7707/20646
Ernie is a party animal this weekend and was off to Hemel Hempstead for another birthday early this morning, so Phoebe and me could cement our sudoku based connection for another morning together. We made a roast lunch together and did some jigsawing (though she wanted money for finding the edge pieces, so has seen the possibility of pro jigsawing much quicker than I did) and then I let her watch youtube for longer than was officially sanctioned.
The lunch was good and then we headed to Stevenage as we'd decided to buy these kids a gaming system, sort of for Christmas. I am not sure why we had crumbled on this one - or rather why Catie was up for it, obviously I am very happy to have as many games as possible. The kids hadn't even been really pressing for it, but Catie decided it was time. We were going to get a Nintendo Switch and the question was were we going to be able to make do with one or would they need one each? You can do two player games on the device or on the telly, but would they share nicely? And what about when they were doing handheld games in the car?
We went to Game, a franchise that I used to frequent a bit back in the day, even though I was never a serious gamer, but it's not what it once was. Or at least the one in Stevenage's very eighties shopping centre feels a bit lost and desperate. They were selling toys that weren't even video games. Has it lost its former glory or did I just not see it before? A bit of both.
The assistant seemed a little unclear about the deals on offer and we ummed and ahhed about getting one or two. When it came down to it, the shop only had two regular Switches and none with the offer that was promised on the display. It seemed a bit rubbish that a shop that is mainly concerned with selling consoles (especially now games are available by download) didn't have the consoles it promised. I thought we should go somewhere else to get full value. Though that was disappointing as the kids had thought they were getting the system today.
I really needed a wee which wasn't helping the decision making so we popped over to Tesco to use theri toilets. Whatever was in the ladies was so gross that Catie looked haunted for the rest of the day and seemed unable to get the unknown stink out of her nostrils. I had been googling while she was in there, but had been unable to find anywhere offering the deal that Game had promised (which was basically just a free Sports game on top of a Mario game), so I relented and decided we should go back and get the games now.
As we arrived another family was clearly about to buy a Nintendo Switch. Our decision to decamp and urinate and scar ourselves via toilet smells has backfired. Or had it? Maybe it was good that we were being forced to buy just one. Maybe our kids could share. That wee saved us £300.
They didn't have any Mario Kart games so we had to have the other one and they didn't have the game that Ernie really wanted, even though the case was up. It was a bit like Monty Python's Cheese shop sketch updated to the 21st Century.
But it was the right choice to just get one system (at least for now) and we managed to get things up and running pretty quickly (though the pack came pretty devoid of instructions and you have to work out quite a lot for yourself). My first video game system plugged into the TV aerial and allowed you to play four different versions of Pong that were supposedly different sports. I'd love to take a Nintendo Switch back to the teenage me to blow his stupid little mind. Though in a way that happened when we plugged it all in. The kids played quite sensibly and shared nicely. Who would have guessed it?
