I'll be the first to admit it. I'm over thirty years old and I play video games. A lot of video games. I play video games more than anyone I know. In fact, I'm writing this column - which is due tomorrow - at 10:30 on a weeknight because I procrastinated by playing video games all evening. Ooops… all the talk about video games got me hyper, and I just couldn't control myself. So now it's actually 11:30 and I just finished an hour of heaving grenades and launching rockets at computer-generated enemies on the 1000th floor of a futuristic skyscraper. This video game compulsion can get me into trouble.

I have a very good friend who I'll call Bee. Now, Bee and I go out frequently and we talk on the phone quite a bit. When she calls, she can tell immediately if I'm playing games, even though I always turn the sound off and try to pay close attention to what she's saying. When Bee calls, I'm usually sitting less than a foot away from my computer monitor unless the power is out or there is a fire, in which case I would be at Bee's or, chucking all of my possessions off the balcony. Our conversations usually go something like this:

ME: (answering on fourth or fifth ring) Hello?

BEE: Hi! What are you doing?

ME: (thinking: What am I doing? I'm smoking the entire German army right now! Hitler fears me!) Ohhhhh, nothing. What are you doing?

BEE: Nothing? Are you sure?

ME: (a long pause ensues while my brain processes visual input of my army's mighty tanks rolling through Berlin like a herd of metallic rhinos. Then Bee's audio is deciphered. The whole process takes about four very noticeable seconds.) Hm? Yep, pretty sure.

BEE: Are you playing video games again?

ME: (short pause while I hunt for pause button) No, I just… was… what? Okay look, I just defeated the entire German Army! I just won World War II all by myself.

BEE: I knew it!

I suppose these games are a waste of time, but I find them entertaining. Where else can I sink a hole-in-one at the TPC of Scottsdale? Certainly not at the TPC of Scottsdale, but since I've got the TPC Course Expansion Pack (only $19.95) for my EA Sports PGA Gold game, I've shaved 10 strokes off my virtual golf game. Where else can I drive a 1971 12-cylinder Jaguar at 174 miles per hour through the crowded streets of Miami? Unlike the actual Jaguar, this car not only starts, but it can catch 50 feet of air and land perfectly unscathed.

Some might argue that living in this virtual world could give a person a false sense of reality. I think I get more than my fair share of reality every day from the sobering newscasts about people rioting over the fate of a little Cuban boy they've never met, to the rush hour gridlock on the freeway.

In this day and age, we all seem to take everything too seriously anyway. Every now and then people need a break from the real world. Speaking of which, dawn is only a few hours away and I think I just heard the Russians talking some trash. It might be time to roll my steel rhinos into Saint Petersburg, or maybe even Moscow. What the heck, I'll just call in sick tomorrow.