Two weeks ago, the Denver Public Library switched to a city wide payroll system called Kronos.Before this, we used to keep track of our hours via old fashion paper time sheets. Now, we have to log in to a program and record our timestamps. In theory, it would make everyone's lives much easier. Your sick, vacation and other hours are all tracked in real time. You can submit a time off request electronically. Holiday hours are logged automatically. Now, remember, I said "in theory".

Kronos was supposed to go live back in July or August. It was then postponed until September or October. Then it got pushed back to this month, where finally it went live. If you ask me, they should have kept postponing it, or just throwing the whole thing out of the window. Kronos LOVES to not work. We access the Kronos server through IE (don't suggest using FireFox, because no one even knows yet), and a lot of times, it will not load, or it will load but when you're about to hit your timestamp button, you get a server error. We're alotted seven minutes until we're marked as tardy, but guess what? More than seven minutes can be spent trying to log into god damn Kronos! Our senior librarian is going to have her hands full always fixing everyone's time sheets.

Then, there's our RFID-based circulation system called CircIt. Earlier in the year, we began tagging our items with RFID (radio frequency identification) tags. What this would mean is that we could dump a ton of items onto a pad and have them checked in at once instead of passing each one under a scanner individually. When Park Hill reopened, they decided to have us as the pilot branch to test out this new system. Checking in items from my book drop is so much better with this system... WHEN it works. When it doesn't work, it's a serious ****ing pain. We go back to our old circulation system, and then we realize we've become spoiled by CircIt.

So I got to thinking, we are HIGHLY dependent on technology. Every little thing we do now is technologically aided. Our phones, for example, are our lifelines. We've decided it's quicker and easier to communicate with people via text, instead of actually calling them. We don't even punch in their numbers anymore. We go to our contacts, touch their name, and the phone magically dials. Forget your phone and need to call someone, and then you are screwed.

But now, our dependency with phones is accelerated ever more. There's a feature that most phones have now, and that's GPS. If not GPS, they can access the Internet and use Google Maps or Yellowpages for directions. I'm sure there are some people out there now that have thrown away their actual maps because they now have, say, ATT Navigation. I can just picture them driving out somewhere they've never been before, totally relaxed untiltheir phone tells them "Service Unvailable" or the phone's battery dies. "****! " Wish you would have kept your paper maps, huh!

Our entertainment needs have definitely changed. Digital download seems to be a new direction that many companies are exploring. You can now buy any album you want online, downloaded directly to your computer. You can now "rent" movies by streaming them online. You can buy video games and store them on your HDD. If you can do this with food, you may never actually need to leave the house again!

Even something as simple as correspondance has been dominated by technology. 15 years ago, you wrote your grandmother a letter on an actual piece of paper. You used a pen or a pencil, and you physically wrote that letter. You'd fold the paper into thirds, put it in an envelope, write her address on it, and use a stamp to mail it. When was the last time you licked a stamp when it was used to mail something that wasn't a bill? Oh, you pay your bills electronically,huh? The United States Postal Service is losing billions of dollars in revenue yearly, even with cost reductions and lay offs, one of the biggest examples of technological advancements having an adverse impact on people.

How many of you carry more than three electronic devices? For me, I have my cell phone, my DS and my iPod. I will admit, I can barely remember any of the numbers in my phone, so if something happens to it, I'm screwed. I haven't used a phone book in a very long time. If something goes wrong with my iPod (again, and for good), then I can't listen to any of my music, because ALL my music is on that machine. If I want to continue to work while listening to music, I'll have to hunt up my Walkman. No no no, not an MP3 Walkman. I mean, a COMPACT DISC Walkman. Yes, Sony made those. And if something happens to my DS, it's actually not that devestating to me, because I have no problem picking up a book again, and reading on my breaks instead.

I'm waiting for the day to happen. We've seen numerous movies depict the fall of technology, causing chaos, wrecking havok and pretty much forcing us into another Ice Age. We are so hardwired to everything that I really don't think society will know what to do when the World Wide Web crashes, when satelites fail, and the power goes out and they can't recharge their devices. Are they going to remember their basic survival instincts, or will they just panic and end their lives?

