The maid just stood there and watched Sky playing with her art books for hours while he should have been cleaning things. Creeepy.

Or maybe I mean laggggy.

Usually I like to show the before/after makeovers in the post, but this time I just couldn’t face putting them in anything like the story.

Hunter:

Forest

Those muscle shirts MUST DIE. And no, I have no idea what Forest is doing, and I don’t want to know.

Sky’s wasn’t noteworthy:

But I think I saw this children’s cartoon at some point. Or maybe it was a nightmare about a children’s cartoon.

And speaking of the title of the post, here’s the crowning lag disaster.

I COULD NOT get the triplets to school on their first morning. I ended up trying a dozen things to deal with the lag and replayed that morning at last three times.

Here, Hunter tries to take a bath before catching the bus, but instead he breaks the tub.

Meanwhile, Veronica has just come home from work. She’s about to fall over from exhaustion, and she desperately needs to pee. But does she listen to me when I tell her to deal with these things? NO. Because the lag has just jumped us forward two hours, it’s now 10:30AM, and Hunter is still standing in the bathroom.

So, of course, the most important thing to do is scold the poor boy.

And what do you think happened? Of course. Hunter, who has failed at everything he was trying to do in the bathroom and is desperately trying to get to school, just stares at her.

And pees himself too.

The family that lags together pees together, I guess.

While Charles was teaching Fabian how to fight, Viola Sharpe was harassing Michelle Yo in the foyer. I have no idea what the action means, but it doesn’t look nice.

Then they sat down and annoyed each other over dinner.

In addition to all the lights seeming to have disappeared from the Salon, the camera has gone bonkers when I try to take shots of action inside.

Behold:

 
Townie/Cross-Pollination Update

And here is Arlo Bunch Sharpe (Velvet’s husband), who decided to drop in unannounced on a tender moment between Fabian and Zahra.

This has been happening more and more. I thought they were paparazzi that I couldn’t keep out, but they’re not. They’re just random townies hanging out in the middle of the house. I’ve started using Twallan DebugEnabler to force them to go home so they don’t interfere with gameplay.

The lot they’re living on used to be a park. I’m wondering if EA still has a flag set someplace. Despite how much I love this lot, it might be a good reason to leave.

Townie/Cross-pollination:

Among the dearly departed in Sunset Valley are Jess Ursine-Hodgins (Sorry DragonWife!), Leighton Sekemoto (Sorry RedHead!), Michael Bachelor Alto, Emma Hatch Goth, and — perhaps less tragically depending on who you ask — Pauline Wan. And when Gus Hart-Williams reached 120 with no return visit from Grim, I killed him. The town is filled with grieving widows.

Morand Cagley is thrilled to call Bella Bachelor Cagley his wife.

Against all odds, Toya Ursine-Sample is expecting again! (Seriously, on Day 0 before aging up. Dang.) This will bring their total to five children plus their foster of Toya’s half-sister, though I fear Adjo will not see this late surprise child grow up.

Holly Alto spent about five minutes grieving for her lifelong love before going out with Mortimer. He asked her to be his girlfriend. She agreed and then immediately began two-timing him with newly divorced Sam French-Sekemoto. She also conned Malcom Landgraab out of a very large “campaign donation.” Wow, Holly. I guess Michael was the only thing keeping you honest.

Oh, wait, I just threw a party, and Michael Alto was on the list of people I could invite. So he’s not dead! HOLLY WHAT ARE YOU DOING??

Maya Langerak (no idea whose kid she is) persuaded Charmaine Ursine-Sample to accept her proposal of marriage. Can our free spirit Charmaine tie herself down to one woman, or is their love doomed from the start?

Arvid Voss and Darlene Branch welcomed their daughter Dayna — system crash — Katie into the world and still did not get married.

Brenna Ursine-Sample and Darwin Landgraab hate each other and are fighting playground wars.

Yet more people are nemeses with Genvieve Goth. She came up in an event I haven’t posted yet, and I looked up her traits. She really is almost the worst bitch you could create with this game. She is Grumpy, Coward, and Mean Spirited. (And Artistic and I forget the other.) Man, I’m glad that Charles couldn’t jump down that rabbithole.

