Happy Sunday, pinfolk, or whatever day you're listening. This is NYC Pin Pod, in which a panel talks location pinball in New York City and sometimes nearby surrounding areas. My name is Benjamin Furiga. My initials are BCF. And, man, I have had very little pinball bandwidth of late. My name is Eric Sweetland. My initials are HIP, and I'm a pinball tournament director in New York City. Hey, y'all. My name is Madeline. My pronouns are she, her, hers. My initials are MXL, and I made first seed at the most recent Winter Bells and Chimes season. Hey, this is Jess Warren. My initials are JLW, and I'm the co-captain of the Colliders and Trolls. On this week's pod, we'll run down a high-level view of local competition results from our winter break. We'll talk with Jess Warren about the Valentine's Day event that she and Eric hosted at Barcade Brooklyn last weekend. And in Ball 3, we will talk about what we did on our winter break. Let's get started. Let's talk about competitive pinball in New York City and nearby surrounding areas over the hiatus. I just want to start by saying we're not going to talk about every single event that happened in the interim right here. We're going to touch on a couple of big things. But the biggest thing that happened in the city, of course, was the IFPA North American Championship Series Theater Tournament that are the New York State Championships in both the open and the women's divisions. a lot of us ran hard at pinball this past year i'm probably going to talk about that a little bit in ball three as to what i did over the hiatus which was not a lot of pinball a lot of us ran hard at pinball last year to try to qualify for this in part because it was in the city in part because there were just a lot of events there were a whole lot of events this past year in the city, near the city, in the state, in places that you could get to. And so a lot of us ran hard at it. And I'm not sure anyone ran harder than Alex Kelly. And he won the Open Championship. He will represent New York State in Rochester in just a couple weeks at the North American Championship. miriam nadler the very next day won the women's state championship and i believe will also represent at the women's tournament then eric is that right do they play the women's tournament effectively concurrently with the open state championship tournament i believe the women's National is being held in New Hampshire, whereas the Open National is in Rochester. Do we know where in Rochester? Will it be the collective place that we interviewed a while back? It will. It will be at Zach's place. I mean, Zach's and Bruce's and Mark's and I'm going to forget two other owners right now off the top of my head, but at the RPC, I think there are five cooperating owners there. They have that. And then the following weekend is the IFPA Pinmasters Tournament right there at RPC. Wow. So the Rochester Collection, it's not just a popular state or national collection. It seems to be a very famous venue then. I think it's just become that. I'm not sure that it existed in its current form three years ago. The 2024-25 IFPA Women's North American Pinball Championship will be held Friday, March 28, 2025 at Port City Pinball in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Okay, so at the end of the month instead of at the beginning of the month and somewhere else entirely. But I believe that Miriam will go. Sam Hall was the runner-up in the women's division. And Eric, correct me if I'm wrong here, but I believe Dante Oliva was the runner-up in the open division. I think that's right. In terms of nearby-ish surrounding areas, on Saturday, February 15th, Lauren Berner Lawrence directed a pin golf tournament at a private residence somewhere up in the Hudson Valley. Nice. Fourteen players showed up and went through six holes of pin golf, cutting to a top four in the end. Gabriel Chazanoff from the city took home first place. Sam Hall got second place. I got third place, and Lauren Dackness came in fourth. All right. At least Albany represented a little bit there, huh? It was nice to have a good city representation. I drove up with Eric Rubinsky. I came back with Gabe and Sam. It was a scary, snowy ride. thanks, Gabe, for the steady driving through the snowstorm so that we could get back in time for Valentine's Day. Yeah, that was a harrowing, I would imagine, night to be on the road. It was. No tilting the car. On Monday, the 17th of February, the most recent season of Barcade Brooklyn Pinball League held its A, B, and C finals at its eponymous location. In the A division, Greg Fertel got first place, followed by Matt Falzone, Alex Kelly, and Matthew Grady. The B Division was won by Wes Ulfig, second place myself, third place Jonah Schlaes, fourth place Michael McNeila. And the C Division played a strikes tournament. Michelle Collimer came out with three strikes in this Progressive Strikes five-strike tournament, followed by Danny Spagnoli, Jose Garcia, and Michael Focus. Thanks to Matt Grady for directing and streaming and Jonah Schlaes for directing the latest season. A while back when we had Alex Kelly on the show and we were talking about how to make pinball more mainstream, he made the comparison to eSports. And a lot of that is adjacent to streaming. and with the filming rig well now pinball is on Twitch very regularly and we are more and more in those relatively current if you will or you know gamery venues for whatever that's worth but more people can watch the game, get a sense of what tournaments are like and that means more people might be joining our tent Silver Ball show me the future what upcoming tournaments do we have in 2025? On Monday, February 24th in Pinball NYC's Left Flipper Division, the first round will be contested of the new season, the 28th, I believe. We Colliders will go to Gebhard's Beer Culture to visit the Lion Persons. Intermission