Ever since man was cold and invented fire and grew tired of dragging things around and made the wheel, technology has been designed to make our lives easier. But I don't think the earliest caveman ever thought that his latest decendants would end up relying on it for just about everything theydo. I think he'd be appauled to see very fit people in malls riding Segways instead of usingtheir own damn legs! So I think we need to stop being so reliant on technology, or we'll ALL be using machines to walk for us.

Yes, I am aware of the irony that I'm typing this on a computer.

I have passed on a whole helluva lot of new games this year. Infamous. Uncharted 2. Brutal Legend. Ultimate Alliance 2. Borderlands. Need for Speed Shift. DiRT 2. Fallout 3. The list goes on and on. Just don't have the budget for it, and just didn't want to keep adding to my backlist. Well today, I bought a game brand new ON RELEASE DAYno less. What game would that be? You're an idiot if you haven't already guessed. Yes, it's:

Yep. This was the only game I had pre-ordered this year at Game Crazy too, until my local store closed on me. I gotta tell you, I do miss the feeling of buying a brand new game. What you get for full price is the experience of going to a store and seeing a brand new shiny Celophane encased game sitting on a shelf when it was only in a box hours earlier. You get to take it home, play it and talk about it with other gamers while it's still fresh... Aside from that, there really is no other reason to pay full price for new games.

Unless you just HAVE to have it. That's when I realized Nintendo means a lot more to me than I thought. You see, every once in a while, I'll get involved in a debate discussing Nintendo and its current state. Really, I don't like it. I've always said, "Nintendo, give us some NEW games! Create NEW IPs! TRY something different!" And what do I decide to purchase over all other games this season, even Assassin's Creed II (yes, I'm not getting it this year)? New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Does that make me a hypocrit? No... I'd like to think that it makes me a loyalist.

I've been gaming on Nintendo arcades and machines since before a lot of you were born. I'm guessing right around 1986 was when I first played a Mario game. Jumping around as this little plumber, hoping over mushroom-like enemies, eating mushroom-like mushroomsand growing big, eating flowers and flinging fire balls. It was so fun, it was so addictive, it was so... so... Nintendo. I heard that this game brings back the wonderful feeling of the older Super Mario games, like Super Mario Bros. 3, and I damn near squeeled like a school girl when I heard the comparison. Super Mario Bros. 3 is my number one ranked favorite Mario game.

Anyway, I know there are other old school gamers that have been fed up with Nintendo and have finally left them. They either didn't buy a Wii, or they gave them one last chance, then sold their Wii when they finally ran out of patience. They're upset with Nintendo, and well, hell... so am I. I just bought a brand new Wii game from Nintendo, and I still feel like they owe me so much more. But I'm not the type of person that just gives up on a console just because I don't have something to play on it every single week. Of course, it makes it easier for me being a multi-platform owner. If the Wii's dry, I play some 360 or PS3 until something comes out for the Wii I want.

So yeah, really, I recognize the significance of Nintendo's lasting impression on me. They've released a new Mario game, which I've purchased over every other thing I've wanted this season, It made me go out in cold and snow to get it, while I'm still under the weather. I planned to play GTA IV all day today, but I've shut the 360 off and will start playing NSMBW the moment I finish this blog. I also plan to do this all over again for the next Zelda. That's some power, huh? Yeah, Nintendo power.

National Gaming Day is observed by libraries across the nation. The Park Hill Branch began participating in this event last year, an event that I helped run. We played a lot of Nintendo Wii, basically just Wii Sports and Mario Kart Wii, and we also had a brand new board game, of which I cannot remember the name of. Anyway, we had several kids participate and it was an enjoyable experience all around.

This year, sadly, it wasn't the same. While we were getting prepared for this year's event, we thought we'd hold a Mario Kart Wii tournament. We made flyers advertising the tournament, and I spent a good deal of time trying to set up and learn a website-based tournament system in order to organize this thing, but it ended up a total bust. We only had two people register in total, and the only kid that showed up to play wasn't even one of the registered particpants.

So from two until almost four, I spent my portion of work playing Wii with a nine year old kid. He's a good kid, a real trash talker too. But yeah, I wish there was a larger turn out, because I was all excited about the tournament t hing. I guess in retrospect, it was for the best, because I'm still under the weather, and I think if we had too many kids, I might have gone nuts.