Stratton/Roseland Week 5: Bucking trends

Last week, Cyd Roseland and his dog Porthos settled in Serenity Valley and were joined by a woman named Christy. 

The Stratton/Roseland family currently includes:

Cyd Roseland, Knowledge/Romance adult, with a job in Architecture and a pet store

Christy Stratton, Family/Knowledge adult, with a job in Business and a salon

Porthos the dog

Cyd rolled the want to get engaged while we were away, so he proposes to a heavily pregnant Christy in the kitchen. They both immediately roll the want to get married, so I stick an arch in their yard and let them go for it.

Carter Roseland is born just a few hours later.

On Wednesday, Cyd is promoted to Architect's Apprentice (and reaches the "Earned $5000" mark.)

Shortly thereafter, Carter grows into a toddler. His personality is 3-8-9-10-1 (Sagittarius)--an evil child is so refreshing after all the nice ones in this 'hood!

Naturally, Christy rolls the want for another baby as soon as Carter ages up.

On Friday, DBI reaches Rank 4, which is very much appreciated given that the Roselands will soon have 4 people and a dog in a tiny 2-bedroom ranch.

Saturday night, Carter grows up to child.

Sunday morning, Cameron Roseland is born!

And that afternoon, Christy is promoted to Junior Executive.

Progress toward challenge:

New Sims: 2

Taxes collected: $800/$34,770

Ramaswami Week 5: Groundhog Day

Last week, the Ramaswamis had lots of babies who looked alike.

The Ramaswami family currently includes:

Sanjay, Popularity/Fortune adult with a job in the Music career and a venue called 3/4 Time

Priya, Popularity/Knowledge adult with no job but a clothing store called White Lotus Boutique

Anand, child

Ravi, child

Sandeep, child

Gita, baby

At the beginning of Week 5, the Ramaswamis move from their 3-bedroom, 2-bath home to a 4-bedroom, 2.5-bath home just across the street. They don't have much money left for furnishings after buying the house and paying taxes, but fortunately both businesses reach Rank 5 within 24 hours.

Gita has the honor of celebrating the first birthday in the new house, becoming a toddler with a personality of 5-9-5-5-6 (Leo), exactly like Anand and Ravi. I was slacking off with the randomizer for this family.

On Tuesday, Sanjay is fired due to a bad choice on a chance card yet again. 

Shortly thereafter, Anand grows into a teen, Pop/Rom with the LTW to become The Law. (Won't happen, poor little BACC kid.) He is turned on by career-oriented brunettes but does not want to add any more black hair to the Ramaswami gene pool.

Anand's parents decide to get a tax break by giving him the money to purchase Ramaswami Dance Studio. I picked this since Anand shares Sanjay's Music and Dance hobby. 

Random picture included because Priya looks so unenthused about being done with diapers and potty training FOREVER.

And here's Gita as a child.

Komei Tellerman and Sandy Bruty fall in love at White Lotus. I suppose I should follow my "rules" and let them become real playables and have the world's ugliest children.

By Saturday night, Sanjay has managed to work his way back up to Roadie. I bet he is thinking that these first 2-3 Music promotions are getting awfully tedious.

Then it's time for the twins to become teens. Ravi is a clone of Anand, so he becomes Pop/Rom as well (in this 'hood I decide aspiration based on personality). However, he wants to be a General--very doable in the challenge, and he already has the hairstyle for it! He is turned on by full-face makeup and black hair and turned off by charisma. Apparently he wants his wife to look pretty and not talk back!

Sandeep bucks the trend by becoming For/Rom (the only one in his family who doesn't have Pop as a primary aspiration). He wants to become Hand of Poseidon, attainable if he starts fishing, and wants a woman who is hardworking, creative, and averse to hanging out in her underwear.

The next day, White Lotus reaches Rank 8!

Progress toward challenge:

New community lots: 1

Taxes collected: $3050/$33,970

Cooke Week 5: Midlife Crisis

Last week, the Cooke family got a dog and were very successful in business. 

The Cooke family currently includes:

Julien, Popularity/Fortune adult and owner of Cooke's Grocery

Jan, Romance/Pleasure adult and owner of Lonely Hearts Club

Juliette, Romance/Fortune teen and owner of Juliette's Flowers

Jerome, child

Beau the bulldog

On Monday night, Jerome grows up into a very serious-looking teen. He becomes a Family/Pleasure Sim with the lifetime want of reaching his Golden Anniversary. He wants a woman who wears cologne and has custom hair...definitely not a stinky woman.

Random picture: Jan somehow ends up playing with two wolves in her pajamas.

Apparently nothing else of note happens until Friday, when Lonely Hearts Club reaches Rank 10!

Jerome uses his parents' money to buy a restaurant (cleverly named Cooke Family Restaurant), and his parents and sister get it up to Rank 1.

Jerome stays home so he can maximize his Logic skill.

Juliette has been working at her flower shop off and on all week, and on Sunday it reaches Rank 3!

Later that day, Juliette follows in her little brother's footsteps and maximizes Logic.

Julien is supposed to become an elder Sunday night, and his aspiration is a bit low, so I fulfill his want to invite over Katy McGaw. Then he wants to flirt and make out with her! (In fact, they both want to woohoo, but I cut them off.) I make her a playable and move her out to her own place to see what will happen.

A few hours later, Julien has a birthday party with his family as if nothing has happened.

Progress toward challenge:

New community lots: 1

New Sims: 1

Careers opened: 1/3 Business, 2/8 Science

Taxes collected: $4200/$30,920

Tam Week 5: Brotherly Love

Last week, the Tam family moved to a new house, flirted a little, and played chess a lot.

