A video game can hurt you

Of course, if you follow Wii news, you already know this. But I'm talking about something more old school. A little less...hip. And also the reason that I started this blog. That's right folks: DDR. Yeah, yeah...I'm a bit of a geek (not my fault, by the way...it's inherent to my job), but really I asked for the game for Christmas so I could have a way to workout at home. You know, for those times I just can't bear to face (er, smell) that collection of musclebound meatheads that seem to live at my gym. A couple of weeks ago, I was dancing around on the pad, put my foot down, and OW! No twisting, no slipping, no falling. And yet I managed to badly sprain a muscle and pinch a nerve in my foot. In just the right spot to make me walk with a ridiculously gimpy limp. As if I needed another way to be completely graceless. In any event, it's enough to convince me that my tootsies aren't up to the task when it comes to DDR--anyone want to buy a dance pad?


So you may at this point be wondering--and rightly so--why this (rather embarassing) event became the kindling for this blog. It's a little convoluted, but I'll try to make it as concise as possible. I was sent to SXSW in Austin for the first time this year right around the time I realized I should probably see a doctor for my foot. But as I left early Monday morning, there was little I could do at that point but slap on an Ace bandage and try to avoid the emergency room all week. And of course, I was still walking with a limp--had to, in fact, for the duration of SXSW--so this naturally garnered ceaseless questions about what I did to injure myself. I'm not a very good liar, so I told the truth. I don't think I've ever been laughed at so much in my life. One photographer laughed, then whipped out his camera and took 17 pictures of my bandaged foot. (The medical assistant who took down my doctor's appointment back in SF laughed so hard she had tears in her eyes...or at least that's what I pictured over the phone.)

Anyway, since the first portion of SXSW is Interactive, there were a lot of techy people about, so I got some geek cred for my DDR damage. I was also told in several instances that I should blog about it, to which I replied "I don't have a personal blog. I write for a living, so that just seems like more work to me." But then it struck me that I'm limited to writing about gadgety things if I stick to that strategy and, frankly, I'd like to avoid becoming a complete geek...although spending four days surrounded be greasy-haired skinny jeans-wearing hipsters certainly made me appreciate my relative dorkiness.