My new daughter arrived at 11:53 in the morning on December 6th, 2004. Needless to say, I’ve been a bit busy since then!

She is our third child, so at this point my wife and I have the drill pretty much down – trade shifts sleeping, keep the bottles and nipples clean, always burp her or she’ll get the hiccups and won’t be able to go back to sleep, etc, etc.

I’m happy she came along. Seeing your new child for the first time is a wonderful experience, and it was one I thought I’d never have again (although now I know I’ll never have it again – we’ve…taken steps).

I think everyone should have kids. Note that I said kids, plural. If you have only one child you do not get the full experience. It’s like Bill Cosby said – if you have only one child, and something in the house is broken, you know who broke it.

Of course, that’s not the sum total of the child-raising experience. There’s lots of other great stuff as well, like when my first daughter climbed up onto the couch next to me when she was three and said, “Whatcha doin’ Daddy?” and I said, “Playing Final Fantasy VII” and she said, “Oooh, what’s that?” And we ended up playing through the whole game together, with me reading all the text out loud to her (editing a bit for content in parts) in different voices for the different characters. It was a wonderful parent-child experience, and is only one of many.

Now my first daughter keeps me buffed while I’m slaughtering Harvest Watchers in Westfall. She’s also always up for a game of Magic. My three-year-old son likes to steal my Neo-Geo Pocket Color so he can play Pac-Man.

Being a gamer dad is great. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.