Hiatus

It's probably silly to post a vacation warning five months after my last post, but I can be silly if I want to. :)

A couple of months ago my 8.5-year-old laptop stopped reading CDs. Which means I can't load the Sims. :( I was hoping to swing a new computer for Christmas but now it's looking more like it'll be a tax refund present. So I'll see all 2-3 of my readers in a few more months, hopefully.

Round 7 Part 14: Long Beach (2053-2057)

Douglas is 32, Sarah is 24

Turn, turn, turn

narrated by Douglas Long

Sarah and I decided not to go on a honeymoon after we got married--neither of us had a job lined up so we didn't want to spend our money too fast, and anyway we lived right on the beach. It was just like a vacation but without the part where you forget your toothbrush.

I think we both enjoyed being lazy for a while after all the hard work of college.

But we weren't completely idle--for one thing, I took up swimming laps in the cove so that I could work off all of Sarah's amazing cooking!

It's a good thing I was in shape, too, since right when our money was about to run out I got picked up by a talent scout and cast in one of the leading roles in this movie about a starving artist, an heiress, and a playboy caught up in a love triangle. (I'm the starving artist. It's a role I can sympathize with for sure!) There was more travel involved in the job than I would like, but beggars can't be choosers.

The timing was especially lucky since right after I signed the contract, Sarah found out she was pregnant! I was on location for most of the pregnancy, unfortunately, so Sarah's mom came over a lot to keep her company and help out on days when she wasn't feeling well.

About two weeks before the baby was due I heard that the studio was looking to retain a lawyer--apparently movie making involves jumping through a lot of legal hoops--and of course I pointed Sarah in that direction. She had a Skype interview since she was far too pregnant to travel and actually managed to get the job! They were even willing to push back her start date by 8 weeks so she could have some time to focus on the baby first.

Sarah ended up having about 7 weeks of maternity leave since the baby came a little early--in fact, she went into labor the morning after I arrived back from filming!

The baby was a girl and we named her Susan. She has her mother's gray eyes and if you ask me she's just as beautiful.

The first thing Sarah did once she was back on her feet was have a little photo shoot with her mom and grandma--baby Susan makes four generations of lovely ladies and since Sarah's grandma has been in declining health of late Sarah didn't want to procrastinate.


Notes:

1. Douglas' work-related travel is of course entirely made up. But having Rock Gods and famous actors and so forth living full-time in a town that's characterized as being very small and rural makes no sense. So Douglas gets some imaginary travel.

2. Since Sims have disproportionately long pregnancies, Sarah actually got pregnant on her wedding night, as I mentioned in the mini update. Which means that she was pregnant for over two years of real life time! Poor thing.

3. Pretend that Sarah is wearing something more professional in the picture of her imaginary Skype interview. Or don't. I mean, if people only see you from the collarbone up do you really need pants?

Round 7 Part 13: Enterprise Park (2053-2057)

Ryker is 46, Jackie is 30.

Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

narrated by Jackie Owens

The first few years of Ryker and me living together were seriously like one long vacation. We had our jobs, of course, but those only take up so many hours of the day and then we had the evenings to do whatever we wanted.

Sometimes we had people over...

Sometimes we went out...

And sometimes we stayed in by ourselves...

But perhaps we had one too many nights in, because a year ago I found out that I was pregnant, quite unintentionally.

After we'd had a few days to digest the news, Ryker asked to talk things over. He explained that as far as he was concerned, getting married was just exchanging a couple pieces of jewelry...

But he still felt like it would be better for the three of us to be one social and economic unit, and marriage does confer certain benefits in that regard.

I told him that neither marriage nor having a baby had been part of my original plan, but that I didn't really care what road we took as long as we took it together.

So we got married in a small ceremony attended by immediate family and very close friends.

And five months later Deanna was born! She looks much more like her father than me so far. The blue eyes weren't a surprise since mine are gray but the blond hair was definitely unexpected! Though I was talking it over with Mom the other day and she said she's pretty sure my dad had blond hair when he was younger, so I guess that's how Deanna got it. If she's really lucky, there were some recessive genes lurking for a nose that's not quite so...aquiline...as mine or Ryker's.

Round 7 Part 12: The Castle (2053-2057)

Corbin is 54, Audrey is 47, Charles is 11, William is 8.

