As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a big-time arcade game champion. Ever since I was a kid, I've possessed a borderline supernatural skill level with all the classic titles. In many ways, this was my fate. You see, I was raised by a domineering single father, a washed-up pinball wizard who interpreted my freakish gaming prowess as a sure indication of the second coming of the messiah, when in reality it just turned out I was really good at Q*Bert. And there is, I'm told, a difference.

I truly appreciate all the emails expressing your heartfelt prayers and support as take on the biggest challenge of my life. As most of you are aware, I was currently laid off from my job testing videogames for PlayStation Magazine. I easily landed the job with my impressive gaming resume, but unfortunately as a child of the classic arcade era, my brain locks up and I spontaneously shit my pants any time I attempt to play a videogame involving more than two buttons. This embarrassing, uncontrollable, and crippling disability has inhibited me from climbing the corporate ladder in the industry I love, or even advancing past the title screen of virtually every modern video game. I guess I just wasn't made for these times...

My recent failures have placed extraordinary stress on my marriage. My wife Pauline moved out, taking with my only son Luigi with her, refusing to return until I can regroup. These developments have left me with a lot of time to reflect on the good ol’ days, that wonderful era when arcades were the hub of my universe. A time when I was somebody. A time when anything seemed possible, and the only thing that videogames cost me was a quarter and any hope of a healthy social life.

My first taste of Lady Fame came when local media outlets covered my electronic deflowering of a Pong Machine at in San Jose, CA arcade when I was just 6 months old. It didn't take long for the national networks to pick up the story, and before you knew it my father was pimping my skills across the country's burgeoning arcades with his specially rigged T.G.H. (Toddler Gaming Harness.™)

My big break came in 1980, shortly after I turned 6, when I showcased my masterful Centipede skills in a challenge of the hosts on That's Incredible!, effortlessly making Fran Tarkenton and John Davidson look like even bigger retards than Cathy Lee Crosby. The dawn of the Golden Age of Arcade Gaming had arrived and I was squarely in the spotlight, a pint-sized phenom setting new World Records on all the most popular titles of the day at a frenzied pace. Overnight, I became the darling of the public and gaming media, which showered me with lucrative offers for product endorsements, TV commercials, cover stories in all the big gaming magazines, and guest appearances on smash-hit novelty songs marketed to children and slow adults.