The Diary of A Simple Man

I looked around for a Nintendo community, but couldn't find one that felt like it was worth posting in. I wish there was a community for over-30 gamers (or maybe over-40 gamers), but I am NOT going to be the one to start one up.
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So it goes...

Sebastian's craze for Mario continues. We play Mario Kart 64 as well as Super Mario World 64; he's a big fan.

Yesterday there was a documentary on TV about Venice, Italy.

"Come here, Sebastian! Look! That's Venice. It's in a country called 'Italy'. That's where Mario and Luigi come from!"

"Is that where Bowser comes from, too?"

"No. I think he's from Germany."

Not the funniest response; if my brain had been working better I'd have said he was from Washington DC. But what do you want? I'm sick as a dog.

You want to know something that bugs me?

I know I sound just like every other doting parent when I talk about Sebastian. That doesn't really bother me all that much, though, because - how shall I put this? - I know that unlike most of those parents, I'm right. The boy is pretty amazing.

On Saturday Sebastian and I went with Teri to pick up a stray cat from the animal hospital and deliver him to the animal shelter, where Teri was volunteering that day. The cat was a beauty, a young male with orange-striped fur and a white belly - amazingly like Sarah. I speculated that he might be her brother, and my sharp-eared boy picked up on that. Soon after he told me that the cat was Sarah's brother, and that she missed him.

There wasn't a lot I could say about that.

So we dropped Teri off, and I took Sebastian over to The Shire bookstore in Franklin, MA. Time flew by; we looked at books (and read some), Sebastian played with toys, and when my commuter train went by (first outbound, and twenty minutes later inbound) Sebastian jumped into my arms and watched with delight from on top of my shoulders.

We found an interesting book for Sebastian: Mouse & Mole's All-Weather Train Ride (or something like that). It was the only train book we could find that he didn't already have. It's kind of neat; a typical story for young children about a mouse and a mole on a train, but on the bottom of each page is an explanation of the weather and environment that's featured on that page. Neat!

As for myself, I found Homer Price by Robert McCloskey. It's a young-adult book, but I still found it very enjoyable. McCloskey is probably best known for Make Way for Ducklings, of course. Lots of great illustrations, just as I remembered.

There was also a book which was frankly kind of a surprise. Quick explanation:

There's a story which has stuck in my head for a long time. The problem was, I couldn't remember the title or author. I thought I'd read it in one of those great collections of mystery and horror stories for young adults that were published under Alfred Hitchcock's name, but I wasn't sure. I'd recently searched Google for what I remembered of the dialog, but came up blank.

But the bottom shelf of an out-of-the-way bookcase at the store had a number of those Hitchcock books. So I picked up one at random, hoping against hope that I might find the story. I was out of luck, of course; none of the titles in the table of content looked like likely candidates. One was a bare possibility, but a quick check confirmed that it wasn't the story.

But there was a story by one of my favorite authors, Lord Dunsany. The title, In A Dim Room, didn't ring any bells, which was unusual; I know most Dunsany. So I took a look.

You guessed it - it was the very story I had been looking for! Naturally I bought it.

I'd love to tell you about that story, but I'd feel really guilty if I were to spoil it for anyone. It's really memorable, and packs quite a wallop. In fact, it would make a HELL of an element for a scenario!

By the time we left almost three hours had passed. We could have stayed even longer, but it was almost 1pm and we'd have to pick up Teri at 2.

On the way home Sebastian suddenly became extremely hungry, and demanded weiners. We'd had them for dinner the night before at his insistence; he doesn't run our lives, incidentally, but yesterday we were kind of up for them anyway, and personally it has never bothered me to eat the same meal twice in a row, if I like it. Besides, it was a quick meal, we didn't have much time.

So for the first time Sebastian ate at a counter. We were right in the front of the store (New York Weiners); to tell the truth, we were kind of in the way (I asked if it was all right for us to sit there before we did, though). Sebastian was cute as hell, but also amazingly good. He ate two weiners and some fries. He discussed how french fries were made with the owners (his guess was "by a BIG french fry machine"). No mess, no disasters; he's really growing up. It felt great to sit at a counter with my red-headed little prodigy.

It's late, so just one more story. Today, Sunday, Teri and I raced against each other in Mario Kart on the Nintendo 64 to amuse Sebastian. Teri played Princess Peach, and I played Mario. This wasn't a fair contest; I'm damn good at Mario Kart (and at Super Mario World, for that matter). Even though I held back a bit, I won handily (fortunately Teri is used to me and my exasperating ways ). On the screen, Mario raised his arms in triumph with a "Woohoo!", while Peachy covered her eyes in sorrow.

"Look, Sebastian! Princess Peach is crying!", I said (he has a bit of a crush on Princess Peach).

"No, Dad!" (his voice dropped to a confiding whisper) "it's just a cartoon!"

Here's what bugs me: I could never convey the precise way he said that. Which means that I can't explain why Teri and I broke up laughing for the next several minutes. And to tell you the truth, I'm afraid that in time I won't remember wonderfully cute moments like that.

If I could, I'd record every precious minute on film.

I've been relatively inactive lately; sorry. Partly that's due to the political situation. The whole situation is nightmarish; I see inevitable disaster coming, and yet so many people insist on believing that everything is fine. Just ignore that anvil 20 feet above our heads...

I've also been sick as a dog. The throat bug that has been going around finally got to me via Teri or Sebastian. It hit me like a ton of bricks a few days ago; my head felt hot, and ready to explode, while my throat felt as if it had been sandpapered. I actually passed out last night at 7:45. But I kept waking up every hour or so. Several times because Sebastian was shouting for me.

In between I had lots of dreams, including a neat one where I was driving Sebastian around on a beautiful sunny day. We stopped at an odd sort of "state welcome center", or something, that had a tall shelf of colorful, used books for sale - most of them for children. Sebastian was really happy to see it, and then we accidentally walked through a curtain into an inner courtyard that had thousands more books, and lots of other fun stuff for sale.

Dreams are fun. Mine are, anyway.

Back in the real world, we've been playing Super Mario World on my old Nintendo 64. At first I didn't think it would play, but eventually I got it working. Sebastian loves it! He loves it so much, in fact, that I have had to give Teri lessons so that she can play it for him when I'm not there. The whole game cracks him up, particularly when I make Mario crawl.

He also really likes to see Princess Peach (I think he has a little crush on her). That requires me to actually beat the game, which used to be hard to do. But I've gotten really good at it.

Recently when this bug was starting to wipe me out I did have some trouble with the final Bowser battle, and got a little upset. So now every time I'm on my way to Bowser, Sebastian pats me on the shoulder and says, very earnestly and sincerely "You're very good, Daddy!".

He's really trying to encourage me. It's so cute.

The boy also finds Mario's butt-stomp attack hilarious. He's been trying to do it on our sofa, and cracks up every time.

I don't suppose anyone reading this plays Super Mario any more, but I was recently able to solve a puzzle that had always bothered me: there are two coins hanging underneath the castle's bridge. It seems that there's almost no way to reach them, unless you've beaten the game and can fly. So why are they there?

It turns out that you can reach them. You need to do a double (not triple) jump against the wall, and then jump up off the wall straight up. It's not really easy, but I've done it several times now; you need to stay on the line of the sun's shadow. Once you've gotten the second coin, a 1-up appears on the floor of the moat directly beneath the center of the bridge.

So it goes.