A post about not posting!

A bunch of my other friends are doing it, so I thought I’d jump in.

Hey there! I’m not posting either!

Urgh. Part of it is life. We just completed a remodel of our kitchen that involved living in less than half of our house for two months. I mean, it’s just the kitchen. Well, and the dining room because its floor had to be redone. Then take all the STUFF out of your kitchen and dining room and put it elsewhere in the house, then set up a table with a kitchenette outside your bedroom. How much space is left? Not a whole heck of a lot!! Claustrophobia shouldn’t have much effect on sitting in front of a computer and writing a blog post, but it turns out it does.

Oh yeah, and we have eaten every microwavable thing that can be sold in this town, and we are sick of them all.

That is officially done, and we’re moving back into our space.

Oh, and here’s something stupid — the next post in the Sample queue involves Hunter, and I have shots of him inside a building. I really want a shot of the outside of the building as a transition, but I forgot to take one. And while the events in Hunter’s story are late summer I think, it’s winter in the game, so any exterior shot I took for that post would be REALLY WEIRD.

The correct answer is to say !@#$ to the exterior shot and my absurd sense of artistic license and just write the $%^& post.

OTOH, playing the game has been really important escapism recently, so I’ve played really far ahead. And the Samples have been *so interesting*. But that kind of makes the posting pressure worse because I want to do justice to the story.

I’m about ready to switch back to playing the Wonderlands, I think. I hope if I just force out a post, the creative juices will start flowing again.

5.4 Open Doors

Apr16

Things only seemed to get more intense for Sky and Leah.

They liked to keep things adventurous, and they were always sneaking away to woohoo in strange and exciting locations.

When Leah wasn’t around, Sky was usually thinking about her.

Hunter was also in a pretty good mood, though he didn’t talk much about details.

Forecasts warned that this would be a record-breaking winter in Avalon. Hunter stored most of his seeds and moved a few important plants into a makeshift greenhouse to last out the cold.

But the thing that his family noticed most was that he was suddenly spending a lot of time sending email on the computer. Sky thought she heard him say something about Eliana Baerwyn. She still had another term left in high school, so email seemed like a good place to talk.

Meanwhile, time passed for the Samples. Veronica and Forest bonded over chess — it was a good thing to fall back on when they couldn’t find much to talk about.

Charles took care of Ghost.

And one day Veronica’s phone rang. When she answered, it was the Mayor of Avalon on the line. They wanted to give her the key to the city as a tribute to all her work with the supernatural.

It took a lot to floor Veronica Krane Sample, but this definitely was it.

On the day of the ceremony, the old Motive Mobile pulled up at the gates of Camelot.

Sky took the chance to entertain the crowd before the ceremony began. If nothing else, it was a good way to increase her visibility.

Shanni made it to the ceremony. “I’m getting too old for this sort of thing,” she admitted. “But then again, I’m getting too old for a lot of things these days.” It was hard to take her seriously when she said that while she was holding her toddler daughter Holly.

Jeannette was there, along with Shanni’s elder daughter with Jeanna, Renee.

Jeanna and Shanni had shared a long and loving marriage after all, which was more than Shanni thought she was offering when they got married. They took every day as a gift.

It was a gift that couldn’t keep giving forever, unfortunately. This was the last time Shanni spent time with her extended family. She died quietly in her sleep not long after. Since she and Jeanna were married, she’d been saying, “If I die in bed with a hot younger woman, I’ll consider myself lucky.” And that’s exactly how it worked out.

As the clock struck 4pm, Veronica stepped into the Great Hall and accepted the award from the major, who she’d never met before. He shook her hand warmly and thanked her for everything she’d done for supernatural understanding within Avalon and throughout the simworld.

Veronica, who had been thinking for a long time about how she would respond, grinned and said, “Yes. About that.”

She walked out of the hall onto the lawn, held up a flask filled with colored liquid. “This is my latest invention, and I think it might help with supernatural understanding.” Then she threw it at her feet. The crowd gasped as Veronica was enveloped in glowing smoke.

When the smoke cleared, Veronica was a ghost.

