Log 5t: Totally Nuclear

Dunno why, but this little family is the most “unit-like” I’ve had yet. The four of them gravitate together like drops of oil in a cup of water.

On an average morning, the littles bond over breakfast at the bar to dad’s piano tunes while mom bones up on mixology for work, and it’s the most natural thing in the world.

The twins are pals now.

Ede still needs to practice her drink making skills a bit, ha.

The kidlets’ birthday was fortuitously timed – they only had two school days before the weekend came and liberated them from homework. But being the motivated little peanuts they are, they wasted no time in knocking out aspirational milestones.

Keyboard commander on one side, chalkboard nails on the other.

Stages one and two of both aspirations were completed with ease. Stage 3, for Forsythia, required a jaunt to the park to make it across the monkey bars a few times. Fennel probably would’ve been perfectly content to stay home and doodle, but we felt he would benefit from the fresh air and some time to regain his hearing, so they made the trip together.

Forsythia eyes the play structures hungrily.

For a Saturday, the park was strangely empty. Fennel meandered over to snack on an abandoned hot dog, said hello to a couple old dudes playing chess, got bored and went home. But Forsythia was determined to play for a while, even if it was by herself.

She did her obligatory monkey-barring, and then pirated her own ship. She imagined she’d just wrested control of it from a would-be mutineer and his cronies, throwing the disloyal overboard so she could keep all of the booty herself.

“See how ya like Davy Jones’ locker, ya traitorous worms!”

She was feeling top-of-the-worldish until she spied something freaky gurgling just off deck.

“Holy plum!”

She’d been so cloaked in her own imagination that having another actual person suddenly appear in her ‘game’ was too much! She booked it outta there — not ’cause she was scared, you know, she just needed to go. Like, now.

“Don’t look back. Don’t look back!”

Meanwhile, back at home, someone had gone back to channeling tormented cats.

Maybe it’s just this instrument.. I can’t still be this bad.

Forsythia could hear them from the tub, but her mind was still on the sea.

The twins finished the day by sneaking in an action film while their parents snuck some alone time.

“Ha ha! Man! That guy better run!”

---

The next morning at breakfast, the kids had something they wanted to discuss.

“Have you noticed that nobody actually lives here in town?” Fennel asked his parents. “Besides our cousins and that one neighbor family, I mean.”

“It’s kind of like there’s something secret going on out there. Something big.”

“I noticed!” Forsythia said, moving down to her parents’ end of the table for maximum impact. “I had to play with some freaky lady at the park yesterday. Where are all the kids?”

“She was clearly not normal.”

Malcolm chuckled. “That ‘freaky lady’ is your next door neighbor, you know.”

Forsythia shrugged, and then squinted. “She seemed awfully natural playing sea monster. I mean she came out of nowhere.”

“To address the original question, though,” Malcolm said, “I’m not sure why people stopped moving in. When I worked for the postal service, they told us there were strict rules about the number of people allowed to live here. So we would be in a place for a very short while and then move on. I had to quit so that I could stay with your mom. But, if that’s still happening with all the houses empty.. that doesn’t seem to be working as intended.”

“Or maybe it is,” said Fennel forebodingly.

“I’m not saying it was aliens, but..”

“Whatever the reason,” Ede said, trying to reign in the creativity a tad, “Maybe there’s something we can do about it. I know I’m not the most social person around, but I’d much rather have a chance to befriend someone once in a while than be exposed to a constant stream of strangers.”

Malcolm thought for a moment. “What if we actually recruited some people to come and live here?”

“Sometimes the simplest answer is the correct one.”

“I like simple,” said Ede. “How do we do it?”

“We write up an advertisement, maybe?” he said. “We could offer help with moving expenses, job placement, that kind of thing.”

“Could that actually work?” Fennel asked. He seemed interested too, now.

“It’s a starting point.”

“Can’t hurt to try,” Malcolm said.

---

Ede was certainly willing to give it a try, so she sat down after breakfast and began to draft up a little flyer.

“Can we request some entertainers that can actually play instruments?” asked Fennel.

“And some more kids!” added Forsythia.

Ede incorporated everyone’s wishes and showed them all what she had:

---

WANTED: SETTLERS!

Calling all
Artists, Performers, Culinary Talent,
Families, Friends;
Anyone in Search of a New Start
or a Place to Call Home!

We can provide:
Career Placement
Moving Expenses
Help Achieving Aspirations

Contact E Wolff or M Presley . Oakenstead . Willow Creek

---

“Should I do the thing with the little tear-away strips of paper and the phone number?” Ede wondered.

“If you want,” Malcolm smiled. “Probably just an email address would suffice.”

“I’ll do both,” she grinned.

---

In addition to posting the flyer online, Ede printed some out and she and Forsythia went and tacked them up around town.

“So what do we do now?” Forsythia asked.

“We wait.”

…….

Ed. Note: If your Sims would like a chance to relocate to our save game, drop me a note by commenting here or on the forums to let me know how to find ya. I probably won’t add a billion sims at once, but if I feel like yours are a good fit I’ll gradually work them in. 🙂