*Actually they are open because it's spring and Val's really trying to get the business up and running. It was still Level 1 when I started the round.
At this point the shop isn't open yet but the deck upstairs is all decked out, for the most part, AND I spent a couple hours making an invisible version of Inge's targetable door, while not remotely knowing what I was doing. (Best I can tell, they're somehow slaved to Maxis doors but not repositoried, or whatever, meaning they don't pick up recolours of said doors. Argh. But SUCCESS!) The teens would be able to come during the afternoons and spend monies while not straying anywhere near the bar without actually changing the look of the dugout. Just the watchful eye of a too small town letting them know not to bother, right. And that part works, hooray, but now I can't figure out how to set the damn timer clock for Pescado's customer selector so they'll not arrive until after school and leave when it gets dark. They won't leave. I swear I used to know how to set it and I've reread the fucking manual but just gave up (again) and re-banned them with the VC. If anyone knows how to get the timer to work, please tell me!



**I love how Proxima seems to have instinctively sensed mistrust in Valentine and immediately set about winning him over the second she was mobile.

Yes! A three-parter!

Give it up, Val. She's a little girl. Your defenses are but wet tissue to her. Though that face is a shock! The chin and jaw might grow up to be more like Rhett's than Sandy's, but they're both triangular in the lower face so even if she does it'll never make that much difference, and it won't be till she's so grown up it doesn't matter.

Poor Sandy doesn't have much instinct for her aspiration, does she? This bunch'd like her better if she splayed out a bit and stood up for herself; plus she's digging herself a new rut that looks exactly like the old one with all this cooking and fixing and cleaning. Reluctance to intrude is counterproductive - it keeps her closed off from them. I can see where the Hart lack of boundaries is a shock (though you'd think being around Rhett would've prepared her for it; where did she think he learned it?), but it's the result of an egalitarian take on family life that would work for her if she let it. Sure, Pop's in charge because he's Pop, but there is no bottom of the heap in a pile of puppies because everybody's wiggling around all the time and anyway, the bottom is the warmest place, if a bit stifling. (Just ask Goldie.) But of course it's alien to how she's lived for the last twenty years or so. Their completely different structural takes on how households operate is one reason I don't expect to see Val and Daytona formalize their relationship, ever - they're not only both used to being on top, they have irreconcilable differences about how the heaps under them should be shaped.

Sandy's reaction to the dogs looks like a regression. When it was just her and Proxy, no one else could run the wolves off. Now she's in a more protected environment, her instincts are telling her she needs the protection - she lost some strength when she lost some desperation. Or maybe shut herself off from it. She needs to gain access to that again.

And she needs to help Goldie with her homework. Somebody should, and she's not only better qualified than anybody else in the house (can you imagine what Rhett's study advice is like?), she'd be creating a direct link with another member of the household. She'll never fit in if all her connections are mediated by Proxy.

I'm a little surprised that Rhett isn't more into Proxy. He's usually good with kids, in a grumpy prickly way that my first playtester dubbed Hostile Babysitter mode. ("You're doing it wrong! Gimme that kid.") But this is just as funny in its way, and is more consistent with his characterization so far.

Lots more to digest here, but I have to get ready to go to Game with People Day. I'll reread tonight and no doubt be back.

Oh yes, no way around that, lots of stuff happened and at this point Hamilton hasn't even stopped by yet with Sandy's clothes. And I mentioned before there are Rhett/Proxy interludes to come; he may not be all that interested in babies but now that she can she's not shy about, shall we say, commanding attention.

I needed to test something a while back and ended up toddler-ifying a test hood Proxy and was so shocked myself I ignored the obvious (the black hair, the same gender) and immediately aged her to adult for a side by side with Sandy, wondering if she had Rhett genes at all. You're right, she ends up slightly fuller cheeked but otherwise, forget Virginia, she's the one who is her mother. Just not personality-wise. Oh hell, forgot to throw up Proxy stats, I'll have to go back and squeeze them in. But there was no way Val would overlook this unexpected turn (of countenance) even if he'll likely have to concede and reckon her at least an honorary Hart.

