The Crombies: Day Thirty

I didn't have much fun going through this day for the screenshots. This old computer's pretty much had it. I ended up spending minutes waiting for anything I clicked to... well BE CLICKED. Very frustrating.

'Pyke! Pyke! I was just about to go to bed when I hear cocktails being poured upstairs! You've got some left, right? RIGHT?!'

'Yeah...'

'I want to *hic* be a karaoke superstar.'

'Wow, Catriona. You're so alcoholic you've somehow broken causality laws and become intoxicated before drinking.'

'You'll never get anywhere in life if you keep ushin' all thosh long words.'

'Did I tell you I got *hic* demoted?! I'm a lobbi- a lobshi- a loobyisht now...'

'What happened?'

'I wash shupposhed to be doing shome paperwork I think? I had them in my hand... I was going to the copy mach- *hic* machine...'

'... Yes?'

'Then I pished on them.'

'I don't think you're really suited to a desk job, Catriona-'

'KARAOKE SUPERSTAR!'

'-Maybe you should think about getting another job.'

'NEAAAAAAR, FAAAAAAAR, WHEREVER YOU AAAAAARE *HIC*'

'Fucking hell, I'm outta here.'

Now, as you may all remember, the Crombies have aged into dithering hoary old biddies - which gave them an unexpected wardrobe change. Due to popular demand, it's time to get those old buzzards back into their regular outfits!

The fashion room seems appropriate. I'll put a wardrobe in there since I didn't when I built it for some reason.

Doesn't look like there's much choice.

Shit! What's going on here? I can't choose individual upper-body or lower-body garments and I've got THIS meagre selection of clothes? What's so different about elderly sims from adult sims that this has to happen?

Meanwhile, downstairs, Nooreen's just received a phonecall from Harriet! Zounds!

'-and that's how I managed to reattach his broken leg on backwards by mistake. Crazy, huh?'

'I was asking if you found the item I was hinting you look for two days ago.'

'Oh, yeah, we remember everything now. And then we fell asleep and woke up as crochet dolls and then Catriona flew a purple hippo with wings into a wall and we woke up and Nathen ran away.'

'... OK. He didn't get any of your limbs did he?!'

'No, by the looks of it the most he got were blood samples.'

'I see... I'm still a little worried. Anyway, I'm going to be trying to track him down before he can do anymore damage so I'll maybe see you later.'

'OK. Harriet?'

'What?'

'Is this Martian alien race of yours really made up of winged hippos?'

'Well... yes.'

'That's weird.'

My next bright idea was to see if I could get them to change their clothes using a mirror (you can't). Here we see that when I set up the fashion room all those months ago I had the mirror turned the wrong way round.

Oops.

Frustrated, Pyke goes for a grumpy sit-down.

'Grr.'

Linuxgirl123: hi who r u?

Linuxgirl122: haha looks like i beat you to this username!

Linuxgirl123: oh no 122 is my favourite number

An interesting point here: this is the first time any of the Crombies have used the computer since I moved it out of the spare room. When I first played this game I thought sims did whatever they most felt like doing, following some internally programmed mechanism. There may be a LITTLE of this in there, but by and large sims tend to just interact with whatever's close to hand.

Linuxgirl123: what no im not dating oliver! im with someone else kinda. why dont you ask him out?

Linuxgirl122: nah i dont really like black guys

Linuxgirl123: thats racist!!!!!

Linuxgirl122: so who r u goin out with then? Nemo???

Linuxgirl123: no way!!! that guy is so faggy

Linuxgirl122: thats homophobia!!!

What could possibly go wrong? And why's he got the same pyjamas as Nooreen?

'This looks like just the thing for putting a bit of zest back into my life.'

Three... two... one...

'Ooh! Ow! Argh! My bones! My favourite bones!'

'Forgive them, Father, they know not what they're doing.'

Linuxgirl123: you want me to wear a hard helmet? u thinkin of doin a YMCA party or sumthing?

Linuxgirl123: hell yeah we shud film it its gonna be awesome!

Linuxgirl123: i dont think i want to be ur friend anymore.

Oh, Jack, you're so zany.

'YOU STAY AWAY FROM MY WOMAN YOU FUCKING WHORE! YOU PHONE AGAIN AND I'LL SAY SOMETHING EVEN MORE INCISIVE AND HURTFUL!'

'... BITCH!'

Shit, man, I think he's serious.

Another speed bump in Catriona's miserable road of life.

Anyway, it's time to solve the clothing dilemma once and for all! Jack! Go thither to the nearest clothes shop!

'Hey Scott! Look at me, I'm all old and stuff! Check it out, I can make my skin stretch like no one's business! Scott! Look! Scott!'

'Aw...'

Jack shows undue interest in the till for some reason. Don't do that, Jack, you're going to freak out the saleswoman.

What? Don't look at me like that, you know it's true.

'Jack, is that you?'

'Yeah. I'm looking for clothes like my old ones. I'm not certain, but I think I might have given them to Oxfam or something. It's all a bit of a haze...'

'Whatever. Does Nooreen ever mention me?'

