Fairly Productive Thursday

Parents were out running around getting new curtain rods and shades and things like that (and helping me come up with gift ideas for the coworkers when they were home; Mom finally found something that should work for everybody!), and I hung out in my room for the most part and cracked through the following:

Tumblr: Made an effort to get caught up on stuff here this morning! Caught up on the Victor Luvs Alice dash and tags before lunch, threw a couple of rough-draft post ideas (new headcanons for the Valicer trio, and some new incorrect quote ideas I had) into the drafts, and swung by The Valice Multiverse and put a couple of ask replies in its drafts for later queuing. NICE. And then, later this evening, I made sure to reblog Moose’s latest Doctober fic (featuring some of the reactions to the story of Clayton Ravine over the years) and found a cool A:MR animatic to stick in The Valice Multiverse drafts for later. :) Very good day for the tumblrs!

Sims 4: . . .it’s really good that I did all that tumblr stuff before lunch, because I ended up spending three and a half hours in this game working on the Valicer house. Granted, part of that time was spent being frustrated with the game and my Sims, but – okay, let me explain what happened –

A) Booted up the game a little after 2 PM, hit the “Resume” button to be taken quickly to the Valicer household. Found things as I had left them, with Alice still rampaging outside – I attempted to have her regain control, but no dice (possibly because of the full moon). All right, I sent her to do some more scavenging and howling while I had Smiler turn on all the lights in the houses so I could actually see to do some decorations before swapping to Build Mode. Went to their new barn party space and decided to add a shade to that one window that can’t have proper curtains as it’s in an awkward space over the stairs –

All the lights turned off.

Baffled, I went back into live mode, turned the lights back on, then started trying to put some posters up behind the karaoke machine. Not only could I not really fit anything, the lights went off again. It was like every time I tried to put something on the walls, the auto-lights kicked back in. Frustrated, I confirmed I could at least put down some rugs, then went back into Live Mode to wait until morning so I could have enough light to see by no matter what. I figured I’d have Alice finish her rampage and see if I could get Smiler to play video games while Focused long enough to get a milestone completed in the Computer Whiz aspiration –

Not only did Smiler CONSTANTLY get off their computer to go bug Guidry or specters or the like, when Alice turned back into a human at last, she was in a random outfit I’d never seen before.

B) Okay, I’m frustrated and confused – let’s quit to the main menu without saving, take a breath, and then load back in through the “load game” button. Back to the beginning of Alice’s rampage – this time, I decided just to wait for night to be over, have Alice do all her scavenging and rampaging, and LOCKED SMILER IN THEIR ROOM to force them to play video games for two hours, monitoring them VERY closely so they just played the damn games. Fortunately, this time the plan went off without a hitch, and while Alice did transform back into the weird outfit, I was able to quickly reset her back to her actual outfit. Think that was just Sim weirdness.

C) Anyway, with THAT all sorted, I had another problem – more thunderstorms! Fortunately, the gang now owns a weather machine, so I freed Smiler and had them go down to feed the chickens, then summon clear skies. And then I had both them and Alice go up to look at the aquarium in Victor and Alice’s bedroom so they were out of the way (Victor was asleep so he wasn’t an issue). Guidry was in there too on their computer, which I allowed because it also meant HE was out of my way. And then once everyone was in position and the skies had cleared to a sunny early morning –

D) BUILD MODE! And this time, when I put all the lights on around the house and the barn, they STAYED on, even when I put things on the walls. THANK you. Anyway, here’s what I did –

I. Put that shade back up in Smiler’s “party barn” space, re-added the rugs I’d found (some fun layered ones from Toddler Stuff), added another nice brightly-patterned rug to the lot later on (it was going to go in Smiler’s room but I found one I liked better), and put another of Alice’s paintings in there.

II. Added more rugs throughout the house, in fact – rugs from Selvadorada and Granite Falls in the “creativity” room (along with a plainer one for Victor’s piano); some nice big rugs for the big hallways on the first and second floors; a black-and-yellow rug for Smiler’s room; a Werewolves rug in the blue color swatch for Victor and Alice’s desk. . .just lots of rugs wherever appropriate.

III. Added pet stuff! I forget what I was looking at exactly, but it involved pets, and then I was like “hang on, didn’t I intend for this lot to get a dog and a cat eventually?” So I decided to prep for that moment by adding all the pet stuff they could need around the house! There’s two automatic feeders with bowls in the kitchen; pet beds both upstairs and down; indoor and outdoor pet toy boxes, with some toys scattered nearby; indoor and outdoor litter boxes; a tree scratching post on the porch; and an obstacle course with two low hoops, a zig-zag area, a curved tunnel, and a platform in the front yard (in the corner formed by the “creativity room” and the kitchen. Oh, and speaking of the kitchen –

IV. I so wanted to put pet treats in the kitchen I ended up making it one tile longer so I could fit in one more counter. XD (Made sure to extend the room above and the roof there as well.) But the treats are in, along with some new prints for the wall! I also shuffled the windows around so they’d look more natural, upstairs and down.

