I just read this reivew [link] of Downfall (about the last days of Hitler) and now I'm imagining a Hitler's Bunker Sims.

Cindy, that is definately of the happy making! I hate to think what our cable bill is. Thankfully, I don't even see it. I'd probably cringe.

I didn't know money wasn't a factor in the Sims, it is in every other Sim game out there.

It is, but there's a money cheat that I (ab)use. And even without cheating, they work, and you can sell their furniture if you need money. It's hard to go *completely* broke.

There's a rocket in The Sims?

It's a toy rocket in the first expansion pack, Livin' Large-- the Sims fire it off and it goes floof, and they're happy watching it. Unless you fire it off in a small room, in which case they're happy watching it until they catch on fire.

Do Sims ever kill other Sims?

No. They slap, though, usually out of sexual jealousy, as askye said.

Are there pets? Can you raise a pitt bull Sim badly and let it loose?

There's a pet expansion pack, but I don't have it.

How about disease? Can you spread a plague?

They can catch colds, but they don't normally die of it, though I'm sure they could if you were mean to them when they were sick.

Or can you give a teenage Sim lots of beer and a sports car and see what happens?

No teenagers, no cars and no beer. There are also no vampires, at least in the games I have.

Sorry.

There are alien abductions.

Toto is currently curled one the couch with his head on a throw pillow. I love it when he does that. It's so damn cute!

Toto is currently curled one the couch with his head on a throw pillow. I love it when he does that. It's so damn cute!

Awww. Cori likes to sleep curled almost into a circle on one chair, and that is very, very cute.

Ah, the toy rocket. Yes, hours of fun.

There are alien abductions.

Also hauntings.

Hmm. I haven't even ventured toward the Sims b/c I get so hooked on things so easily.

My new laptop (whose name, I'm pretty sure, is Ralph) has a chess game on it, which has opened my eyes to the fact that I may know the mechanics of the game (like, the horsie pieces move in an L), but I sure the hell have NO idea how to actually play. I have no idea how to protect my king, and I really REALLY have no idea how to anticipate what my opponent is going to do. It's pretty pathetic.

Sims 2 has teenagers, toddlers, and kids, and old people. They grow up after birthday parties (like my unsuccessful party). There are a lot of options when it comes to talking to each other. One option is Irritate.

They also have aspirations and goals -- stuff like become a master criminal, meet new people, kiss someone, and one of my teenagers had the aspiration to irritate another. So I'm wondering what will happen if I lock them in a small room and have them irritate each other.

Thanks, vw. We've just been so broke. We had a nice chunk of money in the bank, after we purchased this house. It's all gone now, which we expected, and a fair amount of it went into the house--new electric, new boiler, new patio. What it took us a while to realize it that a lot of it also went to day to day living. For the past few months, we've sweated out each month's payday. The primary problem is that this mortgage is just much higher than the old one, because we bought old house, before prices went through the roof. That was back in the days when you could buy a house in our town for under $200K. I don't think you can buy a lot for 300K, these days.

Anyhow, most of our money problems are due to the fact that it's been a long time since we had to be careful, and we'd forgotten how. We've now canceled the newspapers (which hurt Scott more than it hurt me). Now we're saving this money. Next up, we're going to shop around for our heating oil. We're also going to rework how we use the ATM, because that's part of our problem, too. Maybe someday, we'll even be able to actually save money, again. For the meantime, we're just hoping to be able to buy milk and gasoline for those last ten days of the month.

You know how some couples balance each other re strengths and weaknesses? That's true for us on some things, but on quite a lot of things, we share the same weaknesses, and to some extent, this includes our philosophy on money, which is fine when we're flush, but other times? Not so much.

I totally suck at chess. I have a general understanding of strategy (I read a chess book when I was in second grade) but like Teppy I suck at anticipating my opponent's move.

I played chess against a Commodore 64 a few times - even with it at the easiest setting I still lost.