“I wanted to know what it’s like,” she declared in a voice that echoed like Charles’s. Then she floated over to her bemused husband.

He seemed awfully human and solid by comparison. But neither of them was really paying attention any longer.

“You always surprise me,” Charles said breathlessly when they returned home.

Veronica chuckled. “Well, I try.”

Then she was suddenly solid again. “Oh, that’s not fair!” Veronica exclaimed. “I was hoping it would at least last long enough for me to take you to bed. Now I’ll have to make another one!”

But in the meantime, they headed to bed anyway.

[I had a picture of the key, but I can’t seem to find it. I’ll put it in a post at some point.]

———-

This was a really cute end-of-career award opportunity that got totally borked in some later expansion. I ran it about five times, and the Mayor disappeared every time without giving Veronica the key. I assumed this had something to do with the Jynx rabbithole rug I was using for City Hall, but no — when I looked it up online, this opportunity has been borked for ages. So I built a story out of it and gave Veronica the key using buydebug. 🙂

And, once again, how the heck did Hunter get to be so hot??

This is where I finally had to kill Shanni manually. She was caught in some kind of in-between glitch where half the system thought she was dead and the other half did not. I felt bed doing it; she’s a favorite of mine. But she’d already lived an unnaturally long life, so it was way past time. I didn’t even know that Renee existed until this sequence. I was only aware of Holly, who was an adoptee I replaced with a genetic child by both of them — I couldn’t figure out why Jeanna was adopting, and when I went into MasterController to fix it, I discovered Shanni listed under dead sims. Renee certainly looks like she’s a genetic child of Shanni’s though.

5.3 Haunting

Apr9

Ghost really didn’t like gnomes. With the way she treated them, you’d think she had a bad experience in her past. No gnome was safe from her wrath.

Veronica was a spiritual ambassador these days. She gave a constant stream of lectures on the nature of the spirit world, primarily focused on dispelling misconceptions and encouraging sims to approach spirits positively.

She also did a bit of outreach work.

Sometimes reality wasn’t quite as rosy as she made it sound in her speeches. Few spirits locked on the mortal plane were all that happy to be there. Most of them wanted get to back to the Netherworld. Sometimes they were pretty cranky about it.

But she was a persistent and skilled negotiator.

Usually they came around and started working with her to get home.

Then again, some spirits you just couldn’t reason with.

For those, you just had to open up the can of whoopass.

Since the Sample-Royales were such night owls, Veronica was able to take some extra time between assignments to visit her sister-in-law and nephew.

Tomas looked almost too old and wise to be a toddler.

She also took some time on her rounds to test out some fresh inventions.

“Let’s see if this helps you stop obsessing about my husband.”

It might have worked, and it probably didn’t do Ariel any harm.

One place in particular seemed to show up on her spirit reports, but the kind of activity people reported there didn’t really seem like the kind of thing that trapped spirits would do. Eventually, the reports stacked up so much that Veronica couldn’t ignore them. So she made a special trip to an old abandoned crypt on the edge of town.

Well, she’d been TOLD it was abandoned.

For an abandoned graveyard, this place seemed to have a lot of visitors.

She poked around inside for a while and found no real evidence of supernatural activity. Then she ran into a large, menacing, entirely NON-supernatural guard, who escorted her swiftly and firmly back outside.

“I poked someplace I shouldn’t, didn’t I?” Veronica asked.

The man grunted and closed the door. “Poke someplace closer to home next time,” he replied.

Well, THAT had been interesting. Not terribly useful to her work, but interesting.

It wasn’t long after that the doorbell rang at the Sample residence, and Forest opened the door. Standing on the doorstep was a figure that made him tremble just a little bit.

There was something wrong with this creature’s eyes. The longer Forest looked at them, the colder he felt.

“Who are you?” Forest asked. “Are you looking for someone?”

“Sometimes I’m called Flynn,” the figure said. “I just wanted to introduce myself to my neighbors.” The way he said it held some sort of menacing undertone. Forest could have sworn he’d heard that name before…. Wait, no. It couldn’t be could it?

Maybe it was.

Sean Flynn. The legendary lord of the underworld. Some called him the Emperor of Evil.

