Kinda Long Thursday
Apr. 23rd, 2026 11:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
crossover_chickBit of a boring day at work, I'm afraid, and not much happening at home either -- other than the Workout Video Write-Up, which you will see below. At least the weather was nicer today -- mid 60s and sunny. :) I will take it, especially after the chill we've been suffering the past few days! Anyway, let's get straight into it:
Work – As I stated above, it was a pretty damn quiet Thursday at work – I spent most of the day just matching up pledge card scans to donor ID numbers to make it easier to look them up later! There just wasn’t much else to do! But I did accomplish a handful of other things –
A) Calling a parish to try and get an updated address for a donor to resend some returned mail...only to discover they too were having trouble with returned mail and had to get the updated address themselves. *shrug* At least I know it’s not just us?
B) Taking a credit card call from one of the people I e-mailed about forgetting their expiration date when they first submitted their gift (good to see those e-mails ARE working)
C) Calling back a lady who left a message asking if we’d gotten her check and leaving her a message saying I didn’t see it yet (as it’s the time of year where things get Delayed), but I’d keep an eye out for it for her
D) Putting on some more Easter Collection gifts after lunch
E) And puttering around in a spreadsheet of 2025 Appeal gifts that still have balances (that is now very much out of date, and which I haven’t touched since February because of everything ELSE going on) and seeing which ones had since been paid off...which led to me discovering a check to the food bank that had been posted to someone’s record as an Appeal gift in error. Whoops. Gotta fix that tomorrow!
So yeah – nothing terribly exciting! Except maybe that last bit, but we’ll send the donor a check for the money so she can put it toward the CORRECT charity. We’ll see how Friday goes!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – another night on the bike, another night with The Adventures Of Grace And Leon In The Terrible Care Center, as I pedaled my way through –
A) The very end of “Let's Play Resident Evil Requiem: GRACE'S BOSS IS THE WORST | Episode 1!” The last five minutes of which featured:
I. Leon, having chainsawed his way through a bolted door (and broken his chainsaw in the process; everyone was very sad), going upstairs and coming across Grace escaping from the Bug-Eyed Giant Monster that had been chasing her – Leon proceeded to watch as Grace was grabbed by the monster and dragged back into the spooky dark hallways beyond because we already saw this bit with Grace and knew he didn’t immediately intervene, while Andy made another joke about him needing like eight business days to respond to these threats. (My question is, how the fuck did Grace not see Leon, given he was RIGHT IN FRONT OF HER?)
II. Leon eventually using his big fancy hand cannon (taken from RE4 and now named, appropriately, Requiem) to kill the bug-eyed monster, allowing Grace to escape onto the balcony into the light; Leon introduced himself as from the DSO (don’t know what that is, but Grace eventually recognized it as a counter-bioterrorism organization), Grace introduced herself as from the FBI and said she’d been kidnapped, and Leon said they needed to get out of here –
Prompting Victor Gideon, who was lurking at the end of the darkened hall, to activate a lockdown, bringing the original screen crashing down between them again and lowering a big old metal shutter to completely cut them off from each other. Whoops! Not getting out of the Standard RE Mansion that easily!
III. Leon attempting to learn from Grace why Victor grabbed her – but after it became obvious that she had no idea and was basically just panicking, he chose to instead hand over Requiem so she’d have something to protect herself with before they were separated (aw)
IV. Leon preparing to confront Victor G as he approached from the end of the hallway, stating they should have a little chat – unfortunately, his attempt to pull some of his sick moves on the guy was cut short by Victor’s signature move of “grabbing his opponent around the throat and choking them out because he’s a hulking monster man.” Though before he rendered Leon unconscious, he noted some worrying dark patches on his throat and said that Leon was apparently “showing symptoms too” of the same “Raccoon City Syndrome” that was killing the other survivors… D: Not good! Come on, games, Leon already went through this shit with Las Plagas in RE4!
V. And the episode ending with Andy getting control of Grace again, preparing to explore the mansion and engage in more RE7/RE8-style first-person horror antics!
Yeah, uh, they packed a lot into those five minutes. XD
B) And the first half-hour of “Let's Play Resident Evil Requiem: ZOMBIE CHEF! ZOMBIE SINGER! ZOMBIE BABY? | Episode 2!” Which opened with a parody of the dramatic titles that the game keeps slapping on the screen (like “GRACE Wrenwood” or “ELBRIDGE A Few Minutes Ago”) reading “TWO Episode” because the titles are never consistent about what should be emphasized on top. XD Anyway, the first-half hour of Two Episode included:
I. Andy finding a save room right off the side of the lobby with a storage box in it, and IMMEDIATELY dumping Leon’s hand cannon Requiem in there as he didn’t want to use it yet on any of the piddly enemies that were coming up, certain the game would provide less end-gamey guns as he went along – Mike immediately accused him of having “hoarding the awesome thing the game gives you until you get to the end and lose the opportunity to use it” tendencies, while Jane joked that Andy wanted to be buried with the hand cannon XD
II. Grace descending the stairs off the side of the save room toward The World’s Most Ominously Lit Door, and discovering on the other side a dying scientist and a pair of disturbingly-monochrome glass-fronted prison cells of sorts – Andy immediately made the comparison to Magneto’s famous plastic prison from X-2: X-Men United
III. Grace meeting the equally-monochrome little girl who lived in one of the chambers, who had strange milky white eyes and was reading a book via braille to indicate she was blind – Mike promptly complained/wondered about why media so often makes blind people’s eyes pure white, with Andy pointing out it was a convenient visual shorthand to indicate the lack of sight. And then RE9 further justified the kid’s weird eyes by Grace looking at her and realizing she had cataracts – Mike, however, was not dissuaded and pointed out you could get surgery for those. Andy promptly joked that was why the girl was at the care center XD
IV. Grace trying to get some answers out of the kid about what was going on and why she was in there, only for the kid to just ominously state “Everyone’s gone” and the dying scientist to demand that Grace get away from the kid before succumbing to his wounds. The trio promptly gave Grace shit for putting her arms nice and close to his mouth before he died, because, you know, Resident Evil game. At least she got the guy’s West Wing keycard and flashlight!
