More Pokémon

When last we left the topic of Pokémon, my son had expressed that he might want to switch to collecting Yu-Gi-Oh cards instead. But, since we had already gotten a bunch of Pokémon cards, I put my foot down that we were going to stick with them. And Kai turned out to be happy with that.

In fact, he was Pokémon crazy all weekend. He found the Pokémon website that gave an animated explanation of the rules of the card game, and we played a modified version of it many times.

The actual rules are quite involved, so we simplified it quite a bit. Over time, if he maintains his interest, I will try to introduce more of the complicated rules, that is, if I can learn them myself.

I have mixed feelings of Kai’s latest obsession. Pokémon is not as academically productive as learning the periodic table, or at least not as productive as how I think knowing the periodic table will be once he gets to that topic in school in six or seven years.

But, in terms of having the interests of a “normal” kid, Pokémon may be as close as Kai gets. And maybe having a common interest with other boys will help him to socialize with them.

Oh well, perhaps I shouldn’t worry about all that. Right now, maybe all that matters is that my son has found a new source of entertainment, and that he is having fun with it.

By the way, with the motivation to collect the cards, Kai’s snorting has all but completely stopped. And with that, I think we can stop using the Pokémon cards as incentive.

Instead, we will now use the cards to try to reign in an even more difficult behavior: Kai waking me up every night. Let’s see how powerful this Pokémon really is.