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Meh Rainy Thursday
Sep. 26th, 2024 11:51 pmYeah, kind of a lousy day weather-wise, and not my most productive either, as my to-do list will show --
Work – It was an “okay” day in the office today – I got my flu shot in the morning (which they insisted on doing on the fancy Blue Cross Blue Shield bus instead of in the first floor conference room as usual), then spent pretty much the rest of the day on roster maintenance, broken up by a couple of instances of having to call people to help update their credit card pledges. Got to my lunch and my afternoon break a little late, which was annoying, but they did happen, and without all of yesterday’s fuss, so that was good. And unfortunately I had a bit of a rough ride home thanks to the inclement weather – I swear, the SECOND it starts to rain, the route I take just backs up straight to Hell. *sigh* Took me about a half-hour to get home, which isn’t the worst, but also isn’t the greatest. Hopefully tomorrow will be better!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – penultimate night on the bike, but the final night with “The finale of the Every Life Stage Challenge! - Part 8” by James Turner! Admittedly, I had to watch the last five minutes after supper because the last chunklet was just a BIT too long for my workout, but still the final night. XD Anyway, the challenge did end on a high note, with James:
A) FINALLY finishing off the house, thanks to Krystoff’s constant painting (and no thanks to Vivienne constantly leaving unfinished waffles in the waffle maker and nearly burning the kitchen down at one point) – he updated the living room a bit so it had some actual nice décor in it; updated the kids’ playroom with an arts-n-crafts corner, the playtent shoved up against a bookcase, and a nice toybox; and updated the backyard with a little toddler play area (complete with slide and personal splash pad), a treehouse and swings for the kids, and a pool and grilling station (and a slip-n-slide for those hot summer days)! Granted, the backyard WAS full of mud puddles thanks to the constant rain (there was one even floating over the damn pool), and there were clothes and various kid messes everywhere, but it still looked nice!
B) FINALLY throwing the family reunion (ungoaled, because who needs that extra stress) on a nice sunny Saturday – after spending the Friday before getting Semaj to become friends with Kyrstoff’s husband Raoul so he could also attend (which involved cloudgazing, building the treehouse together, and then abusing Social Bunny when all of that didn’t raise their relationship fast enough XD). As you might imagine, things got pretty chaotic pretty fast, mostly because there were a lot of Sims to wrangle and they all kept slipping in the backyard mud puddles. XD (Poor Mei especially – she once got up from a slip, only to immediately fall over again!) But James was able to keep everyone reasonably happy with the help of his beloved crystal (pay it the proper heed), and even got a fun slip-n-slide line going at one point. So even if it wasn’t officially goaled, I think it was a success!
C) FINALLY getting Semaj and Nalani married during said reunion, which involved Semaj rapidly asking Nalani to be his girlfriend, then proposing, then taking her up to the wedding arch that James had set up on Pablo’s balcony because that’s where they had their first kiss and thus it qualified as “romantic.” XD They ended up getting married all on their own while everyone else was using the slip-n-slide, but it was still a nice moment. :) If also a very silly one, as you could see the slip-n-slide from the balcony. XD But yes, Nalani is finally part of the family – as is Raoul, as Semaj made sure to cheat them both into the family (he can’t move them in by normal means because the household is already “full” according to the game). So by the end of the game, James had a household of ELEVEN Sims. Holy shit. XD
Whew! And that is THAT! And considering that this episode apparently took over EIGHT HOURS to record (over multiple days, James isn’t a masochist), I’m sure James was very happy to wrap it up there. XD But it was a fun little series, and I’m happy I watched it. :) Though, that being said, I am also VERY happy to finally get the chance to move onto the Tiny Town sequel series, since that’s the challenge I myself hope to try one day… Just gotta clear out another couple of GrayStillPlays compilations first!
2. Do something with Valicer In The Dark: No check – unfortunately, it took me longer than anticipated to get through everything else on this to-do list (along with writing the actual to-do list entries), and I never figured out if I wanted to do more worldbuilding stuff or try to get the next story going. *sigh* Well, I did miss Monday and a day of “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” – I guess this keeps things fair?
3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Substitution Check – as the only thing in my Subs was the latest GSP compilation (over two hours of GTA V speedbump-based boards), I instead turned to my Watch Later to clear out my OXBox content for the week –
A) “This is the only videogame to ever make me cry (you'll never guess it)” – Mike telling us viewers about the first and only time a video game has ever made him cry! As you might expect from that title. XD So, what was the unexpected game that made him cry? Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020! And why?
