March 21, 2004: Happy Birthday Nate

Min got like no sleep yesterday so she slept in pretty late today. We didn’t go to church because it was pretty much going to be over by the time we were getting out of bed. We finally got up and went to the Omega Grill for some lunch. Then we headed over to Walmart because Min has been playing her GBA a bit recently and she ate through her batteries. That is one of the greatest thing about the new GBAs compared to the regular Gameboys, the batteries just last forever. It is really incredible just how long they last. It isn’t uncommon to hear rumors of people getting 20+ hours out of a pair of AA alkanlines! That is pretty incredible. And when you realize how powerful that little machine is, then it is really cool.

Speaking of really cool handheld game systems, if anyone out there is not aware, there is another game system that completely whomps all over the GBA and is only a little bit more expensive. What could this system be, you ask, well, I will tell you. It is the GamePark GP32. This is a system based on a similar, but more powerful, processor than the GBA. But unlike the GBA, the GP32 went out and added better audio and video support and twice as much memory giving it loads more power. But the two coolest features of this little unit are that it has built in wireless networking and that it uses industry standard Smart Media cards for its software. Using the built in wireless means that four GP32 owners can sit in a room or ride a bus together and play head to head games without all the cables hooking them together. The Smart Media cards means that you can download and play games off the Internet without having to go to a store to get them. And since there are lots of emulators written for the system, you can play NES, SNES, Atari 2600, Lynx, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, Gameboy, Gameboy Color, GBA, MAME, NeoGeo Pocket, Sega Genesis, Game Gear, Vectrex (this one is for you, Francesca), WonderSwan and many others, you can play tons and tons of classic games from the consoles on here. And since you can just pick up the cartridges for it at Walmart, and huge ones at that, you can put hundreds of games on a single cart and take them anywhere with you. And since the carts are SO tiny, you could easily fit thousands of games in your pocket.

Min spent a bit of the afternoon learning web site design as she is working on her own site. Hopefully she will have it up later today and then everyone can stop by and take a look at it. She is just getting going so it should be changing pretty rapidly. She is getting the site up for her new business of making designer knit fashions. So as soon as everyone is ready for some cool new purses and scarves, let her know.

Min has been pretty excited about her new video game, The Sims: Bustin’ Out on the GBA.

Min got called late this afternoon about subbing for the week. Keshequa has already decided to use her for three different classes this week. She is the acting librarian on Monday and then is subbing for two different social studies teachers on Tuesday and Wednesday. It is really cool that she is already lined up for the week and knows what she is going to be doing. That never happens. I have a busy week too. Danielle and I are planning on doing sales on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. I am working in Ithaca all day on Wednesday and then I am working Saturday, Sunday and Monday in Endicott. So we are both going to be very, very busy.

I won Nintendo’s Golden Sun for the GBA on eBay this afternoon. Recently we have discovered that Min and I both love playing JRPG’s (Japanese Role Playing Games) so we are trying to beef up our collection a little bit. She has liked them for a long time but didn’t know what the genre was called and I have always liked them but she didn’t know that the games I were playing were JRPGs. So we finally figured out that we like tons of the same games so we are trying to get more of those. We both really like the handheld game systems so we aren’t getting anything that isn’t GameBoy or potential GamePark related (I am looking for a good deal on a used one.) I really want to get a GP32 because there are tons of great SNES games that I would really like to play but don’t want to bother breaking out my system and hooking it up to the projector to play. The handheld systems are just tons more convenient. So I have been scouring eBay looking for games that we like or think that we will. I am also looking at some original GameBoy titles from way back when. I had an original GB back in like 1992 but it was lost while I was in high school and I lost all of my original games. Then I didn’t have a system at all for years (big mistake) but I replaced it around 1998 or 1999 with a Game Boy Color. I got a few games for that but not nearly as many as I had had long ago. So now I am looking to get the games that I had always wanted but never did and since most of them are really cheap on eBay, it is easy.

So we were looking for something to watch tonight and Min bought the first season of Roswell, which she has already watched, so I decided to give it a try. I actually ended up liking the show. It is more serial like the European shows that I really like than most American shows. So I started watching it while I was working on my laptop in the living room. I ended up watching ten one hour episodes of Roswell, almost half of the first season. Min thinks that it is hilarious that I like the show. This was her and Jenn’s favorite show when they were in college.

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