Imperfect Wednesday
Sep. 25th, 2024 11:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickYes, as usual, it took only one day back at work to get me all stressed out again. *sigh* It wasn't TOO bad in the end, but -- I'll let you read my to-do list/sum-up of the day --
Work – Eh, not the greatest day back – I came back to some credit card nonsense (not the fault of the credit card company this time, though; donor made a mistake while trying to update his payment method and we had to do some fiddling to get him back on track); a lot of e-mails to catch up; some GL weirdness (things added up, there was just something bizarre about how something was displaying) –
And my coworkers all bringing in stuff for Fluffernutters (you know, those sandwiches made with peanut butter and marshmallow fluff?) because apparently they wanted to have a Fluffernutter party. No, I’m not really sure why – I think somebody mentioned never having had one before and it became a thing. I did end up having a Fluffernutter of my own, but – I dunno, it didn’t hit the same as it did when I was a teenager and devouring the damn things. :( (Though I wonder if part of that was the bread – they brought in Wonderbread, and I’m used to Sara Lee and my Mom’s homebaked stuff.) Not to mention I’m just not as social as some of my coworkers, so I found all the chatter in the kitchen to be more distracting than anything… I guess the plus side is that I didn’t have to make a lunch for tomorrow, as what I was going to eat TODAY is still in the work fridge. But yeah – that and some roster maintenance made up my day. We’ll see how tomorrow goes – gotta get my free flu shot, for starters!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – back on the bike tonight, and back with “The finale of the Every Life Stage Challenge! - Part 8” by James Turner! AKA the “glorified building episode,” as James called it in today’s chunklet – and given how much of this episode is him just getting Krystoff to paint loads so he can earn money to fund more renovations, he’s not exactly wrong. XD But to be fair, the house is coming along nicely, and he has done a handful of Live Mode things. Today’s episode included –
A) James actually getting his Sims to sit down and watch a movie together! Yes, while a lot of them did start the movie standing up and staring at the screen, eventually everyone except the infant and the newborn sat down together to enjoy “SuperKids: Cortex Catastrophe” as a family. :) Nobody ate any of the popcorn that James so lovingly put down around them, admittedly, but that’s on him for locking them in the room with the needs-filling crystal. XD Family task for this episode – done!
B) James rearranging the far side of the house (where Scarlet and Camilo’s bedrooms are currently) to fit in another room on the side for Vivienne (to give her her own space instead of forcing her to share with her twin Sonny), which turned into a two-story “loft” build with a bedroom area below and a writing area/book nook above overlooking it. Plus a rooftop patio of sorts accessible by the secret sneakout ladder – James hopes to put a telescope or something up there eventually. And, of course, the whole space was as pink and industrial as he could make it. XD Came out really nice, honestly – he married her two rather contrasting tastes together well. :p
C) James then turning the twins’ former room into a blue island retreat for Sonny, complete with a nice big bed, blue wallpaper, and a small sunken area on the end that has a sand pit with a lounger and big leafy plants. And yes, the lounger was actually usable – Sonny happily plopped down to look at the constant rain outside of his window. XD So now he has a space that’s all his own too, nice. :) Well, two spaces, technically, since the room with the pipe organ is technically his too, since that’s his chosen skill. XD (He played his way all the way to level three today, nice.)
D) James finally making Semaj’s own room a little nicer (he now has a better bed, a nice dresser, and a photo collage of his first few kids above his headboard), and turning the “infant storage area” into a proper connected nursery! Complete with a real crib and changing table, and a sweet little rocking chair! So now Silas doesn’t have to spend all of his time on the playmat. XD Granted, all this renovation did have the very unintended side effect of making Reuben (Krystoff’s son, who lives in Semaj’s room so James doesn’t forget to take care of the baby) go invisible for a short time because this game is buggy as hell, but fortunately the family briefly traveling to the rec center and back brought him back so James could put him in the “newborn” corner of Semaj’s new digs. Whew!
And yeah, that was about it for this part of the episode! I ended it with Camilo having some pistachio ice cream down in the basement movie theater, chatting with his visiting mom Nalani while James quickly directed Semaj downstairs to do some romantic stuff (he’s already thinking that the family reunion shall involve a spontaneous wedding between Semaj and Nalani). Next time – well, there’s only about a half-hour left in this episode, so it’s gonna have to be “James finally finishes off the house, including the back yard” and “James finally throws that giant family reunion.” And also possibly “James gets a weather machine” because he has been really annoyed with how often it rains in Brindleton Bay. Like, I don’t blame him, it feels like it’s done nothing but thunderstorm ALL EPISODE. And despite him spending so much time in Build/Buy, he HAS gotten through multiple days with the family, so… We’ll see tomorrow!