Dolores will be ever so slightly closer to At the Wallace in their new home of Monroe, and I do mean ever so slightly. It's about 150 feet down the street, but they will go to visit NYC FSA at the Wallace in upstate Manhattan. Balls of Steel will travel from Williamsburg to the South Slope to visit the Aristocrats at Rulo's. The Deluxe Horses will go to Solid State to visit the Mutants. The Pin Pals will go to McKenna's Pub to visit the two for-one-ers. Special When Lit will travel from their newish home of Rulo's to Barcade Brooklyn to visit another team that shares a home venue, Pinball Union. Parliament will travel from The Slope to Jack Bar in Williamsburg to play the lesser players. On Tuesday night, in the right flipper division, of pinball nyc the ball drainers will travel to milo's yard to face neptune's treasure trolls will have a bye week no quarters for laundry will visit danger danger at buttermilk the replays will head to williamsburg to visit the schlubs at jack bar Rest in Pinball, parenthetically RIP, will head way uptown to At the Wallace to visit the Harlem Globe Flippers. The Pin Babes will host the Butterballers at Birdies. And Scrapples Squad will head to Skylark to face the Pinister Six. On Thursday night at Jack Bar, starting at 8 p.m. sharp, Thursday Night Strikes will be met. And on Sunday, March 2nd, Silver Ball Sunday number 23 will be contested starting at 3 p.m. That's at Single Cut Beersmith's Astoria. As of February 21st, 2025, there are 273 pinball machines in New York City at 82 public locations. Thanks to the creators and users of Pinball Map for this data, here are updates from the past week. On Friday, February 14th, user ChocolateDinosaur went to Lucky Dog in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and said of their attack from Mars, the dollar collector is broken and they don't have any quarters because, yay, we're in the worst timeline. Also on Friday, an F-14 Tomcat was added to the lineup at Sunshine Laundromat. While removed were Star Trek The Next Generation, Attack from Mars, and The Big Lebowski. On Saturday, the 15th of February, user MerovNow said of the Foo Fighters a transmitter brewing offline with a broken flipper. Also on Saturday, user ChocolateDinosaur went to the bumper factory. They said Stranger Things has a really quick auto-plunge upon New Ball And Star Wars has a real weak plunger but plays great otherwise Also on Saturday, Batman 66 was taken out of single-cut Beersmith's Queens And a Godzilla was removed from the social Brooklyn also on saturday embryon and dialed in were added to barcade brooklyn in advance of v-gay following the event embryon and baywatch were removed on sunday february 16th user chocolate dinosaur went to rullos they said of red and ted's road show out of order tonight of Johnny Mnemonic extremely dark play field but with a movie that has 13% on Rotten Tomatoes it probably deserves it of James Bond they said playin' good even though I'm not and of John Wick they said Right Scoop is struggling a little bit they put a pretty cool mod on the Akira ramp cool bar also on Sunday user MFB went to Boat Bar, and reportedly the Adams family is saying pinball missing, and Guardians of the Galaxy backlight's broken, unplayable. On Monday, February 17th, user Chamber10 went to Barcade Chelsea and tells us that the Black Knight 2000 upper flipper doesn't work. On Thursday, February 20th, user Patrick, son of Tom, played the Theater of Magic at Barclay Brooklyn and reports trunk moves Also on Thursday, a cyclone was added to the lineup at Sunshine Laundromat User Dan Tastic commented, ride the cyclone And on Friday, February 21st, user Fox played the creature from the Black Lagoon at the Monroe and said, right flipper is busted. On Sunday February 16th 56 players gathered at Barcade Brooklyn for Valentine Day under the direction of Jess Warren and myself Jess is here Hey Jess how it go I had an amazing time I hope that everybody else did too Nice Definitely did I have to double check my math and make sure I didn't miss anything, but I believe we raised more than ever $2,916 for the Transgender Law Center from the TransLights for Trans Rights Silent Auction. Oh, yeah. $3,048 for the Ali Forney Center, which provides services to unhoused queer youth in New York City. Nice. That's an event total of $5,964, which does reflect a corporate double match. and now that we've run six events uh brings us just over twenty four thousand dollars across jesus that's fantastic twenty four thousand between those two charities twelve thousand nine dollars for a leo forney center and eleven thousand nine hundred ninety six for transgender law center so yeah still just about 50 50 that's great the the trans lights do you mind if i ask actually about the Translights for Trans Rights and how that came about. It's fun because it rhymes, but it's also, we always have these prizes at pinball tournaments and there are lots of giveaways at Valentine's Day, but there are also these prizes that someone donated that would be for the winner of a local tournament. These things have a silent auction, is that right? Correct. People can come by and bid on their items up until the last round of qualifying. This year was the same as the last couple with seven rounds of match play. We had 15 items this time. The centerpiece was a Elton John banner signed by Steve Ritchie that we got from Ben Ball. Heck yeah. And then we had two other banners. we had a signed, dialed in sticker and then everything else was actually Translites we had a ton this time I saw some that I had also not seen, I think I saw two Dungeons and Dragons Translites and I think also a James Bond that was one of the specific movie like Ellie backgrounds or Translites or something like that that looked pretty cool that came up, the first one right we did that at the at the first pin pride and the