Hey, Guess What Came Early This Month!
Sep. 9th, 2023 11:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickNot THAT early, mind, I WAS expecting it to show up this upcoming week, but -- yup, midway through the day today, while I was taking a bathroom break during my cleaning, my period showed up! Meaning I have had a bit of a bad brain day when it comes to concentrating on stuff. Fortunately, I have been able to take it easy most of the day, and focus my brainpower where it counted the most --
Cleaning: Got a later start than I would have liked (got distracted while making my shake by how manky the blueberries in the fridge were), and got distracted a few times while it was happening, meaning it all took longer, but I got it done – started the dusting around 11 AM, finished up just after 1 PM in time for lunch, then did the Swiffering and vacuuming after lunch and got that done by just after 2 PM. Laundry (sheets, nightgown, bathrobe, blankets) all started going in just before noon, and I got the last load warm out of the dryer at 4:30 PM (which was nice, as I was a bit cold from sitting near my AC in just a sports bra and shorts XD). All done for another couple of weeks, yay~
Tumblr: Well, my RP tumblr got the bulk of my brainpower, but I got a bit done on both –
Victor Luvs Alice – Didn’t do a HECK of a lot over here, but I did get some pictures sorted for a “Sims 4 Valicer Outfit Fun” post showcasing some of the CC clothes I downloaded a little while back on my vacation, and started drafting the post itself just now. I’ll finish that on up tomorrow so it’ll be ready for Wednesday! :) Nice little break from trying to get Chill Valicer Save update pictures sorted. XD
Valice Multiverse – Took the opportunity of a Saturday night hiatus from chatting and RPing to FINALLY get the “Valicer In The Dark” verse officially added to my RP verses over there! So now those versions of Victor, Alice, and Smiler are open for asks and whatnot. :) Put the full write-up of the verse in my queue for anyone who doesn’t want to visit the Google Doc and find it there, along with two ask replies (one making a silly joke, the other informing me that BIG BIRD COULD HAVE DIED IN THE CHALLENGER DISASTER. Yeah, uh, tonal whiplash there – and yes, that is true. Apparently NASA invited Carroll Spinney up there, but the plan was never actually approved. Carroll maintained the sheer size of the Big Bird costume is what stopped them going through with it (eight feet two inches), and, well, it’s a good thing they didn’t, huh?). So that’s good!
Sims 4: Had a pretty short session on here today, between period-distracted brain and the “it’s ALMOST a thunderstorm” weather (seriously, it kept rumbling with thunder but not really DOING anything, beyond a few heavy bursts of rain) – BUT! I will say proudly that I accomplished exactly what I set out to do in the hour I had with the game –
A) First things first (well, after removing all my mods and stuff and patching the game) – I visited JamesTurnerYT on the Gallery to download one of his factory builds into my own Library! I was GOING to download the abandoned warehouse build that he did for Breanne in his HSY LP, but I couldn’t find the original version of that (just the upgraded “Breanne’s been living there for a while” version), so instead I ganked his old “Abandoned Factory” sort-of-shell challenge to use later. (Admittedly, I don’t have all the packs he does, so a few things are going to be missing when I plop it down, but I think it still should be fine.)
B) Then it was off to Windenburg in my building save to demolish the old Rustic Residence starter home and replace it with a Community Space lot – a community conservatory! AKA a fancy greenhouse. XD If you don’t know what a Community Space is, it’s a special lot that is actually four lots in one – a “community space” (a generic lot with no required items other than a voting board), a “community greenhouse” (just what it sounds like, a place for Sims to grow and tend to plants, meaning you need planters), a “maker space” (a place for Sims to make things – it requires you to have a fabricator and recycler, but you can also put down woodworking benches, easels, and even activity tables for the kids), and a “marketplace” (again, what it sounds like – you put out a bunch of sales tables for Sims to use to sell their stuff). You can build either variations on the same lot for all four types, or do something completely different for each type, so long as you have the required items for each one. The space starts out as the generic “community space” lot, and then Sims in the neighborhood vote for what they want the space to become. Once the votes are counted at the end of the voting period, the lot instantly transforms into one of the other three lot types, until there is another vote of Sims changing the lot type. It’s a neat feature of Eco Lifestyle, and I wanted to try my hand at building one. Mostly because, if I ever do get around to doing that VITD Challenge Save I keep mentioning, this is one of the lots I’d want to have in it, so the gang could vote for it to become a Community Greenhouse (as that’s what they do in my VITD AU – find a building much like this one and fix it up to grow food once Victor’s gotten his radiant moths sorted).
