Thankfully, the nitendo is white, the psp is black and the computer doesn’t have an internet connection so my 9 year old niece dumbed things down for me! In a stream of conscious type of excitement, she told me, ‘I’d like game x for the white one and game y for the black one’.

The long and short of it is that she’d like Age of Empires for the computer and MySims for the white one (sorry, the nintendo DS). But I was a bit freaked out when she told me about one of the games she already has. It’s called Imagine: Babies for the Nintendo. I didn’t believe her that it was an actual game. But it is! It’s so incredibly sexist and demeaning that I can’t believe it’s allowed to be sold. As you’ll see from the description below, it’s targeted specifically at girls.

Basically she has to pretend to be a babysitter and earn money.

Here’s a description from game.co.uk

Embody a young student who visits her grandmother’s house for the summer. Your grandmother leaves to go on holiday and leaves you in charge of her house. During her absence you will have to maintain the house and even decorate it to your taste. In order to do this you will need to earn money by taking care of all your neighbour’s babies, where you will find your vocation–babysitting!

Imagine: Babies Features:

* Embody a young babysitter and take of your neighbour’s babies all with their own personalities!
* Take care of 6 babies (one after the other), each with a distinctive character.
* Prepare their bottle and baby food in the kitchen, check on the amount of food in stock and buy the right food according to their needs.
* Rock the babies in a cradle, put on the soothing radio or move the mobile to help them sleep or to calm them down.
* Change their nappies to keep them clean, keep an eye on their health and dress them up with different clothes
* Entertain the babies: Play with them and their toys, play music to make them dance and take them into the garden to play on swings and other garden toys
* Exchange information, photos and clothing with other players through Wi-Fi
* Keep the house clean: Use fun mini-games to create a welcoming home for the babies: wash up, clean and vacuum, paint the walls, mow the grass, trim hedges and drive away spiders!
* Make the house to your own taste: Use the money you earn and the vouchers you receive in succeeding in your missions, buy items at the shops to decorate the house

/Rant

Recently I bought two compilation CDs called ‘Holding Up Half The Sky: Voices of African Women‘ and it’s companion, ‘Voices of Asian Women’. The African cd is very good and I’ll look into getting more music by some of the artists.

I’d only heard of Angelique Kidjo before but some of the other singers include Stella Chiswese, Ami Koita and, my current favourite on this cd, Netsanet Mellesse.

It was released on the Shanachie label in 1999 and the ASIN(?) is B000000E3U.

Incidently, Sinnotts shop is on Michael Street in Waterford. It’s basically the main shopping street in Waterford. It’s just up from ‘The Square’ plaza (which is actually triangular in shape!).

You can also see what other music I like on my lastfm page.

Had a lie-in this morning before going to the gym. I spent so long in the jacuzzi that I started to feel a bit sea-sick! But it was worth it because it’s so relaxing and calming. Then it was into town to do a bit of shopping. I got the bus into town since Dublin is such a nightmare for parking these days.

I pressed the button at the traffic lights to cross the road to get the bus stop. Normally there’s an interminable wait for the bus drivers to finish their tea and drive their buses. But today, the lights changed just in time to stop an approaching bus so I had an easy stroll to the bus. Once in town, I found another art of asbestos sticker on Fade street. It’s a bit blurry because I used my camera phone but it reads, I’ve lost my English-Japanese dictionary. Now finding it hard to buy cheap whiskey in Tokyo. If you find it mail me at…’

First stop was Conn’s Camera Shop to buy a new monopod for my camera. I’m really growing fond of the place because of the pleasant staff and the keen prices. And they always have what I want in stock (hello Berminghams!!). A short stroll brought me to the bookshop and, hallelujah, the new Lee Child (Jack Reacher) book, Bad Luck and Trouble, was in stock. I also bought Niall McCullough’s tome, ‘Dublin, an Urban History: The plan of the city‘. The latter one could be heavy going but there’s lots of pictures so that’s alright!

On the way home, I decided to do something vaguely healthy so I got off the bus a couple of stops before I needed to. The bright idea was to walk that little bit extra so I could call it exercise. Of course, that all went out the window when I spotted a man walking out of a shop with a 99 ice-cream. It’s a bit like admitting an addiction but I had to get an ice-cream as well. Ice-cream before noon – what would the neighbours say if they found out!

Once home, I bought new CD’s by Maria McKee and Wilco from CDwow.ie. I don’t know why anyone would buy music from High St shops anymore. They were €12 each on the internet. Some wag will surely point out that Maria McKee isn’t worth a penny but €12 is a big saving over the sticker price in shops.

A couple of weeks ago, I attended an exhibition by Kilkenny-based William Watson in Dungarvan’s Old Market House Arts Centre and put a deposit on one of his paintings. He co-exhibited with his father (Tom) because William couldn’t come up with enough work in time for the exhibition. Artists are such a temperamental bunch. Still, I get to collect it this Friday and I hope I still like it!

Finally, I get to go to the pub tonight to watch a football match. Liverpool are playing in some final in Greece. I think they beat the same opponents in the same competition a couple of years ago and tonight is revenge-time. It was kinda funny when they won the last final because Liverpool could say they were European Champions (just like the English rugby team claiming to be the World Champions a few years ago) and, since then, they’ve lost loads of matches. Still, I get to go the pub, yippee!!