'I dunno man, even if she wasn't with Catriona, she's a bit old for you now-'

'How wrinkly is she? She's gotta have lots of wrinkles!'

'I've, uh, got shopping to do.'

'WHY ARE THERE NO SHOES IN HERE?'

THAT'S more like it! I'm sort of curious as to why Jack's bald though. Right! To the checkout- wait.

Why the fuck is the shopping trolley symbol greyed out?! LET ME BUY IT YOU FUCKER! Alright, now... breathe deep... there's a little wardrobe icon on the outfit I want. I'll get Jack to check a wardrobe for it when he gets home.

Jack appraises the selection.

Suddenly, Jack stops in his tracks. An all too familiar voice is coming from the other side of the store...

*that fragment of music from Young Frankenstein. Yeah, that one.*

It's Nathen! In the flesh! I wonder what he could be up to?

Just watching Scott snog his multi-cuckqueaned wife. Fair enough.

'Hey, you! Your wife, little man, how strong are her arms?'

'Well, gee, I don't know! Fairly strong I guess!'

'I would like to meet your wife.'

'Psst! Scott! You really shouldn't trust that guy! He only wants your wife so he can use her limbs to build spaceships with! I'm serious!'

'Ik begrijp niet.'

Scott begins to suspect that Nathen's intentions are not wholly savoury.

'Hey, this is my wife we're talking about! She's a classy lady!"

'I only wish to invite her round for dinner, perhaps followed by a game of chess.'

'That right there is what I'm talking about. Chess? CHESS? It's draughts or nothing, mister, 'cos chess is way too complicated. Oh, hey Jack! I didn't know you were still here!'

'"Jack"?'

'...'

'If I can't see him then he can't see me. That's how it works.'

'Boo.'

'PLEASE DON'T KILL ME MR NATHEN, SIR!'

'When I'm finished with you even the worms will turn up their noses-'

'FUCKING DARK LORD F'KRAARG! WHAT IS THAT SMELL?!'

'You made me nervous.'

And with that... he was gone.

'I'd like to buy some new trousers please.'

Later, back at the house, it is time to investigate the wardrobe and see if Jack's old outfit is there.

What.

The.

Bumblefuck?!

Looks like we might be stuck with the new outfits unless there's something I'm missing here. If anyone knows a way of getting those old costumes back I'd love to hear it.

Strangely drawn waving cat with the creepy grin, surely the finest artwork of the twenty-first century?

Suddenly, I hear a terrible wail! Jack! He's hurt!

... He may not be hurt, but he's definitely not alright.

This picture is one I took of Jack reeling from the shock of being in a crashing lift. That's right, the lift's broken again. Tsk.

It's finished!

I'm sorry, Nooreen, but your work's too derivative for my liking. For a start, you've already painted this picture. It's hanging in front of Jack's bathroom. Upstairs.

The garage has needed some sprucing up for a while.

I then order Nooreen to repair the lift. It's no more interesting than the last time she did it. She doesn't even get electrocuted or anythi- oh wait, she's done that too.

Sucks to be you, Noo-na.

And now some senile old bat in her underwear is ticking her! Someone give the poor lady a rest!

'Don't tickle me.'

'Oh... *hic* OK, whatever you say, Noo-noo!'

There are three things wrong with this picture of Jack pissing himself.

1. The piss is nowhere near him.
2. Jack has blue urine for some reason.
3. It is also wrong on some fundamental scale I can't even begin to fathom. Why am I taking these pictures?

The first thing you do after wetting yourself isn't usually to strike up a casual conversation with your friends.

'Wha... whassee talkin' 'bout now? *hic*'

'I'm going to bed.'

Later, Catriona discovers a still filthy Jack sitting on the bench in the... indoors garden? Let's just call it the world's smallest arboretum for now. Anyway, this is a perfect example of the crappy path-finding in this game. And why that bench, or any bench or sofa in the game, is a piece of shit.

The wall directly behind Jack is the outer wall of the ground floor bathroom. Jack's been trying to have a bath for the last two or three hours but keeps getting drawn to this bench instead. And when a Crombie sits on this bench, they never fucking get up unless I make them get up. It seems to work like this:

Sim sits on chair. Gets tired. Goes to bed. Gains energy until they wake up.

Sim sits on FUCKING BENCH. Gets tired. Does not go to bed, but lounges on bench. Eventually falls asleep on bench. Regains energy excruciatingly slowly and never wakes up. This is probably what happened to Rip van Winkle.

I've got half a mind to get rid of that bench, it's been nothing but a pain in the arse.

Jack, get off that bench and go and have a bath NOW so I can destroy it!

A slight snag. Jack enters the room and initially lets out a gasp of horror, but quickly overcomes it. He then marches into the room and proceeds to positively RAGE at Nooreen for daring have a bath at an inconvenient time for him.

Jack, stop being a dick.

He leaves the bathroom and then tries to go in again by, inexplicably, returning to the arboretum.

'You're not the bathroom! I hate you!'

Catriona's really been having a tough time of it hasn't she? I'm going to make tomorrow all about fulfilling some of her wants because I honestly can't remember the last time it happened.

Hell, I can't remember the last time it happened for anyone.