V. Andy making Grace examine the other chamber in the room, which was empty thanks to a tiny escape tunnel dug into the side – Mike wondered if the bug-eyed monster they’d just been pursued by had been the other test subject, but it was pointed out to him her CLOTHES wouldn’t have grown with her...unless they were magical Hulk stretchy clothes :p)
VI. Andy sending Grace to explore the West Wing...only to turn around and have her put away an antique coin she found right after swiping the keycard because girl did NOT have much in the way of inventory space – many jokes were made about the fact that Grace was a woman and thus had clothes whose pockets were largely only decorative
VII. Grace exploring the West Wing (Mike managed to stop himself making all sorts of political jokes) and discovering a door with a unicorn on it that obviously needed some sort of fancy medallion to open; Mike wondered if there was just one architect who ran around being an absolute menace with his ridiculous lock systems in the RE universe (and – there might very well be? I’m pretty sure some flavor text in RE7 indicates that the Baker house was built by the same lunatic who designed the Spencer mansion from the first game)
VIII. Grace encountering a big old chef zombie hacking up viscera in the kitchen (which she had to cut through as she didn’t have the security clearance to get through a nearby door) and having to carefully push a cart of soup/blood/blood soup out of her way to get through the door on the other side of him without attracting too much attention (ducking back behind some nearby storage shelves whenever he started to notice her) – the gang joked about the poor guy’s previous life as a nice human chef, “making breakfast smoothies for all the patients” and “manning the pancake station.” Andy also asked Mike how many Requiem shots he thought the chef would take (Mike said “just one,” to Andy’s mild surprise) – prompting Jane to reveal that she’d missed that Leon’s gun was called Requiem. They ended up having a good laugh over the idea of the game being named for Leon’s gun XD
IX. Grace spotting a zombie butler fiddling with a light switch and a zombie maid trying to clean the bathroom while skulking around looking for useful items in the hallway beyond the kitchen, prompting Jane to ask Mike what he’d be doing if he became a zombie – Mike immediately said “sleeping.” XD Andy asked “so how would you be different from a corpse,” and Jane pointed out that he’d have to do it angrily, so they settled on he’d be tossing and turning constantly. Andy, when presented with the same question, admitted he’d probably be playing Resident Evil XD
X. Grace successfully luring the butler zombie out of her path by turning on a light switch down the end of the hall she was at, causing him to come and turn it out – the gang joked he was like a dad trying to save some cash on the electric bill XD
XI. Grace coming across the horrifying dining room, where a zombie was feasting on human viscera on the table, and FINALLY acquiring a gun from next to one of the dead guys on the floor – greatly relieving Mike, who had been VERY CONCERNED about her wandering around with no proper weapon. And then Andy delightedly informed everyone that he had no BULLETS and the concern continued XD
XII. The gang hearing mysterious singing/wailing as Grace climbed into a storage room through the window (scoring herself two bullets – “one for the zombies and one for myself” as per Andy) and Mike commenting that he figured this was what went on in every posh mansion – spooky singing and (after Andy asked) feasting on the flesh of the proles XD
XIII. Grace proceeding onward and having to shoot her first zombie coming at her down a nearby set of stairs – Mike noted the guy did pretty well not falling over when Grace shot him in the knee, and after Andy took him out, Jane admitted she would have liked to have seen the zombie fall all the way down the stairs (and, actually, when they came BACK to the stairs, the corpse HAD slid all the way down them…)
XIV. Grace encountering a door into what was later revealed to be Cold Storage, locked by one of those big turny wheels – everyone was happy to see the cranking thing they needed was already in place on there as Grace began to turn it –
And then Grace ended up straight-up ripping off the wheel. *facepalm* Well, it wouldn’t be a RE game if you didn’t have to solve a puzzle to open all the important doors! (Mike jokingly said that they should have made a list of all the standard RE tropes that had already appeared in this game.)
