Do you realize???

Round 23: Winter 2017

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Maria Moretti is 74, Filippo is 62, Emil Collins is 45, Anna is 39, Nathan is 7 and Hope is 6.
(Caleb is 35, Cara is 28 and Betsy Carmody is 46)

Hope really likes the new house, and having her very own bedroom in the new house. Her parents even let her pick out most of the furniture and decorations for it, so it's very much her room. But she's missing sharing a room with her older brother Nathan. Just a little bit.



Nathan is just loving his new found privacy. There's even a lock on his bedroom door, so he doesn't even have to let Hope in, ever!

Emil and Anna were able to afford the new house mostly due to Anna's new job as a professional party guest. She gets paid far too much money to show up to parties and events around town, mingle for a few hours and then go home, which leaves her at a loose end during the day.

Seeing most parties in town happen on the weekend, she's at a loss for what to do at night too. Emil works, the kids go to bed at 9 and surprisingly, she hasn't felt the desire to go out looking for other men recently. So she's stuck at home, bored, with Maria and Filippo.

Anna can't stand Maria and has never made a secret of it but Filippo is usually okay. Since he turned 60 though, he's been hinting he'd like another grandchild. Or step-grandchild, he always said, just so it was quite clear who he thought should be getting pregnant. Anna's reluctance to have a third child turned into outright terror a little while ago, so it's definitely not happening. Besides, how many grandchildren do these people want anyway? If you count Nathan and Hope, Filippo has 6 grandchildren already, Cara was pregnant with two more and Kirstin will have another in the autumn.

Anna wished they'd both find another way to occupy their time, quite frankly. She didn't much care what they did in their bedroom, just that them being in there meant they weren't bothering her.
If Maria and Anna got along better, they could probably cancel out their boredom by hanging out together. As it was though, Maria spent her days being scandalised by the movies on cable. Have they gotten filthier or has Maria grown more conservative in her old age?

Maria's got it in her head that she's going to breed Anna's dog Nacho with her new dog Daiquiri. Nacho is pretty old but Maria figures he might have a few good breeding years left in him, if dogs are anything like people.

Meanwhile, Anna has managed to drag her older sister Betsy out to cheer her up after her separation. She felt it was her sisterly duty but was hoping Betsy didn't start crying. Anna has never been very good at comforting people and preferred it when she had no reason to.

Betsy was clearly missing Kimberly but she was doing okay. Finally, after two years, Anna learns the whole story about Betsy and Linnea - the hotel rooms, the trips away, the sneaking around. Anna was a little taken aback - an affair wasn't something she'd expect from Betsy but Betsy had amazed herself with that.

Anna and Betsy talked a long time - Betsy talked about missing Kimberly, mostly and Anna talked about her new career aspirations. The party scene was more boring and less glamourous than she thought it would be and she was starting to think about architecture. Once Betsy reminded her that most architecture firms aren't interested in applicants with degrees in psychology, the idea lost its lustre. No way was Anna going back to college.

As for Anna and Emil, they weren't doing too badly.

Emil is definitely not faithful to her and the only reason Anna hasn't strayed recently is lack of interest, as opposed to any sort of moral objection to cheating.

Somehow though, it seems to work for them. They keep it all fairly quiet, to avoid drama with Maria and Filippo and so as not to upset the kids, and they're on the same page with it, so neither of them see a problem with their arrangement.

Luckily, the impending birth of Caleb and Cara's twins is drawing more interest than anything Emil and Anna are doing.

It hasn't even been a year since the wedding and Cara is already finding her mother-in-law tiresome. Why is she warning them not to move to Exeter? She and Caleb only just bought a house in Sullivan.

Maria is even driving the normally easy-going Caleb up the wall!

Randomness:
Success! Emil wouldn't do it with Anna - he kept holding her chin - but I got him to do it with Sydney. So it seems I am able to recreate this kiss, with ACR 2, as Cissie suggested but I just need to work at it and try several times. It seems like 3 out of 4 times, they'll do the chin one.

Usually, my playable NPCs just get aged up but sometimes I'll play them for a day or two and today, I played Steve for a little while and tested out the ACR Tender Kiss with Steve and Olivia (same results, pretty much). They ended up in bed, which might be the one place they hadn't woohooed yet and I was just in hysterics. Olivia is very vocal - she actually sings out when they're nearly done and it's hilarious! I'm going to have to watch my other Sims to see who else does that!

Notes:

• The title is from Do You Realize??? by the Flaming Lips.
• Poor Anna, everyone wants her to have another baby. She's gone from ambivalence to actually having the fear, so I'm not going to put her through it. Besides, I just got this house decorated the way I like!
• Anna's multiple woohoo and makeout wants rolled away this round and she also rolled up the Play With Relative want (which is why she went out with Betsy), which is a want I've never seen on a non-Family Sim.
• Anna achieved her LTW this round and her new one is Become City Planner. This will be an idle dream for Anna, as I don't see her as the type to work too hard for anything. ;)