Monday, March 25, 2013

I have been bested by Minecraft.

It's no secret our new thing in this house is Minecraft.  We held out as long as we could but we finally caved at Christmas.  Santa brought the kids Minecraft.  It was quite a letdown because all we could wrap was an envelope with the authorization code that needed to be entered into the computer to get the game started.  Once they figured it out though they took the envelope and ran with it.

They Ran.

We never saw them for the rest of Christmas.  Come to think of it, we saw very little of them in January, February and most of March.

Since then, we've been up to our armpits in Minecraft.  Every single thing in this house revolves around it.

And that, right there, is the rub.

We've had to find a happy middle ground where the kids are not plugged into the computer all day and life's passing them by.  They, on the other hand, would love to do nothing more than fight zombies and creepers, download mods and watch YouTube videos.

Truth be told, Minecraft is just one little part of the Total Minecraft Immersion.  You have mods, seeds, whole new worlds and maps.  All of them have to be thoroughly researched and examined on the iPad and then you chose which ones you want to download.

And you have not lived Minecraft till you've lived through the videos.  Oh dear God the videos.  They are a thing unto themselves.

We started off with these prepubescent teens, screaming, yelling and cussing every other word.  They would blow up sheep and use TNT and nuke whole damn worlds.  My kids were enjoying it a bit too much so that lasted less than two seconds in this house.

Then we found Mr. Paul.  He's the new man in our lives.  He's practically been living with us since right after Christmas.  His real name is Paul Sores Jr, and I can't tell you the number of night's I've spent with Mr. Paul, waiting for my own husband to come home.

He does the Minecraft videos in a nice, calm manner and he's downright easy on the ears.  That may not seem to be a big deal but when you are listening to these things for hours on end sometimes, voice quality becomes very important.  Trust me on this.


It got so bad at one point, I called the kids to come up and eat dinner.  They wolfed their food down in seconds. SECONDS.  Then, before I had had a chance to sit down to eat my dinner, I was being asked, "Mom, can I go back downstairs?  Can I, please?!?"  I brushed it off figuring if I ignored the question, I could at least get a little something to eat.

I was wrong.

"MOM, can I go back down stairs?!?"  Alex asked almost frantic, pacing, having to have an answer right that very second.

"Guys, I need something to eat.  Please look around you and put your dishes away.  Just give me a minute, would you?"

Well that wasn't even out of my mouth before my cute little kids with absolutely no gross and fine motor skills, found it within themselves to scoop up their dishes, round the bend of the island, turf the dishes into the sink, round the other bend of the island and with the dexterity of a skilled surgeon, set the microwave timer.

All in under ten seconds flat.

I remember standing there thinking, "What in the fuck just happened?  Jesus, I don't think I've ever seen them move that fast, Alex was almost fluid, even.  I could really use this Minecraft thing to my advantage."

And then it dawned on me, "Hey, why did you guys set the timer?"

"Well mom, you said to give you a minute.  I'm giving you exactly one minute.  Well, you now have forty-six seconds."  

So I stood there looking at my older two kids, all of us looking at each other, a three way stare down, going back and forth from looking at them to the microwave timer and back.  I never knew how excruciatingly long a minute, or forty-six seconds, could be until you're in a stare down with your two kids and the microwave.

DING!

And just like that, my older two ran like they had flaming fireballs on their heels, down the steps to the computers, back to Minecraft.  One of them ran around the corner, overshot it and smack-landed in the other side of the wall.  They righted themselves and kept right on going.  I could hear them in excited voices, "Hey lets see if we can get new saddles to ride the pigs!"

Gracie and I stood there looking at each other, wondering what in the hell just happened.

I stood there trying to figure out why in the hell a pig needed a saddle.


And that is one day in our life, living with Minecraft.

And I still don't know why a pig needs a saddle.  I did find out you have to have a carrot though.



20 comments:

  1. It's not THAT bad at our house, but you should consider using Minecraft the way Beckley does, with her devising entire lesson plans around it...sounds like your kids would be receptive.

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    1. We're not there yet Jim. The kids are still trying to kill each other with trap doors and TNT. We're close though.....

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  2. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  3. Lizbeth you never fail to make me smile.
    I needed that today!Oh Lordy how I needed that today.
    Thank you my dear!

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  4. OMG! I remember those days! My son was addicted to runscape then World of warcraft then Second life in high school until just last year. He kept trying to get me to play second life with him but I'm useless at those games. I have enough trouble with my first life. He would teleport me to his "house" in second life and there were "others" there but all I cold do was bump into things. He had to explain to the "others" that I was his mom and didn't know what I was doing.

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    1. I remember you saying something about that game at your blog. And I do the same thing--I stand there and can't get through the door. Sigh.

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  5. I played LOTRO with my husband for a bit, back before we had the boy, so I can understand the immersion into the game. Zane doesn't yet have the attention span for anything other than Skylanders, and even then we are talking no more than 20 minutes.

    I am not sure if it would be healthy to ride a pig, given their hygiene. Plus, it would have to be a big pig!

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  6. I was torn between wanting to understand that which is Minecraft, so that I could talk to mr 15 about what he was so engrossed in...and just going to read a book by myself! The there was creative play mode and making pixel art in the sky and then skyping and joining another friend's world. Yep, I pretended it was just like hanging out!

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  7. We caved and bought Minecraft xbox about 6 weeks ago. I could have written this post. It is the best reinforcer for getting homework, housework etc done. That includes my husband.

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  8. Minecraaaaaaft!!!! (Like "Khaaaaaaannnn!!!!" only more emphatic.)

    Those YouTube videos. Oh my God. The constant talking about all these boring little square things that I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. The incessant asking to play Minecraft. The negotiating over who gets to play it on the computer and who has to play it on the Xbox.

    Minecraaaaaaft!!!!

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  9. Reading this post and the comments has made me grateful that no one in my family (including me) knows anything about Minecraft. Maybe we are missing out on something major but I'm thinking not...

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  10. Does it make you nostalgic for the good, old Monopoly days? At least this time around, you're not required to play!

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  11. My daughter tried to teach the girl we are now babysitting before and after school how to play Minecraft today. Thankfully, it didn't last too long before the girl gave up. I think her mom might kill me otherwise.

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    1. And of course you need a carrot. How else are you going to get the pig to hold still long enough to put a saddle on it?!

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  12. Love the timer! Minecraft is so creative, that at least, and it beats all day long easter holiday shooting games that my unwell Teen Boy is presently engaging in ! Sigh....

    xx Jazzy

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  13. I can so relate to this, lol... my 11-yr-olds love Minecraft and were this obsessive about it for months (including the videos, lol). At least it's a creative game, they built all kinds of things I never would have even thought of. They've kind of eased back a bit and are back into Pokemon at the moment...

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  14. Minecraft also provide the security option to the player play can lock the game in the medial and continue when they wants but when other player wants to continue this game they needs an authorization code and when code is wrong they can't continue this game.......Read More

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  15. ROBLOX is powered by a growing player base of more than 300,000 creators who provide an infinite variety of highly immersive experiences.

    These experiences range from 3D games and competitions, to interactive adventures where friends can take on new personas exploring what it would be like to be a dinosaur, a miner working a mine or an astronaut on a space exploration.

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