Played a lot of pinball when I was a kid (47 now).

Played every virtual pinball game I could get my hands on (farsight pinball sims on wii, psp, eventually android & iOS)

Recently, a friend of mine whom I reconnected with via facebook posted some pics of a gottlieb "Hulk" he was fixing. That got me wondering...

I ran into him at a benefit I was performing at and we got to talking about pins and such.

That's when it happened...I started looking on CL and found what I thought was a good deal.

$150 for a non-working Allied Liesure Dyn-O-Mite pin.

Talked him down to $125 (shrewd, am I) and scurried home with my prize.

Come to find out that AL parts are damn near impossible to come by. Put in a call to Steve young, and after he basically said I was S.O.L., I decided to think outside the box a little and try and make the parts I needed.

About a month later, and a lot of head scratching and cursing, I had the pin up and running, and playing pretty well.

Next came a bally lost world. First exposure to having to fix circuit boards since college. Got her running, too with the help of Clays blog and pin wiki - two tremendous resources.

Went on a little buying spree last week and picked up 2 EM's from a local guy, and another Bally -35 from jersey city.

So 3 out of the 5 pins I have are up and running.

I'm saving the EM's for something to do during the winter months, or maybe sooner.

So yeah, you might say I'm a little "hooked"...