C) So yes, with the original house demolished, and the new lot type set, I started on my conservatory! And actually, getting it to come together was pretty easy, as I already knew what I wanted it to look like – an octagonal “dome” in the center, with two long rooms coming off either side and a small “entrance hall” in the front. I built that without much issue (just had to make the octagon a little bigger so the side rooms would be big enough), put on the roofs (a big dome over the center octagon, a long hipped roof cutting through the center of the main dome to cover both side wings at once, and a small curved roof for the front), and started changing all the roof patterns to glass –
Only to discover that, uh, the roofs intersecting the big dome looked VERY WEIRD with the glass. And I couldn’t make them work to my satisfaction because they also looked weird NOT intersecting the dome. So I took off the roofs on the side and front and instead just put a really small “half”-wall all the way around those sections, figuring I’d figure out what THOSE “roofs” should look like later. I chose the fancy glass pattern for the top dome, then went into the windows to see what looked good with that – while I agree with James Turner that the Moschino windows are REALLY good for most greenhouses (I used them on Victor’s greenhouse in the Chill Valicer Save), I didn’t think they quite fit the aesthetic of the build I was going for. I eventually found some nice, tall windows from Get To Work in the “Medium” wall height section that had some decorations on the top portion that I thought went well with the dome roof, so I upped my wall height appropriately and slapped those on every wall I could, using the matching door on the front entrance. Most of the rest of the build ended up using the Vampires game pack, with me grabbing a nice brick pattern for the walls, a cool “dungeony” stone floor for the, uh, floors, and some neat-looking arches for the entrances into the main dome and the side wings. I also remembered that one pack had brought us clear glass floor tiles that I figured I could put on each side wing to make up for not having proper, fancy glass roofs – after a brief misstep with the glowing glass dance floors from Get Together, I finally found what I was looking for in the Island Living decorations. So now this build has ALL the natural light. XD
D) And then it was time to save the lot to my library – and then switch over to “Community Greenhouse” and plop it down again! XD Because I wanted to use the same build for each lot sub-type. Fortunately, once I had the lot down for the Greenhouse, it didn’t force me to place it AGAIN for the “Maker Space” and “Marketplace” – I just had to add the appropriate items for each sub-lot (plus a toilet and a sink – forgot about toilet facilities for a second! I’ll have to build a little outhouse on the lot). I also gave the lot a couple of lot traits – “Great Soil” for the gardening aspect, and “Natural Light” for the fact that it’s a big old greenhouse. Not sure what the third one should be yet, though I generally default to “Convivial” for community lots, as it helps people get along better. :p
And that’s where I had to leave off, because that’s when the rumbling of thunder started to sound a bit serious. But I’m pleased with what I was able to accomplish – it’s nice when a build comes together so QUICKLY! Or at least the basic shell – I suspect I’ll be spending a LOT more time with this build later, making each version of the lot look the way I want it to look. But it’s good to have the main structure down, and know I have all required lot items for each sub-type in and ready to be placed around the lot. :) In fact, here, have a couple of pictures –
Still need to get a nice roof trim on there, and change the half-wall trim (I just put up the glass barriers because I wanted SOMETHING glass up there), but it doesn’t look too shabby, does it? (Though, weirdly enough, I am going to WANT it to look kind shabby in its “Community Space” mode. . .I was going to say “too bad we don’t have cracked windows in Build/Buy,” but maybe I can use moveobjects to put those wall cracks on the glass instead. . .) Hopefully it’ll look even better after I’ve had a little more time with it!
