Wii

So . . . I'm standing in line at a gaming store the other day with a couple of new gamecube games for my son.

The line doesn't move. It's getting hot. My claustrophobia's kicking in.

"Er, excuse me. Why isn't the line moving?"

"This isn't a line," says the cheery man in front of me. "We're all waiting for the Wii."

"You're waiting to wee?"

"No. The Wii. See?" He points to a box that holds the new Nintendo Wii and a TV screen that has a Wii commercial so you can see how it all works.

Within moments, the whole line became animated as they explained to me what it was how and great it was and why they'd wait for many hot and nauseating hours to get one. Basically, it's more interactive. You move the hand controllers as if you were doing the action on the screen. So if it's bowling, you make the bowling motion with your arm and it rolls the ball on the screen. Likewise, if you're slicing off a warrior's head with a broadsword (this was in the store's commercial), you make that slicing motion with your arm. Isn't that sweet? Now, why people can't just go bowling or play tennis or whatever (well, except for decapitating people) in real life, I don't know.

But I have to say this, kids WILL get more exercise this way. Instead of sitting down for hours playing it, they're up and kicking their legs and swinging their arms. Just don't stand too close to them. And now they have wrist bands for the controllers because kids were throwing them through the televisions accidently.

Since then, my son's already brought it up once. I avoided talking about it with him. Oh, I suppose at some point he'll get it, but not this year. We're trying to move him into a musical instrument instead. Life can't be all about electronics.

Have you heard of the Wii? What do you think about it? I'm too old to have played these games when I was younger. Did you ever play them? What's your favorite?