name just is so good it had to be done let me also just make sure that we've said this this was valentine's gay you pointed out that this is part of this was the fifth instance right of these or sixth instance of of these tournaments that you're talking about and upcoming is another one in a few months i would presume it's in june called Pin Pride. Do we know, do we have dates for that yet? We do not. It will be a day in June. We'll see. We're always hoping to go bigger and better, you know? How is your decision process for deciding on the charities? And then once the money is donated for potential donors, future or past, where does their specific donation go towards? So we've been supporting the same two organizations since the very beginning. The Transgender Law Center we chose because we wanted to do something specifically to benefit trans and gender nonconforming members of the community. So glad that we did, especially how things are going now. But did some research, found the Transgender Law Center, which is the largest national trans-led organization working to set all people free. Checked in with a couple trans friends, you know, to see if they had any other suggestions. And we decided to go with that one. They're doing the kind of work you would expect from their name. They provide legal services to incarcerated trans people. They're fighting for trans rights in court. And then they have a lot of programs that prioritize BIPOC, disabled, and HIV positive communities. They have some cool youth initiatives too. And the Ali Forney Center, we liked because it's local. We're helping people right here in New York City and really helping some of the most vulnerable people in our community. They're providing services to LGBTQIA plus youth who I believe are 16 to 22. Most of them have been kicked out by their families just for being who they are. And so they have a lot of short term and longer term supports to help. Ultimately, I believe about 80% of their clients become independent adults. One of the great things about working with the Aliforni Center was that, you know, being local, Jess and I got to go and tour their new facility in Midtown last fall and, like, directly see where everyone's donations are going to this amazing place serving four hot meals a day. It's got places to gather. they're building in medical facilities there's education stuff going on really cool nice and a cool makeup room that's pretty cool I want to know about like potential avenues for growth and means to do that over the past six events have you been able to I'm a big fan of graphs have you been able to plot the amount of money raised are we on a logistic curve is it leveling out but still increasing is it a linear increase when will you hit a ceiling where you hit too big a tournament to manage but you still want to keep raising more money i just have a spreadsheet i've not turned it into a graph it's generally on the up our first event pin fried 2022 we had 28 players at randolph beer and we raised 1500 Then for Valentine's Day 2023, we went up to 40 players and raised $4,000. And then we've kind of been in that range. Next was $3,700. Then we went up to $4,800, down to $3,900. And then this last one was just about $6,000. So significantly our biggest. Great news. I guess for some reason Valentine's Day has been out raising pin pride. I think part of that might be related to particular items in the Translites auction. We had that Jersey Jack banner this year and last Valentine's Day we had a signed Labyrinth playfield. And we've been managing to raise the player count in steps along the way. Now, this last time was 56. The first time was 28. We've gotten to double the original, and we hope we can keep taking it bigger because we have giant wait lists, and a lot of people want to come and join us. I also just want to contextualize for anyone who wasn't there or who might be a new member of the pinball community since after the pandemic, Pin Pride 2022 was the first big local event that I went back to, and I think that a lot of people went back to, seeing everyone in the community that I wanted to see again that I hadn't seen in a couple of years. And it also had that warm fuzzy about it too. Aw. Thank you, Benjamin. What if you raise the entry price, right? Because that could like up the amount of money you could raise, you know, that could potentially reduce the waitlist and that could potentially increase the earnings. But that also decreased the amount of people who could participate. Probably the waitlist could support it and all. But also, yeah, I do want to keep it accessible in all sorts of ways. Right. We also need a venue that can support it, which, you know, there's lots of rumors about two that might pop up very soon. but until those exist, we need a venue that could support something bigger than this. This was the biggest possible venue right now because they added two machines to Barcade, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah. They wrote in... Thanks, Jeff. Yeah, thanks, Jeff. And to Grady and Billy, all our techs, and Grady for streaming, which was really great. And Eddie for funding. First time this year. Yeah, yeah, it was a great day. I thought about raising it, But I really like keeping it accessible to everyone and then just encouraging people to donate extra, which a ton of people do. Nice. Sometimes with their registrations or after. Also, often a lot of the winners donate their payouts. We have modest payouts and then hardware for the top four. After the seven rounds of qualifying, the top eight made it to a pop-style finals and Dante Oliva took the day. followed in order by Adam Robinson, Jonah Schlaes, Matt Grady, Chris Caffaro, CJ Smith, Danny Spagnoli, and Amy Poulin. Nice. And I got last place. Sorry, frowny face. I've had a great time. Me too. That's what matters. I was in the middle