I’m packing my suitcase this morning and heading back to the airport. I’m in one of those end-of-convention limbos, where I feel ready to go home, ready to leave all of this behind–San Francisco, the Game Developers Conference, everything–yet also feeling empty or hungry, like I somehow didn’t quite get enough of something here. What that something is, I can’t easily say.

Last night I sat at dinner with friends and I had a moment when I thought, Man, I don’t want this dinner to end. It was all moving too fast–here was the waiter with our drinks, here was the waiter with our food, here was the waiter to clear away our plates. I felt like everything was slipping away, like cold sand through my fingers.

When I was a kid, we lived in a fairly rural area of Upstate New York. On the half hour journey into the nearest city, we’d always drive past a barren acre of farmland where, each July, a traveling carnival would set up shop for exactly one week. We called this week the “Field Days” because, I suppose, it took place in an open field. For those seven days, the usually vacant field was filled with neon-covered carnival rides with names like “The U.F.O.” and “The Scrambler,” fried dough stands, and games of chance.

During the rest of the year, whenever we’d drive by the acre, I’d look out at the patches of milk weed and cattails and wonder if the Field Days ever actually happened or if the whole thing had been some kind of mirage. It seemed impossible to me that something so fantastical could have happened in such a dull, unremarkable spot. These end-of-convention days, like the one I’m experiencing today, always leave me with that same exact feeling.

So I’ll finish packing my things this morning, making sure that I have my passport and my wallet. I’ll haul my bags into the hallway. Then I’ll turn around and look back into my hotel room one last time–a room which I will likely never see again–feeling certain, like I always do, that I’m leaving something behind.

Time for stage 7-6. Today’s stage opens with Mario down in the bowels of a kind of ice dungeon. Your objective: to escape from this ice dungeon. Also: Mario is not alone down here. He’s got three bipedal flame-shaped friends to keep him company. And by “keep him company” I mean “burn Mario to a crisp early and often.”

Thankfully, there’s an elevator–yes!–and an opening/escape hatch in the upper platform–yes, again!–that the elevator will carry you through. Also: the giant key is down here. (Hello again, giant key.) Unfortunately, standing in the elevator’s way, and therefore in Mario’s way, and therefore in your way, is a series of meltable ice blocks.

Stupid series of meltable ice blocks. Why do you have to ruin all the fun?

The idea here is to get one or two of your Flame Friends, who are roaming the walls and crawling all over the place, onto those ice blocks. Note also the nearby switch. Pulling the switch to the right does two things: 1. it changes the direction of the elevator (instead of going up, it goes down); and 2. it closes the retractable bridge sealing off the upper level from the lower level. What you want to do is this: first, you want to make sure that the bridge is wide open, so that the Flame Friends can freely migrate to the upper level. Once they’re all up there–have fun up there, boys–push the switch to the right, sealing off the upper level from the lower level. Now, wait–yes, I said wait–until one, or ideally two of the Flame Friends are standing on the bridge. At that exact moment, push the switch back to the left. This causes the bridge to retract, sending the Flame Friends into a free-fall all the way down to–you guessed it–the series of meltable blocks. Once the Flame Friend(s) are on the meltable blocks, they’ll right themselves, then automatically start roaming around again, melting every last one of the series of meltable ice blocks. Note: you may have to do this a second time, to clear all of the meltable blocks out of your way. Once the ice blocks are gone, or at least mostly gone, grab the key, board the elevator, and ride it up through the opening to Part Two of today’s stage.

Note how the exit door floats in mid-air up here. Strange, yes? Trigger one of the two portable-bridge power-ups up here and position it so that it’s exactly at the top of the pair of ladders that hug the left and right walls. Deploy it. Remember: you can’t climb ladders while holding the key. It’s a dumb rule, but that’s how the world of Donkey Kong operates, folks. Now, jump into the air, hurling the key straight up at the apex of your jump. It should land on the temporary bridge. Hustle up one of the two ladders–doesn’t matter which–re-grab the key, and head for the exit door before the temporary bridge un-deploys itself.

Congratulations, people. Your seventieth level of Donkey Kong is behind you. Good work out there.