Two shy popularity sims in the house should be able to bond. And even though Goldie's having a bit of an attitudinal teenagery turn herself, this is it. That mild, and equally silent, resentment brewing is pretty much the extent of it, she's not likely to be quite as demonstrative as Virgie. And even though that might get in the way at first when Sandy makes overtures to help (with homework, among other things) Goldie isn't the sim to be able to hold out against someone taking an interest.

Sandy definitely needs to stop wallowing but...ok, all I can say just yet is that there's much to be said for wearing clothes that fit!

I scrolled back up to find Proxy's stats - 10 neat, 0 nice! That'll leave its mark in this house!

I wonder if Sandy appreciates how much faith in her Rhett is expressing by warning his Pop of her chess skills. This is a good installment for Rhett - yeah, he's got a lot of jerk going on, but he's secure in his jerkishness and obviously feels that Sandy's superior qualities are to be celebrated as well as exploited. None of that cutting her down to build himself up which is so often a part of the male jerk package. Presumably, Rhett figures the quality of his womenfolk reflects back onto him - if a woman as smart as Sandy got with him, getting with him must be a smart choice!

Nelson, on the other hand, is being a jerk of the unmitigated kind. She owes him nothing and he has no business coming around, unless he's got a better offer to make.

It's a good thing Valentine has got the jogging routine with Goldie, because he's piling on the stress here. Sandy's not the only one who needs an adult to talk to. Between the financial load he's carrying, his doubts about Mary's babies and now Proxy, the cloud of looming disaster that is Candy's marriage, his baby girl growing up, his own growing old - he's got a lot to carry around that he can't discuss with anybody. Daytona can provide him with a space to get away from it, but she comes with her own stresses and there's swathes of stuff he's worried about that he can't even mention to, much less discuss with, her. No wonder he stays the night over there more often lately, though - imagine lying in the bed he shared with Angel, mentally running through his half of the conversation they should be having to figure out how to go forward, and never hearing her respond. Daytona's bed is a vacation from that.

A daughter-in-law (or whatever) can't do the load-sharing as well as a wife can, but Sandy is as deeply invested in some of this stuff as he is now, and can see the situation better than any of his kids can (or than he would be comfortable expecting them to do; they wouldn't be so immature if he weren't a little invested in their immaturity). Part of the deal with all the house and yardwork is that she's showing herself ready to carry a corner rather than being a dead weight. She'd have to be the one bringing the matter up, though, and it'd be good to have a practical suggestion for addressing a problem in her hand when she does. And there's things she should hesitate to acknowledge she has any inkling of, even if she has practical advice to give. I don't think he'd be willing to listen to anything anybody had to say about the Mary situation. He gets mad enough, listening to himself on that subject.

Val may have reservations about the "son-of-an-Ottomas," but Goldie has done well for herself in the boyfriend department, and she should listen to him. Not least about family size - but they have time to work all that out.

Sandy really brings out the worst in Candy - even in front of Goldie, who generally brings out her best. But Candy has a lot of similarities to shout down and prevent herself from recognizing here (just as, in the Beech update, Hamilton rushed to negate comparing Penny and Rhett's relationship with his and Sandy's, neatly sidestepping the comparisons to be made between Sandy's relationship to Rhett, and his own with Penny). Candy needs a confidante as much as her Pop does, and I don't know where she's going to get one.

Defiance of the Hart genes isn't the only thing making Proxy a force to be reckoned with in her own right, already.

That is one estimation that Sandy takes completely for granted. Yes, she is smarter than Rhett. Not really an accomplishment and in some sense that's just as it should be so she presumes upon him and anyone else recognising that automatically. (Another trait that trickled down to her firstborn.) Of course, she couldn't/wouldn't actually say anything to that effect (it hardly needs saying anyway) but in the next part when she interjects a little modesty, not entirely false, it's not in response to Rhett.

Sandy needs to get over this attraction she's got to men with zero nice points and she needs to do it in a hurry. (No wonder she can't get Hamilton off the brain, he's the only one who doesn't fit her pattern.)

Some of Val's stresses will be resolved, which, of course isn't to say they won't be replaced. Val's relationship with Daytona is progressing in ways neither one of them really intended or anticipated so there will certainly be some things to work out because they are neither of them likely to be willing to let go (not without a fight). We haven't seen Day around the house apart from that one recycled "Awkward!" shot, partly because "Costume Changes!" but also she wasn't at all stalkeriffic this round, further confirming my belief that was a glitch rather than straight maxis behaviour (otherwise, why should the door jump open long before she got to it, surely it wasn't Angel inviting her in!) But Day will be around, just not until Part 3. Val was over there almost every night and thus far she's got her own preoccupations to sort.