of the pack, and I had a great time. jonte got a pro badge for fantastic adam got a weekend pass to pin baltimore brady got an entry to pin fest in allentown and jonah got an entry to kate martin's pinberg satellite tournament coming up in berkeley super cool love the love the donated prize support to the the the thing that that other communities and other people in our community can do. And that was something that I was so excited to see this year. I was kind of a little nervous, you know, about how things might go, you know, as I'm going around asking people to give me stuff. But as I said in my speech, I saw no sign of retreat whatsoever from anybody in the pinball community. You know, all the pinball companies were like happy to donate stuff. Arcade continues to be amazing. Match play has the trans flag on it. I saw that! Love it. And the IFPA itself also coming out with its inclusion statement and seeing how well that was received in the community has been heartening. Ball three! Y'all, I am proud to say, just like Latissimus dorsi, it's good to be back. It has been, I think, six to eight weeks since we've all met again together. And we have a chance to share some various adventures and outings that we've all had in the meantime. I know I had a great time playing through all six of the Bells and Chimes Winter League. And I'm also curious, Benjamin, Eric, how have you been in the meantime? It's been a minute. You know, I mean, to just answer. You played pinball? I mean, I've been okay. I haven't played that much pinball. There's been some pinball. There's not a week goes by that there's not some pinball. But in terms of just how I've been, I've been okay. I've been a lot of a curmudgeon this winter, that's for sure. I've been hibernating. As I alluded to in ball one, when we talked about the New York State Championships, man, I ran hard at pinball events last year. And I do not have the social battery that is required to go at it as hard as I did. And so I've spent a lot of time either hibernating or choosing my pinball moments for when I can just go play by myself or meet one person and hang out and play as opposed to going out to tournaments. I played Guns N' Roses. I think it was a collector's edition, the Jersey Jack, in my hometown when I was there over the holidays and that was something of a highlight although I played exactly one game it took about 20 minutes as usually happens on a Jersey Jack game even though there was an end of stroke switch issue with the left flipper you couldn't keep the the flipper did not stay up you would hit the button, it would actuate and then return that was kind of the highlight other than one thing that I imagine Eric and I might both talk about. Again, I had a real social bandwidth issue and I was a little bit of a jerk. Honestly, I didn't realize I was being a little bit of a jerk when we went to the grand opening of the Red Hook Pinball Museum. A mutual friend who may or may not have also joined this panel on this episode sent me a screenshot of something that indicated that there was a grand opening of a Pinball Museum in Red Hook at an address that I recognized to be Seabourn, which used to have pinball in the back I knew that it was going to be a little crowded and a little weird in the back room but I walked into the joint and immediately announced at full volume to Jess and Eric I will not last long here And came to find out later that I walked past a sign that said that this place was closed for a private event into somebody's birthday party which was also coincidentally the grand opening of this pinball museum and that i apparently walked into the you know the birthday party of a dude i didn't know and immediately announced to anyone who would hear me that i was not going to last very long here uh so i i you know i i came to realize i was a little bit of a jerk uh as as the evening went on that i was not just defending my right to be an introvert but that i i actually just like was completely oblivious i i was told by other people who joined us there that like they didn't come in at first and texted people because there was a sign outside that said closed for private event and I 100% blew right past it like I fucking owned the joint. And then announced at somebody's birthday party that I was not going to last very long. I also had a really nice glass of scotch and hung out with friends that night. It was a fine night. I felt a little awkward. And I will, by the way, go back to that place. I played exactly one game that night because it was just too crowded. It was just too crowded for me. To be comfortable. Not, apparently, for other people who were there. I'm glad they were having fun. I couldn't handle it. That's on me. That's not on them. It's really neat. We've got that lineup of EM machines in the city. And I really look forward to, you know, the next time they have an open night, they have an irregular schedule, I understand. It was not, you know, from a pinball player's perspective, not the night. to go there and check it out. Right, right, right, right. There were just so many people in that tiny space, which is attached to an equally pretty tiny bar. It used to be the kitchen of the tiny bar. Yeah, that much is obvious. And as I understand, the Al's machines used to be back there, too. They were really pretty machines. Yeah, beautiful. They had skirts on them. I did not notice that. That's lovely. It was really cool. And apparently one of the owners of the group made the skirts for them. And then you can, you know, have some storage under there and not have to see it. Right. It was a very cute idea. And there was a bar top flipperless, you know, pin machine that you could play. That was really cool. Nice. Neat place. Yeah. Yeah, indeed. I'm going to look forward to really getting to go and check it out. Yeah, yeah, dig into it, but not in that