Writing: Got another chunk done on “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland,” featuring Alice heading out onto the mean streets of Downtown LA to find a cab (probably her usual) while musing about how she’s not used to people treating her kindly (as everybody here besides Victor seems to think nothing of ordering her around and insulting her while they do it), about how she hopes the sarcophagus job will go smoothly (and getting annoyed that she can’t even talk out loud to HERSELF about LaCroix’s deliberations over the Blood Hunt for Nines – at least she can still think about it!), about how much she loathed what happened at Grout’s and how much it reminded her of Rutledge (and how he was lucky that there were no children among his subjects, as she WOULD have found a way to bring him back just to kill him again), and about how she hopes to get an answer about why she suddenly saw one of Victor’s memories while drinking his blood (because that is both neat and horrifying). But before she could hail a taxi, Rabbit’s picked up something that needs her attention – and it seems to involve saving at least one life. . . Time to go to the hospital and meet Simon Milligan and Pisha!
YouTube: Just the one in the Subs today – GrayStillPlays and “Potholes get bigger every 30 seconds in GTA 5!” Another Alex Torture Board, this time with growing potholes, as per the title! Though I should say, said title wasn’t accurate. You see, it wasn’t every thirty seconds –
It was every ten. Yeaaah. XD The course itself was fairly short but also quite tricky – from the starting line, Gray had to make it over a small Dorito-esque pothole, through the twisty road through the flat windmills (while avoiding being slapped to death by their blades), then past the larger pothole manned by a couple of cops, then around the twisty road with giant slowdown circles on it, then past the even larger first construction pothole with two guys looking for their buddy Bob, then along the twisty road through the rest of the construction site, then across the even larger second construction pothole complete with cement mixer, then across the various intersecting lanes of truck traffic just beyond (and if he hit a truck, that truck was going to push him to his doom), then over the second-largest pothole, then finally around the “everything” road (a twisty-turny road with a slow-down circle, a truck coming at him from the other direction, AND a windmill) before getting over the final mega pothole so he could ramp himself to the win. And, remember, the potholes all just kept getting BIGGER – if Gray didn’t do this course QUICKLY, he wasn’t going to be able to do it at ALL.
He of course started with the dump truck, which was in fact too big to go into the course the normal way – Gray had to back it in past the starting-line sign. XD He eventually started trying cars that would be able to complete the challenge – the Power-Wheels-esque quad actually got past the “cop” pothole (I don’t think any of us were expecting that), if not farther; the street-racing car got just past the first construction pothole (with Gray learning he actually HAD to let that one get a little bigger, because he needed it to eat the cement truck so he could get over onto the little “ledge” it was sitting on); and the Patriot truck almost went the distance – it just didn’t have QUITE enough speed to make it past the final pothole. The winner proved to be a super car done up in yellow-and-black “banana split camouflage” as Gray put it, with “SPEEEEED” both on the license plate and in the engine. Took Gray a couple of tries to get a run good enough to actually get to the final pothole before it got too big, but he did it, and cheerfully left the growing, transforming holes to slowly swallow the course behind him. XD I have recommended he play the game Donut County in the comments, as that is a game about BEING a an ever-growing pothole that eats everything, and I think he’d like being on the other end of things. (Though I think he HAS played a similar mobile game before. . .just can’t think of what it was off the top of my head.)
*nods* Yeah, actually, that's not too bad at all for a day where I mainly just wanted to laze around after my cleaning, huh? Glad to have checked off everything I really wanted to do, anyway. :) Tomorrow, though, I gotta muster my brainpower and get that Outfit Fun post sorted on Victor Luvs Alice (and see if I can catch up on my tracked tags as well again); play Fallout 4 and have Victor reach the Railroad through all the ghouls standing in his way; update the FO4 Playthrough Progression doc accordingly; keep up with GrayStillPlays and Jon's new Fallout 4 series; and get in a workout. Hopefully these are all achievable goals, even with period brain! Night all!