While I’m getting my act together for the next post, an interlude…

A closer shot of Latrice Hodgins, since she followed Veronica home from the salon for no apparent reason, then hung around the house until someone kicked her out.

Apparently, she found the Samples really entertaining.

It seems appropriate that Veronica should drive to her first day at work in an invisible car.

Poor Charles just can’t catch a break.

Here’s a fantastic animation fail.

I think that Hunter is supposed to be INSIDE the toy box.

Here’s a random shot of Mortimer Goth and Emma Hatch Goth’s son. He got a really bad roll on the everyday outfit. That muscle shirt really needs to go.

I removed a bunch of custom content while trying to debug my horrible lag (which is improved but still laggy). I think this picture is from some point where I accidentally removed Charles’s hair. But I honestly can’t remember.

He’s not bald. He had some kind of patterned buzz cut, which makes it even funnier.

And I really, seriously, have NO IDEA why I took this shot. I went to a lot of trouble to get it too.

That’s one Autumn Salad up close and personal.

Just a bit of fun to remind you that I’m still around.

Our house in Albuquerque is finally on the market! No offers yet, but it seems to be showing well. We’re now back together as a family and staying in a hotel in Boston. We close on the new house tomorrow. I can’t wait!

Oh, and I just caught Pets on sale at Amazon, so that’ll be showing up around the time the triplets are children, which is where I am in play. It looks like a fabulous expansion!

When everyone arrived at the new house on Waterfall Way, the babies spent a while with some enlightening issues.

Here is Fabian “picking up” Hunter. 

Charles is mad that Hunter is in bed.

Here’s a nice shot of a ghostly Charles fishing in front of the waterfall at night.

The ghosts love the new place. Here’s Lance settling in.

And Susie’s still around.

Townie and Cross-Pollination Update:

Morand Cagley and Bella Bachelor are engaged! I guess he did show her what it was like to be with a real man.

Faith Cagely, on the other hand, has taken up with Leighton Sekemoto. I didn’t know that geriatric ladykiller was still around. Apparently, he still has what it takes. How much longer he’ll have it is anyone’s guess.

Arvid Voss and Darlene Branch are expecting again. They’re engaged, but they STILL haven’t gotten married or even moved in with each other as far as I know. I believe their son Christopher is now an adult. I’m pretty sure they’re both close to elderhood by now.

Hank Goddard passed away. The ladies of Sunset Valley sobbed, and the men breathed a sigh of relief. Pauline is still at large.

Toya Ursine-Sample is out of jail and back to conning her constituents. She’s recently been elected Sunset Valley’s Mayor. Apparently, nobody seems to mind that she has a conviction for embezzlement.

Toya’s primary rival is Holly Alto, daughter of late Vita Alto (Leader of the Free World) and the late Nick Alto (Emperor of Evil). So, basically, leadership of Sunset Valley is torn between two crime families. Fabulous. Holly seems to be playing it pretty honest and legal, though. I wonder if she is influenced by her relationship to her husband Michael Bachelor Alto, which Twallan still can’t stop telling me is the happiest marriage EVAR.

Charmaine Ursine-Sample is following in her mother’s footsteps. She moved out and got her own place and immediately got a job in politics. Toya is grooming her to take over the corrupt political empire. Charmaine is also leaving a trail of broken lady hearts behind her.

Starr Ursine-Sample, on the other hand, had a major split with her family. As soon as she graduated from high school, she had a big fight with Toya, moved out, and joined law enforcement. She also immediately got engaged to her high school sweetheart Felix Andrews, son of the Lavar Andrews who never gave Ada the time of day. Poor Adjo. I hope he’s able to maintain a better relationship with her.

Everyone hates Genvieve Goth, and she hates everyone back. I have never seen a character with so many nemeses. Even her boyfriend VJ Alvi couldn’t stand her. He dumped her, and now she’s stalking him.

Malcolm Landgraab and Beatriz Williams Landgraab are finally married. Their son Darwin is almost a teen. Glad they got around to it.

Gus Hart Williams, husband of Lisette Williams, IS STILL NOT DEAD. Grim, you forgot about this guy! At least he and Lisette are making good use of all this extra time together. They get second place for happiest marriage ever after Holly and Michael.

