Make a Game of Life

In North Loup, Nebraska, where I spent my boyhood summers with my grandfather, the television pulled one signal out of the sky, channel 10/11, and when the picture dissolved into snow the day still had eight hours left in it. A boy in a town like that learns the oldest technology on earth. Boredom is a raw material. A long afternoon wants shape, and shape comes from rules: the stick is a bat because we agree it is, the crack in the walk is a foul line because we say so, the score matters because we decide it matters. Nobody sold us that afternoon. We manufactured it ourselves, on the spot, out of dust and agreement, and the dust became the best part of the summer.

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Death from Internet Video Stupidity

When I was a child, my brother and I regularly heard about kids our age who would get into all kinds of dangerous wacky hijinks, endangering their lives in the process. We would see news reports about a child getting hurt or dying but we would never see the dangerous circumstances in which the child got hurt.

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Clash Mobs and Infinity Blade 2

I’m a new owner of the retina display iPad, but I’m a bit of a latecomer to the Infinity Blade 2 game.  I’ve been playing the game for several days now and I’m having a delightful time leveling up, collecting all sorts of goodies and forging new gems from old gems.  The game looks beautifully and plays exceptionally fine in every aspect.

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What I Learned from Lemonade Stand

When I was in grade school we learned a lot while playing what seemed to be very fun video games — games such as The Oregon Trail, Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, and Lemonade Stand. Each of the games had lessons that were valuable for children, many of which I treasure even now.

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Weeing Over the Wii

I know I’m probably the last person in the world to get a Nintendo Wii — but I have one now — and I’ve been weeing for nearly a week with delight.

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Violent Imagination Shaping Brain Reality

Does perceiving violent acts — real or imagined — change the shape of your brain and how it processes information?  The blunt — and likely unpopular — answer is, “Yes.” 

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