Leif would have loved it - Google's Celebration of the 30th Anniversary of Pac Man

Google has created a playable logo of Pac Man to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the game. How it brings back memories for me! Thirty years ago Leif was five years old and we were living in Japan. The video arcade phenomena was huge and there was a large one not too far from our housing area, in the city of Sagamihara. I think I've already written that one of our favorite family outings was to have dinner (tonkatsu) at Matsumoto's, which the Americans called the "Little Pork Place" and then go to the arcade. We would get a lot of tokens and each of us would have a bundle of them and we'd play, all of us, whatever video games appealed to us. Pac Man and a bit later Ms. Pac Man were popular and so much fun.

Leif later had Pac Man as one of the retro games on his XBox360. I don't know if he ever actually played it as a 32-33-year-old adult, though I bet he at least tried it out for old times sake.

With Leif's memory, he would remember those outings and all the fun we had together. We still played at the arcades in Hawaii, mostly at the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center where the arcade was on the top floor.

How I wish Leif were here to share this with, the fun of playing it with the arrow keys on Google. I don't know how long they will leave it there, but it you want to play and remember, too, just go to google.com. Then click on "insert coin" and you'll be playing. Use the arrow keys to control your Pac Man.

And remember Leif playing when he was 5-10 years old . . .

Leif and Mt. Fuji - Hakone National Park, Japan - January 1981 - Age 6

We were so fortunate to be able to travel so much with our boys. Japan has beautiful national parks and one we visited in January 1981 when Leif was six years old was Hakone. This park is in a volcanic area, and I remember Leif being fascinated with a place where you could hard-boil and egg in a sulfur spring. The practice was so popular that the area was completely littered with peeled-off eggshells. We didn't know about this before we got there and didn't bring any eggs to cook, but Leif enjoyed stepping on the shells and smashing them. :)

We also got this beautiful, clear view of Mt. Fuji, which is often shrouded in clouds, fog, or, if you are trying to see it from Tokyo, smog. It was a lovely but very chilly day in Hakone. We also ate some wonderful hot noodles at a local restaurant. Leif liked Japanese food, especially tonkatsu (deep fried pork cutlet, much like Wiener Schnitzel) and the noodle soup dishes.

Leif's 27th Birthday - Manhattan, Kansas - January 28, 2002 - Age 27

After his three and a half years in the army, during which we didn't see Leif for his birthdays, he came back to Kansas in May 2001, medically retired from the army due to the asthma he had developed, and went back to finish college at Kansas State University. His first brithday back with us was January 28, 2002, his 27th birthday, which we celebrated in the dining room of our old stone house on Moro Street.

I made Leif's favorite birthday foods, tonkatsu (breaded pork cutlet with Japanese barbecue sauce called tonkatsu sauce) and peach fritters with foamy sauce, a rather odd and multicultural combination we all loved. Leif could eat a "ton" of those things. I remember one of his birthdays in Puerto Rico, maybe his 17th, when he ate so many fritters that he got kind of giddy. I teased him that I never saw anyone get "drunk" on peach fritters before.

In this photo, you can see him blowing out a candle perched in a big bowl of fritters. They are a family favorite we don't have often, partly because they are a lot of work to make, and messy, since they are deep fried, and partly because they are a great way to gain a lot of weight. I doubt there are many people in the world who have a pile of fritters with a candle instead of a birthday cake, but that's what he wanted. Leif was unconventional in many ways. I'm sad that I'll never make those things for him ever again.

At the time of this photo, Leif was still moody and not happy, but he was beginning to climb out of the severe depression he was suffering when he returned from Fort Drum eight months earlier. He had a successful semester at KSU under his belt and things were looking up.

Happy Birthday, Leif!