Do you love tag? Wait… another post you say? Three in one week? Have you gone crazy timotheories?

No dear readers, I have not gone crazy – I have come to a realization. If you want to win in life you have to give it your all. That means you step up and do what your heart tells you to do.

In my case, that’s being an advocate for the arts, in all of her glorious forms.

So I’m gonna ramp it up from here on out: more posts, more variety, but also more Frequency. And we all loved that movie right? RIGHT?!?

Okay cool.

Today’s post is gonna be centred around events, the kind that you personally can get involved in, but only if you live in the fair City of Champions. Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

Now, I realize that is not the title of the city anymore, but I like it, and I want it to make a comeback. And because I believe in the arts, and Edmonton’s ability to support them, I think the title still fits.

The first event I want to share with you, is one that is very near and dear to my heart. An event that happens weekly, usually from late March to early November of each year. It’s been around for just over a decade.

Back to my first question. Have you ever played hide-and-go-seek tag as a child?

Most of us who grew up in Canada have, I mean, most of us all over the world have. Well, my friends, I still play tag. That’s right, I am a grownup that plays tag. I haven’t been playing consistently for the past 10 years, I took something of a hiatus between 2008 to 2014, but I started playing again this year. And I have to say, it has been just as fun as I remember it back when I was a university student.

Have any of you heard of Manhunt Edmonton before? I know lots of people my age and +/- 7 years apart have. If you have its because Manhunt Edmonton has made its way around town through word of mouth for a long time.

They even have a Facebook group if you want to receive regular reminders. Right here.

Okay cool.

Now that I’ve told you about it, I’ve fulfilled my requirement to mention something interesting that happens on the regular. But I can’t end this post without telling you something super fun about it and recounting a story.

As I mentioned earlier I haven’t played in years, but this was my comeback year, fo sho. I knew it as soon as I played my second game with the group this season (back in June) and then went out for a “teambuilding” activity after the game. *Hint* teambuilding is code for drinks and war stories of the nights events.

And you guessed it, I’m going to tell you a short story about the championship games that happened last night.

The games were set up back-to-back, with double points awarded to whoever hid or got tags during the match. Normally every first game of the month is a points game wherein you receive 1 point for every person that you tagged or 1 point for every person that had been tagged if you made it to the end without getting caught. Savvy?

Well on championships night, its double points.

I wore all black. I am not a good runner anymore, so I wore all black.

Why did I wear all black? Because I had a plan. My plan was to find a hiding spot and camp for as much of the first game as I could, so I could get a lot of points. Its really hard to get a bunch of tags, because as you tag people, they become Manhunters too, and so I hid.

I know you’re intrigued about the details, so I’ll come back to the rules of the game some other time, I promise.

This is where it gets interesting – Before the game started I ate a giant carrot, because one of my friends, and one of the regulars, was kind enough to share them. Well, it wasn’t a good idea, because I had to run away from a couple of ladies who were “IT” within the first 15 minutes of the game.

Did I mention that the map was the 4 blocks encompassing the Citadel and Canada Place? Not a lot of hiding options, so I ran through the Citadel into Canada Place and around the east side of the building until I could find some cars to hide behind. But I finally ditched them and hid behind some bushes. Just in time to see another manhunter get tagged at some bushes in front of the Citadel. Then I took my chance after they left and hid in the same place.

Like a black rock.

But I felt queasy crouching there. For a good 35 minutes I felt queasy. Carrot queasy. Similar to that adage of not eating before you swim. Then I realized the game was coming to a close. And I got a different kind of queasy feeling, the feeling that the game was over and I didn’t know how it had played out.

When I got back to the start I learned the truth, the truth was that I had won the game. And that everyone, and I mean all of the other 13 players had been tagged within the first 15 minutes, so I got double points. 26 of them to be exact, putting me into the lead of the entire 30 or so players this season.

But Tim, you said there was another game that night, didn’t you? Well you’ll have to wait until my next post to find out how that played out.

Because I’m out of theories.

Tim!