...because his dad was a pilot, and played the original Microsoft Flight Simulators when Mike was a kid...and then died of cancer when Mike was seventeen. Yeah, what made Mike cry was actually seeing the trailer for the game in 2019 and realizing how much his dad would have loved it. :( So yeah, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 has a bit of a special place in his heart...as does the upcoming 2024 version of the game, which Mike was very happy to shill for Microsoft after they gave him a trip to the Grand Canyon to play a bit of it (and compare their digital version of the canyon to the real deal) and allowed him to go up in a real plane and fly it for a bit (with a trained pilot right next to him, of course). Which Mike said he felt “closed the loop” a bit when it came to him and his dad. I imagine it did, Mike. So yeah, sort-of-kind-of sponsored content wrapped in a heartfelt story about Mike’s family. I’ll take it.
B) “7 Basic Weapons You Can Upgrade To Ridiculous Levels” – Jane and Mike talking about those weak weapons in video games that can become absolute BEASTS if you’re willing to put in the time, effort, and upgrade materials! Wondering if that broken sword hilt you start with in Dark Souls can ever become a halfway-decent weapon? Defeat everyone’s favorite fluffy boy Sif and use his soul as an upgrade material, and watch it become the famous greatsword of Sif’s old master Artorias! Figure hero Ichiban Kasuga of Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth should use his Self-Proclaimed Hero’s Bat throughout the game? Get enough rare materials to upgrade it at the garage and watch it become the True Legendary Hero’s Bat – the game’s ultimate weapon (that is not shit-based – yes, apparently that is a thing)! Think it would be funny to have Vincent Valentine from Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus use a child’s model gun in this third-person shooter? Well, if you’re willing to spend a massive amount of gil on it, it can become the second-best weapon in the entire game (though Mike notes that, at this point, you’ve probably replaced every part of the gun to make it so badass, so it’s kind of a Ship Of Theseus situation here). Basically, the moral of this video is, never ditch what looks like a pathetically weak weapon – it could have hidden depths! Or be an April Fool’s joke that the developers are willing to upgrade if you kill enough people with it (hi Payday 2 and the Comically Large Spoon). Either way. XD
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check and very check indeed –
Victor Luvs Alice – Well, earlier today I realized that I hadn’t visited my old FF.net PM friend Ace of Tales’s tumblr in quite some time, so I went and took a look – and discovered that they’re doing desktop wallpaper and smartphone lockscreen commissions now! I decided, “okay, we’ve fallen out of touch, but I really should at least reblog this” – but, of course, time got away from me as per usual tonight, so I decided instead to put it in the queue for tomorrow (raising the queue speed to two per day to accommodate it). So that’s something – hopefully they appreciate it!
Valice Multiverse – Three asks for the old queue tonight –
A) An anon ask for the “universe comparison ask game” (finally realized that I should probably refer to all the universes meeting each other by the thing I tagged the original post as) for “Valicer In The Dark meets Londerland Bloodlines” – I had the VITD trio reacting to LB!Alice’s vampire status by assuming she was like one of THEIR vampires (which are ghosts that have possessed a body – not typically their own – and usually feed by drawing out life essence directly instead of drinking blood), which made LB!Alice go “???” – which was rapidly upgraded to “?!?!” when she learned that their world doesn’t have a sun. XD I was HOPING to get one with another universe reacting to Valicer In The Dark! And it being Londerland Bloodlines was even better, because I’ve often imagined Blades In The Dark looking at the World of Darkness and going “hold my beer” when it comes to being as fucked up as possible. XD
B) Another anon ask for the “universe comparison ask game” for “Fallout Of Darkness meets Secundus” – I had Secundus!Victor being like “you were in the ARMY” to FOD!Victor (who responded “not voluntarily”), with Secundus!Alice then pointing out that the more shocking thing was that FOD!Victor was from the future. Followed rapidly by Secundus!Victor counterpointing that Doc and Marty have a time machine, so timey-wimey stuff is easier for him to accept, and that she hadn’t asked her alternate about being a vampire. XD And then Secundus!Victor asked about the butterflies of the FOD Verse, with FOD!Victor saying he hadn’t seen any and if he had, they would probably be giant monsters trying to kill him. Secundus!Victor’s response was “...if you see a giant butterfly around here it’s not going to be trying to kill you I promise.” XD Oh, I am enjoying these. :)
C) And a final ask from Toonsisters for the Cuddlepile group, stating that every friend group has a dumb one and then looking at Smiler. Causing Victor and Alice to immediately jump to their aid by saying they’re smart and that being cheerful instead of a depressed wreck shouldn’t make them look dumb, and Smiler responding “thanks for defending me, but tone down putting down yourselves.” XD Sorry, Toonsisters, but they ARE protective of each other!
So pretty productive night on tumblr, and I'm glad to have some more stuff out of my Watch Later, but I REALLY wish I'd gotten some writing done. Teach me to think that I can do the YouTube stuff first -- it ALWAYS takes longer than I think it's gonna take! *shakehead* I will attempt to do better tomorrow, on that front and over here (aka REALLY gonna try to get to your messages tomorrow, Moose!). As it currently stands, I do have to hit the sheets -- night all!
