PEW! PEW! HONK! Oh, the lovely sounds of laser tag in the late 80’s What’s that got to do with today’s prompt: 13. What is your favorite color?

I was living in San Antonio, Texas back in 1985. We had just moved there from Boise, Idaho (OMG! The humidity!!!) because my dad had decided to go back into the military. I was in the 7th grade, and getting my ass handed to me in math because I still didn’t know my multiplication tables. I had found a friend that must have been pretty well off, because he had a gas-powered RC car and some cool toys like a programmable tank thing.

I remember being invited to his birthday party, and we all went and played laser tag (you had to actually go to a place to play, it was that new). The outfits were huge and clunky. The ‘play’ area was extremely warm and humid. They had smoke machines that blasted horribly stinky smoke… I hated running through those clouds. They would split you up into 2 teams. Either red or green. Green has always been my favorite color, so I was hoping to get the green team (it was random every time). Sure enough, I got picked to be on the green team, and that’s how Gangreen came to be (you got to put in your own cool ‘handle’, too). Every time I got to play laser tag from that time on, I was ‘randomly’ chosen for the green team every single time.

When the internet came into being (yeah, I know… all of this was BEFORE the internet), I just kept using Gangreen as my moniker. Jump a few years down the road, and I’m playing TRIBES as a part of a team, when someone jumps into chat and asks me if I named myself after the Gangreen Gang. I had no idea who that was (come to find out, they were on the original Powerpuff Girls), so it bugged me a little to find out my name wasn’t quite as unique as I had first imagined.

After the ‘incident’, I only used Gangreen for a few more years before giving it up entirely. I used Neergnag for a little bit, but now I’m pretty much just Mike wherever I go. To make a random story even more confusing, I don’t really have a ‘favorite’ color. I like ’em all. I like to think I’m pretty artistic, so tend to use lots of colors when I’m drawing. I still swing mostly to liking the shades of green more often than not (or when answering, ‘what’s your favorite color?’), but you probably wouldn’t be able to tell, judging by my wardrobe. I have a veritable rainbow of shirts, mostly bright, primary colors, and a single pair of denim shorts I’m usually only wearing to work.

What’s your favorite color? Let me know in the comments… maybe we have something in common. *gasp*

See you tomorrow.