ISBI: Generation One (Part One)

Well, Imogen, I hate to say it, but your time as torchholder has come to an end. I know that it seems, to our readers, that you should be just settling in, actually you've lived your time as our torch holder and are here to tell us about it.

That's right mom. I have lived a very full life to this point, and look forward to kicking back and relaxing...and hopefully getting a grandbaby or two of my own!

Sounds great Im. Why don't you tell us all about your time as torch holder?

Oh my...it was interesting to say the least! But I will start at the begining...right after I graduated from university.

Well!, look how young I was! Anyway, after uni I moved back to Ten Flames Province. The house was modest, but it was what I could afford at the time.

As you may know, I was engaged to Quentin at the time and the first thing I wanted to do was get married to him. The cremony was small...just the two of us and a friend of ours from uni. But it was special.

So, tell us a bit more about Quentin. I feel like I hardly know the man that swept my daughter off her feet!

To be honest, I did not know much about him back then either. Over the years alot more has become clear. To start with, my Quent is a fortune sim. The first thing he did after we were married was to get a job...in fact he took the first one that came up! His job was in gaming and he started out as a flag capturer.

(The player's one command with Quentin for his adult life was to get him a job. He rolled a 1 and therefore took the first job that appeared)

He was also a very loving and attentive husband in those early days. I too had taken a job and was teaching grade school....a stressful thing. I could always count on Quent to cheer me up after a hard day.

But my husband is not without his quirks. As loving and helpful as he is, he spends far too much time in his heart print boxer shorts.

The man does EVERYTHING in them...and I do mean everything *w*.

Careful Im, this blog is supposed to be PG, but I think we know what your getting at *chuckle*.

Well how else did you expect me to have an heir for you?? Hmmm???

Point taken.

That does bring us right to the time I gave birth to our first child.

I had a daughter we named Chamile. She was so sweet and adorable, and she was daddy's girl, but you had informed me that I needed a male heir...so regardless of our little girls charm we would have to try again. I can't say I minded though. Having a child was a dream of mine and having several was even better!

How did you manage to keep your job and take care of your growing family?

Well, it was no easy task, that's for sure. When Chamille arrived I hired a nanny, Jill Yang, to be at the house when I wasn't . She was a decent nanny, but a little strange in my opinion. I know that Quent definitly did not get along with her, but she was a neccisary evil. I needed an extra pair of hands at the house...just in case.

It was awful being away from the house and not knowing what I would come home to at the end of the day. Luckily Jill held her own against Quent...I love my husband, but I know exactly how stubborn he can be.

Chamile grew quickly, and luckily I stayed in a good enough mood to allow her smart milk for most meals which helped with training her to walk, talk, and use the potty.

By the time Chamile had grown into a child, I was pregnant with our second child.

Looks like Chalmile was doing great in school.

Yeah, she was my little overachiever! I got her into private school, but it wasn't easy. I made coffee for the headmaster after a quick tour of the house and he drank coffee and spoke with Quent while I served dinner. I couldn't have planned it better!

I see Quent was sporting his usual attire.

*chuckling* What did you expect?

And you can call me crazy, but I wanted a pet so bad that I decided to adopt Shyla. I know what your thinking...just another thing to look after, but Quent and Chamille were very good with her. They even fed her for me!

Well, I hate to say it ma, but it is getting late and I am pretty tired from rehashing all of this...can the rest wait for another time?

Sure, no problem honey. We will stop here and finish this up later.

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ISBI: Getting to know you

Aquarius - 7 neat, 4 shy, 4 lazy, 7 playful, 5 nice

Meet Imogen Isbee. The sim-daughter of the sim version of my husband and I. She will kick off the challenge by being our very first torch holder (meaning the only sim I can control until she passes the torch to the next generation). By now, Imogen is already back at her house in Ten Flames Province, so we will catch up with her there in the next update. First, I will give you a brief rundown of her university experience.

I created her in CAS as a teen and immediately moved her to uni. Imogen is a family sim that wants to reach the top of the education career track.

