If only Santa had any idea what he just did to my productivity…

I’ll be the first to admit that when it comes to popular culture, I’m typically a little late with jumping on the old bandwagon. My television didn’t first see the barrel-hurdling antics of a young plumber named Mario until several years after the Nintendo was first released here in the US, it took me years of hearing this whole “Tivo is amazing!talk before finally splurging the extra ten bucks to feign off Old Father Time with regards to my reality TV favorites, and I’d never even heard of the rise and fall of an up and coming alternative rock band called Nirvana until long after its lead singer played out the rock stereotype to its ultimate demise.

That said, just because I have a tendency to come to the table late certainly doesn’t mean that I ever find myself leaving with an empty stomach! It may take a while for me to catch up with the rest of society, but once I finally do – goodbye, seemingly already non-existent social life! It’s that unbridled passion to get unequivocally obsessed with whatever’s in front of me at the given moment that cost me days worth of sleep, months worth of sanity, and lord knows how many chances to actually talk with girls in my teenage years, all the while instead I found myself up at three o’clock in the morning chasing down princesses or trying to upgrade my magical armor so that I would stand a chance against the evil dragon that guarded the tri-force that I so desperately needed!

These days I may be a little older, and occasionally even a little wiser, but I’m still just as susceptible to temptation … and given the inane size of my current personal and professional to-do lists, I’m not so sure that tempting fate with the offering of a rich, innovative new gaming platform is really in the best interests of pretty much anybody who needs things done that just so happen to be on one of my lists…

Nonetheless, what can I say? Out of all the other fancy pants gaming consoles on the market today, the Nintendo Wii is by far the one that I can get the most excited about, and despite having managed to hold back for two years already (two long and arduous years), the time for rationale and self control had finally passed and our household simply couldn’t go another Christmas without one. Even being daunted by the unfathomable idea of actually having to move around while playing video games (blasphemy!) could only restrain me for so long, but deep down I knew that ultimately it was only a matter of time before I was waving my Wiimote around the living room like a pro … which would sound vaguely pornographic if the phrase Wiimote didn’t also just sound so darned cute!

So Christmas was only yesterday, but between Zelda and Mario and the illustrious Guitar Hero, I estimate that I’ve already lost roughly 87 hours of otherwise productive time. Now whether that time would’ve been spent actually writing, making a sandwich, or just staring at the TV wishing I had a Wii if the fabled machine hadn’t showed up under our lop-sided Christmas tree this year, it’s hard to say, but I guess at this point further speculation is kind of like crying over split milk.

Instead I think we’re better off simply facing the facts, looking to the future, and wholeheartedly admitting that until I beat each and every one of these new games, my contact with the outside world will be precisely zilch. Nothing personal, but for a guy like me with an addictive personalty coupled with the hand-eye coordination of a blind sea captain, it’s like I’m learning to walk in the video game world all over again. Maybe I should just go ahead and wish everyone a Happy New Year now…

Or possibly even Happy St. Patrick’s Day? Just trying to be realistic!