Thursday 3 September 2009

These days

Round 20: Summer 2011

Maria Moretti is 68, Filippo is 56, Emil Collins is 39, Anna is 34 and Nathan is 9 months old.
(David is 29, Kirstin is 27 and Jesse is 26.)


Narrated by Emil Collins

My brother David came over for dinner a couple of weeks ago, with his new wife Kirstin. Mum was thrilled. I think she'd like to have the whole family over at the same time, but we have a pretty huge family and it's not possible very often.



David and Kirstin have only been married for about six months and they're in that holding-hands-and-making-googly-eyes-at-each-other stage.

They visited Cape Elizabeth for their honeymoon and Mum couldn't wait to hear all about it. She's been wanting to go back to Three Lakes, where she and my Dad went on their honeymoon but I think Kirstin may have her convinced to give the beach a try instead.

David told me Kirstin wants to wait a while before having kids and David wants them now. So he's making do with being an uncle to Nathan for the meantime.

Speaking of parenthood, ever since I became a father, I've been reading all of these parenting manuals, hoping to pick up a few tips.

Anna has eschewed all the books I bought and has been working mostly on maternal instinct. We're both doing okay, so I guess both our methods are working for us. Anna hated every second of being pregnant and she still worries about passing out and nausea, even though she hasn't dealt with that sort of thing since her first trimester with Nathan.

It's yet to be seen how she'll cope with being a mum and working long term but she's doing well so far. I wouldn't say she likes it - she really hated the car they sent for her on the first day and demanded to use Mum's car from then on - but she's coping.

Anna works days and I work nights, so I spend my days in Exeter, seeing if there are any women worth my time. There usually is and because I'm a DJ, I can then invite them to whatever club I'm working in that night.

So they come, they watch my set and then I'm irresistible to them.

Normally, I meet a few other women too before I head home at about 4.

Mum hates my job because she thinks it keeps me away from Anna and Nathan too much and that married men should have more respectable jobs.

I told her that if Anna doesn't care, she doesn't have any reason to either but she won't listen. She's been getting so nosy since she retired.

Anyway, she can leave me alone now because Anna got her foot in the door and is now a DJ too. Initially, I thought she might cramp my style a bit but we'll probably end up playing different clubs most of the time anyway.

We've got a little bit more money coming in now and Anna's decided we need to redecorate because everything in the house is "ugly".

She was very disappointed when I told her we didn't have that much extra money that we could redecorate the whole house and that I wasn't sure Mum and Filippo would go for that anyway. We live here and we're adults but it's still not our house.

Anna's cousin Jesse has dropped by to visit her a few times. Only her. Mum and Filippo won't have him in the house, so any time he comes by, the entire visit is conducted on the front lawn.

He knows he's not welcome inside, since the whole thing with Abigail. Caleb was really broken up about it so Jesse's not too popular around these parts.

Right before we went to bed the next morning (we're both on a non-traditional schedule right now, due to work), Anna told me about her conversation with Jesse. Apparently, he actually has designs on marrying Abigail! Already! While everything is still up in the air with Caleb! I couldn't believe it.

She was really unimpressed when I told her exactly what I thought of Jesse's little plan. I guess I need to remember that he's still her cousin, whatever her loyalties are to my family. Actually, Abigail is her cousin too, on her mother's side, so I guess she's feeling stuck in the middle right now.

I tried smoothing things over with her but she just sat there, completely silent. I thought she was giving me her patented Silent Treatment but I soon discovered it was something else entirely.

She's pregnant again. We were using birth control, so I'm not sure how this happened. I guess this stuff is never 100%. Yeah, so definitely not planned - Nathan's only 9 months old. When this one comes along, he'll still only be 18 months old, so we'll have two kids under two! It's going to be chaotic in this house for a good while yet.