environment. Well, it was most certainly a memorable party, I think, Benjamin. Everybody will remember that night. Yeah, everybody will remember the fucking jerk who walked in with a jacket and shouted to the room, who wasn't invited, who shouted to his friends that he wasn't going to last very long here. There's the crossover event that Benjamin and I both attended, And more or less I've been at the nonstop pinball in the interim. Over the holidays, I spent a couple weeks out with my parents near Seattle. Only got to go and play in one pinball tournament while I was there. But had a good time at the Icebox Friday Night Strikes. It was a random seating for the first round. They get Swiss after that. and I drew Dave Stewart, an awfully good pinball player, on Pulp Fiction, and I wasn't optimistic. I was player two. It was his ball three, and he got up to around $4.5 million when the TD came over and tapped him out. And I got to make a run at it, but I was under $100K, I think, at the time. I didn't get there, obviously. And the TD then gave me an adorable little pin, an enamel pin, a gold star that said, I tried. And then several rounds later, playing Congo against another great local player whose name escapes me, he also got tapped out. And I had one ball to try to catch and did not. and the TD asked if I wanted another pin. And I said, no, thanks, one's enough. And she said, I've never had to give it to one person twice. Oops. Swiss pairing. Madeline, what about you? Or unless, Eric, do you have more to... No, I mean, you know, what else? I played the Barcade League, playing in the South Slope League, did the South Slope selfie thing, did a few of the Thursday Night Strikes. Jess's, Rob Wong's, and South Slope's strikes, always helping out with those. And of course, we were putting Valentine's Day together, getting ready for the big party. So then, Madeline, what about you? Oh, well, I spent the New York City part of my time playing in the Winter League of Bells and Chimes. And I've come to realize I was doing a lot of thinking, you know, as I do. And I brought this up before. MMA fighters have this strategy called overloading, which just means you do a lot of fake outs. And that tires out your opponent's brain because their senses keep having to think they have to react. they don't have to react, they think they have to react, they don't have to react, so their brain gets tired. And so I've tried to apply that concept to pinball. Also, one we've mentioned with Alex Kelly being on the show, I always like to have a high pulse rate. Hopefully you can get your adrenaline going, and similar to how if there's an MMA fight that goes for too long and your brain gets tired, your reaction time goes down for fighting as well as for pinball. So what I've realized with all of that is that I can do really well in a Bells and Chimes event because it's five games within like an hour and a half, you know. And because it's a relatively short amount of time, my adrenaline doesn't dump out. I can keep my heart rate up pretty well. As long as you wear your winter coat and stay warm enough, things go actually pretty darn well. I'm really quite pleased I got the first seed. I had the most points overall as well as best of four. And I think some of that was me trying to min-max and play some alternate strategies i think if you don't mind my selling you out this way that i saw uh that i saw photos of maybe your selfie league card in the wrong place on Banzai Run what happened okay so i also joined so um kate also organized the selfie league and that's cool because that's asynchronous pinball you know i always like to sign up for the alternate formats of things you know i played the the dnd tournament that lauren had hosted a while back and i played the pin golf that the horses had hosted a while while back and so i was like asynchronous pinball let's give it a go i got my selfie card and i realized that if you try to take it you know the way you first might where you hold up the card with one hand, your phone in the other, and you try to take a picture of the score, that because the venues are usually so dark, you need a really wide aperture to let in enough light. And because of that, you have a really shallow depth of field. And because of that, only the score or only the selfie card are in focus. So what do you do? Well, you have to have the selfie card and the score in the same plane. So me being a smart cookie, and maybe not so smart in a minute as you'll see i got the idea to place the selfie card on the upper right or upper left corner of the glass whatever's closer to wherever the dmd or the screen is so that way when you take the picture everything's pretty much in the same plane of focus and you can see the card the number and the score at the same time simple also you don't have to keep worrying about like whipping out the card before the screens flip on the on the on the on the machine you just leave the card there you take a picture you move on however on Banzai Run the scores are not where they usually are because where the scores usually are there's more pinball which is kind of nice you get you get you know one and a half times as much table so i think that you know that's a good value for for your dollar there yeah also very different axis very different gravity equation yeah some 2D chess, some 3D chess, 3D pinball, you know. Anyways, so I was like, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. We can't have the pinball scores be like three feet away. So I need to like position this card a little bit better. And so instead of laying the card flat on the glass, I turn the card 90 degrees, just like the back half of the pinball table in Banzai Run, and I lean it against the glass of that part of the table. However, and this part isn't my fault, The distance between the edge of the glass and then the edge of the