What on earth had attracted Flynn’s attention here?

Flynn was dangerous, and he knew it. More than that, he made it clear to everyone else just by the way he held his body. And he looked strangely young for someone who had been a legend in organized crime for decades.

His very skin radiated some kind of unreal chill. If he could feel it from here, Forest couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to reach out and touch that hand…

“Ahem,” Flynn mused. “I just came here size up the place, but perhaps I found what I was looking for after all.”

He handed Forest a slip of paper. “If you’re interested, call this number. We can teach you want you want to learn.”

Learn what Flynn knew? Flynn was arguably the most powerful man in the simworld. Of course Forest was interested!

Their hands touched briefly as Forest took the paper. The cold left a tingle on Forest’s skin long after the contact was gone.

Flynn turned immediately to leave. Forest couldn’t wait until he was off the property to make that call.

The very next night, it was Forest outside that “abandoned” crypt.

Except that they offered him a job, and he took it.

——–

So the subtext here is that in the University patch, EA FINALLY fixed the bug in the Ghost Hunter profession that was introduced in Supernatural. Veronica hasn’t been able to do the two top level jobs — Ghostly Presence and Angry Ghost Invasion — since she achieved the level to do them. I’ve mostly been getting her promotions by raising her Logic skill, which is why she spends half of her screen time blown up. Once she was actually able to do jobs again, she topped out the career and reached her LTW very quickly.

Since Forest’s LTW is Emperor of Evil, it was a foregone conclusion that he’d be joining the Criminal career. However, this little sequence played into the plan very well. Veronica got an opportunity where the police asked her to release ghosts in the criminal rabbithole. As she was leaving, Flynn came out, but he dashed away with super vampire speed before I could snap a screenshot. Then when she went home, for whatever reason he followed her, and Forest answered the door to talk to him.

This is the beginning of a truly disturbing friendship.

5.2 Work Your Way Up

Apr8

The Charles Sample Martial Arts Academy barely needed Charles’s time anymore. Sometimes he felt like his biggest contribution these days was to hang his name on the door.

Charles was now a Grand Master, and he had blessed several Masters in the Sample Spirit branch of Sim Fu. They were doing most of the teaching now.

That was really how it should be. He didn’t want to be indispensable. He wanted to build something that would live on after he was gone. It looked like that was already happening. It made him feel good, though sometimes just a little bit lonely.

Of course, if he needed a bit of an ego boost, there were always students who desperately wanted to take lessons from him and him alone. Ariel Hodgins was that kind of student.

“Do you mind if I take a picture?” Ariel asked one day after their lesson. “I’ve always wanted a record of my hero doing, you know, every day stuff.”

“Uh, sure,” Charles said. “I was just going to send some email.”

“Thank you!” Ariel cried! “I’ll keep this on my phone forever!”

Her enthusiasm was good and cute until she started calling him up at home, hoping to get him to go out on a date.

Boundaries. Charles needed to set clearer ones, obviously.

Hunter was now pretty sure what he wanted to do when he grew up. Using his classes in sustainable food production from the Round Table Academy, he’d taken over the garden started by his great-grandmother Layla and made it thrive.

And it didn’t hurt that he knew exactly what to do with the food he produced. The Sample family was eating in style these days.

But it did take something of a sales pitch. “I was thinking I could turn this isn’t a business,” he told his parents. “Locally grown, sustainable food, and maybe some guidelines on how to prepare it. It’s just that, um, I can’t really afford the kind of land it would take to do this on my own yet. If I could continue to live with you guys while I get on my feet, I’m sure I could make it worth your while.”

“Just keep cooking!” Veronica declared between mouthfuls.

Charles watched Hunter with his gentle smile, but his eyes were alight with pride. “You didn’t fall far from the tree, did you?” he said quietly. “I think your mother agrees with me that you can stay as long as you like. It’s not like we’re so eager to kick you out.

Hunter beamed. “Thanks Dad, Mom! You won’t regret it, I swear.”

“We couldn’t possibly regret helping you follow your dreams,” Charles said.

So with some advice from his father on self-employment, Hunter headed down to Avalon’s Great Hall to fill out a lot of very tedious paperwork.