Notes (with a couple of pics):
  • An outtake. I was trying to have Anna and Emil argue about Jesse and Abigail but because Anna is a bitch and Emil is a jerk, they just love arguing! One of them will be ranting and raving and the other will be looking on enraptured, as if they're being told some fantastic piece of news. So a chat on the bed, where most of the facial expressions are more neutral and therefore easier to manipulate, was my back-up plan.
  • I've been attempting to pay more attention to the ACR scores, so by the end of this round, you'll be sick of hearing about them, I'm sure! I'm jotting them all down. So I'll use this picture as an opening to talk about Anna and Emil's insane chemistry! When I checked their chemistry at the beginning of the round, the raw score was 161 and the total was 266. Which is pretty friggin' high! Out of curiosity, I checked their turn-ons. Emil was turned on by charismatic women with custom hair (remember Zelda Benton dyeing her hair in the school bathroom, in an attempt to win over Emil?). Anna was turned on by brown hair and facial hair. So I changed the turn-ons to match and the ACR score shot up to 196 raw and 301 total!!! I don't believe I have ever seen a score over 300!

  • I took control of Jesse and got a look at his wants in the process. He still wants to marry Abigail and he also has the want to become engaged to her. His wants to marry the other three women have rolled away, so apparently his feelings for Abigail have become more serious over the past 8 or 9 months.
  • Oh, and I just realised Filippo is only in the intro pic! He was around but none of the pictures of him made the cut. You didn't miss anything, I promise! :)

10 comments:

  1. Oh my, two kids under two years! Life is going to be hectic for Emil and Anna for the next few years.

    Don't you just hate it when you need pictures of sims arguing and they look like they've just won the lottery!

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  2. Yikes, they're going to have their hands full until those babies get older!

    That is an insane ACR score! I've never seen one that high.

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  3. Oh my! Emil, you cad. I love he's so casual about it. Didn't want Anna "cramping" his style.

    And another baby? Yikes! Though Anna is doing better than I expected.

    I'm thinking I'm going to take down my ACR score for the the obviously higher chemistry sims. We can all have a contest to see what couple has the highest scores.

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  4. Setting up pics of arguments (and others things too) is really difficult. I'm actually thinking of going to find these paintings I had once where you could choose what expressions they had. I wonder where that was.

    I am not looking forward to having two toddlers in the house! Anna is not too bad as a mother but she doesn't get any wants to interact with Nathan. Emil does but he's Family secondary. It's Maria who is the most enamoured with Nathan. Her whole panel is usually filled with wants to play with Nathan, read to Nathan, etc.

    Lunar, I think that would be so cool. I'm planning on taking down the chemistry for everyone this round and I'd love to see if anyone has a higher score than 301. Because insane is right. I could hardly believe my eyes.

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  5. Wow Emil is very hairy, lol. I was not expecting that at all.,

    Their ACR score is amazing. I've never had a score so high.

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  6. Ha, yes, he's quite hairy but Tate and Trent are even hairier than he is. Emil is using the second hairiest overlay and Tate and Trent are using the very hairiest.

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  7. I think Emil's hair suits him, lol!

    I think it's because they're married to each other that their total score is so high - that's the changeable one, which goes up with the relationship, so in combination with that huge attraction score, the total would be through the roof! My Matt and Leila Watts are nearly as high. (192 attraction, and 276 total) - now I'm curious to see how high Leila and Corbin would be if they knew each other better, lol!

    LOL, I'm glad it seems Jesse is making up his mind on those four girls ;)

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  8. Yeah, it's about time. It was nice he wanted to spread the love around but there's no polygamy allowed in the game, unfortunately for him.

    Does marriage itself boost chemistry or is it just the fact that married couples know (and like) each other well? I know the total score is changeable but I'm just wondering if the actual marriage is a factor in that change. I'm not sure but I'm paying closer attention to chemistry now so I guess I'll find out!

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  9. Hmmm, that's something to test out. I don't think I've ever noticed the actual marriage changing chemistry - I'll have to remember next time I marry off a couple. I have a few coming up soon. Though I did recently find that having babies together does raise chemistry, lol! Or at least in one case it did. And I know falling in love can raise chemistry too. So maybe it does. There seem to be all kinds of hidden factors.

    I do know that when checking chemistry between a married person and someone who isn't her spouse (for example, my Leila and Corbin), the married one will have a huge penalty on their total score (depending on their aspiration). But that wouldn't affect their actual chemistry.

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  10. Oh, really? That's something I didn't know. I'm guessing that wouldn't apply Emil or Anna, unless Emil's Family secondary would affect it. In my experience, the secondary doesn't seem to affect chemistry as much as the primary.

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