![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Ultra-Late Update Of Bad Things
Sep. 2nd, 2024 11:57 pmSo, update on the family health situation -- Dad still had a fever this morning, so Mom took him to the emergency room before I woke up to have a bunch of tests done and such. The good news is that his insides are apparently healing up nicely, so the fever (which kept bouncing around) had nothing to do with that.
The bad news is that he tested positive for COVID. The doctor was pretty sure that he'd be over it in a few days (by Thursday), but that is still not good. Once Mom told me the news, I went and tested myself -- negative. However, when Mom and Dad came home and Mom tested herself -- well, she screwed up the first test, and the second one was invalid, but on the THIRD attempt, she tested positive. So that's -- great. *sigh* I've been keeping to myself in my room and wearing one of my masks whenever I have to go out, and Mom and Dad have been wearing THEIR masks when I'm out, but -- yeah. I'm not entirely sure how likely it is that I'll avoid getting sick. (Though they somehow managed to avoid getting COVID when I had it a couple of years ago, so -- not impossible.) I'm just -- I am SO DONE with the medical emergencies and scares and what have yous that we've been dealing with over the past month or so. Honestly, I'm done with 2024 in general -- it can just go die in a fire. Along with every OTHER year this decade, it feels like. *heavy sigh*
Anyway -- as you might imagine, all of this ended up throwing off my day pretty hard, so no Sims 4. I did get some other stuff done, though --
Tumblr: Just Victor Luvs Alice to worry about today, which I am grateful about – and I managed to get a decent amount of stuff done over there –
A) Added the image alt text on all six of my Chill Valicer Save update posts for this week, so that’s all set
B) Reblogged a post on about Anastasia Trusova’s paintings (which ARE very cool and beautiful) and Moose’s latest McFly July story about Verne being all excited to meet Marty (which was very cute, and I like how the kids have picked up on the legend of “Clint Eastwood”) this afternoon
C) And answered an anon ask about if I’m getting Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 later this year – I am not, my interest in that game is completely dead. Meh.
Writing: Got a decent chunk edited on “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” at least, covering Alice worrying again about Victor’s nascent blood addiction after meeting Patty (and Wonderland reassuring her that Victor’s not going to end up like her, not with Alice taking care of him) and Alice meeting Venus and getting her initial job from her – mainly, telling some Russian guys in a parking lot next to the Empire Arms that Venus doesn’t have their money. Alice is suspicious of how simple it is, but Venus has promised to let her in on the full story once she makes sure they aren’t going to bother her tonight. So tomorrow, Alice takes on Igor and his cronies and lets them know Venus doesn’t have their money! Fun times!
YouTube: Despite everything, I did manage to enjoy some YouTube today –
A) First up, we had some Severance-related videos (because of the new AU obsession), including –
I. “Severance — Official Trailer | Apple TV+” by – well, Apple TV. XD The trailer for the first season, it definitely highlights just how weird and creepy the whole premise of having separate “work” and “personal” selves really is. Not to mention just how weird and creepy Lumon in particular is. *grimace* Do not like.
II. “Severance - Official Intro Title Sequence 2022 / Credits / Opening 4K ( Apple TV+ ) | extraweg” by extraweg! Speaking of weird and creepy, you don’t get much weirder and creepier than this trippy title sequence, which shows off things like Outie!Mark Scout (the show’s main character) holding a weird conglomeration of his Innie self like a balloon as he stumbles through the snow, Outie!Mark having to jump into his own Innie’s head to pilot it after escaping a coffee cup filled with Innie!Marks, and Outie!Mark having to fight a weird goop-like version of himself for his Lumon keycard. It’s WEIRD, is what I’m saying. XD
III. “Severance (2022) - I'll Never Leave Here (CLIP)” by Down And Nerdy Podcast! A very short clip of Innie Helly R. talking to Innie Mark S. about how she’s never going to leave the Severed Floor, and Mark S. being very matter-of-fact about how technically she’ll leave at 5:15 PM, but this version of her will never realize it; that she’ll never know if she has a family; and if she keeps coming back here, it’s because she chose to do so. Very creepy!