V. ORGANIZED THE DAMN GREENHOUSE. This thing has given me sooo much grief, but I think I have now conquered it, at least for the time being. We have the row of trees at the back; then magical and unusual plants (and mushrooms) anchored by the Tree of Emotions and the Plasma Fruit tree; then flowers, veggies, fruit, and more flowers, and then two planters of veggies/fruit and herbs/flowers, then the line of earth where Victor will grow the oversized crops. The beehive is in the middle, and on the left wall (facing inward) is the flower-arranging bench, the juice fizzing machine, and a grill for making herbal remedies. Put two of the gnomes inside in the corners; the third was by the door but then I was looking at the “Cottage Garden” stuff I downloaded from the Plumbob Tea Society tumblr, found a cute wheelbarrow, and put them in there with some gardening tools. XD

VI. Updated the barn’s lower “crafting level” – there’s now a cauldron down there so Victor can practice alchemy, and I moved the insect collection back in there on the far wall (moving the fabricator and the robot bench to the right-hand wall). Smiler’s frog collection is in there too as well, with the frogs displayed in the Tetris-inspired shelving that came with the “Arcade Stuff” pack by Cepzid. (It was the shelving they fit best in!)

VII. Put some pictures up in all of the bathrooms – a couple of Plumbella’s prints in the upstairs ones; Alice’s latest pictures of some koi fish in the downstairs one as it needed some color. Also added a clock to the front foyer.

VIII. Turned Smiler’s old party room into a séance room, with blue floral bat wallpaper and a darker floor – currently the only thing that’s in there is the séance table and some shelving, but we’ll see how it goes. (Just realized that maybe I can put Victor’s spare broom and all the familiar orbs he’s not using in there. . .)

IX. I didn’t mean to do this, but I ended up redoing Smiler’s room when I recalled I also wanted THEM to get into video production at some point, and I decided to see if I could fit the video station into said room – this resulted in a lot of rearranging, getting them a new desk and desk chair, giving them a new dresser, and rearranging all SORTS of stuff because I like to have all the wall decorations on the walls that stay UP when I use the “Walls Cutaway” setting. Got it to work in the end, but it took some doing, and I had to put the pet bed I’d put in their room outside in the corner nearby instead.

X. Rearranged some shelving – along with getting the Tetris shelves for the frogs, I also got a nice hanging shelf for all the eggs they’d found already and put that downstairs where the fossils and Smiler’s space rock went. I kept the original shelves they were on, though, and currently they’re holding a couple of the snowglobes Smiler’s found. I still need to finish this off, along with fencing off the chicken coop properly and putting some more stuff in the séance room.

And that’s when I finally tore myself away because it was 5:30 and I’d INTENDED TO DO OTHER THINGS TODAY. *shakehead* I cannot be trusted in Sims 4 build mode, I swear. XD But at least the house is a lot CLOSER to done than it was before.

Writing: Got another gift fic edited – the one for Squid, who asked for their OC Caitiff vampire Melody with Kindred superstar Beckett – I have done them on their plane as they travel about having adventures, with Beckett discovering Melody has drawn some of them. :) It’s a cute little piece with a funny twist at the end, and I’m hoping they enjoy it. :)

YouTube: Well, I managed to keep up on the Subs thanks to Kevin not getting too long with his video today, but all that Simming above means there was no chance of AT4W. This weekend, for sure! But in the meantime –

A) First up, the latest from Josh Way – “SKETCHY: Huey, Dewey, Louie, and Webby from DuckTales!” More Duckember for us all, with Josh drawing the 2017-reboot style triplets and Webby, as he liked that style for the new series. According to him, if you want to draw these four, you start with marshmallows for heads and then fill in the detail. He also talked a bit about how having famous celebrities for voice actors can be fun, and was on that show, but it probably has hurt the industry (looking at you, Chris Pratt’s Mario), and how he doesn’t like posting on Facebook as much as Instagram or Twitter as he feels he constantly has to censor and explain himself there. Good stuff as always!

