This vacation has been unfortunately uneventful— bordering on boring, though I don't want to say that because I'm thankful for the chance to relax. I've spent most of my time doing two things: reading and playing video games.
On the reading side, I've kept up my usual dose of science fiction through new collection, . Entertaining, timely, geeky reading, throughout. I've also started on that famous techno-philosophical tome . I haven't gotten too far into it yet, but so far it looks very promising. I've never been one for philosophy, but this book takes so much from math, science, music, and art and expresses it in such an enjoyable way that I have no choice but to like it.
Before tearing apart my old Super Nintendo, I wasn't one for video games, either. However, now that I have access to both my own Mini Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64, I have been slowly realizing the fun I have been missing. I'm not ashamed to say I've logged quite a few hours on my SNES since the beginning of break. On Christmas, I beat (7:23 with 66% items– not bad for a first time), and yesterday night I beat . Yoshi's Island is one of a handful of "new" cartridges that I accumulated since getting a "new" SNES, and to my surprise, it is easily one of the most creative, unique, involved, and entertaining games I've ever played. It's a shame it didn't get more respect back when it came out. It is seriously one of the best games on the system.
My recent return to console gaming also prompted me to spend a bit of my Christmas money on a computer game. I ended up getting because I do so love Myst games. This one, while incredibly, stunningly beautiful, was a slight disappointment for a few reasons. First, some of the puzzles were very, very contrived. Pushing little pieces of furniture around to avoid touching water which would cause me to lose my pet fireflies? Boo. Second, it was a tad short. I beat it (with only a small bit of online help, I might add) in about a week. I had hoped to keep playing well into the semester, which (third) I could have done had been, well, live. Despite these small problems, Uru is an absolutely amazing game. Being able to walk anywhere through such beautiful worlds made it well worth the price. D'ni was exactly as I had imagined it back when I read the books. So... very... beautiful...