Candy doesn't really know how to make friends, not with women or men, but with men she at least knows how to claim and hold their attention. Her only confidante ever was her mother and of course there was a phase during which Angel was the last person she wanted to talk to (and the one person she really needed to be talking to). She and Val also have a unique bond but he's her father and that line between father and friend was firmly cemented after the Hot Tub Dome, nothing like that would ever be allowed to happen again. If Candy could step back enough to allow Goldie to step forward, that'd be best for them both, but, just as Val is somewhat invested in their immaturity, she's invested in Goldie's baby sister mode, it's what gives her access to those best of her instincts.

Since Val and Goldie are the only ones really capable of self-censoring I've got a pretty good idea what Angel sounded like and considering how she was about her baby boy, Sandy and the Hart "imposter" might've been out on their ears unless age mellowed her or Rhett took up for them.

Sandy is trying to find a productive niche for herself, she saw a need and wasted no time filling it. Daughter-in-law, satellite to Rhett, isn't quite the right fit for her so it's a balancing act. And it's that "or whatever" that'll getcha every time.

Angel can speak pretty loud from beyond the grave if you let her, as I found when I was writing the text files that flash back to the Hart youth and she took over for pages at a time. You only have to start thinking, What kind of woman could raise these kids, and be married to this man, and leave them in this state? And she is off and running! I'm a little surprised she hasn't haunted Sandy here, but her haunting is an erratic thing from neighborhood to neighborhood. She refused to manifest at all during development; in the hood I'm playing properly she's a fairly benign presence; in the GSUberhood Challenge Hood she's actively tried to kill Mary twice.

I think Sandy needs somebody a little abrasive around - even Hamilton's only got about three nice points - which is fine, I'm like that myself, but there's such a thing as Overdoing It. She certainly has landed in a place with no oversupply of nice points. She's likely to spoil Proxy rotten, I'm afraid. Being smarter than Rhett is no big accomplishment, no - but for Rhett to acknowledge that, and talk her up as a threat to his Pop's natural right to Win All the Things, that's a separate accomplishment, and not a trivial one.

I like to think that Rhett would stand up for her and Proxy, if it comes to that. It's what he was trying, or thought he was trying, to do that time he accidentally triggered the divorce; and if he did, it'd be the making of him. I'm sure even Val would prefer to see that, in the end. But he's failed, or barely squeaked by, every test life's thrown at him so far, so I won't be surprised if he disappoints me.

I'm going to go check and see if you posted Part Two while I was writing this now.

Oh how I wish I could slap these things together in an hour or two and have done! (And still have them as they are, as I rather like them, that's the hitch.) I was aiming for this weekend, mentally, but I've just remembered that's going to be pretty busy so I'll say Part 2 should be up within the week. (Definitely not another month. Eking out Part 1 means the work's actually more than a third done.)

Ultimately, Sandy might be able to handle herself but there's abrasive and then there's controlling and crazy. She needs to get better at differentiating or at least at calculating acceptable risk. (Being part or all of the allure that'll be tricky but I'm sure she can do the "math".)  To be fair to Rhett, though, his dearth of niceness seldom manifests, as such. He's an all around jackass but that's also part of his charm. And of course, his youth goes a long way toward making it seem like charm. He's just not a mean sim; even Val with his 3 nice points (and I'd forgotten Ham had 3, I knew it wasn't many, but I guess Sandy sure stays on theme) is more likely to initiate a less than friendly gesture (as is Candy, and she's got 6!  Nature v. Nurture. Sims are pretty good at demonstrating how they blend.) And Rhett isn't always as clueless as he seems. He knew what Sandy meant by metaphorical ghosts, for instance, despite claiming not to understand because after seeing Penny and still not getting any closer to getting her back on the hook he didn't want to discuss any of that.

