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And it looked like it was going to start well, too -- my parents' wall WASN'T even a little bit wet this morning, thanks to Dad finding a gap where the sheet rock had apparently slipped and filling it in with foam insulation, and I had a decent day at work that wasn't too stressful. And then I got home, prepared to have a nice lunch and then play vidya games --
And that's when we discovered that the countertop convection oven we've been relying on since the actual proper oven died? Yeah, that was no longer working either. As evidenced by the fact it just wasn't getting hot, no matter what we did. Something about the heating element or the knob that controls the temperature full-on conked out. >.< So lunch was late by about an hour as Mom had to do the fries on the stovetop (actually frying them for a change), and then my parents had to go out TWICE to get a replacement oven (the first one was too small, and has to be taken back -- after Black Friday). And the whole thing just ended up winding me up and making it like impossible to concentrate on some of the stuff I'd intended to do. I mean, I got gaming in, but -- well, look at the to-do list:
Work – Very quiet, fortunately – which included the commute, I am pleased to say. Pretty much the whole thing was updating the GL spreadsheet and cleaning up some duplicates and deceased. Credit card stuff remains broke, but that’s not my problem for the next four days.
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: No check – the whole “waiting for my parents to come home from buying a new countertop convection oven” business meant that I wasn’t comfortable going downstairs into the basement, in case they came home and needed my help with something or something happened upstairs while I was working out. I’ll just reset myself over the weekend at some point on that.
2. Post Chapter 2 of “Londerland Bloodlines”: Check! Got that up while my parents were on their SECOND run to get a new oven – you can read it here! This one covers the beginning of most of the quests in the Santa Monica area, along with everything related to meeting Mercurio, so it’s a pretty hefty chapter. Bring snacks. :p Hoping that I can get Chapter 3 up in time for Christmas!
3. Keep up with YouTube Subscriptions: Check – made easier because I only had one video today, to my surprise. At least it allowed me to get something out of my “to watch” list too –
A) Started with the OXtra video that’s been hanging out in my Watch Later for a bit – “Pokemon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl: Our 7 Most Precious Pokemon Memories (Sponsored Content)!” Yes, the OXtra and OXBox gang shared seven “presh mems” about their forays into the Pokemon franchise in honor of the latest remake of an older game that’s come out! Luke and Andy both had memories about catching that One Last Pokemon (Mewtwo for Luke, who’d used his Master Ball on an earlier legendary and thus had a hard fight – while on a train through the Chunnel on a family vacation no less; Rotom for Andy, who was just pleased to find an ultra-rare spooky Pokemon for his “Spooky Squad” in a genuine haunted house), and Luke also shared that he and Andy had a silly rivalry regarding their starter Pokemon for Sun and Moon (Andy chose Rowlet, Luke Popplio, and much friendly snark was exchanged about their specialties and their evolutions); Jane recalled catching a Tauros in New Orleans on a trip regarding Mafia 3’s reveal (and upsetting Andy because she didn’t tell him there was one in the area when she caught it, meaning he didn’t get a chance to catch it); Ellen shared her love of watching the Pokemon anime on Saturday mornings, and how she literally teared up when she got Pokemon Let’s Go Eevee because she could pet her Eevee and it would make happy noises and all that and it was JUST SO CUTE; and Mike – well, Mike told of how he caught a Magikarp in the original Diamond, read its Pokedex entry, realized how MEAN the Pokedex entry was (Magikarp has been repeatedly called PATHETIC throughout the years), and decided he was going to level this poor sad carp up until it became the awesome dragon it was always meant to be. :) Very cute and heartwarming stuff. :)
B) And then it was over to Anna Chess’s latest upload, because, well, I didn’t have Call Me Kevin today – according to his twitter, poor guy’s sick. :( But Anna is here to pick up the slack, with a video where she plays some Sims 4! A game that she knows pretty much nothing about, despite being in a long-term relationship with a guy famous for his long-running series with Jim Pickens. XD She used the “Create A Story” feature to create criminal Marshmallow Cookie, then set him up in Del Sol Valley and began figuring out how to live a Sim life. Mostly in the form of “how do I get my neighbor Venessa to fall in love with me?” and “WHAT THE HELL ARE THESE CREEPY GNOMES DOING IN MY HOUSE?!” She did okay, though she was clearly struggling with some of the weirder aspects of Sim existence, like the tendency to do random push-ups. Or the Harvestfest gnomes, which she found exceedingly weird and offputting. XD Me too, Anna, me too. On the plus side, after a few false starts (a mountain expedition that went nowhere, a few trips to the gym, a trip to the Von Haunt estate that ended in him playing chess alone and Anna analyzing his game as Chess Is Her Thing), Marshmallow did manage to win Venessa’s heart by gifting her piles of trash and going on a very successful date. :) They are now soulmates, with Anna hoping Venessa can protect her new boyfriend from the creepy gnomes. XD I hope these two make cameos in Kevin’s future Sims 4 videos – it would be cute crossover content! (If, you know, he doesn’t kill them horribly.)