Work – It was an “okay” day in the office today – I got my flu shot in the morning (which they insisted on doing on the fancy Blue Cross Blue Shield bus instead of in the first floor conference room as usual), then spent pretty much the rest of the day on roster maintenance, broken up by a couple of instances of having to call people to help update their credit card pledges. Got to my lunch and my afternoon break a little late, which was annoying, but they did happen, and without all of yesterday’s fuss, so that was good. And unfortunately I had a bit of a rough ride home thanks to the inclement weather – I swear, the SECOND it starts to rain, the route I take just backs up straight to Hell. *sigh* Took me about a half-hour to get home, which isn’t the worst, but also isn’t the greatest. Hopefully tomorrow will be better!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – penultimate night on the bike, but the final night with “The finale of the Every Life Stage Challenge! - Part 8” by James Turner! Admittedly, I had to watch the last five minutes after supper because the last chunklet was just a BIT too long for my workout, but still the final night. XD Anyway, the challenge did end on a high note, with James:
A) FINALLY finishing off the house, thanks to Krystoff’s constant painting (and no thanks to Vivienne constantly leaving unfinished waffles in the waffle maker and nearly burning the kitchen down at one point) – he updated the living room a bit so it had some actual nice décor in it; updated the kids’ playroom with an arts-n-crafts corner, the playtent shoved up against a bookcase, and a nice toybox; and updated the backyard with a little toddler play area (complete with slide and personal splash pad), a treehouse and swings for the kids, and a pool and grilling station (and a slip-n-slide for those hot summer days)! Granted, the backyard WAS full of mud puddles thanks to the constant rain (there was one even floating over the damn pool), and there were clothes and various kid messes everywhere, but it still looked nice!
B) FINALLY throwing the family reunion (ungoaled, because who needs that extra stress) on a nice sunny Saturday – after spending the Friday before getting Semaj to become friends with Kyrstoff’s husband Raoul so he could also attend (which involved cloudgazing, building the treehouse together, and then abusing Social Bunny when all of that didn’t raise their relationship fast enough XD). As you might imagine, things got pretty chaotic pretty fast, mostly because there were a lot of Sims to wrangle and they all kept slipping in the backyard mud puddles. XD (Poor Mei especially – she once got up from a slip, only to immediately fall over again!) But James was able to keep everyone reasonably happy with the help of his beloved crystal (pay it the proper heed), and even got a fun slip-n-slide line going at one point. So even if it wasn’t officially goaled, I think it was a success!
C) FINALLY getting Semaj and Nalani married during said reunion, which involved Semaj rapidly asking Nalani to be his girlfriend, then proposing, then taking her up to the wedding arch that James had set up on Pablo’s balcony because that’s where they had their first kiss and thus it qualified as “romantic.” XD They ended up getting married all on their own while everyone else was using the slip-n-slide, but it was still a nice moment. :) If also a very silly one, as you could see the slip-n-slide from the balcony. XD But yes, Nalani is finally part of the family – as is Raoul, as Semaj made sure to cheat them both into the family (he can’t move them in by normal means because the household is already “full” according to the game). So by the end of the game, James had a household of ELEVEN Sims. Holy shit. XD
Whew! And that is THAT! And considering that this episode apparently took over EIGHT HOURS to record (over multiple days, James isn’t a masochist), I’m sure James was very happy to wrap it up there. XD But it was a fun little series, and I’m happy I watched it. :) Though, that being said, I am also VERY happy to finally get the chance to move onto the Tiny Town sequel series, since that’s the challenge I myself hope to try one day… Just gotta clear out another couple of GrayStillPlays compilations first!
2. Do something with Valicer In The Dark: No check – unfortunately, it took me longer than anticipated to get through everything else on this to-do list (along with writing the actual to-do list entries), and I never figured out if I wanted to do more worldbuilding stuff or try to get the next story going. *sigh* Well, I did miss Monday and a day of “Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland” – I guess this keeps things fair?
3. Keep up with YouTube Subs: Substitution Check – as the only thing in my Subs was the latest GSP compilation (over two hours of GTA V speedbump-based boards), I instead turned to my Watch Later to clear out my OXBox content for the week –
A) “This is the only videogame to ever make me cry (you'll never guess it)” – Mike telling us viewers about the first and only time a video game has ever made him cry! As you might expect from that title. XD So, what was the unexpected game that made him cry? Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020! And why?