2. Continue editing “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” Chapter 3: Check – Alice followed Rabbit over to that weird little “cave” area where some of the homeless congregate, and talked to a lady who was very keen to keep Alice away from her can collection. Fortunately, the offer of a twenty got her to give Alice the name of a potential infectee – Tin Can Bill – and his location – an alley across from “the loud bar.” AKA, The Last Round. Alice is a little put out that the Anarchs did not apparently check for plague carriers that close to their own digs. XD Trust me, Alice, it only gets worse from here...anyway, I left it with her having found her way back to the bar, and preparing to locate Bill and get his story. We’ll see how that goes for her later!
3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Check – got through a double feature Wednesday –
A) First up, we had Josh Way and “RAW TAKE: Between the Temples Review!” Featuring Josh’s thoughts on a new indie dramedy that came out recently, about a man who, after he is widowed, is helping out in his local rabbi’s temple, while the rabbi and his family see if maybe they can set him up with their jilted daughter...only for the dude’s old music teacher (played by Carol Kane!) to show up back in his life wanting to reconnect with her Jewish heritage and get bat mitzvahed. Shenanigans ensue! Josh’s take was “this is a really good movie with just some little bits of weirdness I didn’t care for – the movie makes itself look like it’s from the 70s QUITE aggressively, for starters – but it is definitely worth your time and probably will get some sort of awards nod.” So yeah – if that’s your thing, check it out!
B) And second up, we had GrayStillPlays and “$1 Stairs vs $1000 Stairs in GTA 5!” Featuring Gray once again venturing onto Fiverr to pay people to torture him in his favorite game. XD We had four boards of increasing zeros this time around – $1, $10, $100, and $1,000 – all featuring staircase challenges where they were only allowed to use a single prop for the entire board! So THAT’S interesting. What did our board creators do? Well –
I. $1 board – Creator d3mon decided to make a staircase that blew Gray’s mind – by making it out of propane tanks. Extremely explosive propane tanks. XD Basically, the gimmick here was that Gray had to explode all of the tanks before he could actually climb the staircase, so d3mon provided a variety of cars for Gray to sacrifice to the cause. Including the jumpy tank, a couple of SUVs, and our favorite not-so-Failson the Sherp. :) Gray of course got exploded a LOT, but he did eventually blow them all up, and managed to get one of the armored cars up to the checkpoint. XD Quite the challenge for a single dollar!
II. $10 board – Creator Loo asked for access to the Minecraft blocks and built Gray the Narrowing Minecraft Staircase – a large, steep ramp of multicolored giant blocks that got thinner and thinner as it went down until basically it was a tightrope shooting you through through the D in the VINEWOOD sign. Gray’s initial attempt in the side-by-side did NOT go well, but once he started trying cars with better suspensions, things started going better. The ultimate winner? My beloved Wastelander, doing a full 360 before rocketing down those steps and through the checkpoint. :D We love to see it!
III. $100 board – The return, once again, of Danny, with the Slanted LEGO Staircase! He cheerfully told Gray that he’d used the prop 391 times at the beginning, then set him up with a variety of cars to take on PURE FUCKING LEGO HELL. Like, seriously, the challenge consisted of Gray having to climb up two VERY steep slanty staircases (the second one having wider steps than the first), then go around two sets of ANGLED staircases (which forced him to make a hard turn in the middle because the second one went the other damn way), then climb a little tightrope (which was actually the easiest part of the whole thing, weirdly), then finally go back down a zig-zaggy set of steps made up of the UNDERSIDE of the piece (meaning it was very easy to catch his tires on something and go flying). Oh, and Danny told him at the beginning it was timed, only to tell him at the end “LOL no, it’s not timed at all.” Gray was like “LET IT END” by the time he finally reached the checkpoint in the Beaver...
