Happy Birthday, Gwen E. Bear

Happy Birthday, Gwen!! Today you are three and I cannot believe it! Where did this year go?

This week has been kind of a birthday week for Gwen. Last Friday she had her first haircut ever--she doesn't have a lot of hair, but it has finally reached the point where the knots where too much so she had a couple of inches cut off the bottom.

On Sunday, we took apart the crib (for the first time in 6 years--sniff sniff!!!) and put it in the basement and moved Gwen into a big girl bed. More specifically, MY old big girl bed. My dad bought this bed when I was 5 years old...I still remember coming home from kindergarten and seeing it and a new pink comforter in my room. Gwen's big girl bed, however, is covered in Hello Kitty.

This morning, Gwen woke up and we opened her presents before Hawksbill had to go to his internship. She is now the proud owner of an airplane, a green care bear, Max and Ruby beanie babies, and more clothes and toy jewelry.

We are making a green cake which will be frosted pink when it cools and then a Dora the Explorer cake topper if I can figure out how to put the thing together.

Happy 3rd birthday, little girl!! I hope you have a wonderful day!!

Tuesday....aaaafternoonnn....

Just a quick update about nothing. This weekend we decided to take a spur-of-the-moment trip to balmy Toledo for a hotel with a pool that Simon has begging us to go to. Unfortunately, COSI in Toledo is closed due to lack of money (or so I heard) so the trip was a swimming trip only. It was fun, though--we swam for about 4 hours (not in a row) and had a good time. Why Toledo? Well, we stayed at this hotel almost 2 years ago and had a blast--there are two pools--a family pool and an adults only pool. Both pools are indoor/outdoor pools, and due to this fact, are kept VERY warm. The restaurant at this particular hotel is pretty good, too--it wasn't as amazing as we remembered it being 2 years ago...but good enough :)

Today is Tuesday and based on this morning and the previous two Tuesday mornings, we have determined that it will snow every Tuesday which makes for a long morning commute for Hawksbill. There isn't much snow on the ground, but enough to make those lovely Detroit freeways a mess and add another 30-45 minutes to his already long commute.

I made the mistake of shoveling our driveway and our neighbor's driveway before 1 pm, as we had another blast of wind that swept away all my hard work. Maybe I will redo my shoveling again, but not until after 5 pm when working hours are technically over.

Let's see...it is just before 4 pm so I expect to see Hawksbill again in about 4-5 hours. Only 12 more weeks of this schedule. At least Tuesday is his only late night...it makes quite a difference being able to see him almost every night rather than only on the weekend evenings!!

On a different note, a friend of mine from high school will be starring in the upcoming production on Mama! Mia! that is coming to Detroit in February. I have already seen Mama! Mia!, however, am hoping to gather up some high school friends to go and see him in the play. I haven't spoken to this particular friend since my undergraduate years, but it is cool to see a friend from high school doing what they really wanted to do when they graduated--this friend always wanted to be an actor, and that is what he is. Super cool!

Back in the Swing of Things

Winter semester '08 is upon us, and so is another semester of homeschooling. Simon really seems to like the new math books we bought him, and I have to admit I like them a lot better, too. It seems like they have a better variety of problems, plus more colorful diagrams, and it seems a lot less repetitive. Don't get me wrong, I do believe in practice, but sometimes you need a freaking break. How many times days can you spend adding up the same two single digit numbers before you say, "Enough!"

Hawksbill and I (mostly Hawksbill) have been reading a lot of "Once upon a time" tales and now some Greek mythology stories to Simon at night, which he really seems to like. Gwen still likes reading a billion board books at night followed by singing her 5-6 songs.

