Shawn

Amongst the pushy graininess of this photo, you might be able to find Shawn. You may not know it to look at him, but he is a Guinness World Record holder. Now consider the photo and wonder to yourself, what sort of record might he hold? Is he some kind of collector? Is it some sort of athletic achievement? Well, he did tell me that in the course of achieving his record he did suffer from a very sore hand, arm, and shoulder but said it was all worth it (no, it's not for that. They don't keep records for that sort of thing).

Shawn Howlett is the current certified Guinness World Record holder for having the top score on the arcade game Chiller. Yes, indeed. He got the record in December 2010 at Richie Knuckelz' Arcade in Flemington, New Jersey. Which, not coincidentally, was where this picture was taken just six days ago. I think he said he played for 4.5 hours straight to achieve the record, and then he went on to tell me about a guy who played Q*bert for 48 hours straight. He said the guy had so many lives saved up he could walk away from the machine to take care of his various life functions and then resume playing (so I guess it's not really 48 hours straight).

And you may ask yourself, how did I get here? I mean, how did I get to be at a classic arcade on a Saturday night in of all places Flemington, New Jersey? A town known only for its fur factory and the Bruno Hauptmann trial? Perhaps I'll save that for a future post. Until then, I'll leave you with just two words:

Kong Off.

PS: Yeah, I'm not too thrilled with the excessive headroom either, but I am determined to master the art of portraiture with the SWC. Well, if not "master," at the very least take a reasonable people picture with the durned thing.