XV. Andy having to combine a bunch of herbs in Grace’s inventory to make space prompting Jane to comment about how she always carries a large bag around, and how that would give her SO much inventory space in this game – Andy joked that she’d be able to fit a rocket launcher in there
XVI. The gang discovering that the Care Center had a bar and lounge (complete with a spooky singing zombie inside – fortunately she was easily sneaked past) – Mike was delighted by the idea of karaoke zombies, while Jane admitted that she wouldn’t have minded going to the center for a spa break if this stuff was on offer XD
XVII. Grace finding a helpful note tucked into a scientist’s bloodied coat where they commented that they’d need the chairman’s quartz to get out given the lockdown and asking what the hell was going on with their colleagues killing each other – they promptly made fun of the note-writer for jotting something down to remind themselves they were freaked out XD (Andy: “Dear Jane – you are scared.” Jane, laughing: “Don’t forget, be scared”)
XVIII. Grace locating the chairman’s office and finding within a unicorn trinket box, a weird sort of slot-machine-thing that had symbols of the moon, the sun, and a star on its rotating wheels, a journal with a ripped-out page (though the puzzle was not to find the missing page, but to find a pencil to shade the page that had been just below it to see what had been written there), a printout of an e-mail (stating that a new hire had shown promise, so he should have his security bumped up a level so he could start working on the project...followed by a comment about sending the current researcher for “processing…”), and the zombified chairman – who was eating an unfortunate employee in such a way that it looked rather, uh, SUGGESTIVE, especially with their lower halves concealed behind his desk. XD Mike promptly accused Andy of interrupting an intimate moment :p
XIX. Grace claiming a pencil from the desk and going to shade the paper in the journal to find out what the ripped-out page said – Andy was rather happy that they got to manually do it like in Phoenix Wright, while Jane demanded he do a star or other fun design – he obliged her with a smiley face :p
XX. Grace claiming the necessary moon quartz cube from the sort-of-slot machine and the red gem to open the unicorn door from the unicorn box – only to run up against her limited inventory for the latter; cue Andy accidentally wasting a med injector while trying to figure out what he could ditch, whoops. At least that freed up room for the gem!
XXI. Andy looking at the map to determine where they had and hadn’t been, and Jane noting with confusion that there was a kitchen on the ground floor, but a kitchenette up on the second floor – Andy posited that it was so they could do hot sandwiches for the bar patrons, with Mike adding in “nachos” – cue Andy admitting he’d quite like some nachos
XXII. Grace unlocking the unicorn door to reveal a gambling room, of all things – with special prizes (like a hip bag to increase Grace’s inventory space) contained in glass cases on the side, purchased with antique coins! Everyone was like “this is the best hospital I’ve ever seen,” with Mike noting this hospital was DEFINITELY not for “alcoholics and gambling addicts.” They also, after being briefly and lightly jumpscared by seeing the chef at the door (now wandering about), gave the roulette wheel a spin – Mike said “always bet on black” while Andy guessed “7 Red” and Jane guessed “42 Red – wait, is that a thing?” XD It ended up in 15 Black, so Mike won :p
XXIII. Grace heading back into the lobby area and finding the door that she needed to slot her moon quartz cube into (though, of course, she needed two more to actually get it open) – Jane wondered why no characters ever seemed to go “what the eff is this lock,” but Andy pointed out that Grace HAD openly wondered how people usually got into the gambling room when they first stepped in, so the whole thing HAD been appropriately lampshaded
XXIV. Grace grabbing the antique coin she stored in her item box before heading back to the gambling room to buy herself a hip pouch – Mike warned Andy to “watch out for the chef” as she entered the East Wing, only for Andy to dismissively be like “yeah, yeah, he’s probably not even here” –
And then turn the corner and nearly walk into the guy. XD Fortunately he was right next to the doors back to the lobby so he was able to flee before anything happened to Grace and try all that nonsense again, but DAMN. Talk about instant consequences for fate-tempting! XD
XXV. Grace getting her hip bag (while Jane wondered at what point the FBI would notice Grace missing and maybe send someone to look for her), then cutting through the kitchen into the hallway beyond and deciding to investigate the bathroom the maid was “cleaning” with blood – cue Andy investigating the various stalls, and flushing the toilet in one (which also had a bathtub of blood)...and then having the temerity to act SURPRISED when the maid naturally came to investigate and attacked poor Grace. XD Andy, dude, come on
XXVI. Grace exploring the West Wing looking for goodies she may have missed and stumbling across a scale model of the Care Center – cue the gang being impressed...and then remarking it looked like the building in the Paris level of the original Hitman (No Subtitle) XD
XXVII. Grace unlocking a shortcut to the balcony level in the lobby past the chairman’s office (after shooting a zombie that apologized as it died, surprising everyone), and then heading back down to the West Wing entrance as Jane wondered if there were any Lady D-esque enemies in the game; Andy pointed out that the Chef probably counted, but Jane noted he wasn’t as relentless as Lady D – cue Mike going “But he is just as hauntingly attractive” to everyone’s amusement
XXVIII. Grace returning to the gambling room to make a down payment on a drug to make her better at shooting, then investigating near the dead scientist there to find a severed hand clutching an East Wing keycard – the trio noted that he must have loved that keycard so, to keep a hold of it even when his arm came off; Jane then noted that they had a “world of opportunity” as they could open any Level I door – only for the boys to dash those hopes by pointing out it was just the keycard to open the East Wing. Jane was very annoyed that the keycard was NOT the keycard she’d wanted
XXIX. And Grace entering the East Wing (aka the hospital wing – the gang bemoaned the lack of fun bars and casino rooms), smashing a dancing raccoon statue to collect it, then going into a room to find a corpse with a bag over its head, its chest torn open, and its organs removed – Mike immediately was like “was that the guy we saw smothered before?!” but Jane and Andy reminded him that happened eight years before according to the game. XD Mike defended himself by noting bodies tended to stick around a LONG time after death in this series. XD
*looks at the above* ...yeah, that was probably too much detail, wasn’t it? I’m sorry, there’s just a lot of good moments, and I get caught up in documenting as many of them as I can find...anyway, I left off with Grace finding a “hemolytic injector” that could stop corpses from mutating and stealthily take out enemies – Andy promptly refused to use it on the first enemy he came across that was clearly supposed to tutorialize its use. XD Tomorrow, we see what happens to poor Grace, and if I can TRY to be at least a LITTLE briefer in my damn sum-ups.
