I grew up in a time where home-based emulation of a Arcade Machine was a pipe dream. There was a man whose job it was to drive from Arcade to arcade configuring the videogame machines according to the dip-switches on the motherboards inside the cabinet.

The simplest games were complex labyrinths of transistors, switches, chips and tubes, and they were treated like major entertainment investments by the public venues that could afford them.

The games played at home were quadrichromatic facsimiles of the mighty arcade machines, but you’d only know this if you were one of the lucky few to own a video computer system.

And along came Lord Nintendo. And for a brief time there was parity between the arcade machines in the form of Saint Mario. And although that time of parity was short, it was mighty. It was Lord Nintendo who crafted the sword that first nicked the Arcade’s vitals. And from that wound, although their struggles would be mighty—and parity would be lost and gained 100 times over, the Arcades would founder.

I grew up in a time  where home-based emulation of an Arcade Machine was a pipe dream. We are now witnessing a time where those mighty machines of old are sold as throw-away electronics. Simple arcade sticks that plug and play into any television. There are now arcade machines emulated within the supercomputers that sit under our gigantic televisions. It is a golden time. These are halcyon days. Revel in them. Be amazed by them; they are yours to enjoy.

You dicks. 

Well, look at this. It turns out my 1999-era wifi router, the one that runs my network, affectionately named “Slowand Broken,” is one of the routers on Nintendo’s lists of “routers that don’t work so good with Nintendo WFC.”

It has been our experience that this router typically requires specific changes to be made on the Wii console in order to have a stable connection to our online services.

This is sad. But surmountable—it simply requires a manual configuration. I mean, God forbid I upgrade to a router made within the last 10 years.

This fine Christmas evening, James, Jeni , Gaia and I watched James' brand new DVD of "The Goonies."
Yes. It's the classic/cult film. I don't need to sell you on it. Watch it now. Say the lines along with it. Goonies Never say Die. Do the Truffle Shuffle. Have your time, down there. Or whatever you need to do.

Then, point your browser over at theGoonies.org and watch "The Goonies Vacation." A brillant fan-film wherein the filmmakers tour some of the film's locations and shoot self-insertion peices of some of the best scenes in the movie.

Thanks for all your time and attention this year.
The world is a big place, and we know you have a lot of things fighting for your attention.
We're so grateful that we've slouched our way into yours.

You should see the heroics Jenifer is going through to get to West Allis. It's incredible out there. I shoveled her out and she drove out into the road only to get stuck. So I shoveled her out again and she drove down the street and got stuck. So I shoveled her out and pushed her down the street until she finally pulled over and said that she'd just have to go in later. I didn't hear her say that because I was waving at the other three guys in the street who were helping other cars get unstuck. No plow has come by yet-- and the cat is pissed that we're still home. Apparently this is his special time.

We shall read from the Book of Wikipedia, Article 254453666, Revision 50.

Crop milk, also known as pigeon's milk, is a secretion from the lining of the crop of pigeons and doves with which the parents feed their young by regurgitation.
...
Crop milk bears little resemblance to mammalian milk, being a semi-solid substance somewhat like pale yellow cottage cheese.

The article points out that various commercial substitutes for pigeon milk are sold on the market.

This video, for what it's worth, represents the final moments of the featured computer's life. Shortly after we put it away, the power button fell out, and we have been unable to turn it back on since.

Flickr cut off the last 20 seconds, where my daughter's geek cred, skyrockets when she asks "Where's the Firefox!"
Gaia loves her some Firefox.

Almost bi-annually, I hunker down in a new hastily named village in Animal Crossing and spend two or so months slowly playing my way through paying off the first few renovations to my little house.

And then the novelty wears off and I put the game down.

Along comes Fall of 2008 and Animal Crossing: Lets You Can Has City for the Nintendo Wii.

Interestingly, this time, I’ve actually resumed playing the DS version (Wild World) at the same time, which, is fun, considering that there is only so many things you can do in Animal Crossing in a single play session.

The most awesome thing in the world about Animal Crossing for the WII is the ability to take a screenshot and save it as a JPG on the Wii’s SD Card; I bought a 2 GB SD card exclusively for this feature.

As for the game, it’s pretty much the same-old, same-old. The Online Component is hysterically frustrating, the fishing as overly simplistic, and there are only about six personality archetypes between all the villagers.

What makes it so much more fun this time around is that Gaia and I are playing together. She has a guy, I have a guy, and we run around our little village (embarrassingly named “The Spot”) and we go to the city and get our hair did.

Even though a combination of game-crashing wifi-bugs and the insanity of Nintendo’s “Friend Codes” system has made any kind of online meet ups impossible for me, It’s more fun when you play together. That’s thanks to Gaia.

Gaia and I are home on a snow day to day. Whee! I’m actually hard at work on important work stuff, but she’s enjoying the kind of awesome snow day that you can only enjoy when you’re three.

Anyway, don’t hesitate to check the webcam from time to time today, as we’ll be sitting on the couch and possibly decorating the tree later. If you look at it right now, you’ll probably see a photo of me looking disheveled and working on my computer. Come to think of it, that’s pretty much all you' ever really see on my webcam.

Snow day! For! The! Win!