B) And second, today’s Call Me Kevin – “This game combines two very different genres!” Said game being Dave the Diver, which chronicles the adventures of Dave, a diver (natch). The two genres the game is combining are basically an adventure game where Dave dives in “The Blue Hole” and explores the ocean, catching fish, finding treasures, and doing missions for people (like a marine biologist looking for samples of shells and seaweed and an explorer looking for evidence of a population of mermaids who used to live in the area) while trying not to run out of oxygen – and a restaurant sim, because at night, Dave helps his friend Bancho run his sushi restaurant! In fact, the fish you catch allows you to pick what populates the menu each night! There’s a lot of various little fiddly bits you have to keep track of – satisfying food critics; learning how to hire staff; getting good ratings on the local “Cookster” social media app; learning new recipes and how to improve existing ones; upgrading your suit and oxygen tanks; learning how to construct guns (for shooting fish) and bombs (for blowing your way into the Sea People archives); doing all sorts of little mini-missions for people. . .basically, this is NOT a game for people who get easily overwhelmed. XD Kevin did pretty well, though, even if he insisted on picking fights with the local trigger fish that he then couldn’t win. XD And he really worked Dave hard every night in that sushi bar. But he did find the Sea People archives, get some nice upgrades for his suit, successfully fought a shark and turned it into sushi, and disturbed the Kraken! Well, okay, maybe it was already disturbed, as it sunk a boat early on. . .let’s just say I’m not leaving out the possibility that there’s some Lovecraftian shit in the background of this game. XD

Workout: Another night on the bike, finishing off the Oxventure “A Fete Worse Than Death!” (Well, mostly, I did have to quickly watch the last few minutes in the period after my shower but before supper.) For the final time, the explanation of the names for the body swap portion of the adventure: Merilzon is Merilwen-in-Corazon, Corabert is Corazon-in-Egbert, Egwen is Egbert-in-Merilwen, Dudence is Dob-In-Prudence, and Prob is Prudence-in-Dob.

We picked up with Corabert booking it after his sword that Merilzon accidentally threw away on a Crit 1 trying to fight the demonic duck. XD Johnny insisted this was a Wisdom check, with Mike gleefully telling him not to forget the modifier. XD It wasn’t quite as bad as it could have been – an 8 – but it did keep Corabert out of combat as he hunted for the sword. He did take the time to cast Protection on Merilzon, though, ensuring if the duck went after her it would be at a disadvantage. Egwen was like “I can DO that??” XD Oh Mike. . .

Anyway, the point quickly became moot as Prob decided the best thing to do was to leap onto the duck’s back, snap a lute string, and use as a garrote on the demon. She got up there but, thanks to a middling roll, wasn’t QUITE able to choke it out. Egwen decided to help with his bear strength by grabbing the other end of the string and helping her saw away at it – initial roll wasn’t good, but then he argued that he could use “Animal Handling” because he was kind of handling an animal, and Johnny allowed it as Ellen nearly died laughing. XD THIS did the trick, and the duck was beheaded, sending a gout of blood forty foot into the sky! Luckily the duck and all parts of it crumbled away to black mist as it returned to one of the Hells or something before everyone was soaked with gore. XD Corabert used Locate Object to finally get his sword back too, hooray. :P

And that is when Michael climbed out of the ruins of the wine tent, made sure they were all alive, made sure they had the key, and said they really ought to go to Rufus’s house and take care of the body swap so they could leave immediately. XD Merilzon, however, said that there was no leaving until they heard the result of the “guess how much the pig weighs” competition – partly because she wanted to check on the pig, partly because she wanted the payout. XD Dudence asked if there was anything anyone wanted to do while they were all in each other’s bodies, and immediately regretted doing so as a million tumblr fanfics were born. XD Nobody really WANTED to do anything, beyond Merilzon using Disguise Self to be Merilwen again, and then her and Dudence sharing a Mage Hand high-five (apparently a) Prudence has that and b) it’s a cantrip so it doesn’t need a spell slot), so it was over to the house! Rufus, naturally, had a lovely mansion on the side of town, well guarded but with windows that could serve as sneaking-in points. Corabert, acting on instinct, went to shimmy up the drainpipe, sneak along the window ledge, and jimmy open a door. Johnny asked if he’d like to roll and take the 15 points bludgeoning damage now. XD Corabert elected to roll –

And got a good enough result (I believe a dirty twenty) to pull it off. Johnny decided that he left LOADS of damage in his wake, though – the drainpipe fell off the wall the minute he got off it, his clawed feet gouged up the wall, and rather than jimmying the window he accidentally smashed it with his tail. XD But he got inside, and dropped a rope for the others. Merilzon went up like she was being towed by Mage Hand; Dudence ATTEMPTED to Spider Climb but couldn’t because of exhausted magic, causing Prob to pick him up and carry him as she ascended the rope; and Egwen, no longer drunk but still a bear, managed to climb the rope as a bear with no opposable thumbs thanks to talking Johnny into AGAIN letting him use “Animal Handling” to get up there. XD And then, once in the room, he spotted a fun raised floor covered in squares and began doing a bear dance on it. XD Much to the horror of Merilzon (and probably Corabert too), as Corazon’s old instincts let her know that was a “nightingale floor,” deliberately designed to creak loudly to give away potential intruders –

