vacation and acquisitions.

we spent last weekend up in rochester with my sister again, just like we did last year. this time, the rest of the family came up too. except for having to sleep on an air mattress, it was actually pretty relaxaing. mom and dad bought us lots of food. monday after they left, we all went out and spent 6 hours on the boat. we only caught one fish this year, another king salmon at something like 22 pounds. we also didn't get nearly as many pictures, partly because the camera battery died while we were still out in the middle of lake ontario, but also because with my parents and little brother up, we didn't have a free day to go visit wineries this year (he's not old enough to drink yet. legally, at least).

however, due to this vacation, the two of us are now proud owners of Nintendo's DS Lite handheld game thingy. last wednesday was his birthday, and we didn't really get to celebrate it, and on top of that, he had to stay in my sister's apartment sunday doing homework while my brother was out on the boat, mom and my sister were shopping for clothes, and dad and i were shopping for wine. so when we got back, he decided he'd had enough of homework, and he wanted to go shopping too. at an EB store in a mall, he got to play a demo of metroid prime hunters and decided right there and then that was what he was going to spend his birthday money on.

so how did we end up with two of them? i'm still not sure. he's been in a funny mood recently, where apparently i need to acquire things that i'm ambivalent about. when we found the deal on the lcd screens, he insisted i had to get one if he was getting one. when i wanted to return mine, i was not, apparently, allowed to go back to using my CRT. no, we had to run out to compusa and get me a new one.

monday morning after breakfast, he left with my brother, and returned with two DS lites. so now i have one. whee! i've barely even had a chance to play it yet, but it looks pretty fun. it's going to be really interesting, i think, when we get the new console from nintendo (i still haven't resigned myself to the new name), and we'll both be able to hook our DS lites up independently and download content or use them for multiplayer games (i have also been informed, by the way, that we will be getting the new console. this is not an option).

it is, i have to admit, a very pretty little device. i would have been willing to wait around for the console launch to get one, or until nintendo decided to ship other colors over here. it's going to take me some to get used to it, but i am glad the time was taken to make sure left-handers can play some of these games ^_^ otherwise, that would have been a pretty big waste of money. i wonder if the wiimote will also allow hand switching. hmm. even though i haven't had much chance to play, i do like the idea of "pick up and play" games. and everyone else seemed to be having fun with it (while they played brain age or tetris on my ds lite, i read through my sister's copy of harry potter 6).

i think i will go play some tetris now, in fact.