Macaulay Culkin and Tetris

On this day in 1833, President Andrew Jackson became the first U.S. President to ride a train. Later, Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first U.S. president to ride a plane (though not on this day in history). I predict that much later, Macaulay Culkin will be the first U.S. president to ride in a jet-car. I don't have a projection as to on what day that will take place, but I guarantee that the days of Macaulay Culkin's presidency will be sad ones indeed. However, I bet the burglary rate will go down across the nation.

Oh, and this is good too, especially for the devout followers of my blog: on this day in 1919 the Republic of Prekmurje ends. Short-lived, huh? They had what, like a week? I'll have to study that out more later.

And on June 6, 1933, the first drive-in theater opened in Camden, New Jersey. It must have been really decked out too. Wouldn't they need a piano at every parking spot so you could hear the movie?

I'm going to jump ahead now to the best thing June 6 is famous for. No, not D-Day, although that is a close second. Tetris was released on June 6, 1984. Today marks the 25th anniversary of that release. That's even cooler than Kara, the valkyrie from Norse mythology.

Now we're all familiar with Tetris. But do you know how many studies have been conducted involving it? Prepare yourself. Of course there was a scientific study examining the possibility of playing forever. It was deemed impossible due to the S- and Z-shaped pieces. Better yet, there was a study done by an Oxford University research group that blows my mind and is 100 times cooler than the Norse valkryie Kara. They proved that playing Tetris soon after viewing traumatic material in the laboratory reduced the number of flashbacks to that material over the following week.

How awesome is that? Not only can Tetris cure victims of traumatic events, but Oxford University dreamed it could and conducted the necessary research to prove it!!!

Of course, to be fair, the individuals that played Tetris after viewing traumatic material just had the Tetris theme song going through their heads for the next week, so they could hardly think of anything else. Speaking of that theme song, I highly recommend getting it in some version on iTunes. Everybody could use a little reminder of Tetris' greatness in their lives. My personal favorite is T-E-T-R-I-S, from the artist Gamboyzzz. It's phenomenal.

Unfortunately, no matter how much I searched, I couldn't find the truly greatest Tetris-related song on iTunes. You see, Andrew Lloyd Webber himself contributed to the 1992 Eurodance single that featured music from this video game. While I couldn't find it on iTunes, I did find it on YouTube. It's probably best to get the full effect by watching the YouTube video anyway:

The Greatest Tetris Dance Song Ever (not that there was much competition)

Surprisingly enough, despite the obvious connection to Andrew Lloyd Webber and their very clear dancing and singing abilities, nobody in this group ever made it to Broadway. Such a shame?

I can picture the Tetris musical of the future, with all these singers/dancers, and President Macaulay Culkin himself as the lead. It might be about the forbidden love between an S-shaped piece and a Z-shaped piece, forever opposite, destined to always be apart. There might even be a side story between the square piece and the straight line, both desiring to be different. Eventually, all pieces would come to realize one of the several morals of the story:

You should be satisfied with what you are.
There are consequences for rushing into things.
No matter your background, love will find a way.
Everybody needs to work together to accomplish a greater good.

That last one would be the final note of the musical, ending in that funky noise you get when four lines are suddenly finished at the same time, at which point all the pieces would flash, then disappear, and a new set of pieces would start to fall from the catwalk above the stage, showing the rebirth of the game and the lessons to be learned all over again.

That would definitely be cooler than Kara the valkyrie.

Pictures:
Andrew Jackson
Valkyrie
Tetris