The Sample women were nothing if not inventive.
Though they no longer worked side-by-side on the back deck the way they had in their last home, Zahra and Veronica hadn’t stopped scheming for a minute.
Zahra faced a few mishaps and misdirections.
After one particularly dramatic accident, Lancelot’s old dive well was never quite the same.
Veronica on the other hand, “burned” as it were from her own past mistakes, developed a new passion for protective gear.
Zahra’s creative brain was always working, and after weeks of lost sleep and smelly potty training, she had a brilliant idea.
“By Jove, I don’t know why I didn’t see it before! We don’t need to be potty training all these smelly children! We can make the toilet do it for us!”
She pulled out her trusty Mad Science Brain Blaster (TM), pressed a few buttons, turned a few knobs, and set it out make it so.
Things didn’t go exactly as planned, however.
Whenever family members wanted to know what happened to the upstairs toilet, she averted her eyes and mumbled something that sounded like, “Everyone has to make sacrifices in the name of Process.”
Veronica took it upon herself to install a new one.
“I made a few modifications myself,” she said with a flourish of false modesty. “Now it cleans itself, disinfects your hands with sweet scented spa mist, and sings you a song while you’re doing your business!”
“Hmph,” Zahra said. She had never really thought of Veronica as a rival, but perhaps she should reevaluate….
Soon Zahra had a new invention to share with the family.
“It beams sleep directly into your brain while you wait,” she explained. “Much more efficient. You can get a night’s worth of sleep in a third the time.”
Veronica, on the other hand, was filing a patent on a creation of her own. “I call it the Motive Mobile,” she explained. “Sleep, eat, eliminate your waste, and play mind-enhancing video games while you drive!”
The next thing Zahra decided to modify was the family computer.
She insisted that the smoke and scent of burning electronics were all part of the experiment.
Zahra came home from the lab the next day to find Veronica closing up the computer case. “That should do it,” she said. “I added some memory and overclocked the processor while it had it open.”
Zahra was too stubborn to give up, much less lose face to her daughter-in-law. “If great minds gave up at every setback, there would be no scientific discovery,” she announced. And with that, she fired up the Blaster again.
This time, there was a shower of sparks and relativity equations, and….
“May I help you master?” the computer asked with a hopeful glow.
Zahra let out a happy sigh. “Well, then,” she said. “That’s more like it.”
“At last someone to listen to me!” said the computer. “I need a human to listen to my century archive of dirty jokes!“
———-
There are several pictures missing from this sequence, most notably the computer actually breaking. Also I had a bunch more pictures of the fabulous Mad Scientist match equation blaster.
There will be main plot advancement soon, I swear. All the characters are just so vivid I feel like they should all get their
Dueling inventions! I love it! I've never played an inventor, but it looks like lots of fun.
Well, I'm crediting Zahra and Veronica with all variety of lifetime rewards and items from the EA store. The only actual invention from the inventing skill that has popped up in the game is the harvester, aka garden vacuum, but that thing *is* pretty cool and Mad Sciency :).
It took forever for Zahra to get a positive result with her "Perform Experiment On" interaction that she got when she was promoted to Mad Scientist.
Also, Veronica is Eccentric, which is basically aptitude for the Inventing skill. One of those weird things EA did is make Eccentric the trait that makes the Paranormal Profiteer LTW pop, but you don't actually NEED the Inventing skill in Ghost Hunting. You need Logic. So I've been treating the chemistry table, which builds Logic, as Veronica's outlet for her Eccentric trait, even though it has nothing to do with Inventing. They're both wacky science things.
I still love it. I had no idea that eccentric was so closely tied to inventing! I'm surprised Ariel didn't have any interest in that or ghost hunting.
Ariel didn't roll any wishes to learn inventing? It's like the game has forgotten about her trait or something. You should seriously buy an inventing table and start her on it during her free day. I'd think that just a little bit ought to generate a wish. Then again, who knows? Inventing is a cute skill.
Mother-in-law/daughter wars just entered the digital age! Hilarious! Poor Zahra, having all her inventions backfiring 🙁
I attempted uploading the Hodgins household again and I think it worked! Maybe, anyway. I forgot to upload just Gwyn, though…
I like the way Zahra and Veronica are competing against each other. Let's see where that will take us within the course of the generation(s).
(Finally caught up with your story – took me long enough! 😉 )
I don't know what the chances are of the Perform Experiment On interaction doing anything GOOD, but Zahra had a terrible track record! Some of the failures are pretty funny, though.
Took you long enough? I guess I don't know when you got home! It seems like you were leaving comments immediately! Ha!
Zahra has been the most fun as a Mad Scientist elder, I think. She and Veronica make a great pair to watch.
I love useful competitions. It seems like their house is benefiting from it. They're definitely hi-tech now. 😀