Seeing as how well my day has gone so far, I bought a lotto ticket because there’s a big jackpot tonight.

Today could end up being a very good day indeed! A very good day indeed.

In the letter, Bank of Ireland wrote:

‘The Bank is concerned that your ATM/Laser card details may have been compromised, and we wish to replace your card as a precaution‘.

It’s almost cliched to say it but there was a large sum (to me) of money resting in my account. I got my new cards today so the panic is over.

I must say the bank handled it quite well. They wrote to me with their concerns and included a contact number if I wanted further information. I rang the number and the cynic in me smiled when I got an answer machine. I left my contact details and they did actually phone me back within 20 mins. Apparently, there was a possible skimming scam in the College Green area and my name/bank details were on the list of potential victims. The bank wanted to replace my card to ‘break the chain’. She wouldn’t tell me if it was a cash machine or shop that had been compromised, which is understandable.

The weird thing is that I’ve never used a cash machine around College Green because of the risk of tampered machines (!) and I generally don’t use my laser card. I normally use ATM machines in shops because I believe they’d be harder to interfere with? I’m now wondering if I’m right or wrong in that assumption?

Still, kudos to Bank of Ireland. As promised, my new PIN number arrived yesterday and my new card was in my branch today. I wonder why I haven’t heard much about it the media though?

Co-incidently, two Southerners were arrested in the North for an alleged skimming incident. I love the phrase that breakingnews.ie used –

The pair…were being held on suspicion of going equipped for theft

P.S. I didn’t lose any money.

To be honest, I was a bit suspicious that I kept getting different delivery dates over the telephone but, luckily enough, I had 3 hours free today to, more or less, wait in the shop for the gadget & software to arrive. In fairness, I think the delay was due to the the manufacturer, ColorVision.

The Mister of Sheldon Photographic was a true gent and I’m almost certain to return tomorrow to get a Tokina 100mm macro lenses. The Nikon 105mm version has VR (vibration reduction) but it’s around €1,000. The Tokina is around €400 and it’s just as good. Tokina was started by Nikon engineers wayback when when they got fed up with the direction Nikon, the company, was heading.

I’d recommend his shop if you’re into photography. His knowledge is encylopaedic and his prices are keen. And make sure you ask to see the Hasselblad motorbike photo! His website is pants and there’s no on-line ordering/browsing etc so you have to physically go to his shop. But, what the heck, Malahide is a nice spot to visit anyway! And the Malahide International 10th Festival of Piping and Drumming is on this weekend. I won’t be able to make it because I’m going to the, err, (flickr) meetDublin meet up in Dublin tomorrow.

Anyway, the Spyder2 is a gadget that produces an accurate colour calibration of your monitor. It took about 10 minutes and the difference is phenomenal. My photos look sharper and more vibrant; there’s real depth to (some of) them now. And, of course, I can see how the colour cast was way off. It explains why my printed photos looked so different from the on-screen version.

In particular, the background colour of this blog is horrendous – thanks for telling me, guys!! I’ll change it as soon as.

Seriously, I can’t recommend the Spyder2 Express highly enough. If you look at colour images regularly, you have to buy this!

Well, guess who turned up today, 22nd March 2007. Yes, NTL.

I wasn’t at home but Martin* wrote a message, with a pencil, that said ‘Work to be done on House‘. I don’t know whether he intended to fix the September 2006 problem or whether he was just passing by and felt like making comments on the state on my house.

I guess we’ll never know. But maybe he’ll leave another note in 6 months??? Watch this space.

*It’s probably not fair to write Martin’s surname here. He actually erased his surname, presumably with the eraser on the top of his pencil, and re-wrote his surname on the message he left me.

I wish him well on his journey to adulthood.

From their website:

cat & dog heaven

muttugly was born out of love for all things cat & dog related. The first of its kind in Ireland – we are combining the best products, services & ideas for pet care we have seen in the US and UK with our experience and understanding of Irish pets and their owner’s needs.

muttugly is a little piece of heaven for cool cats, discerning dogs & their parents.

It just goes to show there’s a market for anything and everything.

Caitriona.net has published a wonderful photograph of a snail. I made a comment but co.mment can’t, err, comment. Is it caitriona or co.mment that’s to blame?

Blog in the Bog wrote about some terrible customer service he received from Fedex. I posted a comment at the time and he kindly replied. I want to return to it later to add my tuppence-worth and am using co.mment as a kind of bookmark service. Let’s see what happens… BTW, he’s had similar problems with UPS/Nightline.

p.s. Anybody want to link this from their blog or email it around please do. Let people know that Smart should be avoided. Hey, you don’t have to ask me. Just ask the thousands of people who had their connection severed without warning because Smart couldn’t pay their bills. Please a little give me this little victory.

Tech Note: If you do link this. THANKS! But a quick tech note link it using the words Smart Telecom so that if I get enough links it might creep up the Google rankings when people search for the word “Smart Telecom”.

thesraid.com — Smart Telecom – Getting worse and worse