pinball table is not trivial, okay? There's a good centimeter and a half of space that I didn't know existed until I pushed my card all the way to the end of the table. And then it fell into the table on top of the... So it was like on the playfield? It was on top of whatever the posts are that separate each of the rollover switches. so it was in the behind the glass it was underneath the glass in the playfield area how did you get it out well see this is this is one of those things where it's like you wouldn't have to be you know this intuitive or nonsensical to solve your own problems if you just didn't create these problems in the first place so i got to thinking for a while and eventually i realized okay, we need something that will span the distance and we need something that will connect whatever's spanning the distance to the selfie card. And that will also pull it out of the same sized hole that it fell into. And it has to be kind of flexible because the path it fell down is kind of crooked. So I go to the bar and I get a straw. And I feed the straw into the same gap and I'm sort of messing around and I'm like, okay, okay, the straw matches the distance. We still have to pick the thing up. and then I go back to the bar and I ask the bartender, I'm like, hey, this is a weird question, but do you have any tape? And he pulls out an old roll of masking tape and he just hands it to me. So then I take the straw and then I take the roll of masking tape and I wind the masking tape around the straw so the sticky side is outwards. And I have to maneuver the straw down through the gap of the glass with the sticky side down and try and spear the selfie card using this really old masking tape with this you know thin plastic straw through this very crooked space and as you're poking down you know the the there's actually very little surface area right if you look at just the outline looking down the axis of the straw it's only that little bit of plastic and so now it's like wait a minute wait a minute and so i pull it back out i bend the straw the last centimeter so it's like a little hook and i wrapped the tape around that it's like now we have more surface area oh but now this this thing is bendy so now it doesn't stick as well as you And so it's a whole, and then I have to rotate it 90 degrees. So that way the corner of the straw still has that tension in that direction, but it's bending the other direction. And I just look like an utter fool, right? And so, yes, Eric, a question. I was just going to say, you know, this is amazing ingenuity constructing the tool. I guess the first tool I would have thought of was Ed. right that's that that's where my head is at too is like uh so we did all of this because we didn't have the keys uh yes again in general in any sort of home repair uh well if you have the tool the job is easy but the trick is how well can you do the job without the perfect tool this this is the definition of hacking i believe this is what a hack is a hack is you use a tool that was not designed to do the thing that you are, you know, it's a hack. And it was a little risky because what if you drop it further and then it doesn't reach and when you try and pick it up, obviously the plane of the card is perpendicular to the axis of the straw, but you're trying to get it out all in one axis because the slot of the glass and yada yada yada. So I'm like maneuvering and I'm like twisting with one hand. I'm trying to fit my pinky in the other to sort of dig it out. and eventually I get just enough purchase that I can sort of peel out the selfie card. And as soon as I do it, like all the like, you know, sort of locked in like tense breathing quiet not moving I just like just you know that facade just goes I pick it up and then similar to your story Benjamin I just forget where I am and I like Let fucking go I'm going and let's go! And everyone's looking at me and I'm like, I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry. Look at the fucking thing! This is a fucking shot! I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I can't believe you actually got it. That's amazing. That's cool. Nice job. What was unfortunate is that I dropped the card at the beginning of Bell's. Bonsai was literally the first game I had played, like at 7.55, and then I dropped the card in there, and I'm like, I've been here like seven minutes. I'm so sorry, y'all. And then I believe we text Ed or somebody, but because it was not on the play field, it did not interfere with play. Bonsai was still in play for that evening with no negative results. Gotcha. Yeah. And then I got a good James Bond score. So I got a dollar and I fold it in half and I wrote my name and number on it with a Sharpie. And that was my selfie card for a little bit. Yeah. Cool. Now I get it. But anyways, to bring it back to the other pinball with the selfie league finals, that was like four hours on a Sunday. And, you know, you only play like four or five games or something across a much longer period of time. And I just realized, man, I got to buy food. I had like oranges and a loaf of bread in the fridge. I got to go to work tomorrow. My brain wasn't in the same place. And so I realized if I'm playing at a longer tournament, I got to change up how I'm preparing for a longer tournament versus a shorter tournament. I had a great game on the Buttermilk Godzilla. The other four or five games, I was really tired. But that one Buttermilk Godzilla, I broke 300 million. I'm not joking. And I was like, oh, nice, nice. We're awake. And then your adrenaline dumps back out again. You're like, oh, yep, yep, this ball is moving faster again. Let's talk about briefly my time in San Francisco. I went to three different pinball venues in San Francisco. I went to Free Gold Watch. I went to 440 Castro. And I went to Mauna Loa, which was a bar. Free Gold Watch has 60 