There are two types of volunteering:  the kind that helps make the world a better place ... and the kind in which you tell the gate agent you'll accept a travel voucher in exchange for giving up a seat on an overbooked flight.

While both leave you feeling incredibly good -- especially when your travel plans are flexible and you were smart enough not to check any luggage -- the former (helping the world) has a lasting effect on your mind, body, and spirit.

I found a new kind of volunteering lately, one that's my speed and incorporates one of my favorite things in the world:  laughter.  Like the old saying -- "If you like your job, you never work a day in your life" -- the best kind of volunteering doesn't feel like work and is something I have enjoyed doing:  spending time with a senior citizen on weekend afternoons.

I go to her house and we talk about life and she tells me stories from "the old days" -- which are extremely entertaining.  She knows she's a pistol, and has impeccable timing when she delivers a joke or tells a funny story.  It's what I love about spending time with her -- I always leave happier than when I got there.  And I know she does, too.

Everyone should volunteer.  The world would be a better place if people gave back with their time or their skills.  While past volunteering has taken me to the side of the FDR Drive in midtown Manhattan to clean up garbage (prisoner style!) or in to children's wings of hospitals to juggle -- hanging out with Ruth and making one another laugh is just as much a good deed.  A good deed at my own speed.

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This weekend I had to see what the rage was about, and I broke down and got the Nintendo Wii. Granted, it set my age and social life back about 20 years, but the journey this weekend had its ups and downs.

First of all, it is the coolest thing. Ever.

It's about as addictive as a drug (so I hear ... don't recommend mixing the two) and really fun to play with a group. Had I discovered this thing earlier on I'm pretty sure I would have never left the house (as evidenced by this past weekend's activities -- didn't go outside twice).

There are some downsides, especially if you're a sack of bad bones and crummy arthritis joints like I am. Today I can barely move because I'm so sore and achy -- especially in my wrists, which are weak (Wiik) to begin with. All I can think about today is how out of shape I am, physically, that a stupid Wii would make me feel this sore.

And then I wonder how many other people out there, with or without arthritis, come off a Wiikend in this much pain. Part of the problem is that you go from 0-100 in a split second. One minute you're on the couch clicking the remote, the next minute you're up and about playing the most intense game of tennis possible -- at least the most intense tennis game you can play in your living room.

Now that I have my long-term sustained Wii-related injuries, I think I'll Wiiturn it to the store and go buy a board game. Nobody has ever gotten hurt playing Chutes and Ladders.

And so ends a string of terrible Wii puns.