Smug Inner Geek Moment

This is a "take that" moment directed towards my beloved daughter, the Last Amazon, who is often so derisive of my penchant for video games. She says my gaming brings out an ugly inner geek side of me but the Globe and Mail is validating me by widely reporting this:

Before you assume gadgets and video games fry the minds of the future, consider this: Canadian researchers are finding evidence that the high-speed, multitasking of the young and wireless can help protect their brains from aging.

A body of research suggests that playing video games provides benefits similar to bilingualism in exercising the mind. Just as people fluent in two languages learn to suppress one language while speaking the other, so too are gamers adept at shutting out distractions to swiftly switch attention between different tasks.

A new study of 100 university undergraduates in Toronto has found that video gamers consistently outperform their non-playing peers in a series of tricky mental tests. If they also happened to be bilingual, they were unbeatable.

I think this is the first time I have ever liked anything I found in the G&M.

I really think the Last Amazon should be grateful to my inner geek; as senility does have a tendency to run in the family bloodline – on all sides. Besides anything that could potentially lighten the load of caring for me in my Depends Age such be nurtured, praised, and cultivated. On that note, I am going to ask Big Nana to come visit and ease the load of child raising from my shoulders in April.