It’s 7PM. The bar is too noisy. The air is too warm. The hard oak seat of the pub-chair has the softened finish of overworn lacquer – humid, spongy.

It’s 7:04. How are we going to recognize each other? I realize I don’t even know a real name. Will we really have anything in common? What if it’s completely awkward?

It’s 7:06. Eyes connect. A flash of half-recognition. “Are you looking for me?” I ask? “I don’t know, am I?” comes the response. The tall, long-haired geek-hippy drops his bag. I wonder if he's as nervous as I am. He takes a seat, flashes a self-conscious smile.

Our careful waltz begins.

He holds my hand tightly. He’s become amazed at his own strength lately. His favorite game is to squeeze my hand as tightly as he can. I feign indifference for a moment, then put on my most excruciated grimace.

“Stop, stop, you’re breaking my hand!” I protest.

“I’m using the Force!” he proclaims. And who am I to say he’s wrong?

This week we – the geekospheroid, blogging cognoscenti of the digital age -- were witness to something unique and wonderful. Joss Whedon's Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog was a rare gem. A musical morality tale wrapped under a meniscus of a superhero tropes. It was a great story, brilliantly realized, completely unique.

But that doesn’t really matter. That's not the point. The reason Dr. Horrible was so good has little to do with the easily reviewable components: the singing, the writing, the acting, the staging, the camp. The reason Dr. Horrible stands out as having been so good is that it’s already gone.

Somehow I missed an anniversary.

A little over two years ago I wrote my first article for Gamers With Jobs. I could sink into the wet-jello of maudlin, extolling the virtues of our community and its importance in my life. It would all be true. But my anniversary navel-gazing has revealed a more interesting gem: writing about games for the last two years has changed how I think about games. It's changed how I approach a game when I first fire it up. It's changed how I play it. It's changed how I feel about it.

“It’s just HeroQuest minus the cardboard walls.”

Rob's back from vacation, so I pinged him on IM to catch up. I wanted to share my excitement about Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition which had arrived in his absence. Hes read it. He's less than impressed.

"What do you mean? It looks awesome,” I protest.

“It's just a tactical miniatures game now. They took out everything they gave Dungeons & Dragons that sense of place.” I'm forced to admit I agree with him.

“I guess I just see Fourth Edition on its own terms,” I explained. “I think it's very, very good at what it's trying to be.” In my head I can imagine running it for my inconstant group of teenagers. I know in my bones this will be easier. Faster.

Rob pauses. It's IM, so for all I know he's left the room. The pregnant pause of the white screen is unforgiving.

“Yes but it's not what I want to do when I'm playing an RPG," comes the final reply. "It lacks wonderment.”

It always smells like shoes.

I don’t know why, but O’Hare to me always smells like the Keds I had when I was five. It’s not a horrible smell – not smelly socks. It’s the smell of well work rubber soles and stretched canvas. It’s oddly comforting. I find a seat at the bar of the Red Carpet Club. I fire up my laptop, prepared to waste an hour deleting email and consuming random information which I will quickly forget.

I nod to the gentleman at the end of the bar. He’s perhaps 50, with the sandy brown hair and carefully shaven face of a terminal businessman. His laptop is open, but his eyes aren’t fixed in the glaze of information consumption. They’re darting around the screen. I look at his hands. His right hand on a small, silver Microsoft Optical mouse. The movements are minimal – there’s no rapidfire clicking. His left hand hovers in a claw over the WASD keys. Fingers dart methodically to the function keys at the top of the cramped Lenovo keyboard.

I’m sure of it. He’s playing World of Warcraft.

Just this once, I wish for a real phone.

The conversation had not been pleasant. The source of my anger is unimportant. The source is rarely as important as that horrible, shaky, bile-fueled feeling. That rude sense that my kidneys will eject themselves and black coagulated blood will eject from my torso burning holes into the asphalt as they land.

I long to slam the phone into the cradle, to create the rattle and crack of breaking plastic. As it is, I can only reach vigorously with the cursor and press harder than necessary on the left mouse-button, banishing skype into a shaking demon's hell.

My computer, oblivious to my state of mind, responds with a lollipop-guild “boing.” A dialog pops up, asking me to rate the call quality. There is no button for "hydrochloric."

The rage deepens. I launch a game.

"OK. So, here we go."

She's sitting there on the carpet, her eyes fixed on the black pieces in front of her. She's got a patented "smiling because I'm with dad" smile on, which I know will get me in serious trouble when she's 15.

I move my pawn to E4.

She sits, carefully considering her many options. Five seconds pass. Ten. She moved her A pawn to 6.

I have no idea what to say. It's not a move that would ever even occur to me. It's way out on the edge of the board. It's blocking her light-bishop. It was at that moment I realized I have no idea how to teach someone a game.

With the passage of Gary Gygax, a collective heaving of breast could be felt across the thin silver astral cord connecting us together, bridging the gap of our collective antisocial angst. My inbox and AIM rang, two asynchronous bells, throughout the day.

"Did you hear? The DM is dead," they implored. One after another after another. Skype pinged. The phone rang. The red circle around the webcam lit up over and over and over again. Everyone shocked into silence. And I understand. I feel my own pain. A certain hollowness. An age. A sense of dying cell by cell. But that's not what makes me sad. What makes me sad is how little I cared yesterday.

Every time the word "consolidation" (or even "EA") is in a headline, the gamer reaction seems to immediately be "this is horrible." It's as if we - the deep geek gamer community - have decided that big = bad without equivocation. It's the same mentality that assumes all indie movies will be good, and all unsigned bands are somehow more pure and therefore better.

I have a low tolerance for this.