Saturday, April 16, 2011

The Journal of Phillip Grant - April 1

The girls are still working on their charm. Penny and Nick are rarely apart these days. It looks like she was pretty serious when she said he was the one.

"Hey Dad, can we borrow the car? I want to do some shopping with Nick."

"Shopping? Does that poor lad know what he's in for?"

"He made me swear to keep it quick and as painless as possible."

"Ok then. Don't stay out too long."

Since breaking up with James, Ronnie has been experimenting a bit.

She's decided to flirt with an old friend of hers, I think that one is Kyra Pendragon. I can never keep the Pendragon girls straight in my head. There's several of them.

So far, no one has been back for a second visit with Ronnie.  James must be hard to replace.

Corey and I decided to do some laundry. He supervised while I used the machines.

While the laundry was going, Vanessa and I made a little trip across town. We haven't been to see Vincent or the baby for too long.

Miriam is growing so fast. Just yesterday, she was a baby. Look at her now.

Isn't she just the cutest thing?

Our first and so far only grandchild. Vanessa and I keep hoping for more grandchildren. But Vincent and Kari haven't said anything about a second child and Stephen has yet to officially settle on a life partner.

So that's why Penny wanted to take Nick shopping. I see they made a pretty thorough job of getting Nick a new look. The stylist must have been very busy.

Damn, he looks a lot like his dad now. The resemblance is more obvious with that new hair cut.

Penny seems to approve of the new look quite a lot. The two of them kept that up for hours.

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So I wanted to go to China. Vanessa was offered cash to smuggle one of her books to China. Penny wants to work on her martial arts in China.

So we decided to take a family holiday to France.

No, just kidding, we were off to China.

It's always a long tiring flight, but it's always too exciting when you finally arrive to pause to rest.

I checked the notice board for adventure.

This guy was offering rewards to retrieve items from the Temple of Heaven.

If memory serves, that's going to be interesting since it's supposedly has quite extensive tunnels, labyrinths and traps underneath the main structure.

The girls went off and did some sightseeing first. First was the Forbidden City.

While Vanessa delivered the extra copy of her book.

The shopkeeper paid her an extra 1,000 Simoleons for it. That alone paid for her airfare over.

Ronnie still isn't too sure of the training dummies. She's getting better, but she's better with her books than with a physical activity.

Penny, on the other hand, is making excellent progress toward her next belt.

She's been training hard. She's preparing for her first ranked match.

Vanessa and I both warned her that ranked matches would be tougher than what she's used to. Don't get expectations too high.

I was having a great deal of success exploring the Temple of Heaven. I managed to find some places that no Grant has ever entered.

This is so worthwhile. I've been finding some great artifacts.

I found the key to the inner portion of the temple.

Only one way to get anywhere in life. Dive straight in, head first.

Especially when you need to enter a dive well.

Dripping wet with bugs all over me. Why the hell do I do this again?

Oh yes, the thrill of the treasure. That's why. I should find quite a bit of treasure. There's been no one here for centuries.

15 comments:

  1. Wow, kudos to Phillip! Diving into wells, running around China- quite active for an elder!

    And I looooove how you did their trip to China- I've always had a hard time taking an entire family on an adventure because it's just so much to focus on, but you did a great job dividing the story between all of them!

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  2. Phillip might be an elder but it's barely slowed him down.

    China is the best destination for many Sims. The academy, the scholar's garden, safe places to see. France is second, there is the museum and the nectary. Egypt doesn't work well for multiple Sims. There's just no good places to leave your Sims to their own devices and hope it goes well.

    I do pause and check on all of them a *lot*. LOL

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  3. I just realised that this Grant family is down to Amelia and Kaleeko as serious fans (or at least fans who comment). MJ sometimes. We lost Jen at some point. :( And there is pretty much no one else at all.

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  4. Hiya! Just read this update and I really liked it! Personally, I hate World Adventures, but love reading about other's adventures. So this was a neat story to read! Can't wait to see who continues on the family!

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  5. Hey Drew, nice of you to stop by.

    You aren't the only person to comment that they don't like World Adventures to play but do enjoy reading them. :)

    The writer of the family journal a) has to travel from time to time and b) must wear a hat. So our new writer will be acquiring her hat and the journal renamed in the not too distant future.

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  6. Oh man. ;D Nick's makeover... makes him look like a Brad clone. XD lol.