The obligatory stranger freaks out as Veronica calmly walks into the hospital to have her twins.

After Veronica and Charles exit the hospital and get into the taxi, I exit to town edit mode to tweak something. I save my changes and return to gameplay to find Veronica and Charles standing in front of the hospital again with no taxi and NO BABIES!

I panic.

Then I switch back to the home lot and find them here.

Good to know that nobody minds leaving babies on the porch.

Then, possibly because I screwed things up by dropping in and out of Edit Town, the whole day was wrecked with lag. I ended up quitting without saving and started over.

So here’s where they ended up the second time.

Leave the boys in the bathroom. Classy.

Charles spent most of the time the kids were babies and toddlers in desperate need of a shower, so get used to these fumes.

Zahra ran down the stairs to see Cyclone when he manifest, but this was the only picture I got of it, and it looks like her neck is broken.

Perhaps Fabian and Zahra aren’t getting along quite as well as we thought?

Random shot of Pauline, still naughty after all these years.

Another creepy paparazzi in a hospital gown! What gives?

Fixed

Well, this is embarrassing.

And, finally, here is Stiles McGraw, who stood in this corner of the yard for three days. Resetting him didn’t help. Eventually, I annihilated him, and it really improved my game performance. He was REALLY old and not part of the story anyway.

Later, Marty Keaton got similarly stuck, and I gave him the same treatment. Old sims should not cross me!

Random observation: The post on this blog that gets the highest number of hits is, “Shanni Becomes a Woman.” Now, I know I named it that way for irony, but that’s just creepy.

Along those lines, two of the current Google search terms that land people on this site are “stinky diaper girls” and “wife is a tramp.” BWAH?

Townie/Cross-Pollination Update:

Toya landed herself in jail for embezzlement! Ah, her poor family.

Oh, dear. Morand Cagley is dating Bella Bachelor. I’m sorry. Maybe he can show her what it’s like to date a real man.

Willem Yo is now madly in love with Justine Keaton (Marty Keaton’s widow after I struck him with annihilation). I’d say he was after her money, but he already has plenty of money.

Not much more because I haven’t gotten to play much this month!

This post was just sitting around already written, waiting for the story to catch up with the pictures. Now I’m through all the pictures I’ve already sorted. It may be a while before I get more done, or I might go insane from moving stuff and need to take a break. I estimate I’m still about five or six story posts out from where I actually have stopped playing. I kind of hope that after the house goes on the market next week, I might be able to get a little peace to play, but we’ll see.

A few pics I picked up earlier but forgot to post:

Sim Fu is everywhere now. Vita Alto (the Leader of the Free World) shows off her moves while Charles and Veronica make eyes at each other.

Connor congratulates his great-granddaughter on graduation!

I love the way Ada’s hair ribbon accessory stuck with her graduation gown. It looks like she tied it to her mortarboard, which is totally what she would have done.

Veronica was apparently expecting a ring way before Charles was ready to give it to her!

The mysterious Sim quick-wardrobe-change caught on film!

Veronica thinks some wedding crasher is hilarious.

Fabian finishes his stepson’s wedding doing what he does best.

Charles freaks out at seeing his own wife naked.

I actually did the wedding three times too. The first time, I managed to put the chairs too close together, and people could only sit in the front row. Whoops. The second time, night fell during the vows, and even though there was lighting in the park, it wasn’t close enough to the wedding arch. Veronica’s dark skin just makes her fade into the darkness, and that made me grumpy. So I did it a third time with a whole bunch of extra lighting around the wedding arch. Hey, it was her special day. She should be able to see herself in the pictures!

It took three tries to get Charles’s bachelor party to work.

Bachelor Party Attempt #1: Nobody came. I have no idea what canceled the party.

Xander Clavell was the only guy in the pub.

Charles sat around for a while and had a drink before I reached the conclusion that nothing was going to happen.

Bachelor Party Attempt #2: This time I tried it at the Sample Estate.

Charles changed into goofy party clothes. So this time there really was a party!

Except that nobody would come into the house. They just stood on the front step, complained about the old newspapers, and did the pee-pee dance.

But hey, there’s Avid Voss! That guy never changes out of his hospital scrubs ever. But I think by current gameply he has actually made it to World Renowned Surgeon.