Hawksbill is now into his second full week of this semester, too, and can I tell you how happy I am that we do not have to drag the kids around on a baby/car swap this semester? I don't know why it always takes 45 minutes to get them ready and into the car, but we don't have to do that due to one less class for Hawksbill, and our schedule allowing us to avoid that dreaded swap. I mentioned this to a relative (who knows we are homeschooling) who said to me, "Oh, just wait until next fall when you have to do this every day when they are in school!" I didn't say anything because I didn't want to get into a big family discussion about homeschooling that day. However, when this same, well-meaning, relative called me this morning to let me know, "I needed to register Simon NOW for school in the fall because if I don't, the state won't even know he exists and he can't go to school!!!" I reminded her that we were homeschooling in the fall, to which they added, "Well, in case you change your mind, you really should register Simon now."

This was followed by another light-hearted, "I don't know how you could stand homeschooling--I could never do it--I can't wait to send MY kids to school and get them out of my hair!" I responded, "That's too bad--I want to spend every possible precious moment with my kids, and I just wish I had even more time with them." Perhaps that wasn't very nice of me, but it is true, and sometimes I just blurt out what I am really thinking rather than bite my tongue every single time someone says something to me about not wanting to spend time with their kids. Oh, please--don't get me wrong--everyone's kids drive them batty once in a while--everyone needs a break--but I still want to be with mine more time than I am not.

It is like a very nice post on my friend Housefairy's blog recently about trusting yourself and doing what is right for YOUR OWN family. You know, I really don't care how other people are raising their kids or living their lives, but I do care about my family. You take the advice and ideas you like and use them, and you ignore the advice and junk you don't need.

My "found money" project has gotten off to an ok start this year. I think I have 44 cents now. I am trying to get Simon and Gwen into this, too, but so far they don't care (except when it comes to the time to spend the found money-ha!)

Happy New Year, everyone, and I hope the new year is treating you all just fine!

Ico & Shadow

One last note on video games before I return to real life on Tuesday.

I finished Ico late last night. It is a short game and took me only about 10 hours to complete. However, it lived up to its promise and I found it as moving and introspective as its prequel, Shadow of the Collosus.

In short it is the story of a young boy who is believed to be "cursed" by his community and is imprisoned in a gigantic fortress at the games beginning. In fact he is the latest in a long line of "cursed" boys who have been so imprisoned. The game begins with his entombment and proceeds with his attempt to escape. Along the way he find a mysterious girl in a cage who he sets free and they set off together to find their way out. Or, at least, the boy is looking for a way out. The girl is easily distracted by the clouds and small animals. She seems confused and unearthly.

Basically, your role as player is to solve puzzles which create pathways that allow Ico (the boy) and Zorda (the girl) to leave. On that level it is very Tomb Raider like and isn't all that impressive.

It is on the narrative level that Ico (and SotC) really impress me. But, it is difficult to describe the beauty of the narrative in words because the story telling technique used is so minimal. In fact, the story seems beautiful not because of what is told in the story, but because of what isn't told. It is kind of like a sculpture where everything non essential is chipped away and only the absolute barest details are left behind. And even they are subject to great interpretation.

I was just reading this narrative analysis of Ico and the author there said it best. He said that the story in Ico "insists on holding silence on its own narrative." I love this kind of story telling . If done well the audience is left stunned by witnessing something beautiful but they are also unable to describe that beauty without imbuing the story with their own interpretation.

As such, whoever is describing the story is not describing just the story. Instead they are describing the story in a way that is intertwined with their own perspective on life or beauty or whatever. Everyone brings something of themselves to the interpretation, which is required because the story is so minimal that it requires interpretation to be described.

I won't bore anyone with my own interpretations. That would be out of place here when all I really wanted to do was describe the sense of wonder I'm left with after playing these two really great games.

Some Ico and Shadow of the Colossus links:
Here are a number of nice high rez screen shots of Ico if anyone is interested.
Here is a set of fan created art which is pretty impressive.
Also, here is a blog dedicated to both games.

Hawksbill's post o' holiday gaming

Last semester was so grueling and stressful that I didn't sleep a full night from September through the middle of December. Just about every night I awoke between 3am and 4am worried about something or other, ranging from long papers I had due to getting a job after graduation. Thus, when the holidays hit and I had over two weeks off I was determined to be lazy, to have fun and not to worry about a damn thing. And, other than spending a ton of time together as a family, I was determined to feed that monkey on my back... the gaming monkey.