With only a measly 500 simoleans to her name, the first thing she did was get to work at the local coffee shop. And then he walked through the door. His name was Quentin Jayapalan and Imogen was immediately attracted to him...I must say that I thought he wasn't too bad myself. Looks like we have ourselves a potential mate.

But I wasn't about let my little girl go to the first sim she fancied. I made sure she played the field. And it didn't go so well, as illustrated above.

So I let her have her man, Quentin, and she couldn't keep her hands off of him. Funny that these two only have one bolt of attraction (my usual rule of thumb is a minimum of two) but Imogen did nothing but role wants relating to him. And I thought, meh...why not let the girl have her man?

All of the potential husband hunting had actually paid off when Imogen inadvertently wound up a member of the secret society. With access to all of the funds she could ask for, as well as several skilling objects we began to work on getting her as many skills as possible. But the traditional method of skilling, even durring fall, was just not fast enough for my liking.

So I had her start to use the sim vac. What a useful litte tool this has turned out to be. I have to give credit to ASimWen for giving me the idea in her ISBI blog The Howdyschells.

It wasn't long before Imogen was a regular skill stealer, tho I couldn't let her max EVERYTHING this way with a clean concience. She would have to study the old fashioned way for at least a few of her points.

She also worked on a couple of badges while she was at uni. This took the ENTIRE length of her college career...these darn workbenches drain comfort like it is going out of style so there were several trips to the rejuvinator zappy mood enhancing aspitarion reward thingy!

The most time consuming project was Imogen's garden. My thought was to have her stock her inventory with fruits and veggies to save on groceries, and to get her the gardening badges. I am planning to try for the wishing well once she is back in the neighborhood...should come in handy...and I thought high gardening skills might help with that. I even had her try out her influence on Quentin having help her garden.

It was getting down to the end of her college experience. Soon it would be time to "officially" start the challenge. Imogen had made up her mind, Quentin was the one.

So in a move bolder than I would give her credit for being, she asked him to marry her...and he said YES!

Soon these two would be Mr. and Mrs. Isbee. But first, there was a graduation party to throw...

They looked great, didn't they? All in cap and gown. What a proud mama I am!

Imogen’s Stats at the end of Uni

Skills:
Cooking 10
Mechanical 8
Charisma 7
Body 8
Logic 7
Creativity 10
Cleaning 7

Badges:
Gold Gardening
Gold Flower Arranging

At the end of university, Imogen was excited to start her life after school...I was nervous and worried for her as any mother would be, but I have nothing but confidence in her. See you back in the neighborhood!

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ISBI: Intro

This is my attempt at the "I'm Surrounded by Idiots" challenge written by DylanTK. The official rules can be found here. A brif description of the challenge:

The point of this challenge is to try to manage an entire household through several generations while only having one character under your control. Other household members must rely entirely on their artificial intelligence (or lack thereof), while their wants and needs remain forever hidden. Do you have what it takes handle all the responsibilities of a sim household from one sim's perspective? Pass along the torch of awareness and keep the family going.

Disclaimer:
The rules have not bee updated to reflect the new Seasons EP. Seasons added several gameplay elements that assist in this challenge. Since there are no official rules at this time, I am going to use the game play additions that came with Seasons liberally and to my torch holder's advantage.

With that said, let's get this started, shall we?

Getting to know you

The Lost Challenge: Score

Before I get to the facts, here is a look at the island post challenge. I was able to collect all items on the list for +5 points.

Here are our characters...

