Nintendo discontinues online gaming for Mario Kart - I'm devestated

Why Nintendo, why did you do it?  Why did you discontinue the Wi-Fi connect service for Mario Kart?

Is it all because your shiny new Mario Kart 8 came out for Wii U a few days ago?  Are you just trying to be mean?  

I'm not buying a Wii U, dude, so I guess it's over between us. 

Mario, we had a good run.  I bought you a year after you came out and we played a lot of games.  First we played tennis, oh god did we play tennis.  We got to the point where we were playing 2-player/4 handed tennis.  Where one remote controls the front player and one controls the back player. I'll tell ya, my roommate and I were REALLY good at 4-handed Tennis.  

We had our Wii-mbledon Tournament that one year, where I had fake grass as a table cloth and we had a ten dollar entry fee.  The winner, after many rounds won the grand prize of a $109 and a tiara.  And then we met Mario Kart.

Sorry Tennis, your old hat now and we've played you so many times that even we were bored of you - it was bound to happen.  Mario was new and shiny and bright....and FAST!  

And you could play online against people around the world!  Oh the joy of being able to beat a kid in Germany who you knew was only 5 and taking a whipping from the Granny in South America.....playing you online was fun!

The first time I saw Rainbow Road I think I peed a little - that thing scared the crap out of me!  Not anymore, now its the one I choose when I want to fuck with a group or show them who's boss....and then get quickly knocked off the first jump by that Asian person who is up at 6am playing before work, WTF!

The other great thing was that you could play against friends, and set up your own races, and we did that too.....with Conference Calls!  Oh yes, you heard me right.  We had a standing Sunday night invitational set up that started with everyone getting on a Conference Call.

Playing online against people you don't know is cool.......but playing against people you know AND be able to talk shit while you're playing them is fucking priceless.  We did that for about six months, it was fun while it lasted....but you can only talk so much shit...and play so many rounds before even that gets boring.

But I wasn't done with you Mario Kart, nope.  Even after my BFF and I would play online against each other, until.....he sold his console.  So then I was left to my own vices.

Oh Mario Kart, you don't know how sad I was tonight.  I had gotten home from work, went to the gym, had eaten and taken a shower and I said "Hey, I'm gonna play some Mario Kart tonight" and I was happy.  

I turned on the TV, the Wii powered up and made that nasty whine, I punched through the menus and hit the Wi-Fi Connect service.....and that's when I got the error.  Error....oh that's strange?  Oh wait, I don't think I'm connected, I changed my router...let me check.

I went through all the diagnostics, did a system update and thought "well that's fixed it" to only be presented with the same error......to which this time I read.....at first the words didn't make sense, I didn't want them to make sense....service....discontinued......no longer available.....that's when things went grey and and I slumped back in my chair......I clutched my pearls and whispered "discontinued" over and over like someone doing the rosary.

A few hours later I came to, my hand hurting from clutching the Mario Kart steering wheel so tightly.  I thought, I can get through this.....let's play a game.  

Well that didn't work, it sucked.  Just KNOWING that I was never gonna be able to yell at some 7-year old somewhere in the world who was fucking bumping into me and being a pain made me not able to play.  I just couldn't enjoy it.  

Playing the computer sucks!

There is some joy in this though, it's not just me.  Nintendo discontinued the entire Wi-Fi Connect Service for Wii and DS.  

You always know it's going to happen, in the back of your mind, you don't want to think about when it's going to happen, but you know it's gonna happen. Sooner or later, but it's still hard when it happens.  You're just not as strong as you thought you'd be when it happened, but you get through.....you get through. 

John McEnroe & Roger Federer stopped by

John McEnroe & Roger Federerer (I think)
Originally uploaded by Michael_L

Last evening I was surprised to open the door and find John McEnroe and Roger Federer standing on my welcome mat holding their gear!

Well I wasn't really that surprised, I mean I did invite them, but still I was surprised to see them!

We held the first (of many I'm sure) Wii Tennis Tournaments! Click HERE to see all of the photos.

We had 22 players who all competed in what was supposed to be a double elimination had I done the brackets right! It's really not my fault, everyone knows that I'm sportaly challenged, I mean hell, I just found out that there's a strategy to baseball. Fortunately one of my friends was able to walk me through it and make sure everyone had a chance at winning.

Everyone was great and made a donation to cover expenses and the money left over went to the Tournament Winner (plus a shiny new tiara)! I'm embarrassed to say that I made it into the Final 2. I signed up so we would have even brackets...I tried to lose so badly, but I kept winning! Not good for the host to win!

We had an hour of practice and the games started....for the next 3.5 hours everyone got a chance to play at least two full matches and advance up the bracket for the chance to win the money.

It was a rambuctious group of trash-talking, cheer leading, court running, bellyache laughing bunch of queens (oh yeah and one straight couple). We laughed and laughed and laughed watching everyone play tennis and making fools of themselves, it was the best time we'd had in a long time.

We all had a great time and finally awarded the final prize at 11:45 pm, just in time to shut off the lights and head out to the bars to spend the prize winnings.

I'll let you know when we're having the next one so you can stop by and play with us!

I'm Finally A PRO!

No, I'm not a professional hooker yet, I'm still waiting for my diploma in the mail for that!


I'm finally a Pro at Wii Tennis!


A month ago I bought a Wii and a new Cellphone. I love the new Cellphone and I LURV the new Wii.


We have had people over every weekend and even several school nights to play Wii. When we had our big Husband Hunting Safari the TV room was converted to the Wii Stadium and it was filled the entire time.


But last night I broke the first elusive level of Wii Tennis - I became a Pro! Everytime you play the computer you either gain (or lose) points based on whether you win (or lose). Once you hit 1000 Points you're considered "a Pro". Last night I was able to get over the elusive plateau and hit 1000 points and become a PRO! And it only took me 45 games against the computer to do it!


But damn, now my shoulder is killing me. I tell ya, these sports related injuries really hurt!