The guys came over last Saturday and we played board games from noon until after midnight. I got to play Goa, Power Grid (using the Italy map) and Caylus, which are three of my favorites. There were 7 of us, which meant we had to split into two groups so Paul, Jake, Steve and George played some Age of Empires III, which none of us had played before and I got to play a game of Basari with Larry and Ben, which I had not played before also. The highlight of the day, though, was when we ended by playing a huge 6 player game of Zopp, which has been sitting around in our gaming room, waiting to be played for several weeks. Zopp is probably the most expensive game I own, and I was pleased to see that it was a big hit. It's always nice to end a gaming day with a crazy dex game.

Along with board games, I was determined to feed my video game habit this holiday. I came very close to going out and indulging in a new Playstation 3, but instead I went through my library of PS2 stuff and hit a vein of great games I hadn't played before. This convinced me that I hadn't yet exhausted the PS2's potential and I made a list of highly regarded games to play before I move to the PS3.

I started off with God of War which I played through from start to finish in about 3 days a week and a half ago. This is a fine game with a pretty good story, in which you play a Greek hero seeking vengeance against the god Ares. It has great controls, fantastic graphics and a delightful amount of brutal violence.

I've owned this one for a bout a year, and played it a bit, but it never really grabbed me until a couple of weeks ago. There were a couple of really frustrating moments trying to escape from the underworld, but I guess escaping from the underworld should probably be very difficult. All in all, though, a great gaming experience.

Another game I've owned for over a year but never played is Shadow of the Colossus. In SotC you play a young lad who brings his trusty horse, a stolen magic sword and a dead girl to a mysterious temple in a lonely unpopulated land and prays for her resurrection. His prayers are answered by a booming voice that instructs him to take his magic sword and slay 16 different colossi and then the girl will be brought back to life.

Basically, it is a 3rd person action-adventure combat and puzzle solving game in which you must kill only boss-monsters. You have a horse, a bow and a sword and the monsters are sometimes hundreds of feet tall. The puzzles in the game are all about how to locate the colossi and then how to find their individual weaknesses which you exploit to kill them.

I finished Shadow of the Colossus in about 5 days and after watching the closing animation sequence I had to admit this this was likely one of the best games I've ever played. In fact, Simon had been sitting on my lap watching me play for almost all of that time and at the end of the game he actually cried a little in sympathy for the characters. The story was so sad and moving that I felt like I'd just finished a classic piece of literature. Even now, several days later I can't get it out of my head. It still haunts me.

In fact, many players have found SotC to be haunting and worthy of considerable thematic speculation. I found this plot/theory analysis over at gamefaqs.com which tries to put all the pieces together. One of the great things about this game is that the characters only speak an unintelligible Japanese/Latin combination. This means that the back story is never fully explained which allows for a lot of internal speculation while you're playing.

SotC was written by a game designer named Fumito Ueda who intended it to be a prequel to a previous PS2 game called Ico, which I had heard of before but hadn't payed much attention to. Wander, in SotC is supposed to be the ancestor of the main character of Ico, and is the first of a long line of cursed boys born each generation because of the horrors Wander committed in SotC. It turns out that Ico was something of a cult hit and new copies of it are selling for $80+, but I just ordered a used copy for a reasonable price and can't wait to play it.

For me, playing Shadow of the Colossus is the video game equivalent to reading Alan Moore's comic The Swamp Thing for the first time. You are engaging in medium you think you understand and can't really be surprised about, but the story stretches that medium in simple, poetic and unexpected directions that are simultaneously beautiful and sorrowful. It really reminds you that games can be works of art, although they seldom are. Damn, I can't wait to play Ico!

For anyone interested, I found several interviews with Fumito Ueda regarding his games. One is with the Guardian another is with CVG and a third is with Wired.