    Not to surprised to see Ronnie's experimenting; I had a feeling that may be where things were headed... but I'm still interested to see whether she and James end up making it back together or not.

    Looks like Nick and Penny may be in it for the long haul, though. ^^

    Vincent's baby's already so big! D'aww.

    Hahaha--the "so we're off to France!" bit made me laugh. For a second I thought you were serious, considering you mentioned something about your game crashing and losing China.

    Cute seeing the girls both tackling Martial Arts (and Ronnie failing, lol--definitely not your thing, girl), and of course, seeing Phillip off and adventuring is always cute. He definitely hasn't given up in his old age--I don't recall if his Dad did that. I'll have to go back and look.

    Even if you don't have many commentors on this blog, you know I'm always happy to see them! :D They has a special place in mah heart.

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  7. Agreed. I'd been careful with Nick up to this point to make sure he didn't look like the Brad clone he is. The only thing he lacks is the Kane blue eyes. He's the only Brad/Em child who doesn't have that eye colour. If you can't see the eyes, it's hard to tell it's not Brad.

    We'll see with Ronnie. She's not terribly interested in anyone since losing James. So it's more a question of does James stay available long enough?

    Miriam is a little cutie so far. But time is flying by as far as her grandparents are concerned.

    Yep, most of the pics are from the crashed version of going to China. But since three of my family had a reason to go to China, we went back. I was just a bit more cautious on the second try. Phillip didn't end up exploring Temple of Heaven that time, which means Penny can some time in the future.

    You aren't the only one who can't remember if Indy did much adventuring in his old age. I have no idea if Indy did or didn't. Sam did - Sam adventured quite a long time after turning elder. He corrupted and attempting to send him on holiday crashed the game - which is about the time I finally gave in and triggered age transition for him.

    This is one family that is perfectly safe cause no matter how few or how many followers they have. They will always hold a special place for me.

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  8. The answer about Indy was no, he didn't adventure in old age much. But Indy, in spite of his name, didn't really travel nearly as much as either his dad or his son.

    I went cruising back to see what happened. It can be fun to cruise back, there was Phillip trying to woo Vanessa. And his nephew, The Shrimp, as a baby and toddler.

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  9. It seems so odd to see Phillip as an elder. He's aged well as has Vanessa. I hate, hate how the Sims portrays elders. GAHHHHH!!!!

    Traveling can be fun. I'll manage a large family, triplets, two sets of twins but I only sent a family on vacation once. Never did that again!

    I see that WA is still pretty bugging as you had a big ol' crash in China.

    Nice seeing the traveling Grant family, PiB. :D

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  10. Yeah, Sims is definitely cruel to elders. Phillip and Vanessa came out alright.

    LOL - only to China. I tried once to take the full Grant family; Sam, Rachel, and all 5 kids. And never ever again will I take 7 Sims on holiday.

    Le Crash - well, I really should have known better than have Ronnie take multiple pictures with a camera that still had pics taken by great granny Rachel. It crashed on pic 3.

    Kermit Flail for Chrysame!

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  11. I should have known better than using the camera when selling all of the photos didn't actually work. We got $50 something instead of $1200 something.

    Note for Kaleeko, Travis Kane's wife Ginger is driving me mad. She never goes home - so no babies. :( If she spends any more time in the Fire Station, I will CAS her to a new lifewant. Amelia is being fickle and has yet to commit to anyone at all.

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  12. Lovely update. You have always done a great job in telling the story of the world adventures.

    I could see why Ronnie did experiments a bit. Sometimes, especially after a broken heart, it's easier to have a heart fallen to a girl. Mostly, girls are good listeners.

    Nick surely looks like Brad, indeed.

    Wow, the last two screenshots would be very had to take.

    About the comments, :D that's why I asked you to put me on your email list so I can follow. I don't spend my time everyday online. Sometimes, I take a break from the internet world & gamming.. or else maybe my brain will be overloaded. Also, I'm not a chatty in real life and that's why I rarely elaborate after a brief comment. But, you can be sure I love this family. They are special to my heart. I even kept some of them in my bin.

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  13. Hey MJ

    Thanks for popping by. Ronnie wasn't upset about splitting up with James. But she's not terribly interested in anyone since either.

    The dive well screen shot was luck and timing. The bugs, well, you do get a few moments while they brush bugs off.

    Never feel pressured to do comments. There's no real reason you must, the family will return at some point no matter!

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