Video On Demand

We officially live in the future. Not that I have my evening cocktail prepared by a personal R2 unit, or fly around L.A. in one of those cool Blade Runner hovercars. But so many of the technologies that we oohed and aahed at in 1975 are commonplace today. I mean really, how different is your cell phone from Captain Kirk's communicator? Isn't Google about five minutes from the HAL 9000 computer, able to understand and answer your questions in plain English? And if laser eye surgery doesn't make you feel like the Bionic Man, then you got it done at one of those strip-mall joints.

What does all of this have to with Siena? Whereas the rest of us appreciate all this technology, she takes it all for granted. At two years old. And that ain't good. Especially when it comes to DVR. Digital Video Recording is the poor man's TiVo, and for us starving students it's all that we can afford. But it does let us maintain a current library of the latest broadcasts of such classics of the Western Canon as Dora the Explorer, The Wiggles, and The Doodlebops (which is just creepy; if your kid hasn't seen it yet, don't introduce it). And of course Siena's DVD/VHS library rivals Mommy and Daddy's--and we do get our money's worth out of them, especially the hand-me-down tapes from Aunt Lorraine.

Sounds great, doesn't it? All Siena's favorite shows, playable anytime she likes. Any time. You can even watch 'em over and over.

See where this is going?

When the Principessa wakes up or comes home, she knows that the only thing stopping us from putting on Dora or Beauty and the Beast ("Belle anna Beet") is our tolerance for screeching. And our little Gift from God pushes that envelope every day. There's no telling Siena that her shows just aren't on right now, which MiMi could certainly have done with me viz. Sesame Street, and how would I have known if she was feeding me a line? The concept of programming schedules just hasn't sunk in with Siena--and the way technology's progressing, it might never.

The only thing that's keeping Daddy's big-screen TV from becoming All-Siena All-Day is a piece of relatively old technology: a board game. I can't recommend The Letter Factory game highly enough. Siena plays it at least twice a day, and could go a whole afternoon without asking to watch TV. Of course, even that board game involves a mini-computer that tells you which card to put where and how many spaces to move your piece. And of course, you can't have the game without the separately-sold DVD.

So we're not escaping the technology totally. But I am able to prevent the Doodlebops from monopolizing my TV. Fight Tech with Tech.