How I scored a Nintendo Wii / I did it. Lined up. Waited in the cold at dawn. For a video game. What's wrong with me?

The sky was still inky and dark when I pulled into the Best Buy parking lot over on Geary at 6:00 am on that flat, cold Sunday morning, cold even for San Francisco, colder than Dick Cheney's pitiless glare, colder than Rudolph's darkest revenge fantasies, completely unsure as to what I'd find there and completely unsure if I would be far too late or far too early because there was simply no way to tell.

This was the deal: Two weeks prior, the uber-jaded Best Buy sales dudes told me that each Bay Area store was only getting about 100 units (absolutely the final Wii shipment before Christmas, dude) and they would sell them all when the doors opened at 8:00 am on Dec. 16 and it was first-come, first-served and hence there was no way to know just how insane or depressing or frightening it all might be.

I didn't know what to expect. After all, I'd seen the vulgar YouTube videos. I'd read the stories. Hell, I even wrote some of them. I know all too well the bizarre and depressing scenes of mayhem and destruction when mindless shoppers go on a rampage to save $19 on a Chinese-made plasma television at Wal-Mart, or when armies of unhinged, apple-shaped housewives scream and yank each others' hair just to get their hands on a crazy-popular robotic talking dog for their 8-year-old nephew.

And, like you, I've always looked on those scenes with one part revulsion and one part fascination and all parts absolute conviction: Never. Never will that be me, not in a million years. No way in hell.

And yet, there I was.

Still, I made the vow early on: If the line was at all crazy, if there some sort of simmering domestic gangland mentality hovering over the joint, I was outta there and my intended giftee would get a nice gift certificate for a Wii sometime in January.

Ah yes, the Wii. For two years running the most unexpectedly and insanely popular video game console of the season, and Nintendo has apparently once again far underestimated demand. Despite how their happy sweatshop factories in China are cranking out 1.8 million units per week (can you hear that? That's the sound of the planet's landfills, groaning), it's still not nearly enough to meet global demand. Word has it that Nintendo could've easily sold twice as many units as they manufactured this year, and hence lost well over $1 billion in sales as a result. Strangely, I feel zero pity.

But now there's a Wii shortage, and the Net is positively rife with tales of people going to ridiculous lengths to score one, waiting months and driving all over the city and haranguing wary toy store salespeople and paying way too much and becoming frantic and desperate and miserable. And this is back in, like, August.

Then again, equally common are tales of effortless acquisition, people who just happened to be at the right place at the right time when a store got a shipment in, or who actually paid attention and asked around, or who live in a small town and the local toy shop had plenty in stock and it was no problem at all.

Me, I did a bit of searching around the Net, quickly summed up the situation (two basic choices: eBay/Craigslist for a cool $150-250 markup, or keep hunting the retail stores and get your timing right, and pray). Bottom line: it was bad, but not that bad. Not Tickle-Me-Elmo, Cabbage-Patch-Kid, scratch-your-eyes-out bad. Far from it, actually.

Either way, when I pulled into that lot, I was ready for anything.

Here's what I found: Absolute calm. Ease and laughter and lots of chilly bodies and very little stress. At 6:00 a.m. there were already about 60 people waiting in line ahead of me, and I quickly learned that the first couple had arrived at midnight (there's always a few really crazy ones) with the rest arriving in waves at 4, 5, 6 and beyond. I was number 63. I was essentially guaranteed a Wii, if I could hold out and not freeze or become completely bored to death (too dark to read my magazines, and while God bless the iPhone's lovely Web surfing abilities, its touch screen is not at all fond of gloves).

Indeed, nearly everyone was thoroughly polite and many were completely bemused by the whole thing and I overheard many bouts of casual laughter, people chatting about how they've never done anything like this before, this crazy silly standing-in-line-for-a-toy thing, but oh, it will be worth it, because their nephew/niece/son/daughter will sure love to see that Wii on Christmas morning.

Which made me smile, and sigh, and feel a little strange indeed. Because it is very possible I was the only one in line who was buying a Wii, not for a child, not to flip for quick profit on eBay, but for an adult. For my sister. My 47-year-old sister, the brilliant naturopathic doctor up in Seattle. What can you do?

She wants it for the exercise, the entertainment, the sheer goofy never-done-this-before fun of it all. Specifically, she wants to try "Dance Dance Revolution" (samples here, here, and, most famously/disturbingly, here) in her living room and stomp around to hyper-remixed '80s hits and wave her arms around like a maniac and maybe break a sweat and have a blast. Given her workload and aside from walking her dogs, she doesn't have the time to go to a gym or a yoga joint or shoot heroin into her eyeballs. She saw a Wii demo at a toy store, and was hooked.

Plus, unlike the other game consoles that emphasize raging ultraviolence and insane graphics and are essentially aimed at paroxysmal 11-year-old boys, the Wii, with its interactive remotes and cute, non-slaughteriffic games, is catching on big with families, the elderly, Mormon shut-ins, just about everyone. It's nothing short of a phenomenon. An environmentally devastating, happily wasteful, ultimately brain-numbing phenomenon, but a phenomenon nonetheless.

Then again, it's my older sister. She isn't exactly a glutton for stupid, excessive gizmos. Thoughtless consumeristic waste isn't exactly a family pastime. Besides, how often do I get a chance to be one of those people who wait in line at dawn for a hunk of Chinese-made hype? To contribute heartily to the end of the world and the imminent apocalypse of man? This is the American dream, baby.

The doors opened promptly at 8:00. I had my numbered wristband and we all marched, calmly and dutifully, into the store and passed by the various mountains of shiny tantalizing toxic plastic crap and one by one we were handed our precious Wiis and everyone happily paid their $250 plus accessories (well over 25 grand in sales in one fell swoop), and, as it turned out, only a handful of people were turned away at the end.

And I have to say, it was all worth it, if only to imagine my sister dancing like a lunatic in her living room as her dogs bark and jump and stare at her like she's lost her mind. Hell, I might even do something like that again someday. After all, she's a pretty good sister.

Mark Morford's latest book is 'The Daring Spectacle: Adventures in Deviant Journalism'. Join Mark on Facebook and Twitter, or email him. His website is markmorford.com. For his yoga classes, workshops and retreats, click markmorfordyoga.com.

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