Derek K. Miller - Penmachine words music comment - Vancouver, Canada

I was driving back from the Vancouver suburb of Maple Ridge with the kids today, and my older daughter was playing Mario Kart DS in the back seat.

It was a strange cognitive experience, because we were barreling down the Mary Hill Bypass with Mario Kart music playing. My younger daughter said she was glad we weren't getting hit by red shells, and I was pleased to be able to resist bumping into other cars or going off wacky jumps.

Labels: driving, family, geekery, music, videogames

When it's raining like this outside...

...there's only one thing to do:

Oh yeah, baby!

Labels: family, nintendo, videogames, weather, wii

My hope that I wouldn't see a repeat of my chemotherapy vomiting from a couple of weeks ago didn't come to pass: last night I had one of those face-squeezing barfs that feels like it would come out my eyes if I could even keep them open. But it only happened once, then I felt a bit better, slept for hours and hours, and this morning was awake and feeling semi-decent by 8 a.m.

UPDATE: After a pretty good day overall, I puked again Friday night around 7, but it wasn't as bad as yesterday. I feel much better after that.

I also find that playing Mario Party 8 is a great distraction, even by myself. It's easy and random enough that I can't get too worked up about it, but it's fun and takes my mind off the various poisons coursing through my body until tomorrow afternoon. My wife and I might even try playing it again, without our daughters for a change. The kids take it a little more seriously than we do.

Labels: cancer, chemotherapy, nintendo, videogames

Friends and relatives of Martin Sikes have organized a celebration of his life tomorrow, Sunday, January 6, at 4:00 p.m., at the Kay Meek Centre in West Vancouver. Here are a couple of articles about him from the Vancouver Sun this past week:

NOTE: I've now set up a memorial page for Martin, including links to articles about him, copies of the notes from his eulogy speakers, and photos from his memorial event on January 6, 2008.

Labels: bbs, death, friends, geekery, martinsikes, videogames

This is both scary looking and too awesome...

...but I think most people, like me, never thought that Pac-Man had teeth. (Via Bidi.)

Labels: biology, evolution, games, geekery, pacman, science, videogames