#undine's bachelorette challenge

[simstryingtheirbestok]

After Dietmar left, Carlos approached Undine in the living room to, again, Express Feelings.

As I was capturing the next picture,

a head of black hair moved into the frame and in front of Carlos and Undine. Sorry I don't have a shot of it--I was too startled.

I immediately zoomed back out.

"Oh hey guys! Carlos, Undine... how's it going?"

And then, without missing a beat:

Carlos' face:

[simstryingtheirbestok]

I'll say this for Carlos: He always cleans up after himself (and, usually, the others).

But, so does Youssef--and Youssef doesn't spend all day looking out the window.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Noon came, or maybe it was more like 1:30 p.m. Chess took awhile to get through and I'm bad with time, okay. Time and I are not friends.

But a loser must be evicted, and today that loser was

I'll be honest, he kinda grew on me. Not enough for me to want him to marry Undine, but enough that I repented of calling him basic. Maybe he is basic, but he was also really good about autonomously cleaning things,

which, considering how little the maid could be bothered to leave the hot tub, was really helpful.

It's also uncertain what the guys will do without Brian to Talk About Art to, but they'll just have to soldier on without him.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Undine's has the Irresistible trait and the Attractive reward, so that she wound up with a queue of contestants trying to chat her up on the first day was unsurprising.

Get used to all the pink and red--that's sort of the theme of this tacky-ass house.

Jian and Brian spent most of the day swimming. Troy got in a quick gossip session with Undine

but her most persistent suitor was Youssef.

Youssef has a strange phenomenon going on in which he randomly spawns a meal and tries to eat it.

When he first spawned the curry wurst (!) I'd been paying attention to someone else. I thought he must have whipped it up in the kitchen while I wasn't looking, or maybe it had been in his inventory? I checked to make sure there weren't any other random foodstuffs on his person, then blew it off. I mean, at least I know he isn't going to starve.

But shortly after he finished the curry wurst, and after he finished chatting about art with Undine, he popped out an empanada.

WHERE ARE YOU KEEPING THEM? I made him put that one in the fridge as a leftover. He isn't keeping them. As you've probably figured out, and far faster than I did? He's mooching food off of other Sims. I forgot I gave him that for a negative trait, and I've never played a mooch before. Mystery solved!

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Now that Undine's down to 3 bachelors,

[simstryingtheirbestok]

When I instructed each contestant to dance with Undine, I was not happy about it, because two of them were already there in the living room with her, and one of those two was Andrew. Most of the rest of them were outside, swimming or hot-tubbing and what not. Whatever outdoorsy people do in an island paradise--it's not like I would know.

But look who raced in from soccer practice!

It's Jian Wei!

Youssef: This isn't fair. I was in the kitchen washing up after these animals.

Jian Wei was all the way outside the house, Youssef. He just runs fast, and he got to Undine first. Fair's fair.

Undine danced with most of the guys. I don't think she got to every last one of them before the clock struck noon, but here are the ones she did nab.

(Banners: @oasislandingresident! tysm again!)

He looks awfully smug for someone who just broke a 4000-Simolean plumbing appliance. Also, he can't dance for shit so that's why it looks like he, uh, isn't. He just does the head-nod/shoulder-shrug thing.

That's a little better.

Not bad, Carlos.

Will this be enough to make up for boring her into unconsciousness yesterday? Probably not, but he gets his 30 minutes fair and square all the same.

Now we're talking!

In fact, let's have a couple more photos of these two, because I wish to make an observation:

Carlos. See him pacing around in the background at the left, considering windows to look out of? That, and occasionally brooding on the hollowness of life--these are the only things I ever see him doing. I've had Sims with the Brooding trait before, but Carlos is defined by it. He broods, therefore he is.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

I've had some renaming already.

Every time I looked at "Eddie Allen," I thought "Troy Hansen," so that is his name now.

When I got them all into the same house, I found Brian Clarke had somehow acquired the name "Brian Clarkeccc." 🤡 I don't know whether there's another Brian Clarke in the game somewhere, and this is an attempt to differentiate them, or if I just lost control of my left third finger at some point. Regardless, he is Brian Clavelly now.

I have made them all nameplates and used Comic Sans to do it 🤭. In alphabetical order by last name, the contestants arrrrre--

--oh God of course they'd all turn out proportional. I suck at this! Should've made them all fixed width I guess? But then what if they didn't display right on people's phones? Help me @oasislandingresident, you're my only hope.

I will try to update my avatar with Youssef the highest-ranking bachelor each day. But you'll have to read the posts to know who went home. 😈

[simstryingtheirbestok]

It's here--THE FINAL DAY!