2. Continue edits on Chapter 5 of “The Van Dort Vacancy”: Check – got another page sorted tonight, covering:
A) Steven and Alan the guards being initially startled by Barnaby’s appearance, before Alan realized he was one of the toffs from the party – Barnaby claimed he just needed to get out of that stuffy ballroom and see the other wonders of the mansion, and stated he’d heard the vault was down here somewhere and it really was a sight to see, especially given the Van Dorts are in trade. Steven snorted and assured him it was, but he wasn’t getting in to see it without Mr. or Mrs. Van Dort present, as it was their duty to guard the place; Alan agreed, adding that they got paid a prettypenny slug for it
B) Barnaby praising their efforts and stating that Nell told him her security staff was the cream of the crop – Steven just took the compliment, but Alan ended up a little confused, stating “Mrs. Van Dort said that?” Barnaby quickly bluffed that she just put on the tough, never-satisfied act in front of them, then had Smiler offer them the gin as a reward for “standing around and looking tough,” saying she’d approved it – Steven and Alan were a little hesitant at first, but fortunately decided that maybe Nell was in a better mood because she was getting to show off how rich she was to all the nobs at her party
C) Barnaby adding “Victor having reappeared” as a reason for Nell to be happy – only for the guards to scoff and say that if Victor showed up NOW, Nell would be furious because of him screwing up his wedding. Steven commented that if Victor had any sense, he’d risk a train ride to another city rather than come back and get a bollocking from his mam (excuse his language), while Alan said that the only way Nell would be happy to see Victor would be if he was being delivered by the Spirit Wardens as ashes in a vase :( Yeah, uh, as you might imagine, Victor will be feeling A Way about that…
D) Smiler and Barnaby, upon hearing that, encouraging the guards to drink up before Nell went on the warpath again, and the guards taking the bait and downing their gins (in one long swig – Barnaby couldn’t help a wince). However, most unfortunately for our heroes, it seems like Steven at least knows what slumber essence tastes like…
And I left off with Steven accusing Barnaby and Smiler of drugging the glasses. Tomorrow, he tries calling for help, the guards go down, and Victor gets to explain to everyone that they’re at the entrance to the entrance to the vault. If that makes any sense. :p
3. Watch something on YouTube: Check, surprisingly – mostly because I watched it before I went down to work out. :p “It” being “Coyote vs. ACME | Official Trailer” by Coyote vs. Acme and Ketchup Entertainment! The first trailer for a new mixed animation/live action Looney Tunes film coming out, which featured both:
A) A look at the plot – namely, Wile E. Coyote deciding to sue ACME with the help of a human lawyer (who apparently specializes in getting settlements for toons hurt by ACME products), only for the pair and their friends to stumble upon some sort of bigger conspiracy (possibly headed up by, of all toons, Foghorn Leghorn – and of all people, John Cena, what is this movie)
B) Ketchup Entertainment busting Warner Bros’s chops about this being one of the films they made and then immediately shelved for tax write-off purposes...until Ketchup got its hands on the movie and decided to release it, with Foghorn EXPLICITLY CLAIMING at the end that they were releasing it purely for accounting purposes XD
So yeah, that was fun. :P Movie itself apparently comes out at the end of August – we’ll see how it does in theaters!
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – nothing happening over on Valice Multiverse again, but I did get my queue for Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler) all sorted, I’m pleased to say –
A) First, this morning, I tossed in that cute Emily fanart from nuri4ever that I got from Sunday’s tag crawl for today, and “The Devil’s Wheel” by creepyclothdoll (the story about a woman, the Devil, a carnival wheel, a deal of three million in exchange for a man dying, and an awesome twist) for Friday
B) Then, tonight, I tossed in a reblog of my Song Saturday post for “Boom Boom Clap” by Charlie XCX! Because I listened to the song this morning, remembered how much I liked it and its Valicer vibes, and decided it needed to be featured again. :) I mean, the last time I reblogged it WAS two years ago, so…
So that’s all good, hooray! Now I just have to figure out next week’s queue...