IV. “Severance | Funny Scenes (Part 2 ) Humor” by Artes! And then, to take the edge off the creepy, we had a selection of funny scenes from the show, including Helly’s repeated attempts to get a message to her Outie self being stymied by Mark (warning her she doesn’t want security guard Graner to use the “bad soap” to wash a message off her arms and letting her know the “code detectors” in the elevators can detect messages you’ve swallowed – and that other guard the creepily cheerful Milchick WILL be in charge of extracting the message); Helly attacking Mark during her initial orientation (weirdly timed with whenever he says the word “seesaw”); fellow employee Irving scolding Mark for possibly attempting to “bedsit” in Kier Eagan’s (the founder of the company) bed; and Helly pretending to freak out over a four because she’s been told to sort numbers based on whether or not they felt scary. XD Good to know this show does have genuinely funny moments too. :p
B) And then we had the GrayStillPlays video of the day – “I strapped 70 space rockets together and this happened,” aka Gray plays Spaceflight Simulator! This is a game where you build your own rockets in order to complete challenges, such as safely lifting off and landing back on Earth; safely getting to 10 KM and landing back on Earth; and reaching the Moon. Unfortunately, this is ALSO a game that doesn’t put any proper restrictions on what your rockets should LOOK like, and so Gray was allowed to make the stupidest things he could think of. XD He started with almost the smallest rocket he could make (“almost” because he couldn’t resist putting two astronaut capsules on it, with one balanced upside-down on the other) – then, once he’d had his fun with that, he slowly got bigger and bigger and bigger by using the copy-paste until he was creating rockets that were essentially like twenty massive space-pencils welded together. XD He of course blew up a decent number of these rockets (generally by foregoing heat-shielding, meaning that they largely burned up on rentry – in one case only the tiny little parachute nub survived), or caused them to fall to pieces when they hit the ground, but eventually he got a set into space, and then managed to crash-land them on the Moon. And then he tried to blow up the NASA building next to the launch pad, only to discover it didn’t actually exist (the rockets just clipped right through it), so instead he launched one of his pencil-packs directly at the ground instead. Because, well, it wouldn’t be a GSP video otherwise. XD Good stuff!
Workout: Got back down in the basement for another bike ride and another half-hour or so of “The kids are raising the kids in Every Life Stage Challenge! - Part 6” by James Turner! Things mostly continued to go well for the family, but things did start getting a bit more chaotic as James worked to wrap up everyone’s assigned goals so he can make sure the episode ends on everyone aging up. Your highlights –
A) The skill and milestone-based goals are now complete! For Camilo, Semaj did tummy time with him until he’d gotten both of his Gross Motor skill milestones (I believe “lift head” and “roll onto back”), then chatted with him briefly to get “Coo” in social. For the toddlers, Krystoff potty-trained Sunny until he was at level 3, and then Semaj potty-trained Vivienne until she was at level 3 (gaining a “Strict” family dynamic with her in the process) – and as they’d gotten level 3 in everything else already, they were golden! And as for Semaj himself, he got a few points in the Wellness skill (to represent Camilo’s future life dream), and a few points in the Video Gaming skill (because it was easier to get than Knitting, which he got bored of after one hat) to clear out his required skill-building goals! So THAT’S good at least!
B) The family celebrated Winterfest! Yes, known holiday ignorer James decided that he had to do it and got the family a pre-decorated tree, a pile of presents, and a decoration box so Semaj could hang some decorations up around the house too. They only had like an hour to actually celebrate, though, as it turns out Semaj’s latest gig was in the evening on that same day, so James just got everyone to quickly open some presents before he had to go. Semaj got an antique teapot; Krystoff got an easel (which he already had, so his present got sold, but James appreciated that the game seemed to take into account the fact that Krystoff loves painting); Pablo got a jar of marbles; and the twins got a llamacorn toy and a toy car (I’m not sure which one got which). Hey, at least they all got a moment to enjoy the holiday!