He was now a certified organic farmer! Well, he would be once the inspections and certification process were done.

After that, it was just a matter of finding customers! No big deal, right? Well, seeing as he hated talking to people he didn’t know, that would be the hardest part. But he was going to give it his best try.

Sky and Leah were seeing a lot of each other, and that meant really a lot.

“The thing is,” Sky said, “If we practice really hard, I think we could make a living with our music. You’re a great jazz pianist. I think we have a shot at this.”

Leah was more skeptical. “Most garage bands never make it out of the garage,” she said. “I don’t think I’m ready to give up a day job.”

Leah was in training to be a police officer, and her work hours were only going to get longer once she got out of the police academy. Sky figured that she had until Leah graduated to persuade her to quit.

So they spent most of their time practicing. And practicing. And practicing.

Enigma appreciated the music the most. Sometimes she came down to join in.

“She isn’t half bad,” Leah pointed out. “I’m not sure if that says good things about our music, though.”

Actually, they were starting to sound pretty good. Charles sometimes came down to the basement just to groove.

“You really shouldn’t ever dance where I can see you, Dad,” Sky pointed out.

Charles rolled his eyes. “You think you can make me self-conscious just because you’re my daughter? In my day, I creeped out more hipsters than you before breakfast. Just shut up and play.”

“I think we can do this!” Sky said as they were wrapping up one evening.

“I think you’re right!” Leah squealed. They threw themselves into each other’s arms.

“Do you think you’d consider it?” Sky said for the dozenth time. “Just consider making a living as a musician? With me?”

Leah took a deep breath. “I’m thinking about it. It’s just such a big leap of faith. I’m not sure I’m ready.” Then she looked deep into Sky’s eyes. “But I think I know one thing I AM ready for.”

Sky gulped. “Really? With me?” She was exhilarated and terrified all at the same time.

Leah giggled. “Who else do you think I’d want to do it with? I only have eyes for you.”

“You’re amazing,” Sky breathed. “And beautiful. And sexy. And a whole bunch of adjectives I can’t think of right now.” And she lost herself in Leah’s kisses.

Then, abruptly, she pulled back, looking embarrassed. “Um,” she said. “There’s this problem of where. My bedroom is so tiny.”

Leah pulled her close. “Then let’s get creative.”

And they did.

“Oh, hey,” Charles said when he came downstairs the next morning. “I thought you’d gone home.”

“Ah,” Leah said, casting about for where Sky had gone. “No, I, um, didn’t”

Charles raised his eyebrows. “Ah, I see. Well, I hope you and Sky had a very nice time.”

Well THAT was awkward.

———-

Sky and Leah really are very cute together :).

Simantics: Sims vs. Solid Objects

Apr5

Messy bathrooms, the best place for deep conversations since Sims 1.

Here we meet January Callender-Doctor, creature of the night, and her new baby.

Here’s her husband, Matt Callender-Doctor, also a creature of the night. I’m pretty sure they have the same sire, though it’s possible that January turned Matt.

I think he’s a pretty good likeness, even after elfification.

Here’s Freddy Cagley, son of Morand and Bella Bachelor Cagley. I think he’ll be a looker to watch for.

Here’s our elfified Asriel Bookabet, even more a golden child here in Avalon. I aged him up immediately after this.

Charles is appreciating his ninja music box (a gift from Veronica I forgot to post about), turned backwards, standing the middle of a counter. Ah, ghost sims.

Now, Ceridwen Bookabet does not have the excuse of being a ghost.

Maybe this is the real reason that U signed off.

Apparently, Forest even bored himself to sleep at graduation. Everyone was apparently pleased that he shut up.

Town Update:

Nemo Hodgins and Gala Marmalade got a divorce. Then he dated a simbin sim named Melia Lorien and split up with her. Now he has forgotten Gala and is spending all his time stalking Melia.

Nemo’s a Hopeless Romantic, isn’t he? I don’t know if he came to the game with that trait or got it on age-up, but as far as I can tell, StoryProgression interprets “Hopeless Romantic” as “Hopeless Psychotic.” This is why my poor simself Echo has such a drama-filled life in every save I place her.