pinball tables. Really, really beautiful collection. The employee was closing for the night, and I got there in the last hour. So he was a little tired. But the collection is really nice, like premium everything. I'm not joking. It was really, really cool, and I got to play a bunch of the Jersey Jacks, like the Labyrinth and the, what's it called, the Wizard of Oz that I'd never even seen in person before ever. I got to play the 007 classic pinball version of the James Bond. So good. I know. I was like, holy cow, this is real. I knew it was real, but it's not real until it's in front of you. Yeah, when my fingers are on the flipper buttons, that's when it's real. Yeah, that's ellipsism. No, I'm kidding. but what was cool about that venue was they had a bunch of classics as well as moderns as well as indie tables and they had some traditional arcade things they had some mini bar top arcade cabinets they had a modern mario kart they had a modern star wars um just regular arcade uh video game console so you know for people who are sort of adjacent to the pinball sphere maybe you go in for the the more traditional arcade games and you stay for the pinball which i appreciate it as a business approach. Another night I went to 440 Castro, which is in the Castro neighborhood of San Francisco, a very famous traditional gay neighborhood. And I walk in as I'm waiting for the bar. Some dude is like, hey, do you want to sit and have a drink? And I'm like, I don't think I have what you want here. I mean, this is like reverse trans panic in a way. I mean, no, I'm kidding. That's terrible. But I mean, I mean, you know, if I ever like remake Tinder, it'll be like I can turn straight men and straight girls or gay men and straight girls or something. No, that'd be terrible. Anyways, but I'm playing Jurassic Park, which I haven't played in a very long time. And then some other dude comes up and I play against him. And so, you know, I try to get the modes. Just Data East or Stern? The new one. Okay, Stern. Stern, Jurassic Park. And I'm going for modes. I don't really know what I'm doing. And this other dude, he gets like three different multi balls. Like, I'm not joking. I don't even know what they were, but I was leading in score for a bit, like just for fun, for context. I ended the night with like 80 million after that first game and we beat the replay score. And this dude was going second. He ends the night with like 150 million. But he makes like like 100 million in the last ball with the multi balls and jackpots and stuff. And so we were chatting about like other pinball venues in San Francisco and stuff. And, you know, that was kind of fun. And then I went to Mauna Loa the same night, which is a very fratty bar. I was talking to some finance bros, I think, while I was playing the Simpsons pinball party. And that team, I don't know how to play either. But literally, while I am talking to these finance bros, I do the slide save and I go, because I was trying to not lose the ball because I was trying to get the frickin TV multiball or whatever it's called. Oh, yeah. Because it would have taken me a while. Yeah. I look like such a badass doing that because I did the slide save. I don't think that's like conceivable for most people. Right. And I'm just talking like, yeah, the blinking shots you want to go for, you can cradle, you can post pass. You know, I was able to do one of those on command. Oh, yeah, this shot's kind of hard. That is instantly hit the left lane, left orbit. And they're like, oh, you're cooking, bro. You're cooking. And I'm like, shucks. I mean, hey, for more, come check out New York City pin pod, you know, whatever. Yeah. So thank you. It was it was it was kind of fun to just to to be on the other side of the country and still be sort of doing the same thing and and spreading the culture, you know. So my story that is not pinball related, my flight that was supposed to be like five hours ended up being seven hours. There was a lot of snow and such taking off and landing, exceptionally bumpy landing. But I am super, super tired at this point. Right. I'm jet lagged in the other direction. I've just spent the whole week in St. Louis. I was in St. Louis. I went to the classics part of their city museum. There's a bunch of tunnels which are really terrifying, but really fun to crawl through. yeah that place looks so neat I've always wanted to go there I really want I think it'd be like such a power move to like have my wedding there and like make the guests like crawl through a tunnel to get to the venue where the wedding is or something like I when you when you just when you first you said you sent a burst of photos no context on purpose and right and one of the first couple of ones was your feet and I was looking down a tube and my first thought was at that weird museum in saint louis i didn't know where you were yeah that's awesome cool i i immediately like made sure i was wearing like just a t-shirt and shorts in the middle of saint louis winter so i could have like the maximum amount of volume and i almost got stuck exiting one of the tunnels because it was like through tree roots and so it in a regular shape. A lot of those tunnels, they're 45 degrees declining and there's just no lights. It's crazy. It's kind of scary in a way, but also... Maybe not those ones. I literally just yeeted myself into the first tunnel. I didn't even know where I was going. You're just crawling around concrete in sub-sub-basement levels. There's no lights. It's really crazy. I don't know if any of you know Meow Wolf or whatever that grocery store in Las Vegas is called where it's not a grocery store. It's like this sort of surreal whatever. But yeah, it's one of those just exploratory museums or whatever. It was a great time. They had a great classics collection on the third floor that I got to try out for free. It was like $6 