This past weekend, I drove up to San Jose for one day's worth of the annual 2-day California Extreme pinball and video game show. The idea is that they rent a space in downtown San Jose, people bring in pinball machines and video games from their collection, and the public pays admission to play the games, which are all set on "free" mode.

I didn't even do too much video game playing, because there was more than enough pinball to keep me busy, from the old-timey to the new-timey to my favorite pinball machine of all time to strange pinball machines from other countries.

For the first time, I "flipped" a pinball machine -- I went over 100,000 on a 1971 machine called Dimension with only 5 digits available on the scoreboard. It probably helped that it's an "add-a-ball" machine -- it awards multiple extra balls in lieu of free games -- and it was set to give away extra balls as if they were free candy. I ended up playing about 15 balls.

Hopefully next year, I'll be able to attend both days of the show. Maybe I'll even enter the pinball tournament -- I didn't feel confident enough to do so this year, because I was way out of practice. It's been almost eight years since I was playing pinball regularly (in a league in Pittsburgh).