But first, I have to mention how much I've missed Bonehilda.

I forgot to end services with the maid service, too, so the maid showed up and promptly quit in horror. Goodbye and good riddance!

Everyone ate leftovers for breakfast. Afterwards, Carlos repaired to one of the lounge chairs on the back patio to chill with Bonehilda.

Undine, meanwhile, cornered Youssef in the kitchen. She had Confessed Attraction and had her First Kiss with Carlos yesterday, but had never got around to doing the same with Youssef.

She didn't get around to doing it this time, either.

💔

Utterly tragic.

...though, in a way... in a way it's just as well, because when they all first awakened, Carlos and Youssef were tied, and I wasn't sure how I was going to resolve that. I don't like the method suggested in the original challenge, because why should I care how high the relationship is between two suitors?

But it looks as though Youssef resolved it for me. Undine being rejected for a first kiss didn't lower their relationship by a lot, but it did lower it enough to make a difference.

Afterwards, Youssef hit the pool.

He didn't seem particularly upset.

"Why should I be? I'm still hot."

Indoors, Carlos approached Undine.

And so the winner of Undine's Bachelorette Challenge is

The prize: Admission to Undine's inner sanctum in the bachelorette house, which I've kept locked against every Sim but her during this week.

Goodbye, Youssef! Thank you so much for playing. You've been the best. Well, the next-best.

"Watch it!"

I moved the happy couple, now Boyfriend & Girlfriend, back into Undine's old house, and dropped their family funds to 5000. Carlos wants to become a Hit Movie Composer someday, and Undine has really missed her sculpting, so while a marriage is in their future, it won't be right away. They have some career goals to work on first.

This has been so much fun to play and I definitely recommend it if you have a Sim you need to pair up, but the in-town pickings are slim. It's been a great cure for my case of the blahs, too.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Day 7! I don't have a breakfast picture for today so here are all the guys at bedtime the night before, climbing into their wee pink-linened beds for the night 😄 the way all men dream of doing, but so seldom get the chance to.

What I also do have are pictures of what happened immediately following breakfast: Carlos, apparently having learned not to rest easy in the top spot with Youssef in the house, making moves on Undine in the kitchen.

Somewhere in the challenge rules that I paid such devoted attention to is, I think, something about trying to get to Confess Attraction and First Kiss with each contestant. Well, Undine had both those options, so she went for it.

Such a sweet and tender moment.

--that she immediately ruined.

Gun fingers gotta go, Undine!

I checked in on the other two, but I needn't have. They were entertaining themselves just fine.

Back in the kitchen, Carlos and Undine embraced.

Sure, it's dumb to ascribe human motivation to the lines of C++ code driving the little pixel people, but also maybe I don't care: I think Carlos has got it bad for her. His two main activities in the house center on windows and Undine, and Undine is starting to pull ahead of the windows.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Back at the house and time for chess dates.

Great idea, right? Is there anything more sexy than chess?

"Ahem."

--besides you.

"You pulled me from the warm embrace of the sea for this. For chess."

😬

I have executive function problems, Youssef. As in, I have none.

I did the same race-thing I did with the dancing. First up to match wits with Undine was Jian Wei.

He seems to win these races pretty often. How was everyone else coping with their severely depleted fun and social?

Carlos, you gotta let it go, man.

"Photography is merely a craft, Brian! I'm talking about art."

Brian: Have you thought about not talking?

Undine may have created a monster yesterday.

"Oh hi, friends. Are you finished playing yet?"

Youssef has as much patience with this process as I do.

Dietmar??? But you were just in the hot tub. How'd you beat Youssef to the chess table?

"I didn't lock myself in the bathroom to gussy up first?"

...smart.

(I did lock them all out of the bedrooms this morning, but those two doors in the background lead to bathrooms, and those bathrooms both have mirrors over the sinks. Time to choose violence and rip all the mirrors out of the house.)

"I just need to know where it ends, Brian! How much more can we take? When will we as a species come together and unite against the menace of art?"

Brian: Youssef disparaging photography was better than this.

They're choosing some interesting ways to boost their social today.

"Good morning, Brian! Would you like to hear some of my thoughts about art?"

"...would you be mad if I said I just wanna concentrate on the game, Undine?"

"Not at all!"

Brian: Thank fuck.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Q: What's worse than being awakened at 3 in the morning by a shrieking alarm?

A: Being awakened at 3 in the morning by TWO shrieking alarms.