Charlie

Asp Points: 39,750

Job: Battle of the Bands Judge

Badges: bronze gardening, gold fishing

Cooking 2, Mechanical 4, Charisma 2, Creativity 6, Cleaning 1

Kate

Asp Points: 19,750

Job: Relic Liberator

Badges: gold fishing, gold gardening

Cooking 3, Mechanical 3, Charisma 3, Body 6, Creativity 1, Cleaning 3

Jack

Asp Points: 19,000
Job: Nurse

Badges: bronze gardening, silver toy making, gold fishing

Cooking 2, Mechanical 3, Body 1, Logic 3, Cleaning 3

Sun

Asp Points: 16,750

Job: Teacher's Aide

Badges: bronze fishing, bronze flower arranging, gold gardening

Cooking 4, Charisma 1, Logic 1, Cleaning 3, Creativity 2

Locke

Asp Points: 11,750

Job: Multiregional Sim of Some Question

Badges: silver fishing

Cooking 1, Mechanical 2, Charisma 3, Body 2

Hurley

Asp Points: 7,250

Job: Drive Thru Clerk

Badges: silver fishing

Cooking 3, Creativity 2

Sayid

Asp Points: 1,500

Job: Recruit

Badges: bronze fishing

Mechanical 1

Sawyer

Asp Points: 0

Job: none

Badges bronze fishing

Total Asp Points: 115,750 = 12 points (rounded up)

Bronze Badges: 6 = 6 points

Silver Badges: 3 = 6 points

Gold Badges: 5 = 25 points

All items purchased = 5 points

Total: 54

Week 3-4

The Lost Challenge: Weeks 3 and 4

Since I goofed and no one was taken on Sunday the time frame was off a bit and I had to play into the fourth week in order to complete the challenge. So lets go straight to the returning cast member...drumroll please...Charlie wins again with the most aspiration points, and is still closest to Hurley.

Welcome back AGAIN Hurley!

Woot! More orangeade comin up!

Kate takes to making more Orangeade. Not bad with the flower arrangement badge except she has not gone near the flower bench.

And yeah...another one that leaves me wondering. Well, it was worth a shot.

Ah! It finally worked *doin the happy dance* a worth while one! Lets see if we can keep the luck rolling...

Jack's turn at the juicer...and let me just say that this orangeade stuff has been all but a waste of time!! Cosmetology? Seriously Jack? For that he got the boot juice...muhahaha!

*snicker snicker* Sorry Jack, I couldn't resist with all these boots laying around.

What I hadn't realized was exactly how low Kate's aspiration bar was.

So while Sun wasn't looking, or so she thought, Kate made her move on Charlie...her excuse was that Jack was working.

But Sun wasn't about to let Kate get away with stealing her man.

It was a knock down drag out cat fight.

Unfortunately for Sun, Kate's job required body skills, so Sun got her butt kicked.

Tuesday morning Hurley got taken by the others...yet again. I got tired of taking shots of him coming and going, so here he is contributing to the island. Thanks anyway Hurley.

And if by a stroke of fate, Charlie is struck by lightining the next day while tending the garden. Sorry Charlie...(no worries, he survived).

Despite the turmoil on the island in the early part of this week, both Charlie and Kate bring home promotions. And as a side note, you may notice the tiki style shack the losties managed to build in the pick behind Charlie.

But my dear Sun's luck continues to get worse as she brings home a demotion.

At six Friday morning, poor Sun had the lowest aspiration and was taken by the others...sorry Charlie...too little too late.

With Sun gone, Kate takes over the gardening...and poof she is a plant sim!? I have worked the entire three weeks with Sun trying to turn her to a plant and almost instantly, Kate becomes one!

So I send her straight to the pool in an attempt to max her body skill...a lofty goal, but I thought I would give it a shot (um, it didn't happen in time tho).

Well, this candle that was struck by lightining and started on fire pushed him over the edge and Sunday, dear sweet Jack was picked up by the others for having the lowest aspiration points.

And when Monday rolls around, Charlie is still the highest on the aspiration ladder, so his good buddy Hurley is rescued for the fifty millionth time. Tho this time I got him a job (wahoo!).

Earlier that morning the lot got a visitor...Sun, back so soon girl?

Well, Hurley felt terrible about what has happened with Kate and Charlie, and then with her job...one thing led to another....

...and Sun had found herself a new man! Unfortunately the date and budding romance with sun did not give Hurley enough aspiration to save him from elimination the very next day...Monday morning Hurley made yet another quick exit. Geez I am begining to sound like a broken record!

And after an uneventful few days, it is down to Kate and Charlie...our boy Charlie takes it home as Kate is sent packing with the others.

Congrats Charlie!

You are the sole survivor (err...thats another show). Either way, you are our winner!

Flip the page for the finally tally!

Week Two / Score