Shoot all your problems away, that’s what my uncle always said. Of course, he lived in Texas where most people do in fact have guns. I don’t quite have that advantage, because Australia’s pretty tight on gun control laws. Still, we can shoot plenty of other things. Bows and arrows, air cannons, water pistols, small foam darts…and of course, there’s video games.

I like to imagine my work to be a little bit more exciting. Not that there’s anything wrong with prowling the streets of Brisbane, power sweeper wheel within my fingertips, cleaning up the streets and generally being a good citizen who keeps our city clean. There’ nothing wrong with that at all, for the record. Still, when I’m assigned the same streets over and over again, it gets a bit monotonous. So I imagine I’m a tank commander in a war. Let’s say an alien war, because I’m not ending the lives of any innocent humans who are only fighting for their countries. That’s the problem with big franchises like Summons of Loyalty and Cogs of Conflict. Actually, no…I think that last one is also about fighting aliens. But you get what I mean. Some games have you doing awful things to generic enemy characters, and I just think…this person could be like me. Maybe they were conscripted from their job as a street power sweeper and forced to fight in this pointless war, only to never return because you just picked up a new gun and have to test it out. Maybe they thought of ride on floor scrubbers just before they faded away like all defeated video game characters do.

Gee, now I just feel terrible. Maybe I peaceful job riding a floor scrubber around the streets of Brisbane isn’t so bad after all, even when the streets begin to look the same. At least it’s familiar. And just maybe not all problems can be dealt with by projectiles.