And sure enough, two guards came rushing in. Naturally, they were, uh, concerned about the bear. Corabert pretended to be animal control, and Dudence pretended to be a bear inspector. They managed to convince the two guards (with the help of Egwen continuing to jig and roaring menacingly from time to time) to go into the other room while they handled the bear situation (Corabert pulling out Egbert’s crowbar, which he was VERY baffled that Egbert had), and then tried to fake taking down the bear with the help of Dudence and Prob while Merilzon investigated some locked double doors on the other side of the room.

Unfortunately, while Corabert rolled a nat 20 on the performance check, Dudence and Prob BOTH rolled Crit 1s. Add in that Egwen didn’t get better than a nine, and – yeah. Corabert’s nat 20 stopped the guards from sounding the alarm, but one poked his head back in to say his compatriots sounded very unprofessional in a suspicious way. XD Fortunate, Merilzon was there to save their bacon, changing her Disguise to Rufus and claiming this was an am-dram company she’d invited over to practice, saying she wanted to make sure they projected enough. She managed to convince the guards enough that they went to lunch, and then picked the lock on the doors with Corazon’s tools. Inside was an office, with the lever everyone wanted! Padlocked, of course, but Merilzon was easily able to open it with the key. There was a moment where everyone decided to take care of final business –

Cue Corabert healing Merilzon’s wounds, even though she didn’t have any; Prob using Dob’s healing to heal the damage he did to her body; Egwen suddenly getting nervous that everyone will think Corabert is the better Egbert and inflicting Confusion on him, causing Corabert to run randomly into a wall and crush his snout; Dudence trying to heal him reflexively, only to cast Agonizing Blast instead for MORE damage; and then Dudence, realizing that they weren’t going to have it for much longer, Eldritch Blasting the sky like fireworks. Johnny went from comparing this to tidying up after a stay at a B&B to a band trashing their hotel room. XD Egwen then pulled the lever –

And after a moment of suspense, everyone ended up back in their own bodies! Egbert immediately regretted casting Confusion on Corabert, because ow. XD Michael (apparently having gotten in using his own methods – or maybe he just climbed the rope once he was sure all the bad things had stopped) showed up again to confirm they were all back to normal, and Corazon somehow managed to pickpocket some of his hair. XD And then Prudence began demanding their money back – Michael said he’d already given it back, so they instead demanded all his hair from his lower half, Dob saying he KNOWS they can shed it at will. Michael very reluctantly did so, and Dob swept it all up into a bag. Michael then insisted they get out of here as soon as possible –

And then Rufus showed up and demanded to know what was going on. Dob immediately tried to cast Eldritch Blast. XD Obviously no dice, but Corazon was still Disguised as Rufus thanks to Merilzon, so he promptly claimed to be Rufus from the future, saying that Rufus needed to run away now before he was sucked into another dimension. He didn’t really sell it with a 9, but Rufus for his part was having a very bad day and rolled a 3, so after confirming with his “future self” that he’d go get the prize from the pig-weight-guessing competition (as Corazon naturally said he’d won), literally ran out the window and then peeled off into the distance. Corazon was all for leaving then –

But hang on, Merilzon got the winning guess in that pig-weight-guessing competition! They’ve got to go get the prize! So the gang ran over to the village green, following the sound of what I PRESUME to be the town crier’s voice and bell; Corazon used a bush to change back from Rufus to himself (with Dob saying Rufus died in the bush because of the thorns); and the winning guess was pulled – from “Corawen, the Wood-Elf Pirate Druid.” XD I dunno, I like “Merilzon” too. Corazon collected his prize –

A jar of jellybeans. Because sometimes you guess the weight of the jar and win the pig, and sometimes its the other way around. Corazon took it like a champ, though, sending jellybeans flying into the crowd and even giving the pig a couple as its fair share. XD And so the Oxventure ended – four minutes early, which is rare for a live show. Talk about delightfully chaotic. XD

So yeah -- in contrast to Tuesday, where I dumped video games in favor of YouTube, today YouTube suffered while I binged on the video games. XD At least I'm still caught up with my Subs! And depending on what happens tomorrow, maybe I can fit in one of the AT4Ws. . .more likely to be a Saturday or Sunday thing, though. As it stands, however, I must be off, as I do have one final day of work tomorrow, and it's likely to be busy with more GL nonsense and the like. Night all!