...yes, I understand that was a very long entry for a rather boring day, but -- again, too much detail about the RE9 video. One day I will learn to rein it in again. As it stands, though, I gotta hit the sheets. Night all!
Work – As I stated above, it was a pretty damn quiet Thursday at work – I spent most of the day just matching up pledge card scans to donor ID numbers to make it easier to look them up later! There just wasn’t much else to do! But I did accomplish a handful of other things –
A) Calling a parish to try and get an updated address for a donor to resend some returned mail...only to discover they too were having trouble with returned mail and had to get the updated address themselves. *shrug* At least I know it’s not just us?
B) Taking a credit card call from one of the people I e-mailed about forgetting their expiration date when they first submitted their gift (good to see those e-mails ARE working)
C) Calling back a lady who left a message asking if we’d gotten her check and leaving her a message saying I didn’t see it yet (as it’s the time of year where things get Delayed), but I’d keep an eye out for it for her
D) Putting on some more Easter Collection gifts after lunch
E) And puttering around in a spreadsheet of 2025 Appeal gifts that still have balances (that is now very much out of date, and which I haven’t touched since February because of everything ELSE going on) and seeing which ones had since been paid off...which led to me discovering a check to the food bank that had been posted to someone’s record as an Appeal gift in error. Whoops. Gotta fix that tomorrow!
So yeah – nothing terribly exciting! Except maybe that last bit, but we’ll send the donor a check for the money so she can put it toward the CORRECT charity. We’ll see how Friday goes!
To-Do List –
1. Get in a workout: Check – another night on the bike, another night with The Adventures Of Grace And Leon In The Terrible Care Center, as I pedaled my way through –
A) The very end of “Let's Play Resident Evil Requiem: GRACE'S BOSS IS THE WORST | Episode 1!” The last five minutes of which featured:
I. Leon, having chainsawed his way through a bolted door (and broken his chainsaw in the process; everyone was very sad), going upstairs and coming across Grace escaping from the Bug-Eyed Giant Monster that had been chasing her – Leon proceeded to watch as Grace was grabbed by the monster and dragged back into the spooky dark hallways beyond because we already saw this bit with Grace and knew he didn’t immediately intervene, while Andy made another joke about him needing like eight business days to respond to these threats. (My question is, how the fuck did Grace not see Leon, given he was RIGHT IN FRONT OF HER?)
II. Leon eventually using his big fancy hand cannon (taken from RE4 and now named, appropriately, Requiem) to kill the bug-eyed monster, allowing Grace to escape onto the balcony into the light; Leon introduced himself as from the DSO (don’t know what that is, but Grace eventually recognized it as a counter-bioterrorism organization), Grace introduced herself as from the FBI and said she’d been kidnapped, and Leon said they needed to get out of here –
Prompting Victor Gideon, who was lurking at the end of the darkened hall, to activate a lockdown, bringing the original screen crashing down between them again and lowering a big old metal shutter to completely cut them off from each other. Whoops! Not getting out of the Standard RE Mansion that easily!
III. Leon attempting to learn from Grace why Victor grabbed her – but after it became obvious that she had no idea and was basically just panicking, he chose to instead hand over Requiem so she’d have something to protect herself with before they were separated (aw)
IV. Leon preparing to confront Victor G as he approached from the end of the hallway, stating they should have a little chat – unfortunately, his attempt to pull some of his sick moves on the guy was cut short by Victor’s signature move of “grabbing his opponent around the throat and choking them out because he’s a hulking monster man.” Though before he rendered Leon unconscious, he noted some worrying dark patches on his throat and said that Leon was apparently “showing symptoms too” of the same “Raccoon City Syndrome” that was killing the other survivors… D: Not good! Come on, games, Leon already went through this shit with Las Plagas in RE4!
V. And the episode ending with Andy getting control of Grace again, preparing to explore the mansion and engage in more RE7/RE8-style first-person horror antics!
Yeah, uh, they packed a lot into those five minutes. XD
B) And the first half-hour of “Let's Play Resident Evil Requiem: ZOMBIE CHEF! ZOMBIE SINGER! ZOMBIE BABY? | Episode 2!” Which opened with a parody of the dramatic titles that the game keeps slapping on the screen (like “GRACE Wrenwood” or “ELBRIDGE A Few Minutes Ago”) reading “TWO Episode” because the titles are never consistent about what should be emphasized on top. XD Anyway, the first-half hour of Two Episode included:
I. Andy finding a save room right off the side of the lobby with a storage box in it, and IMMEDIATELY dumping Leon’s hand cannon Requiem in there as he didn’t want to use it yet on any of the piddly enemies that were coming up, certain the game would provide less end-gamey guns as he went along – Mike immediately accused him of having “hoarding the awesome thing the game gives you until you get to the end and lose the opportunity to use it” tendencies, while Jane joked that Andy wanted to be buried with the hand cannon XD
II. Grace descending the stairs off the side of the save room toward The World’s Most Ominously Lit Door, and discovering on the other side a dying scientist and a pair of disturbingly-monochrome glass-fronted prison cells of sorts – Andy immediately made the comparison to Magneto’s famous plastic prison from X-2: X-Men United
III. Grace meeting the equally-monochrome little girl who lived in one of the chambers, who had strange milky white eyes and was reading a book via braille to indicate she was blind – Mike promptly complained/wondered about why media so often makes blind people’s eyes pure white, with Andy pointing out it was a convenient visual shorthand to indicate the lack of sight. And then RE9 further justified the kid’s weird eyes by Grace looking at her and realizing she had cataracts – Mike, however, was not dissuaded and pointed out you could get surgery for those. Andy promptly joked that was why the girl was at the care center XD
IV. Grace trying to get some answers out of the kid about what was going on and why she was in there, only for the kid to just ominously state “Everyone’s gone” and the dying scientist to demand that Grace get away from the kid before succumbing to his wounds. The trio promptly gave Grace shit for putting her arms nice and close to his mouth before he died, because, you know, Resident Evil game. At least she got the guy’s West Wing keycard and flashlight!