I'd hesitate to claim too much for him, however. With the chess game, while stating the obvious, that Pop doesn't know her well, he's reaffirming that he does and claiming her for his team. She's adjunct to him so when she wins so does he...and a victory against Pop by any means is a welcome boon. More challenges in store for the boy wonder. Jailbait and toddlers and Pop's unreliable conscience...oh my. And where would we be if he ever skimped on the comic relief?

I figured how fast you could get Parts 2 and 3 up would depend on the point at which you decided where the break points were and started focusing on Part 1. If you got the whole thing roughed out first you'd be able to get Part 2 out faster than if you'd recognized where Part 1 needed to end as you came to it and polished that up before proceeding. Since you did the first with the Beech episode, I figured it wasn't out of the question that you'd done it again. Besides, I keep checking even when I know better.

I don't think Rhett's in any danger of letting up on the comic relief. I don't see him changing his style much even when he matures - despite what Candy and Penny are telling him, there's no doubt that the braggadocio and apparent overconfidence are working for him as much as against him. He probably has to fake more confidence than he has just to get out there and be his father's son day after day; if amping it up a bit more even than that makes people find him funny rather than obnoxious; maybe gets him in under their guard; makes them roll their eyes instead of punching him - well, that's all good, isn't it?

And Rhett with a toddler is always cute as blazes, because they have so much in common!

I gave the female Hart more nice points than the males because "niceness," as it plays in the game, is mostly about how accommodating, conflict-avoidant, and ready to please other people you are, as opposed to how self-assertive and indifferent to public opinion. I'm sure I don't need to explain how those traits are gendered in Western society! So if Candy isn't using her nice points on somebody, odds are good it's somebody she doesn't need anything from, and who she fears will try to use resources she needs to hoard for her and hers. The exception here would be Rich, who requires a finely calibrated balance between compliance and defiance to keep him in the sweet zone - and that has to be exhausting. I for one can't blame her much for letting it all hang out when she goes home, where love is not contingent upon behavior; but she doesn't need to actively target Sandy.

One thing that makes Nelson scary is that, if and when Rich decides he has a use for Sandy, Nelson is the natural instrument for delivering the threat, bribe, or baited trap. I wonder if that's occurred to Sandy at all? She needs to quash whatever attraction she feels, and complain to the family about the creepy guy who keeps showing up. She hasn't actively encouraged him to date, so she has high ground, but she could easily lose it. Complaining about him would make it much harder for him to maneuver her into a situation that Rhett and Valentine could misperceive. Let's channel some of the excess testosterone kicking around that house to a useful purpose! I grant you it'd be awkward if Rhett decided to pick a fight with him, but that's the worst case scenario for going public; while the worst case for keeping quiet could be dire indeed.

But Sandy is not great about applying her smarts toward people; it's the great tragedy of her life.

I never have any idea how many pics I've taken until I start the sorting and when I collected shots for the Harts I was simply staggered. The decision to do three parts was made just so that I could begin. Two and three were sectioned off, but that's it, still more undone than done. Busy weekend carried over but I'm working on it.

Rhett. Oh Rhett. 'Tis all.
At least until I've got out Part 2. Although now I'm thinking I may push back the Proxy stuff and more or less give him Part 3, mostly so I can use one of the extras as the header pic and title the chapter after it. The main problem is that Part 3 doesn't follow Part 2 (not according to my math) and I wanna show it, dammit! Yes, I could try to get faster...I won't get faster. Ah well, will see how the arranging goes.

With respect to "niceness", its meaning is rather deliberately imprecise, pertaining at times to particularity or fineness of discrimination yet deriving from words meaning quite the opposite of 'knowingness' (noesis...yet not really; it sounds like it should be so, niceness/noesis, but IIRC the etymology cannot be tracked thataway, which was once a sore point to my adolescent craving for the patness of all things) and most often now being used as some sort of non-committal descriptor just on the right side of neutral. "That's nice". Nice women are respectable (which makes it interesting to consider that I haven't ever and wouldn't use the word to describe myself...but then there's still the trap of the "good girl"), nice men are unobjectionable. Not exactly ringing endorsements for a personality but I'll take the nice/mean scale here over TS3 style good and evil any day. And on the sim side of life I've just remembered how I roared with laughter to discover that, despite Proxy being the mean one, Una with all her nice points is the one who's already made enemies of the entire toddler population in Widespot (save Proxy). Unwanted huggles. Is she Woody's niece or what?

