I never Nintendo'd for this to happen...

I've never been much into computer games. The whole gaming revolution pretty much passed me by; as a child I much preferred to get stuck into a good book, as a teenager much the same, (discounting my text books, obviously, which I shunned completely), and as an adult, well, face-to-face interaction always seemed preferable to sitting hunched over a keyboard. (Although blogging seems somehow to have escaped that embargo.)

Anyway, when I had children, I was determined that I wasn't going to raise two pale-faced sons who never saw the sun, and that instead they would be Proper Boys, running around outside, digging up worms, sometimes (retch) eating them, climbing trees, playing football, and generally living a 1950's dream that does not - in reality - exist.

So no computer games for us, golly gosh no.

Despite all evidence that my master plan had failed and that Husband and I were in fact raising city boys ('Yuck! My hands are dirty, mama!'), this mindset continued until recently. I ignored the fact that rather than build dens and get messy, both my sons are addicted to television (or were, before we arrived here and didn't have one which, thanks to one person in particular - you know who you are - has been a lot less traumatic than I had expected), overall we stuck to our guns and kept computer games out of the house at least.

Then, shortly before we left for Russia, a friend took me to one side and said; "I know that you don't want the Boys to become totally immersed in computer games but really, it's important that they have some exposure to them, otherwise they are going to be odd ones out. It is possible to do these things in moderation, you just need to keep any eye on it."

Interesting take, and food for thought, and once we arrived here it became apparent that this friend was right. We found ourselves surrounded by balanced, normal families, who dipped in and out of the game culture as they felt like it, and really, given the fact that 5 months of the year here are not conducive to out-door pursuits, I began to think that perhaps something to take the heat off me during long days at home when it was minus 25degC outside might not be a bad idea. There are only so many 1950's -style airfix planes and ships in bottles one can build, after all... especially on your own whilst your kids are playing at being Ben 10 or Transformers.

So, when Boy #1 did so well with his skiing recently, braving all weathers, being a generally all-round good sport, and most amazingly just getting on with it without moaning and complaining (which any mother of a 6 year old boy will know is a miracle in itself), Husband and I caved. He had been mentioning a Nintendo DS as a potential birthday present for some time - not in a nagging way, just in a 'wow, wouldn't it be amazing if...' way (he's nothing if not canny, my son) -and we decided that with a summer of flights and car journeys not long off, it was time to reward him.

And so the Potski Familiski has finally entered the 21st century in terms of technology. We didn't give him everything he wanted, you understand; Boy #1 was hoping for a Ben 10 game but I looked into it and didn't like the level of casual violence, so he got a Mario Kart game instead. And so far so good; he's loving it and will even - gasp! - share with his brother. He even asks me to play from time to time (although I suspect this is just for the humour value when I lose horribly). But this new toy has brought about a new question for me.

How much time playing is too much? Or, on the flip side, how much is enough? At the moment we've set a limit of 20 minutes in the morning and the same in the afternoon for the Boys to play with it. That seems to me to be enough to give them the chance to play a couple of games without eating into 'real-life' time, but then I started to wonder if it IS too much. Or, on the other hand, are we being too proscriptive, and should we just let him play with it as much as he dam' well pleases?

I thought technology was supposed to answer problems, not create them...