The only appropriate way to read this post is while listening to Eiffel 65’s “Blue (Da Ba Dee)” with your best POGS sitting next to you. That’s right, folks, this is the well-overdo Pokemon celebration post in honor of my 150th and 151st posts.

I got briefly side-tracked by an overwhelming level of stupid that will not be brought up any further in this post.

Day Six – My Favorite Adventure Started in Pokemon Red

There are plenty of things in my life I should probably be embarrassed by. My moral dubiousness? Maybe not embarrassed so much as concerned. My sometimes awful jokes? Yeah. The way I can occasionally walk into solid, clearly-visible objects in well-lit rooms? Definitely.

My love of the Pokemon franchise, however, is something I have no issues with talking about. I don’t remember how I got interested in Pokemon, but I’d hazard a guess in saying it was the cartoon’s fault. Some point or another, I ended up with a copy of Pokemon Blue Version. Started with a Squirtle, which I nicknamed Squirt (I was not necessarily a very creative child).

However, the real adventure was getting Pokemon Red Version. I don’t remember the occasion, but I recall my mom and stepfather (who has bent over backwards to indulge my enthusiasm for video games and electronics, and I am forever grateful for such patience and kindness) taking my sister and I out for a drive. It was after I’d completed Pokemon Blue Version, somehow managing to get an Alakazam (which, to this day, is one of my favorite Psychic types), a Gengar, and…and Butterfree? I don’t know why that one made it to the Elite 4, but that’s not the point.

Odds are, I’d been saying how badly I wanted Pokemon Red. My guess is to the point of madness-inducing frustration for my parents. I remember that we drove out to Toys R Us, and I had to wait in the car. No indication as to why we were there, but of course I was squirming in my seat. As a kid, it was a special kind of Hell being so close to Toys R Us and yet so far away. I had my Gameboy Pocket with me, and I was impatiently waiting whatever it is my far younger self would impatiently wait for, when a copy of Pokemon Red Version found its way to the car. There was probably a lot of giddy screaming and shrieking as I tore into the box and rushed to start with Bulbasaur (sorry, Charmander, you didn’t see any love until Pokemon Yellow Version, and even then it wasn’t a whole lot).

The Pokemon games ended up being a pillar of my childhood, and they got me through a lot of rough times. The concept of traveling the world, going on amazing adventures with those weird little critters. Admittedly, I was a little disappointed with X and Y. There was a great deal of hype and build-up for two games that ended up feeling like the lead-in for Pokemon Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby (which I’m still excited for, of course). There’s still a certain magic to picking out who will make up my team for when I face the Elite Four, or determining which Pokemon in each version were my favorites overall.

I never reached the point where I started EV and IV training, because that breaks the games down to a degree they’d no longer be fun for me. Pokemon will always be about picking Pokemon, occasionally doing very badly in battle, and having a ton of fun.

Thanks for taking this belated trip down memory lane with me, folks. Ninety-four days remaining.