Sorry, DragonWife, Nemo doesn’t seem to be doing any better in my game :).

Garry Crumplebottom (Shanni’s younger child with Agnes) started dating Arya when they were both in high school. He graduated first, and as soon as Arya graduated, he proposed. They seem to be pretty happy.

Anita Bookabet is dating Mulberry Marmalady

Zhan Wu proposed to Lynn Sw0rd, and she said yes! Then he died.

Wu, you didn’t give me any babies! Good think your newphew/clone Zane is handling that job with style. In fact, Zane and the Cambodian sim I married him to are making the prettiest kids in the game, I think.

DragonWife Bard moved to town, got a job at the film studio (an up-and-coming actress, I see!) She also adopted a cat named Tigger.

Zuzu and David Weaver-Doctor had a son named Maxwell. My emotionally balanced simself is doing pretty well.

Echo Weaver took a ride on the love train that is Anton Pierce, but fell off quickly. (Anton Pierce = Angel from Buffy, and he has Commitment Issues. Why a Hopeless Romantic hooked up with Commitment Issues, only Twallan knows.)

Spock Leonard dumped Joanne Bookabet, and now she’s stalking him.

Meanwhile, Spock moved on and is now seriously involved with February Callender.

Brenna Ursine-Sample keeps sending Hunter love letters and naughty looks, which is just creepy.

After U’s death, Valerie jumped on the Anton train. Maybe it helped her get over U.

5.1 The First (and Last) Day of the Rest of Your Life

Apr4

The day dawned cold and rainy, but that couldn’t keep anyone’s spirits down.

It was Graduation Day!

The crowd at the Great Hall for the ceremony was boggling.

All the people was just exhausting for Hunter. He had to back away and close his eyes for a bit.

Great Aunt Toya Ursine-Sample was there with her half-sister and foster-daughter Valerie Ursine Mentary. Valerie was sporting a great big ring and an an even bigger smile.

Her new husband was the renowned Mad Scientist Doctor U. Mentary.

Sure, he was a bit old for her, but her father Harvey Ursine had been a bit old for her mother Zelda Mae too. What did age matter when love was on the line?

Leah joined them at the ceremony, along with their mutual friend Adam Bookabet. Sky thought Leah looked amazing in graduation gowns.

Then again, Leah looked amazing in anything… or nothing a all.

The ceremony ran on forever, and Forest’s speech as Valedictorian made it even worse. Forest just couldn’t stop talking himself up. But at last, after dark, they escaped with their diplomas.

Then all hell broke loose.

And that wasn’t the worst of it.

The shock of seeing U. go was apparently too much for Toya. There were rumors about her and U, though Valerie always denied them.

Toya hadn’t built a corrupt political empire nearly as large as she’d planned when she was young. She kept getting distracted by being a mother. You could argue that she was better at the motherhood part.

Poor Valerie. She lost the two people closest to her in the same day.

Days after, she would learn she was pregnant. Fortunately, she still had Adjo and Toya’s children, who she had been raised with as siblings, to take care of her while she got back on her feet. Taking care of people was something that the Ursine-Samples did very well.

———-

Well, that was a bit of a downer of a graduation. And sorry for all the noxious green clouds. Mandatory graduation actions hit without warning at a very inopportune time.

So here’s the end of U’s story. He lived much longer, but had almost as problematic a life in my game as his own story. After dithering between Toya and Valerie for quite a while, he settled down with Valerie, but they didn’t get long together.

This stuff actually happened a couple of days after the events of the next couple of posts because graduation lags so far behind age-up. So I placed in the story where it would make more sense.

I have played quite a bit ahead now, and I think I’m going to head over and play the Wonderlands for a while. I have a lot of material for posts before I catch up :).

The Triplets up for download

Apr1

I have a CC-free (I hope) version of each of the Gen 5 Samples up for download on the Exchange: Forest, Hunter, and Sky.

I managed to find a Supernatural skintone that I thought suited Sky. I think that’s pretty cool. Though it’s on a multi-color slider, so I can’t represent how much darker Sky’s skin is than Charles’s, and her children will be unpredictable :).