Bachelor Party Attempt #3: Success!

Sean Flynn REALLY needs to pee. I wonder where the bathroom is?

Bachelorette Party: This one worked on the first try. However, the game crashed as everyone was lining up to get into the club. I really need to delete that bouncer. Fortunately, I had just saved the game and only lost about a minute of progress.

However, Veronica had just changed into her party clothes, and when I reloaded, the game forgot to do it again. Here’s a shot of what she would have looked like.

Alberto Royale is mad that he can’t get into the ladies’ restroom.

See?? I wasn’t kidding when Ada said he was going to do that.

I’ve heard of “joined at the hip,” but this is ridiculous.

Townie/Cross-Pollination Update:

Darlene Branch and Arvid Voss are finally engaged! Their kid Christopher is now a teen.

Malcolm Landgraab and Beatriz Williams are also engaged. Beatriz just gave birth to a baby boy they named Darwin. She’s moved in with Malcolm at the Landgraab estate, but they haven’t bothered to schedule a wedding.

My two celebrity lookalike sims, Michelle Yo and Bill Cos-b started dating the moment I put them in the town. They now have two kids and decided to get married. However, they can’t seem to find a house for them both and the two kids. (Which is weird because Michelle’s current house should do it. I should check that out.)

In the tradition of sweet young sims marrying REALLY OLD ones, Lisette Williams married Gus Hart. During Charles’s party, I got a charming notification that Lisette was pregnant, and the coming baby had stayed the hand of the Grim Reaper when he came for Gus. Apparently Grim then forgot about him, because as of current gameplay, Gus is still around, and he and Lisette are expecting their second kid.

The Cagleys are around, but they haven’t done anything terribly interesting yet. They’ve moved houses twice, though the first one was because there were no houses available for starting funds, and I dumped them on an empty lot to see what they’d do. Morand is getting pretty good at tinkering, and Faith has been promoted.

Genvieve Goth is nemeses with half the town, and I’m not kidding. I don’t know what her traits are (other than Coward), but you don’t want them.

Mortimer and Emma Hatch Goth aren’t having a terribly happy marriage, though they haven’t actually split up. I guess Mortimer really is a jerk through and through.

Elton Hatch (Emma’s eldest son with the late Christopher Steel) is seeing Starr Ursine-Sample.

Beatrix and Jess Ursine-Hodgins are expecting their second child together.

Charmaine Ursine-Sample has gone through about three girlfriends and is currently seeing Latrice Hodgins (Trixi’s daughter with Xander). She recently aged up to Young Adult and moved out on her own.

That was convenient because Zelda Mae Ursine has passed on, leaving her child Valerie Ursine orphaned. Toya adopted her into her and Adjo’s family, so she is now raising a half-sister who is younger than her first three kids. Since Charmaine moving out meant that their house (the old Victorian that Lance and Layla lived in when Zahra was born) is still large enough for the family.

Hank Goddard and Pauline Wan have collectively bedded half of Sunset Valley. I believe Hank is currently dating the daughter of a previous girlfriend. Bella Bachelor has recently given birth to his love child. Pauline is also seeing someone young enough to be her son. I’m going to be sorry when Hank and Pauline finally kick the bucket.

Bella Bachelor’s taste in men is really suspect. Her first serious boyfriend was Xander Clavell. Then she dated Hank just long enough to get pregnant. Now she’s with VJ Alvi.

I can’t remember if I posted this one before, but it’s classic. The maid clearly doesn’t understand the point of her job.

Toddler spam of Jeannette Crumplebottom!

She has Lance’s hair, and it looks like Agnes’s eyes. Aww….

Trixi glitched out and actually stood by the street, holding her screaming baby, for Ada’s entire birthday party. I was starting to get concerned that it might kill baby Harrison because the party really did run until dawn, but I’m still getting updates about the whole family. Whew.

This first attempt at a portrait of Charles ended up at the consignment shop.

This was the vacation of weird presumption. Here, Charles is using the shower in a house after exploring the catacombs underneath it. The family is asleep.

Charles meets Berthe at the cafe. At least half of him anyway.

Oh, and the vacation-return pileup never ceases to amuse me.