Cleaning: Got a later start than I would have liked (got distracted while making my shake by how manky the blueberries in the fridge were), and got distracted a few times while it was happening, meaning it all took longer, but I got it done – started the dusting around 11 AM, finished up just after 1 PM in time for lunch, then did the Swiffering and vacuuming after lunch and got that done by just after 2 PM. Laundry (sheets, nightgown, bathrobe, blankets) all started going in just before noon, and I got the last load warm out of the dryer at 4:30 PM (which was nice, as I was a bit cold from sitting near my AC in just a sports bra and shorts XD). All done for another couple of weeks, yay~
Tumblr: Well, my RP tumblr got the bulk of my brainpower, but I got a bit done on both –
Victor Luvs Alice – Didn’t do a HECK of a lot over here, but I did get some pictures sorted for a “Sims 4 Valicer Outfit Fun” post showcasing some of the CC clothes I downloaded a little while back on my vacation, and started drafting the post itself just now. I’ll finish that on up tomorrow so it’ll be ready for Wednesday! :) Nice little break from trying to get Chill Valicer Save update pictures sorted. XD
Valice Multiverse – Took the opportunity of a Saturday night hiatus from chatting and RPing to FINALLY get the “Valicer In The Dark” verse officially added to my RP verses over there! So now those versions of Victor, Alice, and Smiler are open for asks and whatnot. :) Put the full write-up of the verse in my queue for anyone who doesn’t want to visit the Google Doc and find it there, along with two ask replies (one making a silly joke, the other informing me that BIG BIRD COULD HAVE DIED IN THE CHALLENGER DISASTER. Yeah, uh, tonal whiplash there – and yes, that is true. Apparently NASA invited Carroll Spinney up there, but the plan was never actually approved. Carroll maintained the sheer size of the Big Bird costume is what stopped them going through with it (eight feet two inches), and, well, it’s a good thing they didn’t, huh?). So that’s good!
Sims 4: Had a pretty short session on here today, between period-distracted brain and the “it’s ALMOST a thunderstorm” weather (seriously, it kept rumbling with thunder but not really DOING anything, beyond a few heavy bursts of rain) – BUT! I will say proudly that I accomplished exactly what I set out to do in the hour I had with the game –
A) First things first (well, after removing all my mods and stuff and patching the game) – I visited JamesTurnerYT on the Gallery to download one of his factory builds into my own Library! I was GOING to download the abandoned warehouse build that he did for Breanne in his HSY LP, but I couldn’t find the original version of that (just the upgraded “Breanne’s been living there for a while” version), so instead I ganked his old “Abandoned Factory” sort-of-shell challenge to use later. (Admittedly, I don’t have all the packs he does, so a few things are going to be missing when I plop it down, but I think it still should be fine.)
B) Then it was off to Windenburg in my building save to demolish the old Rustic Residence starter home and replace it with a Community Space lot – a community conservatory! AKA a fancy greenhouse. XD If you don’t know what a Community Space is, it’s a special lot that is actually four lots in one – a “community space” (a generic lot with no required items other than a voting board), a “community greenhouse” (just what it sounds like, a place for Sims to grow and tend to plants, meaning you need planters), a “maker space” (a place for Sims to make things – it requires you to have a fabricator and recycler, but you can also put down woodworking benches, easels, and even activity tables for the kids), and a “marketplace” (again, what it sounds like – you put out a bunch of sales tables for Sims to use to sell their stuff). You can build either variations on the same lot for all four types, or do something completely different for each type, so long as you have the required items for each one. The space starts out as the generic “community space” lot, and then Sims in the neighborhood vote for what they want the space to become. Once the votes are counted at the end of the voting period, the lot instantly transforms into one of the other three lot types, until there is another vote of Sims changing the lot type. It’s a neat feature of Eco Lifestyle, and I wanted to try my hand at building one. Mostly because, if I ever do get around to doing that VITD Challenge Save I keep mentioning, this is one of the lots I’d want to have in it, so the gang could vote for it to become a Community Greenhouse (as that’s what they do in my VITD AU – find a building much like this one and fix it up to grow food once Victor’s gotten his radiant moths sorted).