I intend to update the Download page with a few more options: .sim files and Sims3Packs with CC. At some point anyway.

I find it amusing that Forest got a lot of downloads quickly. Hunter has a few, and nobody wants Sky. I wonder what it is about Forest that draws Exchange users.

5.0 Passing the Torch to Sky

Mar27

Charles sat down at the academy to work on some financial records and was met with a nasty surprise.

“Yes!” Forest said to himself as his smartphone pinged that his trap was sprung. “I set that trojan last year. How often does Dad run his finances anyway?”

“You have got to be kidding me,” was Charles’s only response. “An ape?”

Veronica was busy with a new invention that helped the stove learn how to make better meals and teach the chefs.

“But wait!” she suddenly exclaimed to thin air. “We’re forgetting something important.” She dove for her phone and scheduled a party.

It was to be held in the clubhouse of the Little Cottage Park. All the extended family was invited. Darrin Wu-Ursine arrived with the happy regards of his pregnant wife Azaela, Zahn Wu’s niece.

Shanni was still kicking. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world!” she declared. “Nothing tells you’re old like watching your great niece and nephews grow up.”

She was approaching 100, had raised two families, and didn’t look a day over 80.

Oh, and of course there were a couple of party crashers who just showed up to get free cake.

This time, Sky took the first turn.

Though nobody said it explicitly, everyone knew that she would be the one to care for her parents in their advancing age and carry on the family line. Why? Close families just know these things sometimes.

Then it was Hunter’s turn.

He and Sky met eyes across the room and shared a private smile that was all their own.

And at last Forest, who had dashed over to the party after work in his bookstore clerk uniform, or as he liked to call it, his “monkey suit.”

During the mad scramble for cake and ice cream, the three siblings of honor carved out a place for themselves together.

“This is it,” Sky said. “Now we’re going to go out to live in the big scary adult world together. Do you think we can handle it?” It was kind of a trick question. Sky knew exactly what she wanted to do with her life, and the fact that she could finally start doing it made her giddy with excitement.

“I’m ready for the challenge,” Hunter said. “Life is all about finding beauty, and I think I’ve learned a lot about how to look this year.” Indeed, this kid who had barely managed to get out of middle school without being held back a grade had finished Round Table Culinary Institute near the top of his class. Hunter was just as quiet as always, but it was a more confident quiet than it once was.

Forest just smiled that unsettling smile of his and took another bite of cake.

———-

And here it is! Generation 5!!! Can you believe it? I’m not sure I can.

I have to actually update the Story So Far page, which needs pretty much Charles’s entire life story.

I included the bits in the beginning because Charles did autonomously trigger some prank that had been set on the academy computer while I wasn’t watching. Then Forest got a “Successful prank!” moodlet while he was at school. I guess he must’ve set it while he was at the academy peeing himself while talking to Ali, though I hadn’t realized he’d gone that long on autonomy. I found the whole little episode very entertaining.

Sky and Hunter’s age-up looks were actually pretty good, just not suitable to their personalities. Forest’s, on the other hand, was the kind of sim awesomeness that makes me wonder if my ISBI should follow DragonWife’s a make all the idiots dress themselves. Get a load of that kilt.

I cannot believe Hunter aged up so hot. *fans self*

Oh, and it turned out that Shanni was bugged, and it took me a long time to discover it. SP thought she was dead, but somehow her death sequence didn’t complete, and she was stuck wandering around town essentially immortal. I’ve caught that happening to two more sims since (Martin Luther Butterfield-Callender and Willem Yo, if you’re curious.) In fact, I’m not completely sure if ANY sim who dies off-screen is actually dying. The only way I found to fix it was to click a sim who is actually on the screen and use the sim’s NRaas menu to force kill her, which I did I think the next time she came up. But the good news is that she had a *very* long life, and she saw her eldest daughter with Jeanna age into a teen.

4.55 Enchanted Evening

Mar18

Ada and Alberto Sample-Royale welcomed their son Tomas into the world with an after-the-fact baby shower.

“Don’t bring gifts, but wear your swimsuits!” Ada exclaimed on the phone. “It will be fun!”