V. Andy making Grace examine the other chamber in the room, which was empty thanks to a tiny escape tunnel dug into the side – Mike wondered if the bug-eyed monster they’d just been pursued by had been the other test subject, but it was pointed out to him her CLOTHES wouldn’t have grown with her...unless they were magical Hulk stretchy clothes :p)
VI. Andy sending Grace to explore the West Wing...only to turn around and have her put away an antique coin she found right after swiping the keycard because girl did NOT have much in the way of inventory space – many jokes were made about the fact that Grace was a woman and thus had clothes whose pockets were largely only decorative
VII. Grace exploring the West Wing (Mike managed to stop himself making all sorts of political jokes) and discovering a door with a unicorn on it that obviously needed some sort of fancy medallion to open; Mike wondered if there was just one architect who ran around being an absolute menace with his ridiculous lock systems in the RE universe (and – there might very well be? I’m pretty sure some flavor text in RE7 indicates that the Baker house was built by the same lunatic who designed the Spencer mansion from the first game)
VIII. Grace encountering a big old chef zombie hacking up viscera in the kitchen (which she had to cut through as she didn’t have the security clearance to get through a nearby door) and having to carefully push a cart of soup/blood/blood soup out of her way to get through the door on the other side of him without attracting too much attention (ducking back behind some nearby storage shelves whenever he started to notice her) – the gang joked about the poor guy’s previous life as a nice human chef, “making breakfast smoothies for all the patients” and “manning the pancake station.” Andy also asked Mike how many Requiem shots he thought the chef would take (Mike said “just one,” to Andy’s mild surprise) – prompting Jane to reveal that she’d missed that Leon’s gun was called Requiem. They ended up having a good laugh over the idea of the game being named for Leon’s gun XD
IX. Grace spotting a zombie butler fiddling with a light switch and a zombie maid trying to clean the bathroom while skulking around looking for useful items in the hallway beyond the kitchen, prompting Jane to ask Mike what he’d be doing if he became a zombie – Mike immediately said “sleeping.” XD Andy asked “so how would you be different from a corpse,” and Jane pointed out that he’d have to do it angrily, so they settled on he’d be tossing and turning constantly. Andy, when presented with the same question, admitted he’d probably be playing Resident Evil XD
X. Grace successfully luring the butler zombie out of her path by turning on a light switch down the end of the hall she was at, causing him to come and turn it out – the gang joked he was like a dad trying to save some cash on the electric bill XD
XI. Grace coming across the horrifying dining room, where a zombie was feasting on human viscera on the table, and FINALLY acquiring a gun from next to one of the dead guys on the floor – greatly relieving Mike, who had been VERY CONCERNED about her wandering around with no proper weapon. And then Andy delightedly informed everyone that he had no BULLETS and the concern continued XD
XII. The gang hearing mysterious singing/wailing as Grace climbed into a storage room through the window (scoring herself two bullets – “one for the zombies and one for myself” as per Andy) and Mike commenting that he figured this was what went on in every posh mansion – spooky singing and (after Andy asked) feasting on the flesh of the proles XD
XIII. Grace proceeding onward and having to shoot her first zombie coming at her down a nearby set of stairs – Mike noted the guy did pretty well not falling over when Grace shot him in the knee, and after Andy took him out, Jane admitted she would have liked to have seen the zombie fall all the way down the stairs (and, actually, when they came BACK to the stairs, the corpse HAD slid all the way down them…)
XIV. Grace encountering a door into what was later revealed to be Cold Storage, locked by one of those big turny wheels – everyone was happy to see the cranking thing they needed was already in place on there as Grace began to turn it –
And then Grace ended up straight-up ripping off the wheel. *facepalm* Well, it wouldn’t be a RE game if you didn’t have to solve a puzzle to open all the important doors! (Mike jokingly said that they should have made a list of all the standard RE tropes that had already appeared in this game.)
