Yesterday, I went over the boys’ addiction with Legos.  Today, I need to confess my own addiction.  It began awhile back when I needed something to do while sitting with the boys as they went to bed on Friday nights.  I stay off the computer these nights, so that option was out.  Reading wouldn’t work after the lights were turned out.  Then, I saw the DS.

I had previously played Lego Harry Potter: Years 1-4 and Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga on the DS and was a big fan of the series.  They take everything that is great about the fictional world and place their own fun spin on it.

I was interested to see how they would handle Years 5 – 7.  Anyone who has read the books or watched the movies knows that this is when things turn really, really dark.  Harry can’t just be a kid anymore.  Voldemort is back and will go to any lengths to kill all who oppose him.  People die.  People Harry cares about.

The previous DS game took an easy route out of the main non-villain death.  When Cedric Diggory dies in the game, he breaks into pieces.  His grieving dad weeps over his boy’s pile of parts until is handed a blueprint for a Lego minifig.  The implication is that all Amos Diggory needs to do is plus Cedric pieces back into place and he’ll be ok.

This DS game picks up with Year 5, aka The Order of the Phoenix.  The Ministry of Magic, not believing that Voldemort is back and suspicious of Dumbledore, installs Delores Umbridge into Hogwarts.  While the movie focused on Umbridge’s efforts to instill her brand of order, the game uses Order of the Phoenix as an introduction to the various spells and concepts that you will be employing in later games.

As you progress, you’ll use Reducto, Expecto Patronum, Aguamenti, Wingardium Leviosa, Lumos, and more to battle bad guys, avoid obstacles, and collect studs.  For those who are not familiar, those little bumps on Legos that allow them to interlock are called studs.  Studs are used like money to buy new characters and abilities.

Of course, given that nearly everything in the world is made from Legos, you can destroy many of the items that constitute the scenery.  Flowers, rocks, tables, and chairs can all be destroyed for studs.  Sometimes, in fact, destroying these unlocks something special.

All in all, this is a fantastic game.  The humor and gameplay are perfect for kids and adults.

Disclaimer: We purchased this game with our own money and the opinions expressed above are my own.

Lately, the kids have been victims of an addiction.  I’m not talking about their usual addictions to chocolate, pizza or macaroni and cheese.  No, this addiction is of the Lego kind.  The boys just love taking out the bricks and minifigs and coming up with some creations.  Then, they will either give their creations elaborate stories…. or just smash them.

Of course, mix in a couple of their other obsessions, like Harry Potter, Winnie the Pooh, or Toy Story and the kids take their Lego addiction to a whole new level.  For example, here is Buzz Lightyear riding his "flying car" (which he apparently made partially out of Winnie the Pooh’s canoe):

Also for your consideration, a re-enactment of a lost scene of Harry Potter where Harry fights Voldemort while riding on the blades of a helicopter:

I hear test audiences experienced extreme nausea from all of the spinning around.

Finally, here is the flying car of the future, today!  Complete with built-in landing pad.

There are still some bugs to work out.  Like how to actually drive the car when the landing pad doesn’t retract.  Those can be worked on in a future version of the flying car of the future.

Tomorrow, I’ll go over my recently acquired Lego addiction of the computer game kind!

Do your kids enjoy playing with Legos or other building toys?

On Tuesday, after work, I stopped by the local grocery store.  I needed a few items and was in a hurry to get in and get out.  As I walked to the store, a man approached me.  He apologized for bothering me and explained that he was laid off and has two kids.  He asked if I had a dollar or two I could spare.

Almost instinctively, I felt the urge to ignore him and walk on.  Perhaps mumble something about not having any money on me as I quickened my pace.  Then, for a split second, I thought to myself: What if I was in his position?  What if I was laid off and my family rendered homeless?  What if my best bet to put food on the table for my children was to ask for money from strangers?

I told him I didn’t think I had much cash, but fished a couple of dollars out of my wallet to give him.  I wished him luck and we went our separate ways.  As I did so, I felt a wave of sadness that I couldn’t do more to help him.

Sure, the guy could have been lying to me.  He could have taken my cash and gone directly to a nearby liquor store instead of buying food for his kids.  Maybe he doesn’t even have any children.  I’m a big believer of taking a person at their word, though.  A bit naïve?  Perhaps, but I’d rather assume the best about someone and be proven wrong than assume the worst of people from the outset.

I hope that, that night, his family was able to eat, in part, thanks to the money I gave him.  I also hope that his luck turns around and he is able to find work soon.

My Aloha Friday question for today is: Have you ever had someone down on their luck ask you for money?  If so, what did you do?  If not, what would you do?

Don’t forget to enter my $25 EdenFantasys giveaway!

P.S. If you haven’t already, go visit FollowerHQ and let me know what you think of my Twitter application.

P.P.S. For a bit of fun, try my other Twitter Application, Rout. It’s a +F in Fun!

Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the linky there if you are participating.

Aloha #123

Disclaimer: The “Money – banknotes and coin” clipart above is from OpenClipArt.org.

The other day, I was walking to my car.  As I approached my vehicle, I heard a splat.  Then another.  I looked around.  It wasn’t raining.  Nothing seemed to be falling that I could see.  Yet, the splatting sounds continued.  Then, I looked up.

Above me was a flock of birds.  Actually, flock is too weak of a word.  There were several HUNDRED crows flying overhead.  They were following each other high in the sky and many of them had obviously decided that the spot I was standing on was a restroom.  I quickly opened my car door and dove inside.  My car had been hit twice, but, luckily, I escaped unharmed.

The next day, I brought my camera in to work to attempt to capture this crow swarm.  And capture it I did (though there seemed to be less crows this time).

Have you ever witnessed a swarm of birds like this?

Disclaimer: The image above, crow flying down, was obtained from OpenClipArt.org.

Take one box of building toys.

Add in one imaginative JSL.

Result?  A boat.

Note the handy cell phone holder.

Time to go sailing.

Reminder: Don’t forget to enter my $25 EdenFantasys giveaway!

A few weeks ago, I wrote about EdenFantasys and mentioned how I’d like to spend more quality time with just B and me in 2012.  With Valentine’s Day approaching, this seems like the perfect opportunity to plan some special time with her.  Perhaps, we’ll go out to dinner.  Perhaps we’ll see a movie.  No matter what we do, it’ll be a special activity because I’ll be with the woman that I love.

For my readers, I have an early Valentine’s Day present.  One of my readers will win a $25 EdenFantasys gift card.  To enter, simply leave a comment below answering this question: What would you go out and do on your ideal Valentine’s Day date with your significant other?

You can also earn bonus entries by doing any (or all) of the following items. Just be sure to leave a separate comment for each item that you complete.  (Don’t just leave one comment listing everything you did.)

• Follow @TechyDad on Twitter. (1 bonus entry)
• Follow @EdenFantasys on Twitter. (1 bonus entry)
• Tweet about the giveaway on Twitter. Be sure to include @TechyDad, @EdenFantasys and a link to this post in the Tweet. (1 bonus entry per day) For example: Get ready for Valentine’s Day with @TechyDad and @EdenFantasys #Giveaway http://bit.ly/x1ILO3
• Circle Me on Google Plus. Let me know your Google Plus name in the comments. (1 bonus entry)
• Leave a comment on any of my non-giveaway posts from January/February. Leave a comment here letting me know which post you commented on. (1 bonus entry per comment, maximum 3 entries)

To enter, please follow the rules above within the comment section. Contest starts today, January 24th and ends at 10pm EST on February 7th, 2012. You do not have to be a blogger to enter, but must leave a valid e-mail address for me to contact you for mailing address once the giveaway is over. I will select the winner using random.org and contact you via e-mail. You will have 48 hours to claim the prize. If there is no response, another winner will be selected. Open to U.S. residents only.

Disclaimer: The Heart Balloons clipart comes from OpenClipArt.org.

Two nights ago, it was time to get the boys ready for bed.  For some reason, NHL was complaining so B went to take care of him while I got JSL ready.  Don’t ask me why, but I decided to pull JSL’s shirt off of him while he was standing on a stairwell.  As the shirt went up, JSL lost his balance and fell.  He went clunking down the stairs and slid to a halt face down and not moving.  I screamed for B to call 911 and then… I woke up.

Yes, all of this was a nightmare.  A horrible nightmare.  Although, I was relieved that it wasn’t real, I lay awake in bed afraid.  I was terrified that, should I go back to sleep, I would re-enter the dream from where I left off – with JSL lying lifeless on the floor.  The image of JSL laying there, face down with his arms splayed, was (and remains) burned into my brain.  Though I was exhausted, I forced myself to stay awake for a few minutes.  Thankfully, the rest of my dreams were free of injured children.

Have you ever experienced a very realistic dream about your children being hurt?

Disclaimer: The image above, Turtle-Hits the Floor, was obtained from OpenClipArt.org.

When I was young, I kept a journal.  In it, I wrote about all of the private thoughts, fears, and feelings that I felt I couldn’t tell anyone.  Well, that was the general idea.  By "kept a journal", I really mean I wrote in it for about a week, rediscovered it a month later, wrote in it once more and then forgot about it for another three months.  I was never very good with writing things with paper and pen.  My love of writing only flourished when I was first introduced to computers.

Fast forward to the present.  Sometimes there things we feel the need to write about that we just can’t blog about.  Perhaps family members read your blog or perhaps the issue crosses a TMI boundary.  However, despite these misgivings, there might still be an urge to write about it, just not in a public manner.  After all, writing is a very good way of organizing your thoughts on matters.

