The Aspir Family: Week 1 (2023/05)

We are here in Desiderata Valley, at 250 Main Street. This is the home of Luis Aspir and his son.

Their household biography reads:

Can Victor convince Elizabeth to grow their family? Will Elizabeth listen to him? What will Luis discover in the attic - could it be the answer to his lifelong question?

At the start of the game, Luis is 87 years old. He is a Knowledge Sim with the (as yet unfulfilled) lifetime want of maxing out all his skills. His wife died, according to his family tree, and he moved to the converted garage to make room for his son and his family. His bio reads: Luis has lived a long and satisfying life. He knows there is more to learn, but making friends is important to him as well. He just doesn't understand his Cousin Natasha's views on Grilled Cheese and that strange Mr. Mole character.

Here are Luis' son Victor, his wife Elizabeth and their daughter Pauline.

Victor is one year younger than Elizabeth. His bio reads: Victor wants more children, lots and lots of children, but Elizabeth is satisfied with just Pauline. How can a loving husband convince his workaholic wife to increase the family? His aspiration is Family, but unlike what his Maxis-written biography says, he dreams of becoming Education Minister.

Elizabeth is not quite the career-oriented woman her mini bio makes her out to be - she may be a Fortune Sim alright, but she really has the same LTW as her father-in-law, wanting to max out her skills. Her bio reads: Elizabeth is a classic working mother. She has a beautiful baby girl, a job she likes, a loving husband, and her sewing machine, but there is something that she is missing. Perhaps if she tries a new hobby she will find her calling in life.

 

Little Pauline is a toddler and therefore should not have neither aspiration nor lifetime want. But the game shows her wanting to be a World Class Ballet Dancer. Her bio reads: Pauline is a happy baby, but lonely. She is eager to learn, but she'll have to wait to see what destiny has in store… Actually, with a loving granddad as well as her parents around nearly all the time, she does not appear lonely at all.

 

So, what's happening on this Monday?

Elizabeth is off to work; she has a job as a Field Sales Representative, but Iwill make her quit that. Luis' pension check of 657 Simoleons per day should be enough for now; at 5,415 Simoleons, the family may not have a huge amount in the bank, but their house and land has plenty of value and things that can be sold off, it need should be. Also, remember Victor's wish to become Education Minister - so he will be the one to focus on his career, not her.

Today, though, all is as Maxis meant it to be.

Three Sims turn up to say hello: The Travellers and Mary Gavigan. Luis welcomes them in, and between him and his son, they take care of little Pauline and their guests.

When Elizabeth returns from work, she immediately changes out of her business attire into something more comfortable. She longs to sit down at her sewing machine, and so I have her make her very first (not very good) potholder.

Before bedtime, Pauline's granddad teaches her to walk.

Unsurprisingly, Pauline is first to wake up on Tuesday morning.

Both her Mum and Dad quit their jobs that day; Elizabeth in order to focus on maxing out her skills, and Victor to get started on his career in Education.

Luckily, he finds a position as Playground Monitor right away, and returns home that same afternoon with a promotion to Teacher's Aide. However, it must have been a bit nippy standing around on the playground, as he also comes home with a cold.

Pauline learns to talk from her granddad, while Elizabeth makes sure to take advantage of it being atumn, when acquiring skills is easiest.

After a rainy start, Wednesday sees plenty of golden autumn sunshine - perfect for Luis to work on the old car in the driveway, and for Elizabeth to spend the afternoon raking leaves.

Victor is promoted to Substitute Teacher and comes home with colleague Samantha Ottomas in tow. The two ladies seem to get along just fine. "When are you due?" Elizabeth asks over their bowls of Mac'n Cheese - it can't be long before Samantha enters maternity leave.

Luis prides himself on his ability to do any job that needs doing around the house (ok, maybe he is not the best of cooks), and so he takes it upon himself to repair the TV.

On Thursday morning, Elizabeth and Pauline share a tender mother-daughter-moment.

Unfortunately, Victor takes the wrong decision with a chance card and is fired; at the same time as the car pool drops him off, his wife's best friend Hannah Bell shows up.

Yesterday, Victor's colleague Samantha Ottomas came home with him. Today, her husband Peter (not pictured) comes by to assure Victor of their support (the loss of his job had to do with a conspiration between headmaster and another teacher at the school). A little later, Herb Goodie walks by. Right now, Victor needs any friend he can get, and so everyone is asked in.

Pauline wakes up from her afternoon nap just as it begins to get dark. She grows up into a child, and now her baby and toddler things are put up in the attic above Granddad's garage home, and she gets a "big" bed, desk and chair.

On Friday, Victor wakes his daughter. "Good morning, sweetie! Time to get up - today is an important day!" It is indeed, as it is Pauline's first day at school.