C) So yes, with the original house demolished, and the new lot type set, I started on my conservatory! And actually, getting it to come together was pretty easy, as I already knew what I wanted it to look like – an octagonal “dome” in the center, with two long rooms coming off either side and a small “entrance hall” in the front. I built that without much issue (just had to make the octagon a little bigger so the side rooms would be big enough), put on the roofs (a big dome over the center octagon, a long hipped roof cutting through the center of the main dome to cover both side wings at once, and a small curved roof for the front), and started changing all the roof patterns to glass –
Only to discover that, uh, the roofs intersecting the big dome looked VERY WEIRD with the glass. And I couldn’t make them work to my satisfaction because they also looked weird NOT intersecting the dome. So I took off the roofs on the side and front and instead just put a really small “half”-wall all the way around those sections, figuring I’d figure out what THOSE “roofs” should look like later. I chose the fancy glass pattern for the top dome, then went into the windows to see what looked good with that – while I agree with James Turner that the Moschino windows are REALLY good for most greenhouses (I used them on Victor’s greenhouse in the Chill Valicer Save), I didn’t think they quite fit the aesthetic of the build I was going for. I eventually found some nice, tall windows from Get To Work in the “Medium” wall height section that had some decorations on the top portion that I thought went well with the dome roof, so I upped my wall height appropriately and slapped those on every wall I could, using the matching door on the front entrance. Most of the rest of the build ended up using the Vampires game pack, with me grabbing a nice brick pattern for the walls, a cool “dungeony” stone floor for the, uh, floors, and some neat-looking arches for the entrances into the main dome and the side wings. I also remembered that one pack had brought us clear glass floor tiles that I figured I could put on each side wing to make up for not having proper, fancy glass roofs – after a brief misstep with the glowing glass dance floors from Get Together, I finally found what I was looking for in the Island Living decorations. So now this build has ALL the natural light. XD
D) And then it was time to save the lot to my library – and then switch over to “Community Greenhouse” and plop it down again! XD Because I wanted to use the same build for each lot sub-type. Fortunately, once I had the lot down for the Greenhouse, it didn’t force me to place it AGAIN for the “Maker Space” and “Marketplace” – I just had to add the appropriate items for each sub-lot (plus a toilet and a sink – forgot about toilet facilities for a second! I’ll have to build a little outhouse on the lot). I also gave the lot a couple of lot traits – “Great Soil” for the gardening aspect, and “Natural Light” for the fact that it’s a big old greenhouse. Not sure what the third one should be yet, though I generally default to “Convivial” for community lots, as it helps people get along better. :p
And that’s where I had to leave off, because that’s when the rumbling of thunder started to sound a bit serious. But I’m pleased with what I was able to accomplish – it’s nice when a build comes together so QUICKLY! Or at least the basic shell – I suspect I’ll be spending a LOT more time with this build later, making each version of the lot look the way I want it to look. But it’s good to have the main structure down, and know I have all required lot items for each sub-type in and ready to be placed around the lot. :) In fact, here, have a couple of pictures –
Still need to get a nice roof trim on there, and change the half-wall trim (I just put up the glass barriers because I wanted SOMETHING glass up there), but it doesn’t look too shabby, does it? (Though, weirdly enough, I am going to WANT it to look kind shabby in its “Community Space” mode. . .I was going to say “too bad we don’t have cracked windows in Build/Buy,” but maybe I can use moveobjects to put those wall cracks on the glass instead. . .) Hopefully it’ll look even better after I’ve had a little more time with it!