At one time, I considered setting up a private WordPress blog for my son for this very purpose.  He could use it to express his thoughts on anything and everything.  The posts would not be publicly visible.  After all, he’s only 8 and doesn’t need a public blog.  However, B and I would be able to read it.  I actually got it all set up, but never showed him it.  Perhaps when he’s older he’ll use it.

As for me, I’m thinking of setting up a private blog for some of my thoughts.  They might be matters that I don’t feel comfortable shouting out to a random mix of strangers, friends and family.  They might be matters that I feel don’t interest my TechyDad.com audience (or my Twitter or Google+ followers).  Or perhaps it is something that has been on my mind that might be a blog post at some point, but hasn’t been fully fleshed out yet.  In any event, it would be nice to have a place to record my thoughts privately and a non-public blog seems ideal.

My Aloha Friday question for today is: Have you ever had a journal or a private blog to record your thoughts?

P.S. If you haven’t already, go visit FollowerHQ and let me know what you think of my Twitter application.

P.P.S. For a bit of fun, try my other Twitter Application, Rout. It’s a +F in Fun!

Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the linky there if you are participating.

Aloha #122

Disclaimer: The “Paper,Write,Pen” clipart above is from OpenClipArt.org.

Perhaps you’ve heard that there’s a threat looming on the horizon.  A pair of dark clouds hanging over our favorite websites.  The dark clouds are called SOPA and PIPA.

If you haven’t heard about them, allow me to bring you up to speed.  You see, content providers are scared that their content is being copied online.  There are laws in place to deal with this, but they want more laws.  Tougher laws.

Under SOPA and PIPA, not only would copying copyrighted content be a crime, but linking to it would be a crime too.  It doesn’t even have to be you posting a link.  If you own a blog and a commenter leaves a link to a site that contains a copyrighted image, your blog can be shut down.  Not only that, but any ad network or Paypal accounts can be shut down too.

You might think that your site would be immune to this shut down because you would defend yourself in court or take down the offending link and/or content when you are notified about it.  However, the shut down provisions can take place BEFORE any court hearing.  Yes, you are guilty before being proven innocent.  After your site is taken down, then you can defend yourself against the charges and *maybe* get your site brought back online.  (Think of the “fun” that a malicious individual could have faking copyright infringement claims to take down blogs he/she doesn’t like.)

To imagine the effect of this, picture every blog having to police every link that they and their commenters post lest one lead to a site with a single infringing image.  Now, picture Twitter or Facebook having to do this.  Imagine Google needing to not only filter out Google+ but their normal search results as well.  After all, one of the links they index might have an image that someone else claims was wrongly posted.  Google and dozens of other Internet companies will need to make these decisions on the fly.  If they make one wrong move, you could say goodbye to services such as Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and YouTube.

Speaking of which, YouTube is always a source of entertainment: Animals acting cute, people acting out strange stunts, and kids singing pop songs.  Well, strike that last one.  If you post a video of your kid singing a copyrighted song, you could end up behind bars for 5 years.  You read that right.  Five years of jail-time for a YouTube posting.

Now, you may have heard that SOPA was killed.  When people heard the news, they began to celebrate.  This celebration was, sadly, premature.  SOPA hasn’t been killed or even shelved.  Instead, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith plans on continuing work on SOPA next month.  The claim is that this break is due to “Republican and Democratic retreats taking place over the next two weeks.”  Personally, though, I think this was a delay tactic to try to get the outcry to die down.  Even if it is killed, though, we will need to remain vigilant.  Legislators love taking controversial bills, breaking them apart into different pieces, and sneaking them in attached to other pieces of legislation (the more “must pass”, the better).

Lest you think that all of this will, at least, somehow stop piracy, it won’t.  The site takedown only keeps the domain name from pointing to the site.  If you know the IP Address, you can still get to the site.  This will hurt you and me as normal users won’t remember your site’s IP address.  Pirates, however, will still be able to connect to their destinations just fine.

Maybe you are wondering how the tech companies allowed these bills to get this far.  Simple: They were not only not consulted, but actively excluded from the discussions.  Only pro-SOPA companies were allowed in.  Meanwhile, during hearings, Congressfolk seemed to reveal in their ignorance of how the Internet worked.  They said that they aren’t “nerds” and that discussions of Internet security were a “waste of time.”  They ignored experts saying that this would break the Internet.  Apparently, not knowing how something works isn’t a barrier to passing a giant legislation package regulating it into oblivion.  Is it any wonder that the bill wound up so one-sided?

So what can you do?  Contact your state Senators and Representatives and tell them to vote NO on SOPA/PIPA.  Make your voice heard now or you might not be able to make your voice heard online later.  (This site is a useful tool to see where your Senators/Representatives stand on SOPA/PIPA.)

(I’ll post my own words about this issue tomorrow.  For now, see this video and infographic from http://americancensorship.org.)

Disclaimer: Both the video and infographic are from AmericanCensorship.org.