C) Semaj had another gig! As stated above, Winterfest was cut short by Semaj having to rush off to work to star in some sort of cop drama – and fortunately, as he’d done most of his assigned tasks and arrived in a good mood, he did well, getting gold on his performance and a $3,000+ pay day. Plus as much food as he could steal off the catering table. XD He actually switched acting agencies after that, wanting to find a new one that would get him better gigs, so we should see some more elaborate stuff from him soon!
D) Krystoff got a boyfriend! Mostly because one of his tasks to age up is to go to prom with someone. James tried to get him to meet people while he was at school, but for some reason he never actually socialized there, so Semaj dragged the whole family to a football day at the high school in the middle of winter to find someone for Krystoff to get to know. He quickly zeroed in on football player Raoul because the dude had the winning “black hair and brown clothes” combo, and proceeded to have Krystoff say hi before abusing Social Bunny to make them immediately like and love each other. XD Nothing in his self-imposed rules say that he couldn’t do that! So once Krystoff was done texting Raoul ten thousand times, he asked them to be boyfriends, then asked if they could go to prom together, and Raoul was game both times! So that is sorted. Well, unless prom bugs out, because this is an EA game…
E) And I left it with Semaj going around the worlds hunting down toddlers to meet so that he could fulfill the “family activity” that the wheel assigned to them last episode – hosting a toddler playdate with three other toddlers! Dragging all the kids with him, of course, because that’s what he does. :p So far he’s met Evie in Brindleton Bay, and Monica in San Myshuno – meaning the only one left is whoever Bernice’s toddler is. As you might imagine, James is thrilled at having to visit her house. XD
So yeah – most of the goals have been smashed out, and now Semaj just needs to find a new DNA donor and get this toddler playdate done, and Krystoff – well. Krystoff still needs to take his new boyfriend to prom (James is hoping that they can have their first kiss there), BUT he was also supposed to score “Average” or better on his exams. But because James has been sending him to school alone, he never got a pop-up stating how well or poorly Krystoff did (possibly because he can’t take the exams without it being an active school day). Meaning we have no idea what happened. And as James is NOT keen on waiting another week to redo the exams properly – well, we’ll see if the final half-hour brings an on-the-fly rules change tomorrow!
Glad I managed all that at least. And now it is time for me to hit the sheets, because I do have work tomorrow -- well, depending on how I'm feeling. We'll see how things go in the morning, I suppose. *sigh* Night all.
The bad news is that he tested positive for COVID. The doctor was pretty sure that he'd be over it in a few days (by Thursday), but that is still not good. Once Mom told me the news, I went and tested myself -- negative. However, when Mom and Dad came home and Mom tested herself -- well, she screwed up the first test, and the second one was invalid, but on the THIRD attempt, she tested positive. So that's -- great. *sigh* I've been keeping to myself in my room and wearing one of my masks whenever I have to go out, and Mom and Dad have been wearing THEIR masks when I'm out, but -- yeah. I'm not entirely sure how likely it is that I'll avoid getting sick. (Though they somehow managed to avoid getting COVID when I had it a couple of years ago, so -- not impossible.) I'm just -- I am SO DONE with the medical emergencies and scares and what have yous that we've been dealing with over the past month or so. Honestly, I'm done with 2024 in general -- it can just go die in a fire. Along with every OTHER year this decade, it feels like. *heavy sigh*
Anyway -- as you might imagine, all of this ended up throwing off my day pretty hard, so no Sims 4. I did get some other stuff done, though --
Tumblr: Just Victor Luvs Alice to worry about today, which I am grateful about – and I managed to get a decent amount of stuff done over there –
A) Added the image alt text on all six of my Chill Valicer Save update posts for this week, so that’s all set
B) Reblogged a post on about Anastasia Trusova’s paintings (which ARE very cool and beautiful) and Moose’s latest McFly July story about Verne being all excited to meet Marty (which was very cute, and I like how the kids have picked up on the legend of “Clint Eastwood”) this afternoon
C) And answered an anon ask about if I’m getting Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 later this year – I am not, my interest in that game is completely dead. Meh.
