Monday 9 November 2009

Selective memory

Round 22: Summer 2016
Principal Augustin Novak is 61, teacher Tatiana Lachance is 33, Sarah Carmody is 11, Ethan Novak and Matilda Jacobson are both 10, Adrienne Novak is 9, Rebecca Kirby and Tessa Novak are both 7, Malcolm Novak, Nathan Collins, Dominic Lachance and Susannah Carmody are all 6 and Julia Gray and Hope Collins are both 5.


It's the first day back at Sullivan Primary School and unfortunately, it's raining. Let's hope the rain holds out or the teachers will be cooped up inside the school at lunch time with some very insane children.

Tatiana has her son Dominic in her classroom this year. Dominic is quite a sweetheart and is often found giving his mum a quick hug. Nathan Collins is not the hugging type and thinks Dominic is a bit of a suck-up.

And maybe he is. He's the only kid who heads straight for his books as soon as he enters the classroom. It's probably safer to behave yourself if your teacher is also your mother though - she might continue punishment at home if you don't!

Most of the kids really like Tatiana. It's hard to keep most of them concentrating on their work because they're constantly rushing up to tell her about their weekends, what they're going to do in their holidays or stories about their families.

Tatiana has a couple of new kindergarteners in her class and Julia seems to have a case of first day nerves. That'll be fun for Tatiana to clean up!

None of the other kids see her throwing up, thankfully for her, and she's soon befriended by Nathan.

So it turns out that there's not really much for Julia to be nervous about anyway. Story time? Not scary.

Despite the rain, Augustin really, really wants to play soccer today, so he takes the big kids out anyway. Ethan indulges him for a little while.

Soccer in the rain is fairly unpleasant though and the other kids soon start occupying themselves in other ways and Augustin decides the PE lesson is over.

Fortunately for everyone, the weather is fine by lunchtime.

Dominic spends his lunch time telling Tessa how great it is that he doesn't have to ride that smelly school bus to school and gets to go in a car with his mother instead. He probably won't be as appreciative in 4 or 5 years, so he should enjoy it while he can.

Lately, Augustin and Tatiana have been having a minor problem with the older students' tag games spreading out past the school gates.

It sets a bad example for the younger students because if the big kids do it, the little ones will soon follow.

But the kids are mostly well-behaved and usually only need a quick reminder of the out of bounds areas and they'll come back without much fuss.

Hope Collins might have found a new best friend in Julia Gray. These two girls are inseparable!

One is rarely seen without the other somewhere nearby.

Hope's brother Nathan has found himself having to revise his initial assessment of Dominic. If Dominic is willing to laugh at Nathan's "secrets" about his grandmother, he can't be that much of a suck-up!

Once school is over, Tatiana heads home with Dominic and all the other students head off to their own homes. Everyone except for Adrienne and Malcolm, that is.

They have to wait for their grandpa to finish "working".

Notes:
  • The title is from an Eels song.
  • I'm still not quite sure about the heights for the older kids. I may still adjust them a little.
  • I am still not sure why Julia threw up in the classroom. She was on the merry-go-round outside but she'd been chatting to other kids for a little while inside before she finally threw up.
  • Augustin will eventually retire (from his real job and from the school) but not until he's at least 65. He may stay on longer but he already has the want to retire, so he's looking forward to it. Seeing Sims get a pension when they retire, I've decided they can't claim that until they're old enough. I guess Tatiana will be the new principal at that point, but I'll need another teacher too. I'm glad I have a few years to figure out who that'll be!
  • I'm planning on choosing a treasurer/governor/some other title that won't conflict with the Maxis Mayor sometime before next round. The only reason I haven't done it so far is because I've been trying to think of a title, which is really lame of me. Previously, my Sims' taxes have just gone off into the ether but now they will pay for town betterment! Anyway, the governor/treasurer/whatever's job will be to collect taxes and distribute them around to areas of Sullivan that need it, including the schools. Once Augustin gets some of that money, I'm planning on refurbishing the school with it. I didn't have community lot versions of any of the reward objects when I built the school but I do now and I think I might be able to do some cool things with those.

5 comments:

  1. The kids look so adorable!

    Is your governor/treasurer/whatever going to be one of your playable sims or will you make a dummy sim for the position? I have set up the Maxis Mayor as the sim who handles the tax money. Currently it's Ryland Whitfield but I don't know what will happen when he dies.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The position will be held by one of my own Sims. I was going to wait until Zaria got into Politics and became the Maxis Mayor but then there's the issue of what happens when she dies or retires. I'd rather have the position be completely separate so I don't have to worry about always having a Sim in the Politics career.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love the looks at your schools and the kids!

    Poor Julia! I've noticed that sometimes it takes a bit for them to get sick, especially if they have some actions set up. I love how you worked it into her first day at school. Cute in a gross kind of way!

    Some of the older kids look a little creepy stretched out so tall. If they're that close to a teenaged height, you should probably age them up. Real kids don't age at a normal rate. Some would look like teens at an earlier age than others, so it would make some sense.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Military sims might make good Governors too, and apparently, actors quite often in real life, lol! So yes, I keep my Governor's position separate from the political career track too.

    I love the different heights on your kids, but I have to agree with Lunar about the oldest ones :) What factor are you using for the oldest? I think my older ones (10/11 yr.olds) are usually 1.17 at most. And then I shrink down my youngest teens to 0.87 which ends up being a pretty close transition.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Lunar, yeah, that must have been what it was with Julia! I was worried she was sick, briefly, but no one else on the lot was sick and her parents aren't sick either. It's such a kindergartener thing to do though. I've definitely dealt with that before!

    Yeah, the older kids are definitely too tall but I don't think I'm going to age them up any earlier than I do. Even though some kids do start to look like teens earlier in real life, I'm a bit anal-retentive about my Sims in game aging to the next age stage at the same time. I also don't want any Patience and Jacob style shenanigans with even younger kids!

    Laura, I'm going to look carefully at my Sims' jobs and backgrounds before I choose my Governor/Treasurer/whatever. I'll probably go with Governor because here, that's mostly a ceremonial position (premiers are the equivalent of the US state governors) so I can make anything I want of it.

    Ah, that explains a lot! I'm using 1.25 for Sarah, I think and 1.2 for Ethan and Matilda (my 10s and 11s are different heights right now but they won't be when I figure out what heights I like the best). Adrienne is 1.1 and she looks pretty good, I think, except when standing completely still. I might try 1.17.

    I don't have any 12 year-olds right now but all my 13s are at 0.92 (I know kids don't all age at the same rate but I'm going to let mine do so until they're about 14 or 15 - just for simplicity's sake!). When Sarah turns 12, I might try her out with 0.87 and see how that looks. Thanks, Laura!

    ReplyDelete