C) And finally we had GrayStillPlays and more Happy Wheels! As usual, we started with an overly-elaborate bottle flip (this time Poppy Playtime-themed), in which Gray decided, for a change, that he wanted to get the win – which, hilariously, was partially blocked by his own spinning section. XD There’s a metaphor in there somewhere! At any rate, he eventually got it, and moved onto boards like a table jump with various wins of various levels (Gray managed to get all the way to the end – and then had to struggle for a while to figure out how to get there with his guy still ALIVE, which was – tricky. And not just because of the harpoons along the way); a “Flordia” apocalypse where you had to pedal through a board that was actively falling apart (Gray survived the third attempt and managed to get his guy over the debris and into the secret base with only one broken leg); a hobo rope swing featuring a rope made out of pineaples and a spike fall through trash cans (which ended with a landing on gallons of Bud Lite – not that Gray saw that at first, as good at missing the rope as he was XD); a table slide down a massive hill through the usual cast of weirdos (Gray both completed the board normally, then tested if he could grab onto the text box at the very beginning – he could XD); the hardest “shopping lady” board he’s ever done (with a short but sweet spike fall at one end, where the bottom is basically as wide as the lady herself, and a Flappy Bird-style spike JUMP at the other – and don’t think you can abandon your scooter, because after the thumbnail holes you have spike pits you have to leap. Gray finally managed it while trying to explain how hard it was XD); and a ride on a jet-powered shark who loves ice cream (self-explanatory). The usual delightful madness that is this game. XD
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – got the link to Chapter 2 of “Londerland Bloodlines: Santa Monica’s Deluded Depths” in my Victor Luvs Alice queue, along with an Alice reblog and a song reblog for Song Saturday. Rather glad I only had the one to worry about, given how my mood went sour over the course of the afternoon!
5. Play Bloodlines and get through the Fu Syndicate: Check – though it took some doing! Mostly because I couldn’t recall how to get through the spinny blades room right away – I knew it involved shooting, but I couldn’t remember what to shoot. Had to look it up to be reminded it’s the panels BEHIND the grates. *shakehead* Look, it’s been a while since I played the game, AND in my last playthrough, which was my Alice playthrough, that particular room glitched out and the blades didn’t move. Also had to shoot the electrical things a few times before they shut off. . .and for some reason my feed thing wasn’t giving me the usual audio cue to let me know it had failed when I tried it. Weird. But I got through the experiments, got out of the fire room, picked up the Squashed Odious Chalice, killed the Mandarin with Blood Boil, freed Barabarus, purged the Fu Syndicate’s info on Kindred, and got Gary’s phone call letting me know that the sarcophagus is with the Giovanni. I immediately – went home and finished off the poster quest. XD What, I was only two items away from all the posters! XD But that’s all set now, and Crystal is ALMOST up to maxed-out Scholarship skill, which will help her greatly with both her Research and her Persuasion feats, both of which I want to be high when I do the Giovanni quest. So it’s time to do the quest featuring the former hitmen friends and try to get the max experience from that!
. . .okay, so I actually got most of it done, but I did want to work out, and I did want to watch more videos. And I didn't want to spend most of my afternoon wondering where my parents were and why the hell the oven had to conk out TODAY of all days. *grumbles* Ah well. . .just have to hope the actual holiday tomorrow goes better. Giving myself a break from an actual to-do list since it is Thanksgiving -- though I do hope to clear out my Watch Later, and get in some Sims 4. We'll see how it all goes! Night all!