Writing: Got a decent chunk edited on “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” at least, covering Alice worrying again about Victor’s nascent blood addiction after meeting Patty (and Wonderland reassuring her that Victor’s not going to end up like her, not with Alice taking care of him) and Alice meeting Venus and getting her initial job from her – mainly, telling some Russian guys in a parking lot next to the Empire Arms that Venus doesn’t have their money. Alice is suspicious of how simple it is, but Venus has promised to let her in on the full story once she makes sure they aren’t going to bother her tonight. So tomorrow, Alice takes on Igor and his cronies and lets them know Venus doesn’t have their money! Fun times!
YouTube: Despite everything, I did manage to enjoy some YouTube today –
A) First up, we had some Severance-related videos (because of the new AU obsession), including –
I. “Severance — Official Trailer | Apple TV+” by – well, Apple TV. XD The trailer for the first season, it definitely highlights just how weird and creepy the whole premise of having separate “work” and “personal” selves really is. Not to mention just how weird and creepy Lumon in particular is. *grimace* Do not like.
II. “Severance - Official Intro Title Sequence 2022 / Credits / Opening 4K ( Apple TV+ ) | extraweg” by extraweg! Speaking of weird and creepy, you don’t get much weirder and creepier than this trippy title sequence, which shows off things like Outie!Mark Scout (the show’s main character) holding a weird conglomeration of his Innie self like a balloon as he stumbles through the snow, Outie!Mark having to jump into his own Innie’s head to pilot it after escaping a coffee cup filled with Innie!Marks, and Outie!Mark having to fight a weird goop-like version of himself for his Lumon keycard. It’s WEIRD, is what I’m saying. XD
III. “Severance (2022) - I'll Never Leave Here (CLIP)” by Down And Nerdy Podcast! A very short clip of Innie Helly R. talking to Innie Mark S. about how she’s never going to leave the Severed Floor, and Mark S. being very matter-of-fact about how technically she’ll leave at 5:15 PM, but this version of her will never realize it; that she’ll never know if she has a family; and if she keeps coming back here, it’s because she chose to do so. Very creepy!
IV. “Severance | Funny Scenes (Part 2 ) Humor” by Artes! And then, to take the edge off the creepy, we had a selection of funny scenes from the show, including Helly’s repeated attempts to get a message to her Outie self being stymied by Mark (warning her she doesn’t want security guard Graner to use the “bad soap” to wash a message off her arms and letting her know the “code detectors” in the elevators can detect messages you’ve swallowed – and that other guard the creepily cheerful Milchick WILL be in charge of extracting the message); Helly attacking Mark during her initial orientation (weirdly timed with whenever he says the word “seesaw”); fellow employee Irving scolding Mark for possibly attempting to “bedsit” in Kier Eagan’s (the founder of the company) bed; and Helly pretending to freak out over a four because she’s been told to sort numbers based on whether or not they felt scary. XD Good to know this show does have genuinely funny moments too. :p
B) And then we had the GrayStillPlays video of the day – “I strapped 70 space rockets together and this happened,” aka Gray plays Spaceflight Simulator! This is a game where you build your own rockets in order to complete challenges, such as safely lifting off and landing back on Earth; safely getting to 10 KM and landing back on Earth; and reaching the Moon. Unfortunately, this is ALSO a game that doesn’t put any proper restrictions on what your rockets should LOOK like, and so Gray was allowed to make the stupidest things he could think of. XD He started with almost the smallest rocket he could make (“almost” because he couldn’t resist putting two astronaut capsules on it, with one balanced upside-down on the other) – then, once he’d had his fun with that, he slowly got bigger and bigger and bigger by using the copy-paste until he was creating rockets that were essentially like twenty massive space-pencils welded together. XD He of course blew up a decent number of these rockets (generally by foregoing heat-shielding, meaning that they largely burned up on rentry – in one case only the tiny little parachute nub survived), or caused them to fall to pieces when they hit the ground, but eventually he got a set into space, and then managed to crash-land them on the Moon. And then he tried to blow up the NASA building next to the launch pad, only to discover it didn’t actually exist (the rockets just clipped right through it), so instead he launched one of his pencil-packs directly at the ground instead. Because, well, it wouldn’t be a GSP video otherwise. XD Good stuff!