IV. $1,000 board – And then he got to the final board, which was made by Alex and was called “4 Levels Of YEET Staircases.” Meaning that, yes, this board was made entirely of the YEETER hydraulic press prop. (Which, in addition to making Gray’s life hell, also absolutely DECIMATED the traffic on the road below. XD) With Gray’s only solace being that Alex HAD put a checkpoint at the end of each level, presumably to stop his employer throwing his computer out the window. XD Anyway, Gray had to get through –
a. Level 1: Raising Staircase – a staircase where the steps got taller and taller as time went on – and every one had a YEETER in front of it ready to bounce Gray in place eternally if he didn’t have the forward momentum
b. Level 2: Encroaching On Personal Space Staircase – a staircase where the steps got bigger and shallower (that is, there was less space atop each step) as time went on – and every step had a YEETER ‘lip’ that would send Gray flying back to the beginning if he didn’t time every stair climb juuuust right
c. Level 3: Yeetus Staircase – a staircase that was a bunch of tiered floating blocks with a YEETER on the end, meaning Gray HAD to climb it by getting on the YEETER and getting launched – fortunately this proved to be not so bad once Gray learned how fast he had to go and where to line up his car
d. Level 4: Jerking, Thinning Staircase – a staircase made up of doubled-up YEETERS on either side, whose yeeting motion jerked Gray from side to side as he tried to climb it – and, true to the title, the staircase got thinner as he got closer to the blessed end
Patented Alex pain there! Fortunately Gray is a patented masochist, and after finding the right vehicle (the patented Vapid bananamobile, aka the Trophy Truck), he finally made it to the winning circle and to the end of his agony. Some good stuff here – I appreciate how much pain everyone was able to inflict upon him with one prop each. XD
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – just Victor Luvs Alice to worry about tonight, which is good, as I was running a bit late to get the old queue sorted tonight. I ended up doing a reblog of some Alice fanart (with her touching up her eyeliner with the help of her Vorpal Blade) for Thursday; a reblog of some very pretty Corpse Bride fanart of Emily (looking almost like a Disney princess) I found for Friday; and a reblog of someone’s video about how the best part of the day is blasting The Smiler OST so loud the room shakes for Saturday (couldn’t think of a better Song Saturday). So at least the queue ended up a bit Valicer, I suppose. :p But yeah, I really gotta block out some time to work on some more of my original posts – I have a handful that are just kinda stuck in the “rough draft” stage because I never seem to have either the time or energy to complete them. Meeh.
So yeah -- not a horrible day, but not a great day. And now I have to go to bed so I can have another day tomorrow. Night all!
Work – Eh, not the greatest day back – I came back to some credit card nonsense (not the fault of the credit card company this time, though; donor made a mistake while trying to update his payment method and we had to do some fiddling to get him back on track); a lot of e-mails to catch up; some GL weirdness (things added up, there was just something bizarre about how something was displaying) –
And my coworkers all bringing in stuff for Fluffernutters (you know, those sandwiches made with peanut butter and marshmallow fluff?) because apparently they wanted to have a Fluffernutter party. No, I’m not really sure why – I think somebody mentioned never having had one before and it became a thing. I did end up having a Fluffernutter of my own, but – I dunno, it didn’t hit the same as it did when I was a teenager and devouring the damn things. :( (Though I wonder if part of that was the bread – they brought in Wonderbread, and I’m used to Sara Lee and my Mom’s homebaked stuff.) Not to mention I’m just not as social as some of my coworkers, so I found all the chatter in the kitchen to be more distracting than anything… I guess the plus side is that I didn’t have to make a lunch for tomorrow, as what I was going to eat TODAY is still in the work fridge. But yeah – that and some roster maintenance made up my day. We’ll see how tomorrow goes – gotta get my free flu shot, for starters!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – back on the bike tonight, and back with “The finale of the Every Life Stage Challenge! - Part 8” by James Turner! AKA the “glorified building episode,” as James called it in today’s chunklet – and given how much of this episode is him just getting Krystoff to paint loads so he can earn money to fund more renovations, he’s not exactly wrong. XD But to be fair, the house is coming along nicely, and he has done a handful of Live Mode things. Today’s episode included –
A) James actually getting his Sims to sit down and watch a movie together! Yes, while a lot of them did start the movie standing up and staring at the screen, eventually everyone except the infant and the newborn sat down together to enjoy “SuperKids: Cortex Catastrophe” as a family. :) Nobody ate any of the popcorn that James so lovingly put down around them, admittedly, but that’s on him for locking them in the room with the needs-filling crystal. XD Family task for this episode – done!