That hasn't occurred to Sandy, at all, no. She's not afraid of Rich. Intimidated possibly, at the thought of being too much in his power, and perhaps attracted but not properly wary. (Another reason antagonising her may not be completely consequence-free for Candy, not that she's especially concerned with what Rich gets up to with other chicks but there are a few choices that'd get under her skin and Sandy's one of them. Rich messing around with Mary would irritate her life, even if it did serve Junior right for marrying her but at least that's one horror I don't see ever happening in my hood.) And it's unlikely that Sandy will be complaining about Nelson. She wants to keep him around and, even if she wants more than just another bed buddy, when that romance secondary starts kicking in Sandy is not above settling for what she can get or leaping first and regretting afterwards.

Goldie and David are adorable! As is Proxy, Val can keep his concerns to himself!

They and their triple-bolt-iness have been cuter than I could've imagined. I don't know what Dixie thought she was doing but she's out of her depth with them.

Val's keeping (mostly) mum for now but he'll be watching that one, and her mother, just in case.

Thanks, I'm glad you liked it! One of the benefits of being a cc hoarder is that I don't really have to plan ahead, at least not on a case-by-case basis; whatever I need for the scene that's shaping up while playing is usually right there to hand. And when it isn't I improvise and sometimes that's funnier, like Rhett grabbing a pot instead of a frying pan to run into the fray back during The Mann Act.

Punny names aren't my forte but Sunny (or Sonny) is one of those I'm also keeping on standby, though it doesn't necessarily have to be for a Beech. Sandy must have found her voice in Daytona's home to be able to decree what even Daytona will wear, though perhaps it isn't Daytona's home at all in your hood, belonging instead to the couple. That alone would change the dynamics considerably.

Aw, Goldie. There's always something, isn't there, being the odd one out in that family. And in hoods where Mary's pregnancy proceeds as planned and her father's foibles are as on-display as the rest, I can see where coping with all that, and alongside her mother's recent death, might make her a bit neurotic.

That does put a different spin on things. Primogeniture only seems foreign to my Beeches until we remove the traditional gender clause in favour of the male. Daytona might believe her ideas for her legacy are meritocratic but there are more things influencing the rights of succession in her family, especially since it would never be verbalised that way. She loves Hamilton but Virgie is the one and he'll just be holding her place, should Daytona not live long enough to pass the torch herself...but she fully intends to. Has Hamilton surpassed Daytona on the career ladder in your game? If she's still running things and you've kept their ages as they start out then he is not a young man and seemingly not so invested in his patriarchal privileges that he'd feel a need put his mother in her place and establish himself for the whole town to regard him as the head of the family. But however much habit might mediate their relationship that won't necessarily fly with his wife. I take it no one is doubting Sunny's paternity and you say you haven't corroborated for yourself in game, but some secrets will out of their own accord. Perhaps it wouldn't matter as much because she's a girl? But if Hamilton's not already aware of her infidelity and choosing to overlook it, that could get tricky. His dominance, more than any of the other men as Widespot starts, has been undermined, on several sides. He's sure to need some outlets (his children, affairs of his own?)(mine started to drink a bit too much although he's getting that under control but then advancing in his career, even though it brings him into conflict with his mother, has helped) or some new ideas about the way things should be to hold onto.

Bringing the gender inequality to the fore is an intriguing way to go with this hood. It does still exist in mine, but only the men seem to believe fully or unreflectively in their privileges (even the more benign characters) but they are then challenged by what the women in their lives do if not by what they say. The exceptions would be Mary, oh and Samantha definitely, and possibly Beulah because where else would Mary have learned it - only in her case it'd definitely have to be more 'do as I say, not as I do' to have taken root. And Miss Mary just might be due for an awakening soon because deferring to Junior will not seem quite as right as it might had she ended up with Valentine.

I've been swapping aging mods in and out and fiddling with the ages in game to suit but from what I remember and have seen of others' Widespots, Hamilton and Sandy start out on the cusp of elderhood themselves, which is why I wondered. The highs and lows are relative, of course, and since I'm playing this challenge with timed rotations Daytona's starting Level 6 has actually meant that she's in serious crunch mode if she expects to top her career and become Widespot's first mayor.