And that's when we discovered that the countertop convection oven we've been relying on since the actual proper oven died? Yeah, that was no longer working either. As evidenced by the fact it just wasn't getting hot, no matter what we did. Something about the heating element or the knob that controls the temperature full-on conked out. >.< So lunch was late by about an hour as Mom had to do the fries on the stovetop (actually frying them for a change), and then my parents had to go out TWICE to get a replacement oven (the first one was too small, and has to be taken back -- after Black Friday). And the whole thing just ended up winding me up and making it like impossible to concentrate on some of the stuff I'd intended to do. I mean, I got gaming in, but -- well, look at the to-do list:
Work – Very quiet, fortunately – which included the commute, I am pleased to say. Pretty much the whole thing was updating the GL spreadsheet and cleaning up some duplicates and deceased. Credit card stuff remains broke, but that’s not my problem for the next four days.
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: No check – the whole “waiting for my parents to come home from buying a new countertop convection oven” business meant that I wasn’t comfortable going downstairs into the basement, in case they came home and needed my help with something or something happened upstairs while I was working out. I’ll just reset myself over the weekend at some point on that.
2. Post Chapter 2 of “Londerland Bloodlines”: Check! Got that up while my parents were on their SECOND run to get a new oven – you can read it here! This one covers the beginning of most of the quests in the Santa Monica area, along with everything related to meeting Mercurio, so it’s a pretty hefty chapter. Bring snacks. :p Hoping that I can get Chapter 3 up in time for Christmas!
3. Keep up with YouTube Subscriptions: Check – made easier because I only had one video today, to my surprise. At least it allowed me to get something out of my “to watch” list too –
A) Started with the OXtra video that’s been hanging out in my Watch Later for a bit – “Pokemon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl: Our 7 Most Precious Pokemon Memories (Sponsored Content)!” Yes, the OXtra and OXBox gang shared seven “presh mems” about their forays into the Pokemon franchise in honor of the latest remake of an older game that’s come out! Luke and Andy both had memories about catching that One Last Pokemon (Mewtwo for Luke, who’d used his Master Ball on an earlier legendary and thus had a hard fight – while on a train through the Chunnel on a family vacation no less; Rotom for Andy, who was just pleased to find an ultra-rare spooky Pokemon for his “Spooky Squad” in a genuine haunted house), and Luke also shared that he and Andy had a silly rivalry regarding their starter Pokemon for Sun and Moon (Andy chose Rowlet, Luke Popplio, and much friendly snark was exchanged about their specialties and their evolutions); Jane recalled catching a Tauros in New Orleans on a trip regarding Mafia 3’s reveal (and upsetting Andy because she didn’t tell him there was one in the area when she caught it, meaning he didn’t get a chance to catch it); Ellen shared her love of watching the Pokemon anime on Saturday mornings, and how she literally teared up when she got Pokemon Let’s Go Eevee because she could pet her Eevee and it would make happy noises and all that and it was JUST SO CUTE; and Mike – well, Mike told of how he caught a Magikarp in the original Diamond, read its Pokedex entry, realized how MEAN the Pokedex entry was (Magikarp has been repeatedly called PATHETIC throughout the years), and decided he was going to level this poor sad carp up until it became the awesome dragon it was always meant to be. :) Very cute and heartwarming stuff. :)
B) And then it was over to Anna Chess’s latest upload, because, well, I didn’t have Call Me Kevin today – according to his twitter, poor guy’s sick. :( But Anna is here to pick up the slack, with a video where she plays some Sims 4! A game that she knows pretty much nothing about, despite being in a long-term relationship with a guy famous for his long-running series with Jim Pickens. XD She used the “Create A Story” feature to create criminal Marshmallow Cookie, then set him up in Del Sol Valley and began figuring out how to live a Sim life. Mostly in the form of “how do I get my neighbor Venessa to fall in love with me?” and “WHAT THE HELL ARE THESE CREEPY GNOMES DOING IN MY HOUSE?!” She did okay, though she was clearly struggling with some of the weirder aspects of Sim existence, like the tendency to do random push-ups. Or the Harvestfest gnomes, which she found exceedingly weird and offputting. XD Me too, Anna, me too. On the plus side, after a few false starts (a mountain expedition that went nowhere, a few trips to the gym, a trip to the Von Haunt estate that ended in him playing chess alone and Anna analyzing his game as Chess Is Her Thing), Marshmallow did manage to win Venessa’s heart by gifting her piles of trash and going on a very successful date. :) They are now soulmates, with Anna hoping Venessa can protect her new boyfriend from the creepy gnomes. XD I hope these two make cameos in Kevin’s future Sims 4 videos – it would be cute crossover content! (If, you know, he doesn’t kill them horribly.)