add-on for a free play of like 13 machines. So definitely get your value. So anyways, I had been in St. Louis for the weekend to see my grandma. And I had been to San Francisco to see some of my friends. I went to Berkeley to see the birth house. We have a seven-hour flight. I'm really exhausted. I'm really motion sick. I'm just like, I want to go fucking home. Let's just get me fucking home. I also got a few of my cats. And as I'm walking out the doors of JFK, you see some dudes who are like, hey, anybody need a taxi? And I'm like, listen, you're not the taxi. And I go straight to the taxi stand. and I see some dude who's like, hey, anyone need a taxi? I'm like, yes, please, I'll take a taxi. He's like, excellent, come with me to the taxi. We immediately start walking away from the taxi line. And I'm like, bro, what's going on? Where are you parked? Oh, just right over here, right over here. And I'm like, and we come over to this white van that has Texas plates. And I'm like, this is not a taxi, bro. And I'm about to turn around. And then I see the dude's girlfriend asleep in the driver's seat. Oh, no. this is probably not as publishable but i was like fucking hell okay fuck it i got in the fucking van okay why did you get in the van i don't know okay okay so you i mean i see you you're home you're alive uh well now i owe a couple thousand to a russian mafia no i'm kidding i have to pay in rubles i don't even know how to find a ruble no i'm so sorry um but right i'd like to think i can read people pretty well i see i work with kids all the time i work with you know adults who try to play poker faces but can't and my initial read of the people is that they were okay people i mean this is objectively dumb you're getting in an unmarked car not even lyft or uber with a bunch of strangers and i tell them my home address and then they type it in. But in spite of those series of red flags, this ended up being an absolutely absurd journey because these people are like my age and they're like trying to just like make a dollar. They clearly have not done this before, right? The dude's asking like, hey, is the heat on? Are you warm enough? And I'm like, oh, shucks, dude. Yeah, it's great back here. At one point, I like uncrossed my legs. He's like, whoa, do you need more space? And then he tells his girlfriend, hey, are you able to scooch up your chair? And I'm like, oh, thanks, dude. No, I'm good, I'm good. We're chatting about whatever you chat about in the car. We were just having actually like a pretty decent time. And they were from Long Island City and they went to LIC High School. And I teach at the neighboring rival high school in Astoria. And so obviously I'm still keeping my senses very aware. Obviously, I just shouldn't have gotten in the car in the first place. But what is what is funny about this is that they also don't really know where they're going. So he keeps showing me the map. He's like, is this the best way to get there? I'm like, yeah, just stay on the highway, dude. Yeah, you're fine. You're fine. You're fine. and we're just chatting and by the end of the ride which has been like half an hour he's like yeah I mean we found this job because my mom is sick and she's in the hospital and he literally opens his lock screen and it's a picture of his actual mother and obviously you can tell if someone's making shit up or not I mean obviously I'm saying this having gotten into a white van from Texas but we're having an actually really nice chat and then this dude pulls all the way onto the curb all four wheels onto the sidewalk in front of my building and then they're then they're trying to do the thing where it's like okay well how do you get payment and i'm like you know you want card you want you want phone and they're like uh do you have a venmo and i'm like sure what's your venmo and then they struggle for a bit and i'm like okay just just just give me give me the id and i punch in the id and they're like okay what's what's the number you want me to type in and they're like huh and i'm like and so i i looked at their other transactions and obviously the way you do is you start high and you you negotiate down i'm just like fuck it like here's here's the whole number so i can like leave and what's funny is that this dude is like very genuine and he's like oh thanks i'm sorry this is a hassle i mean you know my my venmo keeps getting flagged for fraud for some reason i just dropped the facade for a quick minute and i'm like that's because it's not a real taxi bro I'm putting the Venmo payment as taxi in quotes I got into an unmarked white van with Texas plates with two strangers from the airport I gave them my home address I only did this because it's 12.30am and I'm really tired I get my bag and I leave and I shut the door I see the dude's hand is extended because he wants to shake hands and apologize and I feel bad and I reopen the door and I say I'm sorry to leave you hanging and I shake his hand and I shut the door and I go inside my building obviously this sounds like I was just getting sob story they were actually a very like if they weren't running this sort of thing i would actually want to like hang out with them like i'm not joking so anyways that's how i got home uh back to my building at about 12 35 a.m as of this morning of recording and uh gave a lot of life advice to uh people being uh taxis that's all for this week's pod i'd like to thank jess warren for joining us today to discuss v gay join us next week when we will run down local competition results including the first week of the 28th season of pinball nyc in ball two i believe we'll discuss sunshine laundromat as a pinball venue and in ball three i believe we'll talk about some of the potential crossover between pinball and gambling and kind of how that all works out. Between now and then, whatever you're up to, go get them, pinfolk.