After playing God of War and Shadow of the Colossus from start to finish I was determined to finish one more game before I go back to school next Tuesday. In my research I stumbled across the Prince of Persia series which, like Ico, I'd seen before but never paid a lot of attention to. I'm currently about a third of the way through the first in the PS2 trilogy called The Sands of Time.

The graphics in The Sands of Time are a bit dated, as it came out back in 2003, but are still fairly pleasant. Like the others it is a 3rd person action-adventure game, but this one has more emphasis on puzzle solving than on combat, unlike God of War which is a bit more weighted towards ripping the heads off Gorgons. Actually, I picked up this game because I read a review of Ico in which they were compared as having similar game play styles. It is a good one, but not as moving as SotC so far.

I'm very pleased, though. Most games are marginal at best and the really good ones are few and far between. I feel like I've hit a gold mine of quality gaming fun to maximize my holiday goofing off.

Once school starts up again I won't be able to be this epically lazy. But, I've put together a list of other games I plan to play on the PS2 over the next several months before switching to the PS3.

These are: Ico, God of War II, and parts II and III of the Prince of Persia series (The Warrior Within and The Two Thrones). I'm also a bit tempted by The Devil May Cry trilogy, which I have part 1 of but haven't played yet and by Psychonaughts, which I started last year and played for a couple of hours but never finished. Also I want to finish Dark Cloud II, which Simon and I started a few weeks ago and Star Ocean, which are both rpg's that look well worth playing.

I was toying with going with the xbox 360 instead of the PS3, but I've pretty much decided now to stay with Sony's console. After all, God of War is exclusive to the Playstation line. Also, and probably more importantly though, Fumito Ueda who designed Shadow of the Colossus and Ico is currently working for Sony on a 3rd game. This next one is all hush hush right now, but I'm hoping it will be set in the same universe as the others and will be as haunting as SotC.

What a great holiday this has been. I can't express what a relief it is to spend all this time with Barb and the kids and playing games instead of worrying about papers, exams, internship stuff, my upcoming graduation and getting a job.

I'll get back to that stuff next Tuesday. Until then I have misshapen Arabian sand demons to slay!

Happy New Year!!!

Yay yay yay it is 2008!! Hawksbill, Simon and Gwen and I are having a really nice, lazy, relaxing vacation...I am sad to say today is my last day off and have to go back to work tomorrow, but Hawksbill really has one more week off (if you don't count Friday when he goes in for his internship one day--school starts up next week for him!)

Gwen woke up this morning and we told her, "Happy New Year, Gwen!" and she responded, "Thanks. Did our presents come?" Ha! Sorry, little one...you'll have to wait another 3.5 weeks until your birthday for that....

I am going to restart my *found money* counter at the beginning of the new year instead of in March like I said I would. I have been having so much fun with it that I figured I might as well begin the new year fresh. So, my 2007 total ended at $9.11 which is a little more than $1/month. I only found 1 bill ($1) so all of the rest was pennies, dimes, nickels and quarters--mostly pennies and dimes.

I found this article about other people doing the found money experiment so I am not the only geek in town! However, my money will be spent on Amazon.com since we just pooled our found money with our counter change jar and turned in the change for another e-certificate. I was hoping to buy another copy of my destroyed Tae Bo tape (laugh if you will, but Billy Blanks is my hero!) so I can start up another New Year's resolution that I was doing well with last year up until about 6 weeks ago when final exam, final paper crunch time exhaustion set in (yes, I know--I wasn't writing any papers), but since Hawksbill was studying every last minute and Gwen wants me to pick her up every time I try to put on an exercise tape, the whole exercise part of last year really fizzled during the most important time of the year! However, it appears the original Tae Bo that I want to buy is some weird collector's item now that they want at least $65 for an *acceptable* condition DVD!! No thanks! I guess we will buy something else and maybe I'll try ebay for my tape or just go to the Tae Bo website and buy some new set of DVD's and try something different. However, I really really liked my old tape...so we shall see.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful New Year. I am looking forward to Hawksbill finishing school in about 4 months (yay!!!) and going camping this summer and just having a fresh start this year.