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iPod games

Once upon a time I promised some reviews of the time-wasting games I have found for my iPod Touch. Oddly enough, I would rather waste time playing the games than writing about them, but here’s the beginning of my list.

Sheepish: I love this one. The sheeps are adorable, the puzzles are just challenging enough and just short enough to keep me interested. Unfortunately, I am completely stuck on one of the levels and I have now moved on to other time-wasters.

Like Bejeweled2. For some reason, the “line up a specific number of alike things in a row” sort of games are terribly appealing to me. I can get sucked into this game for HOURS. No exaggerating, I really mean hours. sad, isn’t it? Oh, and I just tried playing this online on my laptop, and I must say, it is much more fun to use my finger and drag the pieces on the iPod. Trackpads are so last year.

The most recent addition to the game family is Gumdrops. It’s described as “what you get when you turn the game play of Tetris on its head.” That makes it sound much more exciting than it really is, but again it is a “line up a specific number of alike things” sort of game, so I have wasted several enjoyable hours with this game. My only complaint was going to be that it doesn’t really use the iPod screen to its full potential, but I discovered last night that really the problem is that it isn’t so intuitive. I didn’t bother with the instructions because the other games just worked “the way they should”. With this game, I tried everything I could think of before I finally discovered how to speed the falling of the pieces.

One last game worth mentioning is Tiki Towers. I refused to pay for the full version until I had tried the free version, and I finished all the levels of the free one really quickly. Perhaps too quickly to pay for the full version. It was fun, and I do like monkeys, but I am enjoying my other games too much right now to spend more money on iPod games. Also, the physics are supposedly pretty realistic (my two semesters of college physics were completely devoid of monkeys and their towers, so I really can’t comment on the subject) which to me just made the game a little less game-like and a little too nerdy.

…More games, less writing about games… see ya!

PS - In case you’re here to hear about Nathan, ToothWatch ‘09 is nearing an end. There are two teeth through the gums. Oddly, only one of those is a top front tooth. The other is the tooth to the right of his front tooth. Their companions are visible under the gums, but taking their time. Four teeth at once makes for a somewhat crabby baby sometimes. It seems that he didn’t get the memo about when teeth should erupt and in what order.

Something Fishy

I spent the whole weekend hanging out on the couch, sleeping a lot of it, trying to get over the swine flu or something like it. Nathan had it last weekend and now I know why he was as crabby as he was. I just hope that I didn’t give it to everyone at work last week.

Mike recently took some pictures of his fish tank so I thought I would share them here. He works hard to make his silly rocks happy and I think he’s done quite a lovely job.

That’s my fish. His name is Four.

Here’s Nathan deciding where we should take him for vacation. Oh, and those teeth we’ve been waiting for? One of them arrived and the other one is making itself known.

Pride

Usually when the question “where are you from?” comes up in conversation, I am quick to point out that while I may have spent my formative years on the east coast, I really like the middle of the country better. Today, though, I am proud to claim New Hampshire as my home state.
It’s time that the rest of the country gets this one right.

Tooth Watch ‘09

It has started again. There is a consensus among those of us that regularly wonder about such things (me, our daycare provider and occasionally Mike, though I’m not sure that he “wonders” so much as “rolls his eyes at how much time we spend wondering”) that Mr. Nathan is working on some more teeth. The top ones seem to be getting ready to make an appearance. Judging by our skills at predicting the eruption of the first two teeth, there is absolutely no way we have any idea when these teeth will actually show up. Last time we started paying attention just before Christmas. The teeth stayed under those gums until late March.
But we have irrefutable evidence that something is happening. right now. His gums might be a little swollen. He has definitely been more cuddly this week. He isn’t interested in food or bottles and his nose is running. Must be teeth. Couldn’t be anything else. No way, no how.

Tooth Watch ‘09 has begun again. From now until those teeth finally appear, everything that Nathan does will be because he’s teething. That’s how it works around here. I wonder if we’ll ever learn our lesson.

Who needs more teeth, anyway?

Emma likes her cousin even though he only has two teeth and can’t figure out how to give her a kiss on the cheek.

Good times

My cousin got married this past weekend, so I got to spend my very first Mother’s Day in The Big City (not the one closest to here, the one that is a bit of a drive away, but still to close to justify plane tickets) with my mom. The wedding was beautiful and as usual it was great to see aunts and uncles and cousins with whom I don’t spend nearly enough time. (who? whom? ugh, I wish I were cool enough to know that and/or motivated enough to look up the answer. Brett to the rescue?) Also as usual, I spend weeks before the event looking forward to seeing family and then as soon as we all get together, my ridiculous shyness returns and I forget how to carry on a conversation. Why does this always happen?

***ugh. I must interrupt this terribly boring post with a terribly unrelated story that may interest only me. Too bad for the rest of you. Anyway. I am watching a hideously craptastic show (if you have to ask why, you obviously don’t know me very well. The DVR records it, therefore it must be watched.) and they just used my favorite joke. Since Nathan was a few months old I have been saying, “that boy has more blankets than…a…um… someone who has lots of blankets” and variations on the theme. Hilarious! I know. The guy on my craptastic show just said, “That swindler, he’s as blind as … something… that can’t see very well.” As he started the line, I thought, “no way. don’t do it! Don’t ruin my favorite line! GAH!” I should write bad TV. I wonder if there’s any money in that.
***Also, I just noticed on the website of the craptastic show, there is a link to “Get caught up in 5 minutes! Watch the 5 minute recap!” Sounds like the perfect way to watch the show.

I think I was talking about not being able to carry on a conversation… Interesting. or not. I’ll have some pictures from the weekend one of these days. And perhaps some reviews of my nifty new iPod Touch (Nathan is the smartest baby I’ve ever had; he knew just what to get me!) and it’s associated apps. I’m going to be testing out some games as soon as I hit publish. See ya!