“I didn’t think you had a pool,” Charles said.

“We don’t have a pool. Why would you think we had a pool?”

“Never mind.”

The party was in the evening, which seemed like an odd schedule for a baby.

“Isn’t it past Tomas’s bedtime?” Veronica asked in passing.

“Oh, he sleeps all day and is awake during the night.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Veronica said, remembering the difficult days when the triplets had been babies.

Ada looked puzzled. “Why are you sorry? Do you need to sleep too?”

Veronica smiled. Insanity aside, Ada and Alberto were both self-employed, so maybe the kid’s sleep schedule really didn’t bother them.

Tomas wiggled and gurgled and did adorable baby things on his play mat while everyone cooed at him.

The only one who wasn’t cooing was Jeremiah, who wasn’t pleased about loosing his place as Ada and Alberto’s baby.

It had been such a long time since Charles had held a baby. He dandled his nephew and reminisced about how delightful little ones were without a shred of irony. Parents are so forgetful about the baby stage.

Maybe all the sleep deprivation helps keep the long-term memories from forming. Probably better for everyone.

Once Tomas had gone to bed, Charles and Veronica found a good use for their swimwear.

Prom had rolled around, and Hunter still wasn’t sure what he was going to do. He had no date and no prospects of one, and the idea of standing around feeling self-conscious in a loud, dark room filled with other teenagers gave him shivers. But everyone talked about prom. Perhaps it would be better to go, even if he had a bad time, just so he wouldn’t regret it later.

But wow, it was a lot of people all in one place.

Then, while visiting the dog park with Enigma the morning before the dance, he found an unexpected answer.

Eliana Baerwyn, who was the class a year behind Hunter in school. She met his eyes from across the park, then dropped her gaze with a flush. It was like an electric shock ran through Hunter. He stumbled over a rock, a clump of grass, and a dog bowl trying to get closer to her.

“Hi,” he said. “You’re, um, here early.”

“I had to bring PJ back in time for me to get ready for prom.”

Hunter cringed inside. “So you’re going too?”

She nodded. “Weston Mentary asked me.” She sighed. Then she perked up. “Are you going? Maybe I’ll see you there!”

Hunter gulped. “Sure I’m going! I don’t have a date, but all kinds of people go stag.”

She beamed “I’m so glad.”

An hour passed while they talked about their dogs. Eliana glanced at her watch and gasped. “I have to go get ready!”

“Oh!” Hunter exclaimed. “Goodbye!”

“I’ll see you in a few hours!” Eliana cried as she dashed away.

Well that settled that. Now he had to come up with something to wear.

When he returned to the house, Sky and Forest’s dates were already there. Apparently everyone was going to change in the basement.

Leah was gushing with anticipation, but Ali was mostly quiet and distant. There was some kind of tension between her and Sky that he didn’t understand.

Then everyone scurried away to do their hair and makeup.

Veronica and Charles were thrilled to help Hunter dig up something that wouldn’t embarrass him at prom. It turned out that an old coat of Charles’s worked pretty well, and though Hunter carried more weigh than his father, you wouldn’t notice if he left it unfastened.

“You look dashing,” Veronica said. “My baby is growing up to be such a ladykiller!”

“Mom!”

Charles gave his son an elbow nudge. “She’s just teasing you. Have a good time.”

All right then. Showtime.

Well, Forest and Sky had a perfect evening.

For Hunter, it was pretty much the way he expected. It was dark, the music was loud, and he couldn’t work up the nerve to ask anyone to dance. Lots of them were there stag, but they weren’t the kind of people who usually talked to him.

Well, at least he’d never wonder if he’d missed the pinnacle of teenagerhood because he didn’t go.

As the dance let out, he was the first one out the door, and he hung around the schoolyard waiting for his lovestruck brother and sister to finish lingering over the last dance.

“Hey,” came a quiet voice.

“Eliana! I thought you’d be in there dancing with Weston.”

Eliana blushed. “Well, you know, it’s really loud in there. It really wasn’t my thing.”

Hunter was so wrapped up in talking to Eliana that he didn’t even notice when Forest and Sky emerged with their dates, waved to him, gave up, and headed home without him.