...because his dad was a pilot, and played the original Microsoft Flight Simulators when Mike was a kid...and then died of cancer when Mike was seventeen. Yeah, what made Mike cry was actually seeing the trailer for the game in 2019 and realizing how much his dad would have loved it. :( So yeah, Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 has a bit of a special place in his heart...as does the upcoming 2024 version of the game, which Mike was very happy to shill for Microsoft after they gave him a trip to the Grand Canyon to play a bit of it (and compare their digital version of the canyon to the real deal) and allowed him to go up in a real plane and fly it for a bit (with a trained pilot right next to him, of course). Which Mike said he felt “closed the loop” a bit when it came to him and his dad. I imagine it did, Mike. So yeah, sort-of-kind-of sponsored content wrapped in a heartfelt story about Mike’s family. I’ll take it.
B) “7 Basic Weapons You Can Upgrade To Ridiculous Levels” – Jane and Mike talking about those weak weapons in video games that can become absolute BEASTS if you’re willing to put in the time, effort, and upgrade materials! Wondering if that broken sword hilt you start with in Dark Souls can ever become a halfway-decent weapon? Defeat everyone’s favorite fluffy boy Sif and use his soul as an upgrade material, and watch it become the famous greatsword of Sif’s old master Artorias! Figure hero Ichiban Kasuga of Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth should use his Self-Proclaimed Hero’s Bat throughout the game? Get enough rare materials to upgrade it at the garage and watch it become the True Legendary Hero’s Bat – the game’s ultimate weapon (that is not shit-based – yes, apparently that is a thing)! Think it would be funny to have Vincent Valentine from Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus use a child’s model gun in this third-person shooter? Well, if you’re willing to spend a massive amount of gil on it, it can become the second-best weapon in the entire game (though Mike notes that, at this point, you’ve probably replaced every part of the gun to make it so badass, so it’s kind of a Ship Of Theseus situation here). Basically, the moral of this video is, never ditch what looks like a pathetically weak weapon – it could have hidden depths! Or be an April Fool’s joke that the developers are willing to upgrade if you kill enough people with it (hi Payday 2 and the Comically Large Spoon). Either way. XD
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check and very check indeed –
Victor Luvs Alice – Well, earlier today I realized that I hadn’t visited my old FF.net PM friend Ace of Tales’s tumblr in quite some time, so I went and took a look – and discovered that they’re doing desktop wallpaper and smartphone lockscreen commissions now! I decided, “okay, we’ve fallen out of touch, but I really should at least reblog this” – but, of course, time got away from me as per usual tonight, so I decided instead to put it in the queue for tomorrow (raising the queue speed to two per day to accommodate it). So that’s something – hopefully they appreciate it!
Valice Multiverse – Three asks for the old queue tonight –
A) An anon ask for the “universe comparison ask game” (finally realized that I should probably refer to all the universes meeting each other by the thing I tagged the original post as) for “Valicer In The Dark meets Londerland Bloodlines” – I had the VITD trio reacting to LB!Alice’s vampire status by assuming she was like one of THEIR vampires (which are ghosts that have possessed a body – not typically their own – and usually feed by drawing out life essence directly instead of drinking blood), which made LB!Alice go “???” – which was rapidly upgraded to “?!?!” when she learned that their world doesn’t have a sun. XD I was HOPING to get one with another universe reacting to Valicer In The Dark! And it being Londerland Bloodlines was even better, because I’ve often imagined Blades In The Dark looking at the World of Darkness and going “hold my beer” when it comes to being as fucked up as possible. XD
B) Another anon ask for the “universe comparison ask game” for “Fallout Of Darkness meets Secundus” – I had Secundus!Victor being like “you were in the ARMY” to FOD!Victor (who responded “not voluntarily”), with Secundus!Alice then pointing out that the more shocking thing was that FOD!Victor was from the future. Followed rapidly by Secundus!Victor counterpointing that Doc and Marty have a time machine, so timey-wimey stuff is easier for him to accept, and that she hadn’t asked her alternate about being a vampire. XD And then Secundus!Victor asked about the butterflies of the FOD Verse, with FOD!Victor saying he hadn’t seen any and if he had, they would probably be giant monsters trying to kill him. Secundus!Victor’s response was “...if you see a giant butterfly around here it’s not going to be trying to kill you I promise.” XD Oh, I am enjoying these. :)
C) And a final ask from Toonsisters for the Cuddlepile group, stating that every friend group has a dumb one and then looking at Smiler. Causing Victor and Alice to immediately jump to their aid by saying they’re smart and that being cheerful instead of a depressed wreck shouldn’t make them look dumb, and Smiler responding “thanks for defending me, but tone down putting down yourselves.” XD Sorry, Toonsisters, but they ARE protective of each other!
So pretty productive night on tumblr, and I'm glad to have some more stuff out of my Watch Later, but I REALLY wish I'd gotten some writing done. Teach me to think that I can do the YouTube stuff first -- it ALWAYS takes longer than I think it's gonna take! *shakehead* I will attempt to do better tomorrow, on that front and over here (aka REALLY gonna try to get to your messages tomorrow, Moose!). As it currently stands, I do have to hit the sheets -- night all!
