I’ve loved videogames since I was about five. Whether it was playing my dad’s Atari, or going over to a friend’s house just to play Super Mario Bros., they’ve always brought me a lot of entertainment.

I’ve had a PS3 for about three years now, and in that time my love for games has really increased, and it blows me away how awesome current games are. Back in the day it was rare to find a game that could keep my interest until the end, but that’s common fare now.

I think a big part of this is trophy support, and having those accomplishments recognized. But I also think game developers have reached a new level of quality. Check out some videos of God of War III. It’s amazing what they can do now.

I just finished Modern Warfare 2′s single player campaign, and now I’m working on Uncharted 2. I have never played the God of War games, but I have the first two coming for PS3. They remastered them in hi-def, added trophies, and it’s only $30 on Amazon.

But there are so many great games to play. Heavy Rain looks awesome, as does God of War III. And who can forget FFXIII.

It is a great time to be a videogamer.

Now that I’m waiting on book edits I’ve turned into a lazy bum. I felt so much more productive when I was spending a couple hours a day working on it.

I’ve been playing a lot of Mario Kart on Wii. Too much. It’s addictive, and a ton of fun.

We finished watching all the TV shows we had recorded. I’ve been recording reruns of the Big Bang Theory, so we started watching that tonight. It’s super geeky and funny.

I watched the show “Wanna Bet?” and it was absolutely terrible, but Tom Green was on. It reminded me about his website, www.tomgreen.com, and when I went there I started to watch episodes of the Tom Green Show. I’ve only seen a handful of them, but they’re super funny. They’re totally stupid, but still very funny. After that it reminded me that I was going to buy The Jamie Kennedy Experiment on DVD, another funny show. Maybe with my DVD profits I can get those.

I saw The Dark Night on Monday with my brother and sister-in-law. Heath Ledger was super good. Even if he wasn’t dead people would be talking him up. The movie itself was entertaining, and without spoiling anything I think it just went a little long. The story got sidetracked and wasn’t as tight as Iron Man.

Another movie I saw a little while ago was Wall-E. Like all Pixar movies it was breathtaking and a technological marvel, but there was something that bugged me the entire movie. Without spoiling anything, the premise of the movie is that humans have ruined the earth with trash and are now living in a space “cruise” ship. I couldn’t help but feel like I was being slapped in the face the entire time. Humans are stupid and ruining the planet, and it’s all the fault of evil corporations. I understand we need to take care of the planet we call home, but the movie builds on the stupid belief that we’re years from all being dead, and we’re not. The anti-capitalist message is almost laughable considering Pixar is making tons of money because of capitalism.

Took me two weeks to finish my editing of the book. That’s spending 3-4 hours at the library almost everyday. I went to Kinkos and had two “books” printed to send to my editors, Kevin and Joanne. Once I get back their edits, and incorporate them, I can start working on putting it up for sale!

A friend of ours got me Mario Kart for the Wii, and it absolutely rocks. Today we played it for over five hours. The are a ton of online options, tons of characters, and it’s super fun. I have Kurtii on my friends list, but he’s never on, and Paddy hasn’t even registered me yet. Anyone else have Mario Kart for the Wii that wants to play online?

I’ve gone from 109 dvds for sale down to 20. Pretty darn good for only a week and a half.

Now that the book is mostly done it’s on to other summer projects. I need to edit lots of video, and I have a huge box of negatives from my parents house. I have hundreds of pictures to digitize, so I might start working on that…

…or I could go play more Mario Kart.

I was tired of the Wii’s super slow wireless connection. Granted it sits below the TV, a terrible spot, but downloads would sit and sit and do nothing. Finally bought a Wii Lan Adapter. The Wii is now hardwired just like the PS3 and downloads and internet are quick and reliable.

There is a new channel on the Wii called “Check Mii Out.” It lets people post their Miis and other people can rate them. The best part is that they are having contests where you have to design a Mii for a specific topic, and then judge them. So far they’ve done Mario with no hat, and someone who would be at the first thanksgiving. My first entry in the Thanksgiving one was a skinny white guy with a lot of hair and a bushy beard, but my second try was 100x better. It’s an Indian looking guy named Squanto. Maybe I’ll win!

We’ve been playing Zack and Wiki, and I must say it is way cool. Solving the puzzles in this game are much more satisfying than solving a puzzle in Zelda. I think Mario Galaxy would be fun too, but I’m too busy playing The Show on PS3.

Stacie got a gift card to Best Buy for her birthday, so we’ve been looking for a good video game for her to get. We decided on Zack and Wiki for the Wii. It’s basically a point and click adventure game kinda like the old Monkey Island games. I’d been pushing her to try out Mario Galaxy, but the videos and more intense control scheme didn’t excite her as much. Zack and Wiki is a very easy game to control, but is difficult enough to challenge an adult. Last night I headed over to the local store to get it, and so far she really likes it! Mario Galaxy does look like a lot of fun, but I’m still playing my baseball game on PS3, and I still love it. So much fun.

