Infinity and a little mind.

I LOVE cheats in a video game. And before any of my gamer friends climb up on a high horse with "I never use cheats" for whatever reason, to you I say this: If you're done with a game, for whatever reason and therefore will most likely never or rarely play it again, why not cheat? I've always loved using cheats to goof around in video games. It's fun, and also adds extra playability. I especially love the "infinite whatever" cheats. It's nice to use guns or power ups whenever you want instead of saving it for "that one boss," or to always have enough money to buy what you want, or even have all the health you need to explore that one lava section.

I think this love for inexhaustible resources started when I was little, around age 4 or so. I wasn't into video games yet, but I'll tell you what I did like:

FIRETRUCKS

Firetrucks were awesome! They were really big, really shiny, and they had a giant water gun, what's not to love?

I was talking to my dad about fire and firetrucks for some reason, I can't remember the specifics, but I'm guessing it started something like "Hey dad, d'ya think a firetruck could stop a forest fire?" Conversation followed in which my poor father had to answer, then try to explain the "why" and the "how come", but in the end, the one thing I remember clearly was my father asking me "what if your fire truck ran out of water?"

I was stumped.

What's he mean? Run out of water? Firetrucks ALWAYS had water, IT'S THERE JOB! There's no way, it can't run out!

My father assured me that they can indeed run out, and that a lot of firetrucks don't even have a tank. The water has to come from somewhere and in fact, that's what fire hydrants are all about.

My little mind could not believe it... so I didn't. At this point I was fairly sure I knew more about firetrucks than my dad did.


Fire hydrants? Please, you only use fire hydrants if you don't have a fire truck... or maybe when the firetruck hasn't gotten there yet. Anyway, dad's not a fireman, so he probably doesn't know for sure...


I believed other things like this too, like banks and money, grocery stores and food, and soldiers and ammo. Sure, TV and Movie heroes can run out of bullets because I knew that was pretend, but real soldiers? No way.

Of course, for the most part I grew up, and learned that my dad was right. Just like he was when he said the earth was smaller than the sun, but there's still a little part of me that can't help but get excited when I discover that something is infinite, never ending or otherwise inexhaustible, even if most of the time it's just in a video game.

When I first jumped into the back of a the Warthog and discovered that the chaingun had infinite ammo, there was a small part of me that rejoiced.


New plan: I'm going to defeat the Covenant armada WITH THIS GUN.