Video games as duct tape

The title is crazy but its late and the Yankee game is going into the 12th inning. I watched Mythbuster's on Wednesday where they basically proved duct tape can save the world in any cataclysmic event. It's the ultimate bonding agent and that is its only reference to this post.

You see, Noah and I did some serious bonding last night. He's had a chest cold and I was trying to keep him away from Jenna. So he and I sat down last night and played a little Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle's on the PS3. Some of my first memories were 1978, playing Missile Command on the Atari 2600 with Cuz. We'd name the 4 cities we were saving Junction, ElDorado, Norphlet, and Smackover. After 3 hours and the game got hard we'd basically save JC and let the others get blown to hell.

Wow I'm seriously digressing here. The point is I loved video games when I was a kid and always have. Noah loves them too. Not only does he have 2 pages of games on my iPhone but he can navigate all their menus and play them independently. He also has a Diego and Reader Rabbit game on the iMac. How a 3 year-old can be so good with a mouse is kind of creepy.

TMNT is his new love ever since he accidently saw an episode 2 months ago. He's going as Leonardo, or 'the blue ninja tuttle' for Halloween. Every day is a combination of him crashing through the house doing ninja poses with his play swords over his head and shouting 'Turtle Power.' So I downloaded a TMNT game off the PS Network. It was to be his first real video game and not some interactive cartoon trying to teach him something. It's a coop game so we can play as a team. We've played some levels this past week but last night I told him we were going to play until we run out of 'men.'
When we got to a new level he was so excited. He'd pause the game and yell 'We at new level Mom!!!!' Finally we got to the boss battle against Shredder and he was beside himself. I mean truly beside himself. He was fired up. When we finally beat him he did a dance. Then...there were no more levels. I thought he was going to cry. I guess he thought the game would go on forever. I had to explain to him that video games end. We can play it again but they just don't go on forever (unless its a MMO but that would only confuse him more).

It was a lot of fun and it reminded me of Cuz and I sitting on the living room floor saving JC from annihilation, Holly watching me play a Zelda game, and the Madden/SF2 throwdowns in the dorm at college. People can say what they want about video games but I love them. I think Noah's gonna be a fan too.