B) James rearranging the far side of the house (where Scarlet and Camilo’s bedrooms are currently) to fit in another room on the side for Vivienne (to give her her own space instead of forcing her to share with her twin Sonny), which turned into a two-story “loft” build with a bedroom area below and a writing area/book nook above overlooking it. Plus a rooftop patio of sorts accessible by the secret sneakout ladder – James hopes to put a telescope or something up there eventually. And, of course, the whole space was as pink and industrial as he could make it. XD Came out really nice, honestly – he married her two rather contrasting tastes together well. :p
C) James then turning the twins’ former room into a blue island retreat for Sonny, complete with a nice big bed, blue wallpaper, and a small sunken area on the end that has a sand pit with a lounger and big leafy plants. And yes, the lounger was actually usable – Sonny happily plopped down to look at the constant rain outside of his window. XD So now he has a space that’s all his own too, nice. :) Well, two spaces, technically, since the room with the pipe organ is technically his too, since that’s his chosen skill. XD (He played his way all the way to level three today, nice.)
D) James finally making Semaj’s own room a little nicer (he now has a better bed, a nice dresser, and a photo collage of his first few kids above his headboard), and turning the “infant storage area” into a proper connected nursery! Complete with a real crib and changing table, and a sweet little rocking chair! So now Silas doesn’t have to spend all of his time on the playmat. XD Granted, all this renovation did have the very unintended side effect of making Reuben (Krystoff’s son, who lives in Semaj’s room so James doesn’t forget to take care of the baby) go invisible for a short time because this game is buggy as hell, but fortunately the family briefly traveling to the rec center and back brought him back so James could put him in the “newborn” corner of Semaj’s new digs. Whew!
And yeah, that was about it for this part of the episode! I ended it with Camilo having some pistachio ice cream down in the basement movie theater, chatting with his visiting mom Nalani while James quickly directed Semaj downstairs to do some romantic stuff (he’s already thinking that the family reunion shall involve a spontaneous wedding between Semaj and Nalani). Next time – well, there’s only about a half-hour left in this episode, so it’s gonna have to be “James finally finishes off the house, including the back yard” and “James finally throws that giant family reunion.” And also possibly “James gets a weather machine” because he has been really annoyed with how often it rains in Brindleton Bay. Like, I don’t blame him, it feels like it’s done nothing but thunderstorm ALL EPISODE. And despite him spending so much time in Build/Buy, he HAS gotten through multiple days with the family, so… We’ll see tomorrow!
2. Continue editing “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” Chapter 3: Check – Alice followed Rabbit over to that weird little “cave” area where some of the homeless congregate, and talked to a lady who was very keen to keep Alice away from her can collection. Fortunately, the offer of a twenty got her to give Alice the name of a potential infectee – Tin Can Bill – and his location – an alley across from “the loud bar.” AKA, The Last Round. Alice is a little put out that the Anarchs did not apparently check for plague carriers that close to their own digs. XD Trust me, Alice, it only gets worse from here...anyway, I left it with her having found her way back to the bar, and preparing to locate Bill and get his story. We’ll see how that goes for her later!
3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Check – got through a double feature Wednesday –
A) First up, we had Josh Way and “RAW TAKE: Between the Temples Review!” Featuring Josh’s thoughts on a new indie dramedy that came out recently, about a man who, after he is widowed, is helping out in his local rabbi’s temple, while the rabbi and his family see if maybe they can set him up with their jilted daughter...only for the dude’s old music teacher (played by Carol Kane!) to show up back in his life wanting to reconnect with her Jewish heritage and get bat mitzvahed. Shenanigans ensue! Josh’s take was “this is a really good movie with just some little bits of weirdness I didn’t care for – the movie makes itself look like it’s from the 70s QUITE aggressively, for starters – but it is definitely worth your time and probably will get some sort of awards nod.” So yeah – if that’s your thing, check it out!
B) And second up, we had GrayStillPlays and “$1 Stairs vs $1000 Stairs in GTA 5!” Featuring Gray once again venturing onto Fiverr to pay people to torture him in his favorite game. XD We had four boards of increasing zeros this time around – $1, $10, $100, and $1,000 – all featuring staircase challenges where they were only allowed to use a single prop for the entire board! So THAT’S interesting. What did our board creators do? Well –
I. $1 board – Creator d3mon decided to make a staircase that blew Gray’s mind – by making it out of propane tanks. Extremely explosive propane tanks. XD Basically, the gimmick here was that Gray had to explode all of the tanks before he could actually climb the staircase, so d3mon provided a variety of cars for Gray to sacrifice to the cause. Including the jumpy tank, a couple of SUVs, and our favorite not-so-Failson the Sherp. :) Gray of course got exploded a LOT, but he did eventually blow them all up, and managed to get one of the armored cars up to the checkpoint. XD Quite the challenge for a single dollar!