In fact, he didn’t notice till the curfew police showed up to round up the stragglers and drag them home.

Veronica was a tornado. “We helped you go to prom, and you get dropped off by the cops! This is the kind of thanks we get!”

“I’m so sorry,” Hunter begged. “I just got to talking to this girl, and I lost track of time…”

Veronica’s face lit up. “You were talking to a girl? Well, that’s different!”

“You’re a nut, Mom, but I love you.”

“The feeling’s mutual.”

Forest, Hunter, and Sky all dragged themselves to bed at dawn, then slept late the next morning with excited romantic dreams dancing through their heads.

———

And this, believe it or not, is the LAST POST for Generation 4.

I was starting to wonder if I was going to get to play prom. It ran on the last day before the triplets aged up, and some glitch canceled it, so I had to restore from a previous save and do a Reset Homeworld. Turns out that’s a very useful option buried in the NRaas menus on City Hall. I think it was under MasterController.

As it was, the crowd in front of the school was such that I could barely get all three through the door before prom was over. Speaking of the bad routing behavior in this game. I really hope they work on that in Sims 4. I pretty much had to choose who would get actual time at the dance, and Hunter lost out. He was only there for about 10 sim-minutes, but he got his picture.

I’d kind of hoped that the prom would pair Hunter up with someone, but as it turned out he had this lightning flash from the attraction system on the day of the dance anyway. Eliana is a 10 out of 10, and he finds her “Devastatingly attractive.”

The next post will be birthdays. Woo.

Simantics: Zombie Simantics

Mar17

We’ll begin with a bit of an introduction to cross pollinated sims around town.

Here’s Lynn Sword and Hector. Lynn has had a long day.

Arma Mentary being trained in Sim Fu by our Slayer, Beatrice Saunders.

Doc U. Mentary, who got old. Considering how things turned out for him in his own story, this is news.

Lara and Alan Berg are a very happy family in this game with two children. The eldest is Alexandra, and I don’t remember who the baby boy is.

February Callender out to dinner with her vampiric mother January.

Sebastian Hodgins and his little boy Cliffton.

And sims being sims —

Zahra can’t set personal limits, even in death.

During Avalon’s first full moon, only one zombie appeared. Guess who? And what plans does she have for poor Charles?

She shambled toward Charles but got distracted by the Sim Fu dummy. Charles shrugged and gave her a private training session.

Town Update:

Emma got pantsed at the assembly.

Echo Weaver proposed to boyfriend Ace Wilde. He accepted, then apparently found out that she was still stalking her ex-boyfriend Zhan Wu and dumped her.

Wu, otoh, while complaining constantly of Echo stalking him, has finally moved on and is going steady with Lynn Sword.

Doc U. Mentary had a few dates with Valerie Ursine and then set his sights on her much more mature, widowed half-sister Toya Ursine-Sample.

Maya and Charmaine Ursine-Langerak had a boy named Lionel. Their relationship is still rocky, but they’re still together.

Alan and Lara Berg gave birth to their second child, a boy named Eloy. Lara immediately got knocked up again.

Nemo Hodgins grew up to YA and almost immediately started going steady with Gala Kandy Marmalade. After a short, intense courtship, they were married.

Zuzu and David Weaver-Doctor are in a close match with Ada and Alberto Sample-Royale and Franco and Ceridwen Bookabet for the most sickeningly cute couple in Avalon. At least one of my simselves is happy.

Joanne Bookabet (I decided to make her Ceridwen’s sister because a lot of unrelated simselves running around with the last name Simself is terribly confusing) is going steady with Spock Leonard. Three guesses who that is, and the first two don’t count.

February Callender has taken up with Anton Pierce (Angel from Buffy). Considering that her mother January and new stepdad Matt Doctor are both newly-minted vampires and she spent about two hours as a vampire one night herself, her interest in a hot vampire lover is pretty understandable.

Did I mention that Anton is a Private Investigator? And Beatrice (Buffy) is the Slayer? Talk about fiction resembling… um, fiction.

Plum Marmalade bats for the girl’s team in this game, and is going with Wu’s teenage granddaughter Xia.