XV. Andy having to combine a bunch of herbs in Grace’s inventory to make space prompting Jane to comment about how she always carries a large bag around, and how that would give her SO much inventory space in this game – Andy joked that she’d be able to fit a rocket launcher in there
XVI. The gang discovering that the Care Center had a bar and lounge (complete with a spooky singing zombie inside – fortunately she was easily sneaked past) – Mike was delighted by the idea of karaoke zombies, while Jane admitted that she wouldn’t have minded going to the center for a spa break if this stuff was on offer XD
XVII. Grace finding a helpful note tucked into a scientist’s bloodied coat where they commented that they’d need the chairman’s quartz to get out given the lockdown and asking what the hell was going on with their colleagues killing each other – they promptly made fun of the note-writer for jotting something down to remind themselves they were freaked out XD (Andy: “Dear Jane – you are scared.” Jane, laughing: “Don’t forget, be scared”)
XVIII. Grace locating the chairman’s office and finding within a unicorn trinket box, a weird sort of slot-machine-thing that had symbols of the moon, the sun, and a star on its rotating wheels, a journal with a ripped-out page (though the puzzle was not to find the missing page, but to find a pencil to shade the page that had been just below it to see what had been written there), a printout of an e-mail (stating that a new hire had shown promise, so he should have his security bumped up a level so he could start working on the project...followed by a comment about sending the current researcher for “processing…”), and the zombified chairman – who was eating an unfortunate employee in such a way that it looked rather, uh, SUGGESTIVE, especially with their lower halves concealed behind his desk. XD Mike promptly accused Andy of interrupting an intimate moment :p
XIX. Grace claiming a pencil from the desk and going to shade the paper in the journal to find out what the ripped-out page said – Andy was rather happy that they got to manually do it like in Phoenix Wright, while Jane demanded he do a star or other fun design – he obliged her with a smiley face :p
XX. Grace claiming the necessary moon quartz cube from the sort-of-slot machine and the red gem to open the unicorn door from the unicorn box – only to run up against her limited inventory for the latter; cue Andy accidentally wasting a med injector while trying to figure out what he could ditch, whoops. At least that freed up room for the gem!
XXI. Andy looking at the map to determine where they had and hadn’t been, and Jane noting with confusion that there was a kitchen on the ground floor, but a kitchenette up on the second floor – Andy posited that it was so they could do hot sandwiches for the bar patrons, with Mike adding in “nachos” – cue Andy admitting he’d quite like some nachos
XXII. Grace unlocking the unicorn door to reveal a gambling room, of all things – with special prizes (like a hip bag to increase Grace’s inventory space) contained in glass cases on the side, purchased with antique coins! Everyone was like “this is the best hospital I’ve ever seen,” with Mike noting this hospital was DEFINITELY not for “alcoholics and gambling addicts.” They also, after being briefly and lightly jumpscared by seeing the chef at the door (now wandering about), gave the roulette wheel a spin – Mike said “always bet on black” while Andy guessed “7 Red” and Jane guessed “42 Red – wait, is that a thing?” XD It ended up in 15 Black, so Mike won :p
XXIII. Grace heading back into the lobby area and finding the door that she needed to slot her moon quartz cube into (though, of course, she needed two more to actually get it open) – Jane wondered why no characters ever seemed to go “what the eff is this lock,” but Andy pointed out that Grace HAD openly wondered how people usually got into the gambling room when they first stepped in, so the whole thing HAD been appropriately lampshaded
XXIV. Grace grabbing the antique coin she stored in her item box before heading back to the gambling room to buy herself a hip pouch – Mike warned Andy to “watch out for the chef” as she entered the East Wing, only for Andy to dismissively be like “yeah, yeah, he’s probably not even here” –
And then turn the corner and nearly walk into the guy. XD Fortunately he was right next to the doors back to the lobby so he was able to flee before anything happened to Grace and try all that nonsense again, but DAMN. Talk about instant consequences for fate-tempting! XD
XXV. Grace getting her hip bag (while Jane wondered at what point the FBI would notice Grace missing and maybe send someone to look for her), then cutting through the kitchen into the hallway beyond and deciding to investigate the bathroom the maid was “cleaning” with blood – cue Andy investigating the various stalls, and flushing the toilet in one (which also had a bathtub of blood)...and then having the temerity to act SURPRISED when the maid naturally came to investigate and attacked poor Grace. XD Andy, dude, come on
XXVI. Grace exploring the West Wing looking for goodies she may have missed and stumbling across a scale model of the Care Center – cue the gang being impressed...and then remarking it looked like the building in the Paris level of the original Hitman (No Subtitle) XD
XXVII. Grace unlocking a shortcut to the balcony level in the lobby past the chairman’s office (after shooting a zombie that apologized as it died, surprising everyone), and then heading back down to the West Wing entrance as Jane wondered if there were any Lady D-esque enemies in the game; Andy pointed out that the Chef probably counted, but Jane noted he wasn’t as relentless as Lady D – cue Mike going “But he is just as hauntingly attractive” to everyone’s amusement
XXVIII. Grace returning to the gambling room to make a down payment on a drug to make her better at shooting, then investigating near the dead scientist there to find a severed hand clutching an East Wing keycard – the trio noted that he must have loved that keycard so, to keep a hold of it even when his arm came off; Jane then noted that they had a “world of opportunity” as they could open any Level I door – only for the boys to dash those hopes by pointing out it was just the keycard to open the East Wing. Jane was very annoyed that the keycard was NOT the keycard she’d wanted
XXIX. And Grace entering the East Wing (aka the hospital wing – the gang bemoaned the lack of fun bars and casino rooms), smashing a dancing raccoon statue to collect it, then going into a room to find a corpse with a bag over its head, its chest torn open, and its organs removed – Mike immediately was like “was that the guy we saw smothered before?!” but Jane and Andy reminded him that happened eight years before according to the game. XD Mike defended himself by noting bodies tended to stick around a LONG time after death in this series. XD
*looks at the above* ...yeah, that was probably too much detail, wasn’t it? I’m sorry, there’s just a lot of good moments, and I get caught up in documenting as many of them as I can find...anyway, I left off with Grace finding a “hemolytic injector” that could stop corpses from mutating and stealthily take out enemies – Andy promptly refused to use it on the first enemy he came across that was clearly supposed to tutorialize its use. XD Tomorrow, we see what happens to poor Grace, and if I can TRY to be at least a LITTLE briefer in my damn sum-ups.