"Shake it off"

narrated by Corbin Todd

I know Audrey and I aren't the most popular people in this town and maybe we deserve it (I'm immature and Audrey's a snob; I'm just gonna own that) but if Fate has a problem with us she's hasn't shown her hand yet. The only bad luck we've had lately was a minor break-in years ago, and nothing actually got stolen then. Audrey was unhappy about it, though. I'm not sure if she was more upset about a threat to her precious stuff or unnerved that the cops showed up. She's nervous around cops for some reason.

Audrey adopted a puppy after that in the hopes that he'd scare off potential burglars before the cops had to be called. I was a bit skeptical about whether this tiny fat puppy could scare a fly, let alone a burglar.

But within a year Leroy was a big brown and black dog, so I guess I would be intimidated if I met him on the porch on a dark night and didn't know he's a total pushover.

The boys kind of just do their own thing most of the time--Audrey and I aren't the sort of parents to sit there making up crafts for you during your summer vacation. They probably watch way too much TV, but they seem to be turning into decent people anyway. One time when they were in maybe 3rd and 6th grade they brought home this little kindergarten girl just because they thought she might be lonely and need friends. When I was their age I definitely wasn't sparing a thought for unpopular kids or the "babies" in the lower grades.

Charles turned 12 not long after that. I keep expecting him to get into girls but more and more lately he's got his nose buried in books! He's not shy or awkward at all, so I don't see why he doesn't get out more, but he says he wants to get good grades so he can go to college and become a teacher...so, basically, he wants to do well in school so he can do more school so he can spend the rest of his life in school. I don't know where he gets that studiousness from; certainly not from me.

When he's not doing his own homework, Charles is practicing his teaching skills on William--I swear William's never once come to me with a homework question! (Which is good because Charles probably knows the answer better than I do anyway.)

They do have fun sometimes, though. A lot of times on the weekends they'll spend hours fishing together and talking about their favorite sci-fi show.

Oh, and on top of all that, Charles has a part-time job helping out at the ER over at Sim City General. Like I said, no idea where he gets his altruism and work ethic...if he didn't look just like me I'd be seriously questioning his paternity.

As for Audrey, she's still working for Malcolm Landgraab, raking in the big bucks and having a great time spending them. Last year she bought herself a helicopter and took flying lessons as a 50th birthday present to herself. I teased her that she was having a midlife crisis and already had the fancy convertible so had to go one bigger. She pretended not to be able to hear me over the whir of her helicopter's blades.

I think William takes after his mom; he only just turned 12 and he's already talking about how when he's grown up he wants to run the whole town.

Lately when I'm home alone, instead of calling up my lady friends I find myself painting. I can really get in the zone and it feels like no time at all passes before the boys are home from school.

I've been doing a bit of pottery too.

My coaching job is going great; I even have my own star in the hall of fame. Lately, though, I've started to think that I spend an awful lot of time traveling and maybe it's time to cut back and really enjoy the last few years we have with them at home--maybe their school needs a basketball coach.








Notes:

1. Corbin is definitely coming across a little more mature and responsible in this update, mostly thanks to his new secondary aspiration being Family. But really I think that's kind of realistic--he seems like the kind of guy to party hard through his 20s and 30s and then one day up and decide that he's had enough of parties and wants to settle down a little. But of course that gets complicated when you father a few kids during those wild 20s and 30s. We'll see whether Corbin ever ends up rebuilding the bridges that got burnt when he broke up with Edith. 

2. Leroy the dog was actually Charles' 12th birthday present so he'd spin up a LTW, but it fit better in the story to have them buy a dog because of the break-in. He came with the name Leroy and I thought it fit well since it means "the king" and their last name is King.

3. Charles is a Knowledge Sim with the LTW to Become Education Minister, but currently working as an EMT because that was the job that happened to come up.

4. William is a Popularity Sim with the LTW to Become Mayor. He doesn't have a job yet.

5. Corbin maximized enthusiasm in his One True Hobby, Arts and Crafts. He also got his second TOC/LTW, Become Hall of Famer. Now he wants to Become Education Minister, amusingly enough. Sometimes the father takes after the son, I guess.

Round 7 Part 11: The Academy (2053-2057)

Rishell and Veronica are 42.

"The Lucky One"

narrated by Rishell Whitfill

Every now and then something happens that makes me feel old. Like when my twin sister actually slows down enough to have a hobby. She was doing pottery for a while and then branched out--no pun intended!--to flower arranging.

She also gardens now. Though she gardens while wearing silk pajamas, so maybe I shouldn't despair of her ever acting too old.