II. $10 board – Creator Loo asked for access to the Minecraft blocks and built Gray the Narrowing Minecraft Staircase – a large, steep ramp of multicolored giant blocks that got thinner and thinner as it went down until basically it was a tightrope shooting you through through the D in the VINEWOOD sign. Gray’s initial attempt in the side-by-side did NOT go well, but once he started trying cars with better suspensions, things started going better. The ultimate winner? My beloved Wastelander, doing a full 360 before rocketing down those steps and through the checkpoint. :D We love to see it!
III. $100 board – The return, once again, of Danny, with the Slanted LEGO Staircase! He cheerfully told Gray that he’d used the prop 391 times at the beginning, then set him up with a variety of cars to take on PURE FUCKING LEGO HELL. Like, seriously, the challenge consisted of Gray having to climb up two VERY steep slanty staircases (the second one having wider steps than the first), then go around two sets of ANGLED staircases (which forced him to make a hard turn in the middle because the second one went the other damn way), then climb a little tightrope (which was actually the easiest part of the whole thing, weirdly), then finally go back down a zig-zaggy set of steps made up of the UNDERSIDE of the piece (meaning it was very easy to catch his tires on something and go flying). Oh, and Danny told him at the beginning it was timed, only to tell him at the end “LOL no, it’s not timed at all.” Gray was like “LET IT END” by the time he finally reached the checkpoint in the Beaver...
IV. $1,000 board – And then he got to the final board, which was made by Alex and was called “4 Levels Of YEET Staircases.” Meaning that, yes, this board was made entirely of the YEETER hydraulic press prop. (Which, in addition to making Gray’s life hell, also absolutely DECIMATED the traffic on the road below. XD) With Gray’s only solace being that Alex HAD put a checkpoint at the end of each level, presumably to stop his employer throwing his computer out the window. XD Anyway, Gray had to get through –
a. Level 1: Raising Staircase – a staircase where the steps got taller and taller as time went on – and every one had a YEETER in front of it ready to bounce Gray in place eternally if he didn’t have the forward momentum
b. Level 2: Encroaching On Personal Space Staircase – a staircase where the steps got bigger and shallower (that is, there was less space atop each step) as time went on – and every step had a YEETER ‘lip’ that would send Gray flying back to the beginning if he didn’t time every stair climb juuuust right
c. Level 3: Yeetus Staircase – a staircase that was a bunch of tiered floating blocks with a YEETER on the end, meaning Gray HAD to climb it by getting on the YEETER and getting launched – fortunately this proved to be not so bad once Gray learned how fast he had to go and where to line up his car
d. Level 4: Jerking, Thinning Staircase – a staircase made up of doubled-up YEETERS on either side, whose yeeting motion jerked Gray from side to side as he tried to climb it – and, true to the title, the staircase got thinner as he got closer to the blessed end
Patented Alex pain there! Fortunately Gray is a patented masochist, and after finding the right vehicle (the patented Vapid bananamobile, aka the Trophy Truck), he finally made it to the winning circle and to the end of his agony. Some good stuff here – I appreciate how much pain everyone was able to inflict upon him with one prop each. XD
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – just Victor Luvs Alice to worry about tonight, which is good, as I was running a bit late to get the old queue sorted tonight. I ended up doing a reblog of some Alice fanart (with her touching up her eyeliner with the help of her Vorpal Blade) for Thursday; a reblog of some very pretty Corpse Bride fanart of Emily (looking almost like a Disney princess) I found for Friday; and a reblog of someone’s video about how the best part of the day is blasting The Smiler OST so loud the room shakes for Saturday (couldn’t think of a better Song Saturday). So at least the queue ended up a bit Valicer, I suppose. :p But yeah, I really gotta block out some time to work on some more of my original posts – I have a handful that are just kinda stuck in the “rough draft” stage because I never seem to have either the time or energy to complete them. Meeh.
So yeah -- not a horrible day, but not a great day. And now I have to go to bed so I can have another day tomorrow. Night all!
