Like this:

Last time we saw the Dayes, they moved to Legacy Island, Lola died and they were at Puddle’s stag party, which is where we rejoin them… in the midst of post-EP install CC chaos.

Alley: ‘There’s something about this Lola Lauder I can’t put my finger on, but she reminds me of someone…’

I did consider moving them to Appaloosa Plains or whatever it’s called but it looked like it might be easier to install Pets venues in Legacy Island than attempt to put Late Night lots into AP, so that’s what we did.  I’m sure one generation of this family will move to AP eventually but we need to get a lot of those Late Night LTWs out of the way first (sooo behind!  I just realised Puddle became heir at the very start of 2011, and he will still be heir when the year changes.  That’s one slow generation, right there).

Anyway, Bramble looks like a batty old lady without CC hair, and what do batty old ladies need?

Budgies.  Or whatever type of bird this is.  Bramble’s child naming trait would have been eco-friendly, so her pet can have a name along the theme.  This is Greenpeace.  I’m not sure of birds have a gender.  Actually I’m not sure if it’s even still alive, I haven’t checked on it lately.

Here is where I need to point out that in TS1, I let Cassandra Goth’s hamster die.  More than once.  My fish tanks were always full of floating corpses, and when I installed the proper pets EP, most of my households had anti-pet signs to stop the critters invading, and the only family that had pets, the Goths, somehow mysteriously stopped being played with as often.  I really, really sucked at that EP.  Let’s get that out there up front.

I really don’t think Bramble will ever do her skill challenges.  She still hasn’t made 500 drinks according to her skill journal, although I swear she must have, is two off the unique mixes (that one we will manage), hasn’t made enough cash serving sims and hasn’t learned enough recipes – because to learn them you have to drink them, and if you’re drinking, you can’t be mixoliging.  If we can scrape together enough LTH points we’d get her a young again potion as well as Mona, but I’m not sure that’ll happen.  Also, I want more members of Gen 9, so maybe I’ll just let a future sim try for the mixology skill challenges.  When I’m really bored one day.

I don’t remember any of the family drinking a Purple Gnome before.  She drank one and got a -30 downtrodden moodlet…

…and then wandered around looking like the Hunchback of Notre Dame.  So funny.

I know I’ve mentioned this before, but I love this bar in Legacy Island.

Don’t give me a look because the textures are being slow, Blackberry.

‘That’s not why I’m giving you the look.  It’s what you’re about to make me do’.

Well, if your mum and your Aunt Alley can have special creatures, so should you.

I’ll confess to some light cheating here.  We lost Lola’s grave.  So I just Master Controllered her into the household.

I finally-FINALLY-got them married off…

…and then they woohooed in the time machine, and then they also made good use of this sarcophagus…

Bramble adopted a stray from the paper.  I’d intended a dog or cat for our first pets but they were all elderly and so we ended up with a foal.  I cannot remember if this pony is male or female, but as Blackberry is a Bramble clone, we used the same naming trait, so this is Ecover, whose traits are untrained and clueless.  Result.  What else is a result is our stupid lot, because the pony can’t climb stairs, and there’s only a small space where it can live, and it just traps the broken maids and the paperboys with it.  Oh dear.

This poor, poor creature.

Yeah, we’re going to need to figure something out with the space eventually.

I’m not sure what we’re going to give Blackberry in terms of her LTW – something pet-related, though, as we’ll probably do for Alley and Lola’s incoming baby.  I’m also not sure what I will do with Lola.  Her current LTW is Rock Star, but I am still planning on Puddle’s kids doing all the music-based stuff, so maybe she will have something else pet-related.  Or maybe she can just deposit the baby and leave.  We’ll see.  Anyway, Blackberry rolled up the Noah’s Ark LTW but that seems a little hefty – do I want a house full of pets whilst I’m trying to give Puddle a brood of kids?  I’ll leave my options open until she turns YA.

This is my solution to the space issue – at least people interact with the horse now, as they were getting too many route fails before.

That said, interaction with Ecover is going “well”.  The pony refused to sniff Blackberry’s hand here.  And note the red plumbob.  This is pretty permanent – the creature is always hungry or lonely or tired or wanting exercise.  We have no room for jumps.  And I keep forgetting about the creature.  It and Blackberry are both about to age up.  Neither will age well – stupid stupid Generations and the way kids get punished for missing the school bus, and therefore take ages to wait for their punishment so they can never get to school and the parents can never get to work.  I HATE IT.  So that keeps happening to the Dayes.  And the Knights.  Has anyone invented a mod that stops automatic punishment yet?  I will love that person forever if so.

When you have a bird you’ve forgotten about and a horse whose needs are so in the red that you’ve had the social worker pop-up (let’s just pretend that was deliberate, eh?), what’s the thing you need to do as a simmer?  Slow down?  Care for your pets better?

Or adopt a puppy from one of your neighbours?

This one is technically Lola’s, and I picked Ambitious as the naming trait, so meet Ruth Badger.  For those who are not initiated, she was one of the best ever Apprentice contestants.  All of Lola’s pets will probably be named after Apprenti.  Unless I change my mind.  I can’t remember the puppy’s traits (see how I care about these pets already?).

Lola then went home and left the puppy at her old home, so she had to run all the way home.  I can’t help but think of the theme tune to the Littlest Hobo.  Or that film with the dogs they always used to make us watch on school cinema trips in the 80s (The Incredible Journey?).

Also, am I the only one who always feels a bit teary whenever they hear the Littlest Hobo theme tune?  I’m a softie really.  Just a softie who can’t look after animals.  Or plants, for that matter.  I’ve just discovered someone on MTS has created a mod for a gardener NPC – that is so worth looking into.  All my TS1 sims had gardeners if they were rich enough.  Or dead plants to go with their dead fish if they were not.

Blackberry took a riding class so she can now finally sit on the horse.  Not that either of them seem that keen on each other yet.

Ecover and Ruth Badger get next to no human interaction, so they mainly play together.  It’s not doing that much to alleviate the threat of the social worker though.  I know I want to have my pets taken away at some point, but it would be a bit embarrassing for the social worker to take my first pets, wouldn’t it?

*Quickly does the shifty eye motion to pretend that was the plan all along*.

With Lola pregnant and Puddle and Nadine technically engaged, it was time to free up some house space, so Quentin moved out.  Gawd bless you, sir.

Nadine would never come over when we asked, always claiming to be at work.  So we threw a wedding party.

When everyone kept doing the ghost and simbot reactions to each other, I remembered I had taken the no reaction mods out and forgotten to reinstall.  Nobody married anybody.  I kept queueing and requeuing the actions…

…and then I discovered that Quentin must have been the member of the household with the no fires LTR.

Join us next time to see how much more of a hash we can make of things…

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