Oh, and she still has that boyfriend. The boyfriend who is very obviously living with another woman and their small children. I had hoped they would drift apart when she changed jobs so that they no longer work together, but no such luck.

At least they confine their "boxing practice" to the spare room so I'm not forever changing the sheets on our bed.

When Ronnie wants to be mean she says I'm trying to act like Mom, but really she's just as bad as I am with the interfering. We had our friend Ryker over with his girlfriend the other day and Jackie took a second to freshen up in the bathroom so Veronica asked when they were going to hurry up and have kids. (Ryker just laughed.)

Then as soon as Jackie came back, she switched the topic to asking if they planned to go anywhere on vacation this year. Sneaky thing.

The funniest part is that Ronnie says I'm acting like Mom when she's trying to be nice, too. Like when she complemented me for implementing a schedule of having our brothers and their families over for dinner. I figure that it's about time to get to know all our nieces and nephews now that most of them are getting to the age where they're thinking about college. I bet we could help them earn scholarships and things.

We had Donte and his girls over just the other night. Little Shelley is so bright--she's doing a report on the Far East for her geography class at school and was asking if Veronica and I would be willing to be interviewed for it.

Emmy's great too. I know Donte worries about her--she's getting a bit boy crazy--but even she talks about how nice it is to have everybody together. She thinks we should have a big family reunion sometime, and I'm inclined to agree.








Notes:

- I realized after I started writing this that Rishell narrated last time as well. Remind me to let Veronica say her piece next round...in, you know, two years or so real time.

- Veronica topped another career, becoming World-Class Ballet Dancer.

- Rishell, meanwhile, became Chief of Staff, which was a LTW as well. Now she wants to be an architect, but I'm getting bored of Sims constantly career-hopping.

Round 7 Part 10: Dejackome-Seifert (2053-2057)

Timothy is 46, Jeannie is 38, Caitlin is 10, Patrick is 7, Stacy is 3.

(Also pictured: BJ Bigfoot)

"Iris"

narrated by Timothy Seifert

You'd think I'd be used to my life not being exactly normal at this point, given that I have a Sasquatch living in my house. But honestly, most of the time I think about what every guy my age thinks about--like the fact that my daughter somehow became a beautiful young woman overnight and I should really buy a shotgun so I can sit on the porch and clean it when boys come over. Not that Cait brings boys over for anything but study dates. She's like me and her mom, nose always buried in a book. But if any of her study buddies start getting fancy ideas, I'll be ready.

All of the kids are getting older right under my nose, come to think of it. Stacy has started school now.

We managed to get her into private school with the other kids--I was worried we'd have trouble on account of BJ but the headmaster babbled on for a while about being in tune with nature and then informed us our application had been accepted, so I guess that's a success. At least she'll have Pat with her at the elementary school for a few years so she'll be looked after.

It used to be that Pat and Stacy shared a room, so poor Cait wouldn't get woken up in the night every time one of them had a wet diaper or a bad dream, but now that everybody's older and Pat's getting to the age where he wants a little more privacy, we rearranged things so Cait and Stacy are sharing.

(They have two dressers and another desk on the opposite side of the room.)

Pat's room is huge--Jeannie says it's bigger than the whole house she and her 3 siblings grew up in, though I think she might be exaggerating a bit--but it's not his fault he's the only boy.

So, yeah, life is pretty boring. The most exciting thing that happens is usually eating breakfast with my lovely wife and listening to her talk about how she's investigating some celebrity stalker.

And the kids have friends over near every day, which keeps things loud and crazy.

Anyway, I meant to talk about the telescope thing. Jeannie got it for me for my 50th birthday, a huge fancy thing. And sure, I guess I might have been spending a little too much time out there, late at night, when the kids were in bed and I should have been too since I go to work pretty early in the morning.

Jeannie says that I probably got so tired I started hallucinating, but all I'm going to say is it sure didn't seem like a hallucination when I got sucked into a giant flying saucer and then spat back out on my front lawn a few hours later, with no memory of what happened in between. I guess we'll see if I come down with any funky alien diseases or anything.

Notes:

1. Caitlin is Knowledge aspiration, LTW City Planner, turned on by blond hair and mechanical skill but turned off by black hair.

2. So! Turns out that if your Sim's Science enthusiasm gets high enough, they can "summon aliens." Which results in...summoning aliens. I don't know if this is going to lead to little green babies in this already weird household, but I guess we'll find out next round.