Juvenile, Reckless Adventure

A text message conversation this morning between my buddy Nate and I began with the logistics of growing ivory in a lab (and, consequently, how rich we could become). It quickly devolved into this:

          Outbox Msg 12
          6/6/07 11:45am
          So, I'm thinkin' we get
          some long-range paintball
          guns w blue paint (leave
          ...little trace) and do our
          our Halo thing in a real
          glacier.

          Inbox Msg 15
          11:49 6/6/07
          Brilliant! We should
          totally do that. But we'll
          need some adaptive
          camouflage to make it as
          fun as possible.

          Outbox Msg 13
          11:53 6/6/07
          Think blue & white
          camo, Alaska, kayak to a
          remote glacier, and
          demarcate play
          boundaries w handheld
          GPS units.

          Outbox Msg 14
          11:56 6/6/07
          http://tinyurl.com/23wg4p

He and I only have a chance to get together over Christmas, at which time, as we have for the last several years, we engage in what we like to describe as a "gentleman's game" of Halo. (for those not hip to the video game, bear with me) He and I, on separate TV screens, match wits in duels which individually can take hours, played with sniper rifles in an expansive glacial canyon. There's no "woohoo"ing, no aggression or one upmanship - it's chess with guns.

For what it's worth, Nate is mostly joking, and he's far too sensible with his money to fly to Alaska with me for the World's Greatest Paintball Fight (though he probably doesn't know about crevasses, so convincing him is merely a monetary issue). But we've been friends long enough for him to know that I'm entirely serious, and it's not as though I'd pick the Khumbu Icefall as the locale (although, now that I mention it...). Wherever it might be held, it does sound pretty badass, if I do say so myself.

And thus, it's on The List.


Afterthought: We've also discussed - should we ever find ourselves both with a terminal illness - an actual battle to the death on Antarctica; however, I fear its theatrics would surely fall short of our imagination, due to the inevitable lacking in our ability to recreate the necessary Amok Time soundtrack.