I'm with Stupid?

A very interesting article from Matthew Sakey discussing how a book named ‘The Age of American Unreason’ by Susan Jacoby essentially blames the "fast, video-oriented culture" in regards to the United-States’ intellectual downward spiral. Let’s be clear, she doesn’t put the onus specifically on games for causing America’s declining IQ, but does point towards it as being a cause. Matt goes on to share that he believes the very opposite to be true, since ‘Videogames engage three senses simultaneously, and the brain is collating, prioritizing, interpreting and acting on information at a staggering rate’. When you think about it, that’s absolutely true... And we do this for fun: go figure! In any case, it’s worth a read.

Friday is here so that means it’s time for some drunken debauchery!

Actually, no, I don’t mean that and please don’t think for a second that I was serious (although the debauchery part does sound mildly interesting now that I think about it). I was talking to some friends at lunch how David 4.10 is really looking forward to Pixar’s Wall-E, which will be coming to theaters later this year. One of them asked if David had seen ‘Robots’, and all of a sudden I had a light-bulb moment: both my wife and I wanted to see it years ago when it was initially released, but never got around to it and it had since completely left our minds (well, mine anyway). She mentioned this movie and, of course, I think David would absolutely love it, so I’ll be dropping by Future Shop later on today and see if I can find it. That, and possibly ‘Planet Earth’ on BluRay, since I’ve been dying to see that.

And now, during a lull in the workflow, we’re discussing old kid shows: Mr. Dressup, Romper Room (the bastards never said my name), The Friendly Giant and Fred Penner’s Place, just to name a few. One of the girls here mentioned a show she recalls where someone had a ‘big bag of tricks’... That doesn’t ring a bell to me, and assuming it’s not a porn movie or something, I’d be curious to find out what it is.