The Tam family currently includes:

Scott: Knowledge/Family elder with a job in the gamer track and an arcade

Megan: Family/Knowledge elder with several bestselling novels and a library

Simon: Family/Pleasure teen

River: Family/Knowledge teen

Malcolm: Pleasure/Popularity teen

Derrial: Pleasure/Family teen

Hoban: Popularity/Romance teen

Jayne: Child

I mostly keep the Tam children skilling when they're not at school--it keeps them busy so I don't have to keep track of them all. This is River maxing charisma.

And Jayne becomes the last Tam child to max logic.

Shortly thereafter, he grows up in Platinum. He is Family/Knowledge like his sister River and wants to reach his Golden Anniversary. He's turned on by fatness and gray hair but turned off by underwear. I guess he doesn't mind if his future wife gets old and flabby as long as she isn't immodest.

I take the opportunity to snap a family portrait in front of the fireplace in the living room. Scott and Megan are 57, Simon and River are 24, Malcolm and Derrial are 21, Hoban is 16, and Jayne is 12.

That night, Jayne engages in some very shy flirting with Ivy Copur the Younger. (They have two bolts.)

On Friday morning, the arcade reaches Rank 10! Another slot in business is opened.

His last afternoon as a teen, Simon gets himself into plat by going on a date with three-bolter Meadow Thayer. His brother Derrial found her first, but who can argue with three bolts? Meadow doesn't seem to be arguing, anyhow.

After Simon, River, and Orlando age up, I make Orlando selectable and we have an engagement out by the pond. River's parents are very pleased.

Meadow is going to grow up with the younger twins, so while he waits Simon keeps himself occupied with a job as a Field Sales Rep. We need some business districts to boost our Sim Multiplier!

And it's back to the skill grindstone for the younger kids--here's Malcolm maximizing Charisma.

I don't make them work all the time, though. Sometimes they have midnight snacks of spaghetti and wonder if there will be enough rain for their new garden.

While her kids run around in six different directions, Megan has been sitting quietly upstairs hammering out novels. She sells her eighth on Sunday morning, netting $3054. Hoban the Popularity Sim gets to the phone before she does.

On Sunday afternoon, Megan's neglected library finally reaches Rank 3, thanks to a "projector" in the meeting room.

And a few hours later, Simon is promoted to Junior Executive. And we all breathe a sigh of relief that he and River will be moving out Monday morning. Eight Sims in one house is just too many.

Progress toward challenge:

Jobs opened: 1/2 Business, 3 Entertainment, 3/6 Science

Taxes collected: $2750/$26,720

End of Week 4 Stats

Now that some interesting things have actually happened, I am going to start doing very boring end-of-week summaries just to keep the status quo around here.

Playable Sims: 23
Households: 5
- Tam: $55k
- Cooke: $84k
- Ramaswami: $61k
- Stratton/Roseland: $16k
- Long: $18k
Unused CAS slots: 6

Community lots: 11 (+1)
- Serenity Library (library, Megan Tam): Rank 1
- Tam Arcade (video arcade, Scott Tam): Rank 9
- Cooke Grocery (grocery store, Julien Cooke): Rank 10
- Lonely Hearts Club (nightclub, Jan Cooke): Rank 9
- Juliette's Flowers (flower shop, Juliette Cooke): Rank 0
- Three-Quarter Time (music venue, Sanjay Ramaswami): Rank 4
- White Lotus Boutique (clothing shop, Priya Ramaswami): Rank 4
- Domesticated Beasts Inc. (pet store, Cyd Roseland): Rank 3
- Christy's Cosmetics (salon, Christy Stratton): Rank 1
- Serenity Park (park, Ivy Long): Rank 1
- Ben's Box o' Fun (toy store, Benjamin Long): Rank 1
- Serenity Station (military base, NPC)

Fires: 2
Burglaries: 2 [I know the Ramaswamis were burgled at one point but I apparently have no record of it; I will double-check their memories next time I play them]
Electrocutions: 0
Graves: 0

Careers:
Architecture: 1 (Cyd Roseland)
Business: 1 (Christy Stratton)
Gamer: special (Scott Tam)
Military: unlocked (vacant)
Music: unlocked (Sanjay Ramaswami, vacant)
Science: 3 (Ivy Long, vacant)
Slacker: 1 (vacant)

Business Districts: 0

Downtowns: 0

University Taxes collected: $23,970/$1,000,000
Universities: 0

Sim Multiplier: 4
Population: 92

Copur/Long Week 4: The Science of Fun

Ivy Copur and Benjamin Long fell in love autonomously at Tam Arcade. Fortunately they were friends with Jan Cooke, so she invited them to become playable, and here they are.

Ivy is a Knowledge Sim, with a LTW to become a Mad Scientist. Happily for her, there are lots of open positions in this town full of nerdy children.

Ben is also a Knowledge Sim, with the LTW to become a Space Pirate. That will have to wait until we have enough households for another NPC community lot, since nobody in this town can afford the required museum.

The third member of the family is Sheba the dog, who is stupid but friendly.

Two Knowledge Sims alone are boring, even with a dog, so Ivy "accidentally" gets pregnant.

Then they have a quickie shotgun wedding. (I think they rolled the want to get married once the baby was on the way.)

Heather Long is born early Friday morning.

Ivy and Ben are both nature Sims, so I have them buy Serenity Park. It reaches Rank 1 on Saturday.

Ivy is promoted to Science Teacher shortly thereafter.

Saturday night, Heather grows up into a black-haired, female version of her father. Her personality: 7-5-5-8-10 (Aquarius).

The money from Ivy's promotion is used to found Ben's Box o' Fun, a toy store. For now it just sells premade stuff, but eventually it will offer custom toys.

Progress toward challenge:
New community lots: 2
New Sims: 1
Taxes collected: $3570/$23,970