Around the time of October, 2015, my life was forever ruined. A lady friend of mine by the name of Melissa made a status on Facebook simply stating, "First comment gets five unopened packs of Magic cards." I was, in fact, the first reply. We met up the next day and she gave me the cards. And from that day forward, I was hooked on Magic: The Gathering.

What is Magic, you may ask? Well, it is a card game that was developed by Richard Garfield and is distributed by Wizards of the Coast (who also publish another obsession of mine, Dungeons and Dragons). The rules are plentiful but here are the basics: you have a deck of 60 cards that which contains creatures, spells and lands. You use lands to conjure creatures and spells to do combat with your opponent. The goal is whittle your opponent's Life Points from 20 to 0. Now, of course, there are numerous complexities, but that's that.

So back to my crippling addiction to Magic. You can easily get addicted to the game, almost to the point where its die-hard fans often referred to it as "Cardboard Crack." As with anime and role playing games, I could have been a casual fan. I really could have. But then as with all things, I thought to myself, "Why don't I let it consume my life instead?" The result of that is what you see above. Yes, that is my personal collection of cards. I am lucky. Out of the approximately 20 million people who play Magic, I am sure there are plenty of worse cases. I guarantee it.

But do you wanna know the funny thing? I am not even any good at the game. I constantly get my ass kicked in the game by my veteran friends (Raymond, Ray Kendrick and Julian, I am looking at you three). But I guess it is the companionship and the pretty, colorful cards with the awesome artwork that keep me coming back for more.

And the fresh smell of new trading cards. Like, have you ever smelled new trading cards? Like, do yourself a favor and buy a pack of any card game of your choice and take a whiff of them. If that alone doesn't get you hooked, then I don't know what will (outside of anything illegal, of course).

So that's my story about me and "Cardboard Crack."