C) And finally we had GrayStillPlays and more Happy Wheels! As usual, we started with an overly-elaborate bottle flip (this time Poppy Playtime-themed), in which Gray decided, for a change, that he wanted to get the win – which, hilariously, was partially blocked by his own spinning section. XD There’s a metaphor in there somewhere! At any rate, he eventually got it, and moved onto boards like a table jump with various wins of various levels (Gray managed to get all the way to the end – and then had to struggle for a while to figure out how to get there with his guy still ALIVE, which was – tricky. And not just because of the harpoons along the way); a “Flordia” apocalypse where you had to pedal through a board that was actively falling apart (Gray survived the third attempt and managed to get his guy over the debris and into the secret base with only one broken leg); a hobo rope swing featuring a rope made out of pineaples and a spike fall through trash cans (which ended with a landing on gallons of Bud Lite – not that Gray saw that at first, as good at missing the rope as he was XD); a table slide down a massive hill through the usual cast of weirdos (Gray both completed the board normally, then tested if he could grab onto the text box at the very beginning – he could XD); the hardest “shopping lady” board he’s ever done (with a short but sweet spike fall at one end, where the bottom is basically as wide as the lady herself, and a Flappy Bird-style spike JUMP at the other – and don’t think you can abandon your scooter, because after the thumbnail holes you have spike pits you have to leap. Gray finally managed it while trying to explain how hard it was XD); and a ride on a jet-powered shark who loves ice cream (self-explanatory). The usual delightful madness that is this game. XD
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – got the link to Chapter 2 of “Londerland Bloodlines: Santa Monica’s Deluded Depths” in my Victor Luvs Alice queue, along with an Alice reblog and a song reblog for Song Saturday. Rather glad I only had the one to worry about, given how my mood went sour over the course of the afternoon!
5. Play Bloodlines and get through the Fu Syndicate: Check – though it took some doing! Mostly because I couldn’t recall how to get through the spinny blades room right away – I knew it involved shooting, but I couldn’t remember what to shoot. Had to look it up to be reminded it’s the panels BEHIND the grates. *shakehead* Look, it’s been a while since I played the game, AND in my last playthrough, which was my Alice playthrough, that particular room glitched out and the blades didn’t move. Also had to shoot the electrical things a few times before they shut off. . .and for some reason my feed thing wasn’t giving me the usual audio cue to let me know it had failed when I tried it. Weird. But I got through the experiments, got out of the fire room, picked up the Squashed Odious Chalice, killed the Mandarin with Blood Boil, freed Barabarus, purged the Fu Syndicate’s info on Kindred, and got Gary’s phone call letting me know that the sarcophagus is with the Giovanni. I immediately – went home and finished off the poster quest. XD What, I was only two items away from all the posters! XD But that’s all set now, and Crystal is ALMOST up to maxed-out Scholarship skill, which will help her greatly with both her Research and her Persuasion feats, both of which I want to be high when I do the Giovanni quest. So it’s time to do the quest featuring the former hitmen friends and try to get the max experience from that!
. . .okay, so I actually got most of it done, but I did want to work out, and I did want to watch more videos. And I didn't want to spend most of my afternoon wondering where my parents were and why the hell the oven had to conk out TODAY of all days. *grumbles* Ah well. . .just have to hope the actual holiday tomorrow goes better. Giving myself a break from an actual to-do list since it is Thanksgiving -- though I do hope to clear out my Watch Later, and get in some Sims 4. We'll see how it all goes! Night all!
