On Sunday morning, the family went to see the new Harry Potter movie. I haven't read any of the books but my husband has so we tend to walk away from these movies with two completely different opinions. To me, this movie seemed a bit jumbled. There was a lot going on and it didn't seem like anything really truly got explained. Things seemed to happen suddenly then they ended just like that. There were some very good and very entertaining parts (the Weasley twins just need an entire movie dedicated to them) but I'm hoping that this movie sets up a lot of stuff for the next one. I think I'd like it a lot better if I thought of it as a prequel to the next movie instead of a sequel to an already established world.
Jump Start World
For those geeks out there with small children, there is now a computer game that is a perfect learning tool for the youngsters. Jump Start World is an educational game that starts with Kindergarten and goes up to Second Grade. Since my daughter will be going into kindergarten in the fall, I'll be talking about that particular version of it. The game encompasses 12 "Adventure Packs" with the first two packs included in the purchase of the game. (The additional packs are purchased at $8 each. Your credit card will automatically be charged each time your child finished a pack.) As your child progresses through the game, his/her status is updated via the internet to a parental tool. Now, the child is not actually playing on the internet so there are no worries that something bad will get downloaded.
When you click on the Parental Tool icon, which is separate from the game icon, you'll get a variety of options. From something as mundane as picking which holidays the game characters celebrate to the terrific page that tracks how your child does on each activity. For that part, you'll get to choose which pack you want to check on. Then you will get a list of what activities are contained in that pack, such as counting from 1 to 10 or matching lowercase letters with the uppercase letter, and a percentage on how well the child did in that area. It's a wonderful feeling to see the 100% pop up everywhere. It also lets you know which areas your child needs to work on so you can help them offline if necessary.
My daughter truly loves this game. Almost every night she asks me if she can play it and I have no problems letting her play it for a little while each night. And she knows that she can tell me when she's having a problem with a particular area so I can help her work on it. While this shouldn't replace a formal education of some sort, it is a great addition to help reinforce concepts. I would recommend it to anyone with small children and a computer.
Finding a place in cyberspace
I'm not really sure what I want to do with this space yet. I already have a ton of different blogs for different things. I have a music blog and a jdorama blog and a personal blog. So what do I want to do here? I suppose I can post about geeky type news things but that is kinda boring and you can get news in a ton of other places. I guess I'll just play it by hand until I get a good feeling for this place.
On the geeky news front, Sony has dropped the price of the PS3 by $100. We still don't plan on buying one. Maybe if it were to drop a bit farther or if something truly amazing came out on it. As it is, we are really happy with the Xbox 360 and Wii we currently have.
Movie Stuff
On Sunday, the family went to the movies to see Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. It wasn't an amazing film but it was pretty good. Though I'll admit that I had some problems with Sue's hair being too blonde and her eyes seemed weird too. I know Jessica Alba is wearing contacts but these contacts seemed different from the ones in the first film. The Silver Surfer was awesome. Overall, not a terrible movie. Last night, the husband and I saw Transformers. This movie was amazing. I think a lot of people were expecting too much from it though. The Transformers cartoon was made to sell toys. If you think that there is "more" to them, you are definitely looking for something that isn't there. The live-action movie (since there is a cartoon movie, I'll make the distinction) doesn't have any deep meanings hidden in the plot. Heck, the plot itself is pretty much "Find the cube before the bad guys." It has wonderful graphics, some really good acting and a great soundtrack. Despite what many people think, it's not going to "rape my childhood" and I wish people would stop using that phrase.