Yes I’m still using Wii Fit (mainly for the Yoga) and I’m also wondering why EA didn’t send me their more aerobic version of same. Dance Dance Revolution has fallen by the wayside for now (hey, it had an 11 year run) and GamerMom is thrilled – thrilled! – with the DS “Game” called Personal Trainer: Walking.  Yes, walking. It comes with two pedometers and you can wirelessly upload your daily steps and it’ll track the health benefits of same.  Very clever stuff here, even if it is just walking (it’ll also tell you some racier things like… races… and how many “steps” (it works by jiggling) sex takes – hey, all excercise is excercise).

Sorry for yet another absence. I was working on two big slideshows for iVillage (will be posted soon) and taking a needed break. See, freelancing is a lot like gardening. It takes patience. You spend your time planting seeds and then reaping the ones that don’t get eaten by varmints.  Yes, I call my competition “varmints.” The ones that grow, are the ideas you get to write and the money you get paid. I had the good/bad luck to have several articles and opportunities grow big and strong right after my Quarduple Bypass. This is why a mere 3 weeks after coming home I was jetting to San Francisco to meet with the Leap Pad people and with the founder of WhatTheyPlay.com. Then Crispy Gamer launched and I found myself with more work than I’d seen in years. I couldn’t pass it up, because I don’t get disability or unemployment. If the GamerDad doesn’t work, the family doesn’t make any money.  Yeah, it’s big fun being an independant contractor in America. It’s somewhat like a punishment really.

So, later in the year I was writing that PTA/ESRB guide show on the right side of the page, traveling to Chicago and then to New York for the live broadcasts. Throw in several radio appearences, three major speeches (PAX, National Library Assoc. Mississippi Library Assoc.), running GamerDad, negotiating the sale of over 1000 GamerDad reviews, my 10-year anniversary and being a stay-at-home to an 8-year old and a five-year old.

Suffice it to say, with all that on my plate, I had no time for figurative seed planting. The result? 2009 has been a terrible year for work. It doesn’t bother me – gives me time to plant some seeds for 2010 and take it easy.  So far so tiring but you can add a predictable ADHD diagnosis and the lovely fact that heart patients cannot take the pills that balance an ADHD person (ADHD does explain how I’ve been able to be so prolific in my career – it’s a common ailment, a useful one – to any ambitious person or artist. Just ask Rahm Emmanuel or Stephen King). Since I couldn’t take the recommended stuff I was offered alternatives and tried them – one worked well but the side effect was impotence. Woah, wait, I mean impotence in terms of writing. I had a really hard time writing – at all – in early ’09. 

This was terrifying.

Thankfully we’ve found a better drug and so far I feel better than ever before – despite the fact that I take about 20 pills per day (for the old ticker). Looks like I can write again, so this State of the Heart augers good times to come. Hooray!

Tags: Misc