An update on the dog…last you heard we had left our bedroom door open, and everything was magical, but it didn’t last. What I think happened was the dog thought we weren’t really leaving, because we always shut the doors upstairs when we do, but after a few weeks she realized we were still leaving for long periods of time. She went back to her anxious pooping and peeing in the house behaviors. Tired of it all, I went to the pet store and bought a crate. She’s slept in it every night since, and things have improved a great deal. As we prepare for the baby too, it will be nice not having the dog run around and go crazy every time we wake up.

Speaking of the baby, we’ve got about a week and a half until we find out what it is. My kids have been asking me, and every time I tell them we’re having a human. They look at me strange for a moment until they finally get the joke. We both want a boy and girl at some point, and the order isn’t particularly important to us. I would say that Stacie really wants a girl, and I lean slightly in that direction. Ultimately I’ll love the baby no matter what it is, so putting too much hope in one sex or the other means I could potentially be disappointed in what we get, and I don’t want to be disappointed in the baby.

Dennis Prager was talking the other day about spirituality versus religion. I was going to try and explain what he said, but then I found you can download the whole half hour discussion! This is the first time I’ve looked into a podcast of any kind, and I plan on downloading and listening to a lot. No commercials, you can listen again…it’s great stuff. Visit this link, and go down to H3: Ultimate Issues Hour: Is Spirituality Enough? You can click listen now and hear this great discussion. If you don’t want to listen to the whole thing, fast forward to about 20 mins when he talks to Kent. Very good stuff.

Due to my pathetic lack of posts lately, I give you two in the same hour!

What’s up with Wilson Betemit? Most of the year he looks like total garbage, then they bring up LaRoche and he starts hitting. All I know is one of them needs to break out and shine.

Speaking of baseball, I’ve been reading about MLB ’07 The Show on PS3. I’m really in a precarious situation. I love my Wii, but it will never have a classic baseball game on it due to the motion controls. My other console is the original xbox, which only has one new baseball offering this year, and it’s probably the last.

As I consider my inevitable purchase of either an Xbox 360 or PS3, the baseball title offerings are a huge priority. Sega has a monopoly on the MLB license, so MLB 2k7 is the only baseball title made by a 3rd party publisher. SCEA, Sony’s publishing house, is exempt from that exclusivity, so they can make their own MLB game. It’s only available for PS3 though. That means Xbox 360 has one game to choose from, and PS3 two games.

Of course the PS3 costs $600 and the game is another $60. There should be a price drop eventually, but the kid in me still gets excited reading about new games even though I don’t have a lot of time to play them. I still need to beat Zelda, and I have Paper Mario on the Gamecube waiting.

From the time I was a young boy the release of a new Nintendo system has been a milestone in my life. First there was the original NES. I wasn’t quite old enough to be excited about it’s release, but I still got one! I have fond memories of guilting my parents into buying one and getting Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2. After years of good memories with my trusty Game Genie, it was time for the SNES. Still a young boy with no purchasing power, and with a price tag of $200, I was yet again unable to enjoy the splendor of a new videogame system at its release. Eventually though my NES and all that went with it was off in the mail to Funco, which would be the first of many videogame sales.

The sale of my NES led to the purchase of the SNES, and of course, Street Fighter II, Mario Kart, and Star Fox to name a few. As the N64 approached I was finally in High School. Still not a member of the labor force, I was again resigned to selling my beloved Nintendo system for its successor. My memory of this occassion is quite clear…we brought the system home from Toys R Us with the brand new Super Mario 64. It seemed as though videogames had been turned on their head forever. Nights of Mario Kart, GoldenEye, and NHL ensued during the High School years.

By the time GameCube arrived I was a proud employee at the library, saving my money for months before the launch. For the first time in my life I didn’t have to sell my old console. The GameCube and I had a great time, but it also saw my life change from a teen to an "adult." With that transition came a change in my videogame habits. Gone are the 2 a.m. gaming sessions that marked High School and College. Videogames have always been a part of my life, so I’m almost glad to see that excitement come around again with the pending launch of the Wii.

If I was in High School or College I would probably be running to Gamespot to try the Wii, but instead I have quietly been reading every article I can find on the web. I’ve cashed in my credit card reward points (that makes me old!) to finance this new purchase. I’ve once again leveraged my previous Nintendo console (though for different reasons than in previous sales). I’ve even bought Nintendo stock!  When exactly a Wii will be at Toys R Us and available to me, I don’t know. I sit here and patiently await the release of an exciting new Nintendo console…maybe I’m finally growing up?

Hmmm…no, not really….

BOOO! I typed a whole entry and got some server error and it got erased! argg. Everything is now going to be shorter and less witty.

Worship tonight was good. Students in the band are cool, I’m proud of them. Good job.

Stacie and I get keys to new house, less than 2 weeks. Oooh scary. Mario rules, bought us a giftcard to Home Depot, we buy paint.

Next month, young adults go see Star Wars. It be awesome. Maybe first Saturday it’s out, during the day. We can camp outside for a few hours and eat otterpops in line. I go plan that, bye.

Sorry, I started to get witty there at the end with the otterpop thing, my bad.