The fun parts

Yesterday I created a new Bob and Willa Sims family; I'm slowly creating a new neighborhood, but slowly. I've been looking and looking for the old house that I had, but haven't been able to find it, and I really liked it. I did finally find another one that I liked, a glass house:

It has a nice little deck outside the master bedroom upstairs; I just noticed that there used to be a small round table there, but it has apparently disappeared. Apparently if a person creates an object, such as a piece of furniture, whatever expansion packs they have on their computer are required to be on the computer of the person who downloads the object, or it won't work, i.e., whoever created that little table probably had Hot Date on their computer, but I don't, so while it shows up in the purchasing application, it doesn't actually work in the game. There's a nice round rug that does the same thing--I put it in a room, and the next time I look, it's gone.

There was a fire right away. I did remember to buy the fire alarm, so no one burned up, and the fireman came right away, but I always forget that before you actually prepare a meal, you're supposed to "study cooking." I think you can probably make a quick meal or a snack without fear of fire, but using the stove is perilous.

I seemed to do okay the next morning, though, and still hadn't studied cooking. Maybe they only let you have one fire per 24 hours or something.

I guess after Bob went to work I should have been reading the cookbooks; instead, I was playing a game on the computer, in my pajamas.

The house has a great indoor pool:

And I really like this little corner in the living room:

The living room also has an alcove just right for the chess table and two chairs:

I don't know if I'll have any more time to play this week or not, but late last night I made another new family--an Egyptian family, and one of the family members is a mummy.

The last time I wrote about the Sims, someone wrote and asked me how I got such great houses. The answer is, I cheat.

The way the game is supposed to work is that any family, no matter how many members is has, starts out with $20,000. You either find a house that costs less than that, or you move onto an empty lot and use your $20,000 to build a house, and you need to immediately find a job and start bringing in income to pay the bills.

Well, frankly I figure I have enough of that kind of stress in my real life, I don't need to play a game to simulate it. I love furnishing the houses--that's my favorite part--but as dumb as it sounds, it is stressful trying to be sure that everyone gets to bed at a decent hour, has regular meals, gets their showers or baths and gets to the bathroom. You have to set the alarm so they get up on time, tell them to go to the bathroom and take their shower, and someone has to make them breakfast--if everyone has to go to off to work or school, well, it's just a madhouse. Just like a real family.

I've forgotten to set the alarm, or they've stayed up too late talking, and they won't get out of bed to go to work, and I hate that.

So yeah, now I cheat. I try to start out life in a little more leisurely manner. I import already-built houses that I've downloaded (I don't like to build them, I don't seem to have the necessary spatial ability), so they don't actually have to buy them, they just sort of inherit them. And then, of course, there's the money cheat, a code you enter in that lets you give your Sims a few thousand dollars for necessities.

I don't like cheating, but if I had to start every family out in poverty, in a panic to find a job, living in a shack, I'd never play. I just want to do the fun parts.