Blessed-Family Blog

Finally the suspense is over, Mom just called to let me know that Baby Sammie has arrived! A little past 2pm, 8 lb 2 oz, 21′’, blue eyes, beautiful little girl. Both mom and baby are fine.

Congratulations to the Johnsons! (From now on, your life will no longer be the same…) May the family be filled with joy, love and blessings always.

We are a reasonably web savvy family, 6 computers for the 4 of us, each doing very different things on the Internet. Buying things online is nothing new to us, shopping around for good deals is always a must. However, between eBay and Amazon, bidding and buying outright, there is no comparison. We have spent hours researching, comparing tons of items that are similar, and then trying to out-bid other people and hours/days later, even with the nifty bid sniper tools, only to find that we lost the bid. However, since the ’start bid’ price is so low, the temptation to save a few bucks is great so we get sucked into trying it first, however, we frequently ended up wasting a lot of time. It seems to be more of a seller’s market. Even when we buying on eBay, we tend to use the “buy it now”. (Note: we are affiliates to both companies, and both are great marketplaces offering their own unique advantages.)

It was 3 weeks before an important birthday in the family (somebody is turning into a teenager!!). Top item on the wish list with a 5-star urgency rating is the “ Nintendo Wii Console“. I checked on eBay, and watched several bidding wars, all of them went on for days and then bid up pretty high. I tried a couple times, trying to get them at the optimal price, but lost out at the end.

How about buying them from retail stores either online or offline? It must be a slam dunk, right? It’s much cheaper than the Sony PS3, and almost 9 months after it’s initial release, it should be pretty easy to get, right? WRONG! We went to and/or called EB Games, Game Crazy, Target, Walmart, … nobody has them. They all said the same thing: they get about 3-4 units every 10 days or so, the shipment come unannounced at random times, and they are gone quickly within the hour. This is pretty outrageous, and it’s pretty amazing that Nintendo is doing so poorly to meet the market demand, even 9 months after initial release. What a big loss of opportunity!! Just imagine all the accessories, games, etc, that could have been sold!

Finally, we went back to our ‘old faithful’, Amazon. At the Amazon Market Place, many vendors are selling the exact same product, at the same configuration, and competing for my business. It’s easy for me to compare and make a quick decision based on the final price vs quality of the seller. For me, it’s a very convenient buyer’s market to find the best deal. With 10 days to go, we quickly picked and got the best deal. The wii console and all other items (see list below) came very quickly, several days before the big day, and everyone was very happy.

For the 4 of us, here is what we got: (thanks to Nono’s recommendation!)

• 1 Wii Console, which comes with 1 Remote (Wiimote), 1 Nunchuck, and the Wii Sports game
• 1 Nintendo Wii Play with 1 Wii Remote
• 1 Mario Party 8 game
• 2 additional Wii Remotes (make total of 4 Wii Remotes for 4 player games)
• 1 additional Nunchuck (makes total of 2 nunchucks for 2 player boxing)

Typically, we are two or three generations behind in the game consoles, this is the first time we are within the first year of the product release. Wii is a very impressive and innovative invention. The remote control based controller with motion sensor gives it a lot of freedom in the use of space, most of the time, it’s pretty intuitive to use, especially with on-screen instructions. Family members young and old all want to try. Even our dog Mocha wants a piece of action.

The Wii Sports game is an initial set of games that comes with the console. It has many fun, family/group games. Our favorites are tennis, baseball, bowling and boxing. They are generally easy to get into and lots of fun to play. Some games, such as tennis, allows 4 players to play at the same time, this is perfect for our family of 4.

” Wii Play with Wii Remote ” is a highly recommended since it’s a package of fun games with an additional Wiimote included. Our favorite games are Billiards, Ping Pong, and Fishing. Tank Game is very addictive but a little hard for beginners like me.

” Wii Mario Party 8 ” is also a good family or party game. It has a main game thread with mini competitions in-between. It’s not as competitive as the sports games but it gets everyone chatting and socializing with each other.

Finally, the last game we got recently was Redsteel Wii , it’s a sword game we got from Costco at $43.99, we could have gotten it from Amazon for $25. The game is rated T for teens, pretty bloody and violent on my scale, I guess everyone qualifies now. With this game, we don’t need to go to Dave & Buster’s to play our favorite sword game there any more. Sorry D&B.

Wiikend boy

According to a news report, there is a new “Ying-Yang Live Fish” dish in Taiwan (嘉義). The body of the fish is expertly fried and prepared with sweet and sour flavor, while the head is still alive! The fish is served while the fish mouth is still moving. After the fish stops moving, the fish is taken away and the head is cooked in a soup as the 2nd dish in the banquet. The dish costs 600 to 800 NT Dollars (about $20-$30 US).

The chef learned the cooking from a recent China (四川) trip. Animal protection groups have learned of this news and are protesting.
Source: Taiwain United News