As a treat, it's pancakes for breakfast.

When she is gone, Elizabeth pours over her books in order to increase her skills, while Luis takes care of some gardening. Victor, who has not yet found another opening in the Education career, feels somewhat at a loss.

But when Pauline returns from school, he is full of purpose again, and helps her with her very first homework. Later, the entire family sits down for dinner.

Before anyone else is up on Saturday morning, Victor checks his emails. To his surprise and delight, he finds a message from his former work place. The school have finally uncovered the conspiracy and want him back! [Of course, this did not really happen in gameplay. But Victor found a job as Teacher's Aide, and since that was the position from which he'd been fired after his wrong decision with a chance card that was about a conspiracy he reported, it seemed right to assume he'd had been offered his former job back.]

With no work and no school, today is ideal for a community lot visit. As winter is fast approaching and nobody has suitable clothing in their wardrobe, The Frippery Frock is where the taxi drops the Aspirs off.

Several residents of Desiderata Valley are here, such as Samantha Ottomas, Cyd Roseland and Rick Contrary. Victor makes it a point to thank Samantha - her husband had told him about their ongoing support at the school, and it seems they have been successful. "You are welcome, Victor - it was the decent thing to do, and about time!"

Luis foots the bill for what his family have chosen.

Back home, first Julien Cooke and then Sophia Joqcue pass by and are invited in.

A long time ago, one of the Sims players whose blog I regularly enjoyed introduced Sundays as Family Days in their game. (Sorry, I can't remember who it was - if you're still around as one of my readers, please let me know!)

Most of the time, I try to stick to this, and so for the Aspirs, this Sunday is Family Day. In their case, there is only one person to invite over: Luis' cousin Natasha Una.

She arrives soon after Luis has invited her over (she does not live far away), and spends the afternoon and evening here.

Apart from that, some house and garden work gets done; I finally tell everyone to get rid of the many heaps of raked-up leaves - by disposal, not by burning them ;-)

My newly set-up game seems to be working alright. There have been two or three crashes, but not since I cleared out "trash" and "corrupt" memories; to be on the safe side, I have taken to save not only after completing one entire day, but every now in between - it is so much quicker now with my new computer!

Graphics are not ideal, but the settings can not be changed, and I am too lazy to look up ways to work around the presets from EA.

Anyway - it's good to be back!!

A Fresh Start - For Real

It's been a while since my last post here. Since then, what play time I had (or allowed myself) at the computer was spent with Hogwarts Legacy, the game I wanted and got for my birthday back in March.

Now I am housebound with Covid (yes - after going through the "pandemic years" without catching it, my Mum has now passed it to me...) but not so unwell as to have to lie down all the time.

The weather outside is beautiful, and were it not for me being ill, you bet I'd be out there, walking my heart out in the spring sunshine! But since I can't do that right now, I thought I'd tackle my Sims 2 "issue".

I have thought long and hard, but with the many issues New Maximiliania was presenting (the unsolved disappearance of the Roth family, one or two Sims having become nearly unplayable, graphics problems cropping up in neighbourhood view, seemingly random changes of lifetime wants), I have decided to start afresh.

This time, I am going to play the Maxis-made neighbourhoods separately. I think about it as a "meant to be" style of playing: I will treat each household and each Sim according to the mini storyline Maxis have written for them, but will not necessarily stick to it. Instead, I will use it as a base to build their lives on, ultimately trying to fulfill their lifetime wants.

The rules will remain basically the same: Sims are played in order of their surnames, a Sim-week each. During that week, at least one visit to a community lot is planned. Passing residents of the 'hood should be greeted whenever possible. Money cheats are not used; but I will use from time to time the "move_objects on" cheat as needed.

As before, births will happen only if they are necessary for a Sim's lifetime want OR they happen "naturally" by Alien abduction. Of course, Sims that are pregnant when the game begins will have their babies.

Deaths will occur as before - either from old age or by fire. I am not deliberately out to kill off my Sims, but if they don't stay away from flames, it's not my fault, is it :-D

To start with, I try to keep each household in their assigned place, unless it is VERY impractical to play. When that is the case (for example, with the Summerdreams' house in Veronaville), I will alter at will or move them to a different place.

Each 'hood has all three vacation/holiday destinations, but each hood has only one uni assigned to it, and some 'hoods have deliberately no shopping district or downtown. I will introduce these as I go along.

Should I get too fed up or really hanker after my dear old New Max - it still exists as a backup, but right now it is unlikely I'll be reviving it anytime soon.

Fingers crossed - not only for smooth gaming (loading time is SUPER fast on this new machine!), but also for you, my readers, coming back to my stories when start posting them!