The kids’ obsession recently has been World of Warcraft, to the point where they were continuously fighting over who got to play. “You played last! It’s my turn!” “No, you played! It’s mine!” (This is how they play: they start a character, do all the intro quests, lose interest, start another character. Sophia has shown great fortitude in getting a character all the way to level 15.) So, finally I came up with this rule: Sophia was born on an even day, so she plays on even days; Simon was born on an odd day, so he plays on odd days; only Mommy gets to play on the 31st.
And this plan, almost unbelievably, seemed to work out just fine.
My current obsession has been Doctor Who. The third season has been playing here, and I love it so much that, while I can pass on watching anything until a few days have gone by, Friday night I am right there in front of the TV. (Albeit, after it’s TiVo’d—can’t stand commercials.) I have recently become so into it I a)joined NetFlix (nope, hadn’t been a member before) and b)queued the first two seasons to watch at home. I’d never seen any of the Christopher Eccleston ones, and we missed about half of season two.
The day my first NetFlix movies arrived Sophia had a friend over, and they were off playing in her room, while Simon stayed with me. He, of course, wanted to play World of Warcraft, but it wasn’t his day. So I said, “Hey, wanna watch Doctor Who with me?” We snuggled on the couch and I put the first disc in. And it was hilarious—FTW: “If you’re a space alien, how come you sound like you’re from the North?” “Lots of planets have a North!” (Eccleston has a northern British accent you could cut with a chain saw). Simon thought it was the greatest thing ever.
The next day Simon said, “Can we watch another one?” and Sophia said, “Another what?” So she sat down to watch the Doctor and Rose get into various messes.
The day after that, when I got home with the kids, the first thing they asked was, “Can we watch another Doctor Who?” No one mentioned World of Warcraft. It was somewhat blissful. Of course, now my DVDs have run out and I have to get the next set post-haste.
But when the Doctor’s in the house…no Warcraft! Yes!
Obvious “Adlers”, we all are Dr Who fans from the gitgo!! Dad
As someone who was directly influenced to watch Doctor Who by the “Adler” you are married to, I also have passed that passion on to my kids for a couple of years now (and lately they have really been into it).
Heck, we just watched the first episode of “Robot” tonight.
Next time you are in town, they can come over and watch as many episodes with my kids (and me :-)) as they want to; I have all the region one releases, both classic and current (and season 3 on pre-order from Amazon).
Dum dum de dum, dum dum de dum, dum dum de dum, dum dum de dum…
Yay! Dr. Who has replaced a lot of video gaming for us as well!
I have all the region one releases, both classic and current.
You are basically celebrating replacing interaction with passivity, though…
Or I’m celebrating figuring out problems by using your head instead of taking a sword and hacking them to pieces. Or I’m celebrating science fiction over fantasy. Or… See, it’s really easy to play the reframing game!
My kids are fine, thanks.