Now that this Kingdom Hearts thing has invaded our lives, it’s become sort of an obsession. I believe Jenn is starting to understand the conversion of a game from a pastime to an addiction, just as I understood when I first encountered Grand Theft Auto 3. It’s no longer just something to sit down and play; it’s a common reference point that we can share and see what’s going on with the other person’s game.

Jenn’s a bit further ahead than I am as far as her characters are concerned, but I’ve taken more time to go through each world you must traverse and get all of the things so I don’t have to go back.

A few nights ago we watched A Very Merry Muppet Christmas on NBC and were very pleased with it. We had just recently been complaining about how Kermit the Frog really doesn’t sound like Kermit now that Jim Henson’s dead, and with this latest movie, I was pleased that his voice was nearly spot-on. They also paid a lot of tribute to the original Muppet movies and had some great humor for both the kids and the adults.

I ended up buying the VHS tape (along with a “Best of Muppets CD”) from ShopNBC.com. Normally I would never consider buying a VHS tape in my land of DVDs, but I asked the customer service folks and they said they weren’t going to release it on DVD. Anyway, I look forward to that getting here so I can see it again. Great stuff.

Hmmm… Oh - I get the Zamboni newsletter (what - don’t you?) and saw in this latest one that they’re coming out with a remote controlled Zamboni ice resurfacing machine. I think that’s a must-have for yours truly. Jenn’s dad has a remote controlled truck, my dad has a Hum-Vee… I need the Zamboni. (Speaking of Zamboni, a lot of their clothing items are on sale. For those looking for gifts for Trav, there you go…)

I’ve started reading a book called The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman. It reads a little like the Harry Potter series, but has a much different world; rather than placing magic into today’s world like Harry Potter does, this series takes place in a world where you might recognize the names of things, but that’s about as far as it gets. Sort of alternate universe style. Anyway, it’s really quite good so far, though I’m only on page 50 or thereabouts, so you don’t have to take my word for it.

Finally, I’m in the process of installing and testing SharePoint Portal Server v2 beta 1. After talking to the Microsoft guys about it, it looks like a lot of the work I’ve done on customizing v1 over the past year will basically amount to jack squat because they’re changing the whole thing so drastically. On one side, I’m happy that they’ve improved everything so greatly; on the other, I can’t help but feel like I’ve basically just been spinning my wheels for the past year now because I’ve gotta start all over from scratch - there’s no “migration path” for these things. C’est la vie.