me away and put me in a room probably wallpapered with little colored ballies and sheet and towels imprinted with the words CHAIN REACTION just to make me crazier than I aleady am. I'm telling ya - this game is a prelude to a frontal lobotomy. Perhaps I should find a hobby before I succumbe to the alluring sounds of the "gentle breeze wind chimey sounds" and finally fall head first into the abyss of little ballie hell.