Workout: Got back down in the basement for another bike ride and another half-hour or so of “The kids are raising the kids in Every Life Stage Challenge! - Part 6” by James Turner! Things mostly continued to go well for the family, but things did start getting a bit more chaotic as James worked to wrap up everyone’s assigned goals so he can make sure the episode ends on everyone aging up. Your highlights –
A) The skill and milestone-based goals are now complete! For Camilo, Semaj did tummy time with him until he’d gotten both of his Gross Motor skill milestones (I believe “lift head” and “roll onto back”), then chatted with him briefly to get “Coo” in social. For the toddlers, Krystoff potty-trained Sunny until he was at level 3, and then Semaj potty-trained Vivienne until she was at level 3 (gaining a “Strict” family dynamic with her in the process) – and as they’d gotten level 3 in everything else already, they were golden! And as for Semaj himself, he got a few points in the Wellness skill (to represent Camilo’s future life dream), and a few points in the Video Gaming skill (because it was easier to get than Knitting, which he got bored of after one hat) to clear out his required skill-building goals! So THAT’S good at least!
B) The family celebrated Winterfest! Yes, known holiday ignorer James decided that he had to do it and got the family a pre-decorated tree, a pile of presents, and a decoration box so Semaj could hang some decorations up around the house too. They only had like an hour to actually celebrate, though, as it turns out Semaj’s latest gig was in the evening on that same day, so James just got everyone to quickly open some presents before he had to go. Semaj got an antique teapot; Krystoff got an easel (which he already had, so his present got sold, but James appreciated that the game seemed to take into account the fact that Krystoff loves painting); Pablo got a jar of marbles; and the twins got a llamacorn toy and a toy car (I’m not sure which one got which). Hey, at least they all got a moment to enjoy the holiday!
C) Semaj had another gig! As stated above, Winterfest was cut short by Semaj having to rush off to work to star in some sort of cop drama – and fortunately, as he’d done most of his assigned tasks and arrived in a good mood, he did well, getting gold on his performance and a $3,000+ pay day. Plus as much food as he could steal off the catering table. XD He actually switched acting agencies after that, wanting to find a new one that would get him better gigs, so we should see some more elaborate stuff from him soon!
D) Krystoff got a boyfriend! Mostly because one of his tasks to age up is to go to prom with someone. James tried to get him to meet people while he was at school, but for some reason he never actually socialized there, so Semaj dragged the whole family to a football day at the high school in the middle of winter to find someone for Krystoff to get to know. He quickly zeroed in on football player Raoul because the dude had the winning “black hair and brown clothes” combo, and proceeded to have Krystoff say hi before abusing Social Bunny to make them immediately like and love each other. XD Nothing in his self-imposed rules say that he couldn’t do that! So once Krystoff was done texting Raoul ten thousand times, he asked them to be boyfriends, then asked if they could go to prom together, and Raoul was game both times! So that is sorted. Well, unless prom bugs out, because this is an EA game…
E) And I left it with Semaj going around the worlds hunting down toddlers to meet so that he could fulfill the “family activity” that the wheel assigned to them last episode – hosting a toddler playdate with three other toddlers! Dragging all the kids with him, of course, because that’s what he does. :p So far he’s met Evie in Brindleton Bay, and Monica in San Myshuno – meaning the only one left is whoever Bernice’s toddler is. As you might imagine, James is thrilled at having to visit her house. XD
So yeah – most of the goals have been smashed out, and now Semaj just needs to find a new DNA donor and get this toddler playdate done, and Krystoff – well. Krystoff still needs to take his new boyfriend to prom (James is hoping that they can have their first kiss there), BUT he was also supposed to score “Average” or better on his exams. But because James has been sending him to school alone, he never got a pop-up stating how well or poorly Krystoff did (possibly because he can’t take the exams without it being an active school day). Meaning we have no idea what happened. And as James is NOT keen on waiting another week to redo the exams properly – well, we’ll see if the final half-hour brings an on-the-fly rules change tomorrow!
Glad I managed all that at least. And now it is time for me to hit the sheets, because I do have work tomorrow -- well, depending on how I'm feeling. We'll see how things go in the morning, I suppose. *sigh* Night all.