Why's it always gotta be two disasters simultaneously in my game? In David's save he couldn't just be visited by a burglar, no! he had to be visited by a burglar and aliens.

This fire started literally seconds after the burglar showed up. Here, look!

Sure, it's my fault for leaving the fire going. Fine. I'll own that.

Jian Wei has the Brave trait. Unfortunately, his negative trait is Absent-Minded. So he started out of the bedroom intending to subdue the burglar, but then he spaced it.

He was brave enough to team up with Dietmar to put out the fire, though, so I can't complain. He hit it with the fire extinguisher while Dietmar ice-blasted it.

The burglar, of course, got away through her wily maneuver of walking straight past the cop.

"Oh hey. 'sup, officer."

"Have you seen any crime?"

"Can't say that I have. I gotta get to work now, though."

"Good day, citizen!"

The Sims 3 cop is an Imperial Guard now, I guess. Except, the player actually had some reason to fear the law in Oblivion. In TS3, psh.

At this point it was around 5 a.m. and my control-freak side had a little skirmish with my play-by-the-rules side.

On the one hand, I didn't want these fellas passing out at 2 p.m. or taking naps on the couch that would only be interrupted by, probably, Jian working out to the stereo.

On the other hand, the rules say to leave 'em alone. Embrace the chaos!

But some kinds of chaos are fun and other kinds of chaos are boring, and I think sleep-deprived contestants are the boring kind of chaos. So I settled on putting all their motives like this:

--because what I had planned for the morning were 1:1 chess dates, an hour each. They couldn't do that if they were all hungry, tired, dirty, and needing to pee.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Day 2 Final (Noon Elimination) Ranking

Carlos Estrada (no change)

Youssef Nagi (no change)

Jian Wei (+1)

Brian Clavelly (-1)

Dietmar Bloom (+1)

Troy Hansen (-1)

Some movers on the chart! Jian Wei overtook Brian Clavelly, and Dietmar Bloom leapt over Troy Hansen. (One thing that hurt Troy is that I forgot to have Undine dance with him in the morning. I was too excited about getting rid of Andrew. I will have to be more careful about things like that.)

Carlos is still on top and I don't know why! but I will tell you, Undine's already spawned a wish to kiss him. How he's done it when all I ever see him doing is Brooding-trait stuff, though, I have no idea.

All of the guys have compatible astrology signs, incidentally, so there's no advantage there. Maybe he appeals to her as a fellow artist of sorts? He isn't artistic like she is, but he does have Virtuoso. If it's not that, they must have reeeeeally hit it off during their first-day conversations.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Meet the Contestants: Youssef Nagi

Human

Black hair and brown eyes

Virgo; loves Stu Surprise, French music, and the color gray

Artistic, Flirty, Friendly, Mooch, Natural Cook

LTW: Celebrated 5-star Chef

I gave each of the contestants one good socialization trait and one negative trait--these are in bold type.

Dialed back the beak a touch, changed his everday outfit, and put him in a CC skin, but otherwise left his appearance alone. I did have to edit his traits on account of their being too excellent. 😞 Apart from that, he's the same as he ever was (perfect).

Saved the best for last! and notice that it's the Sim I had the least to do with making.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

lmao these bozos

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Oh, no, Andrew's got hold of her.

I swear I had nothing to do with her reaction. She genuinely felt bored to death by this clown.

So she passed out.

Andrew: And I'll do it again, too!

Not if you get sent home tomorrow, you won't!

Someone turned on the stereo, and that woke up Undine. By then there was definitely some tension in the air, though.

Fault lines are a-formin'.

Carlos, in the very back there, is defaulting to the Brooding trait-haver's preferred activity, looking out the window. As for the Loner Sim--wait, where's Dietmar?

[joke about him spending time alone in the bedroom ✨holding his wand✨ goes here]

Hey! This isn't how you win the game, bro.

"I don't care. Youssef's okay and Undine is nice, but mostly this house is filled with freaks and losers."

Can't argue with that.

[simstryingtheirbestok]

Meet the Contestants: Eddie Allen Troy Hansen

Human

Blond hair and green eyes

Taurus; loves autumn salad, roots music, and the color green

Eco-friendly, Hopeless Romantic, Green Thumb, Grumpy, Handy

LTW: The Perfect Garden

I gave each of the contestants one good socialization trait and one negative trait--these are in bold type.

Love when I auto-level one photo in a collage but not the other, that's fucking quality.

This tall jar of mayo was inspired by some of the kids I met at Evergreen, especially the ones majoring in sustainability studies and things like that. I don't have high hopes for him but who knows, ✨anything could happen✨.