Writing: Got another chunk done on “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland,” featuring Alice heading out onto the mean streets of Downtown LA to find a cab (probably her usual) while musing about how she’s not used to people treating her kindly (as everybody here besides Victor seems to think nothing of ordering her around and insulting her while they do it), about how she hopes the sarcophagus job will go smoothly (and getting annoyed that she can’t even talk out loud to HERSELF about LaCroix’s deliberations over the Blood Hunt for Nines – at least she can still think about it!), about how much she loathed what happened at Grout’s and how much it reminded her of Rutledge (and how he was lucky that there were no children among his subjects, as she WOULD have found a way to bring him back just to kill him again), and about how she hopes to get an answer about why she suddenly saw one of Victor’s memories while drinking his blood (because that is both neat and horrifying). But before she could hail a taxi, Rabbit’s picked up something that needs her attention – and it seems to involve saving at least one life. . . Time to go to the hospital and meet Simon Milligan and Pisha!
YouTube: Just the one in the Subs today – GrayStillPlays and “Potholes get bigger every 30 seconds in GTA 5!” Another Alex Torture Board, this time with growing potholes, as per the title! Though I should say, said title wasn’t accurate. You see, it wasn’t every thirty seconds –
It was every ten. Yeaaah. XD The course itself was fairly short but also quite tricky – from the starting line, Gray had to make it over a small Dorito-esque pothole, through the twisty road through the flat windmills (while avoiding being slapped to death by their blades), then past the larger pothole manned by a couple of cops, then around the twisty road with giant slowdown circles on it, then past the even larger first construction pothole with two guys looking for their buddy Bob, then along the twisty road through the rest of the construction site, then across the even larger second construction pothole complete with cement mixer, then across the various intersecting lanes of truck traffic just beyond (and if he hit a truck, that truck was going to push him to his doom), then over the second-largest pothole, then finally around the “everything” road (a twisty-turny road with a slow-down circle, a truck coming at him from the other direction, AND a windmill) before getting over the final mega pothole so he could ramp himself to the win. And, remember, the potholes all just kept getting BIGGER – if Gray didn’t do this course QUICKLY, he wasn’t going to be able to do it at ALL.
He of course started with the dump truck, which was in fact too big to go into the course the normal way – Gray had to back it in past the starting-line sign. XD He eventually started trying cars that would be able to complete the challenge – the Power-Wheels-esque quad actually got past the “cop” pothole (I don’t think any of us were expecting that), if not farther; the street-racing car got just past the first construction pothole (with Gray learning he actually HAD to let that one get a little bigger, because he needed it to eat the cement truck so he could get over onto the little “ledge” it was sitting on); and the Patriot truck almost went the distance – it just didn’t have QUITE enough speed to make it past the final pothole. The winner proved to be a super car done up in yellow-and-black “banana split camouflage” as Gray put it, with “SPEEEEED” both on the license plate and in the engine. Took Gray a couple of tries to get a run good enough to actually get to the final pothole before it got too big, but he did it, and cheerfully left the growing, transforming holes to slowly swallow the course behind him. XD I have recommended he play the game Donut County in the comments, as that is a game about BEING a an ever-growing pothole that eats everything, and I think he’d like being on the other end of things. (Though I think he HAS played a similar mobile game before. . .just can’t think of what it was off the top of my head.)
*nods* Yeah, actually, that's not too bad at all for a day where I mainly just wanted to laze around after my cleaning, huh? Glad to have checked off everything I really wanted to do, anyway. :) Tomorrow, though, I gotta muster my brainpower and get that Outfit Fun post sorted on Victor Luvs Alice (and see if I can catch up on my tracked tags as well again); play Fallout 4 and have Victor reach the Railroad through all the ghouls standing in his way; update the FO4 Playthrough Progression doc accordingly; keep up with GrayStillPlays and Jon's new Fallout 4 series; and get in a workout. Hopefully these are all achievable goals, even with period brain! Night all!