2. Continue edits on Chapter 5 of “The Van Dort Vacancy”: Check – got another page sorted tonight, covering:
A) Steven and Alan the guards being initially startled by Barnaby’s appearance, before Alan realized he was one of the toffs from the party – Barnaby claimed he just needed to get out of that stuffy ballroom and see the other wonders of the mansion, and stated he’d heard the vault was down here somewhere and it really was a sight to see, especially given the Van Dorts are in trade. Steven snorted and assured him it was, but he wasn’t getting in to see it without Mr. or Mrs. Van Dort present, as it was their duty to guard the place; Alan agreed, adding that they got paid a pretty
B) Barnaby praising their efforts and stating that Nell told him her security staff was the cream of the crop – Steven just took the compliment, but Alan ended up a little confused, stating “Mrs. Van Dort said that?” Barnaby quickly bluffed that she just put on the tough, never-satisfied act in front of them, then had Smiler offer them the gin as a reward for “standing around and looking tough,” saying she’d approved it – Steven and Alan were a little hesitant at first, but fortunately decided that maybe Nell was in a better mood because she was getting to show off how rich she was to all the nobs at her party
C) Barnaby adding “Victor having reappeared” as a reason for Nell to be happy – only for the guards to scoff and say that if Victor showed up NOW, Nell would be furious because of him screwing up his wedding. Steven commented that if Victor had any sense, he’d risk a train ride to another city rather than come back and get a bollocking from his mam (excuse his language), while Alan said that the only way Nell would be happy to see Victor would be if he was being delivered by the Spirit Wardens as ashes in a vase :( Yeah, uh, as you might imagine, Victor will be feeling A Way about that…
D) Smiler and Barnaby, upon hearing that, encouraging the guards to drink up before Nell went on the warpath again, and the guards taking the bait and downing their gins (in one long swig – Barnaby couldn’t help a wince). However, most unfortunately for our heroes, it seems like Steven at least knows what slumber essence tastes like…
And I left off with Steven accusing Barnaby and Smiler of drugging the glasses. Tomorrow, he tries calling for help, the guards go down, and Victor gets to explain to everyone that they’re at the entrance to the entrance to the vault. If that makes any sense. :p
3. Watch something on YouTube: Check, surprisingly – mostly because I watched it before I went down to work out. :p “It” being “Coyote vs. ACME | Official Trailer” by Coyote vs. Acme and Ketchup Entertainment! The first trailer for a new mixed animation/live action Looney Tunes film coming out, which featured both:
A) A look at the plot – namely, Wile E. Coyote deciding to sue ACME with the help of a human lawyer (who apparently specializes in getting settlements for toons hurt by ACME products), only for the pair and their friends to stumble upon some sort of bigger conspiracy (possibly headed up by, of all toons, Foghorn Leghorn – and of all people, John Cena, what is this movie)
B) Ketchup Entertainment busting Warner Bros’s chops about this being one of the films they made and then immediately shelved for tax write-off purposes...until Ketchup got its hands on the movie and decided to release it, with Foghorn EXPLICITLY CLAIMING at the end that they were releasing it purely for accounting purposes XD
So yeah, that was fun. :P Movie itself apparently comes out at the end of August – we’ll see how it does in theaters!
4. Get my tumblr queues sorted: Check – nothing happening over on Valice Multiverse again, but I did get my queue for Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler) all sorted, I’m pleased to say –
A) First, this morning, I tossed in that cute Emily fanart from nuri4ever that I got from Sunday’s tag crawl for today, and “The Devil’s Wheel” by creepyclothdoll (the story about a woman, the Devil, a carnival wheel, a deal of three million in exchange for a man dying, and an awesome twist) for Friday
B) Then, tonight, I tossed in a reblog of my Song Saturday post for “Boom Boom Clap” by Charlie XCX! Because I listened to the song this morning, remembered how much I liked it and its Valicer vibes, and decided it needed to be featured again. :) I mean, the last time I reblogged it WAS two years ago, so…
So that’s all good, hooray! Now I just have to figure out next week’s queue...
...yes, I understand that was a very long entry for a rather boring day, but -- again, too much detail about the RE9 video. One day I will learn to rein it in again. As it stands, though, I gotta hit the sheets. Night all!
