One last story from Christmas, then I’ll move on. I was sitting in the kitchen drinking coffee on my last morning upstate when my brother opened up a new browser window on his family’s ancient PC. An old commercial that I remembered watching as a kid started playing onscreen. It was for a kitschy toy called Squirmles. In the commercial, people wear shocked expressions on their faces as a fuzzy, neon-colored snake thing coils around their fingers and hands. In one especially surprising moment, the snake thing–which has two eyes glued to its front–suddenly leaps into an empty glass, performs a stylish figure eight in the bottom, then leaps back onto a man’s hand. Even now, as an adult–or rather, as an adult who still subscribes to Nintendo Power magazine–I was nothing short of captivated.

I had no idea why my brother had conjured this relic of a commercial, until he produced an actual Squirmle, still in its packaging, and said, “I got you something.” I could not believe my eyes. Suddenly, I felt the urge to say the words, “OH BOY!” just like one of those shocked-looking people in the TV commercial.

But my brother wasn’t finished. He produced a second item, also still in its packaging, called a Mystiflyer. The Mystiflyer was a playing card that could float and spin in midair. Once again, I had the urge to shout, “OH BOY!”

My brother works in the marketing department at a Native American casino. The Native Americans who own the casino also own a chain of convenience markets, which are places where they can sell their inexpensive cigarettes and gas. My brother’s area of expertise is in convenience markets. He’s worked the convenience market circuit in Upstate New York since he got out of college, usually getting up in the middle of the night so he could be at work by dawn.

A salesman had come by his office recently trying to convince him that he needed to stock Squirmles and MystiFlyers in his chain of markets. And apparently, my brother had taken one look at his wares and said, “OH BOY!” He’d gotten the guy to toss in a few freebies, knowing that I would appreciate these things as much as anyone on the planet would.

Both items, it turned out, were pretty junky. The Squirmle doesn’t ever really come to life as it appeared to do in the old commercials. I hooked an invisible string to my shirt and tried to get it to run over my hands. No luck. It flopped around a bit, and occasionally showed some signs of life, but never really had the out-of-my-way pizazz that it has in the TV commercial. I had better luck with the MystiFlyer, which also involved invisible string. After half an hour of practice, I got pretty good at casually tossing the playing card into the air, letting it spin there for a few moments, then grabbing it again.

Both items were complete junk, as my parents swore up and down they would be when we begged them to buy them for us when we were kids. There was a part of me–the kid-spirit part–that felt crushed to learn that these things did not do quite what they promised they would do. But mostly what I felt was this abundance of warmth and love towards my brother for thinking of me, for knowing things about me that no one else on the planet knows, and for understanding that sussing out the mysteries of Squirmles is something that I have been desperate to do for decades.

Next stop: stage 7-2. Today’s stage has a secret. No, I’m not telling what it is (not yet, anyway). Here’s what we’re dealing with: we’ve got a parade of icebergs–all the same size and shape–bobbing along from left to right across the bottom of the screen; we’ve got two tiers, with Mario and the exit door on the lower tier and a bona fide walrus and the oversized key on the upper tier; we’ve got a pair of defunct elevator pathways–one short, one long, which will obviously be needed to reach the upper tier. Let’s begin.

Jump from the lower tier onto one of the icebergs. Notice how the iceberg begins to sink down below the water line as soon as you put some weight on it. What you need to do is hustle from iceberg to iceberg at a fast enough rate so that they don’t have a chance to sink. Once you’ve reached the defunct elevator pathways via your iceberg jumps, you realize that simply jumping around in their vicinity of the defunct pathways will not somehow magically trigger them into being operational. And that’s it: you have officially done everything you can possibly do in this stage.

I spent a few minutes at this point sighing audibly. No need for you to do the same. Instead, what you want to do here is this: let yourself fall into the water–don’t worry, it’s perfectly safe–and start swimming down.

Could this be the big secret I promised in the opening paragraph? Indeed, it is the big secret. As you continue your downward swim, and entirely new gameplay screen will be revealed to you. On this second screen are two things: 1. a large, roaming octopus (which I did not go near) and 2. a switch. Swim to the switch and trigger it.

Swim back up to the iceberg parade and climb onto an iceberg. Notice anything different? That’s right–the elevators are now fully operational. When the rising/falling elevator platforms are within range, jump onto one–doesn’t matter which, just pick one. Once you’re airborne, ride the elevators up to The Domain of the Walrus. He will bare his teeth, then charge at you. Do what Mario does best, and jump over him as he rushes towards you. Grab the key, turn around, then leap out of the way of a second walrus charge.

The next step is a bit tricky. What you want to do here is get the key back to the exit door on the lower tier. The best way to do this is to make the smallest jump possible onto the rising-falling elevator. (Remember, jump from too great a height and you risk having the key jarred lose by the fall.) Also: careful here not to fall into the water; oversized keys don’t exactly float, folks. Step gingerly onto the icebergs, then jump once, twice, and voila, you and the key are at the exit door.

This stage has all the qualities of a good Donkey Kong stage: a semi-exciting showdown with an enemy, a decent puzzle to work out, and some tense jumping-leaping moments requiring a bit of dexterity. Next up: stage 7-3.