We've never been to a Dave and Buster's before today, perhaps because we don't have one close to us, and it seems likely that we might not visit one again. I know other's like them, and I suspect they're much better than Chuck E Cheese's but, still, I didn't care for the place all that much.

Mostly that's because of the confusing system they use to give credits and tickets and prizes for their games, almost all of which are typical county-fair-midway "games" of chance designed to just suck money away and which give trashy toys in the end.

We drove down to Irvine to meet our college pal and now-Blizzard employee and his family for a lunch date at D&B's. We had a good lunch and it was interesting to learn that he does *all* the numbers in World of Warcraft. He uses a ton of spreadsheets to analyze everything. He determines the numbers used for set bonuses, spell damage, bonus effects: you name it, he generates them. Sometimes he also creates items or names them.

After the meal we tried some of the various games. Kelley's not very good at skee ball, or really at anything else the place offered (she's just too young), but she did seem to enjoy all the flashing lights and animated screens and mechanical horse-race games that we helped her participate in.