Back in about February of this year, my friend Karl mentioned that a local game store (Beard Bros) was having board game nights every Wednesday and I might like to drop by. Advantage for him, the store was walking distance from his home (a long walk, but for someone who doesn’t drive walking distance is a pretty good range!) and only a short drive for me.

And it was FUN! Getting to hang out, talk gaming, play games, every week… well, I started doing work-from-home days on Wednesdays so that I could fulfill my gaming need without stressing over traffic or struggling to get to the game store in a timely manner. That turned into a weekly KBBQ for Karl and I, time to catch up, vent about our week, and get our meat-food cravings satisfied! Followed by, of course, game night. My copy of Red Dragon Inn actually got PLAYED – since I was always having trouble getting coworkers to make time for it. Recently we added a Korean fried chicken dinner as a variation to our KBBQ tradition, and started the Pathfinder 2.0 playtest (https://paizo.com/pathfinderplaytest) on Wednesday evenings. It was great.

I started coming down other days, sometimes even my Saturday nights, to hang out and talk everything gaming, I even started to get back into Warmahordes (Warmachine/Hordes – the miniatures games) and mini-painting.

But all good things, as they say…

The owner of the store became not just a source for gaming good times, but a friend. However the store ran into some rough spots, and so he is having to close the doors as of the end of this month. It’s still his goal to run an area game store, so while it may be a while before a new opening I fully expect that some day Beard Bros game store will live again!

So let’s pour one out for the homies, and see how we can keep my Wednesdays as a great release valve for work/life balance!

To Beard Bros. *clink*