The rabbit holes from Island Paradise are priced really low. I'm not sure if it's a bug or not, but we now own Cruzita's Grocery and Diner for a cool $1,200, meanwhile I'd scraped together $40,000 for nothing.

I never realized that kids who get the germy moodlet can get the day off school. This is mostly due to my usual practice of using Master Controller cheats to get rid of the moodlet whenever it appears. I only discovered it this time because I hadn't noticed the kid had the moodlet and I was occupied with another sim's birthday. I wanted the kid to eat some cake before getting on the bus, so I cancelled the 'go to school' action and immediately got a message saying "Thanks for being considerate and keeping your child home". All this time playing the game and I've never seen that before!

OK, Thank you to EA for promoting keeping the sick kids home!!!

(I wonder if any of them who are parents actually do that themselves, or if this was a gripe about their kid coming home with a bad case of the flu and giving it to the entire family?)

A few minutes later I got another message, this time a red one, telling me that Jerry missed school on a school trip day. Well, you didn't want him spreading his germs around the Police Department too did you? Things are sloppy enough there without half the force calling in sick.

And then you have the fun illogic of your Sim parent grounding their kid, forbidding them from leaving the house... and then getting yelled at because they didn't go to school... which the kid couldn't do with the parent(s) in the house because the kid was grounded.

...yeah, that was SO weird when I saw that. I actually had the parents go out in a 'date' and kept them out of the house past 2 PM, just so the grounded teen could go to school and come back in time. And then mom still yelled at her for leaving the house while grounded.

Man, EA's idea on how grounding works is really weird.

No, it's just a puzzle to solve and a really well-kept secret.

What we are meant to do without being sneaky about it is have an adult take the grounded child/teen to school in the morning and pick them up when school is over. Kids who are grounded are not allowed to roam around town unchaperoned, they aren't really locked down in their own houses. But the sneaky way and using mods to override or prevent the punishments seem to occur to most players first for some reason. And to be fair I don't know what was really intended if all of the adults have work schedules that would prevent them from doing this.

I've been a kid and I am a parent. If I told my kid that she was grounded, I would expect her to go to school on the bus like normal! When I was a kid and I was grounded, I was expected to get on the bus and go to school like normal. It's dumb computer logic that grounding means no leaving the house ever, not even for school. It leads to loops where you're teen is grounded for their bad grades, then they miss school and are grounded again for that, and then their grades slip even more...

Hey, I'm not defending the logic behind EA's theories of how to raise children and I wouldn't think of having to chaperone my kids (if I had any) to and from school unless the mischief they got up to was always en route in either direction. Just pointing out that there may have actually been some logic, for what it's worth, to what is widely regarded as a bug that seemingly leaves the player with no way out of the described loop.

The lesson for any sim child or teen planning any kind of mischief is to make sure you're fed, well rested and have an empty bladder. It's a good idea to have already done your homework too. I've had kids almost starve to death, piss themselves and pass out on the floor, all because they chose the wrong time to be given time out, because they can't do any of those things without being scolded and given more time out. And then they had to do their homework in class next day.

"... and when we got home, our dad would murder us in cold blood and dance on our graves singing hallelujah..." - Well, maybe not as bad as that, but honestly you young people today don't know how lucky you are!

Well, thank you. My own logic would not have solved this problem. In truth my logic fails me even when not grounded, over the question of why I have to take a bus to a school scarcely two blocks away. But school districts have their own notions of what's logical, no doubt.

I learned that dogs can be peepers- disturbing!

Suggested caption:
"Waiter! You have once again forgotten the parsley garnish on my dinner bowl and I am still waiting on the cocktail that I have ordered!!"

Working out how Sims are related is quite complicated, even with family trees. I started my neighborhood with all my own Sims a few months ago. I've been going around to each house to view people, fix up their houses, do landlord duty and move out those who are too crowded because I'm only really playing 3 siblings in their own families now. I keep going into these other houses and saying who's that, looking at the family trees to see where this crazy journey has gone so far with my non-played families. I like to see how they retain or lose the looks of their various founders and ancestors. Occasionally I change the names the game gives them especially if they start having too many of the same.

Sims who are in the Singer career will sing karaoke like a pro; however, once they quit that career they will be back to singing horribly.

Or in more technical terms: Singers will act as if they maxed the karaoke skill; once they quit that career they will sing again according to their karaoke skill level.

ETA: I also discovered that having a lounge on a 10x10 lot was probably not a brilliant idea. Now I am about to discover how brilliant it is to have an open air disco in summer
:sings "Burn Baby Burn, Disco Inferno...":

Even old men can get pregnant. My sim was only 4-5 days from dying, got pregnant by an alien and had a beautiful green little daughter. This game is awesome

I found a video of how to record the voices of characters for the Sims 3, from ChrillSims3.

https://youtu.be/7pWaJV_C1cM

This is an excellent channel, he has a lot of research about families from Sims 2, it's very interesting to listen.

Don't use your unedited screen shots as background for your laptop. You'll start clicking on it thinking the game is still running or you never shut it down properly.

Oml that'd never happen cause I rarely close down the game

Liza's post (above) got me interested in several Youtube videos about Simlish. Which led me to realize that sim children can apparently speak 'Old Simlish': the speech they use when they are 'holding court' is very similar to that of the monarchs in The Sims Medieval when they hold court for real in the throne room.

I discovered it is not a glitch...
Vampires can gain skill in science, Logic, alchemy, networking, athletic and charisma at a prodigious rate. Even the social groups rebel, geek and jock.. almost instant max out!
Why didn't anyone tell me this! I've been playing for years... thought "meh, vampires are only sucking blood and getting turned to ash in the sun". All I've been playing are witches, fairies, aliens and regular humans. Vampires are kinda fun!

After actually paying attention when my sim was preparing dinner, I found out Stu Surprise is gray before it's cooked. Who at EA thought that gray is an appetizing color?!

I just discovered that the Ambitions junk piles are CAStable; it never occurred to me that one would want to recolour trash, but there you are.

Sims cry hysterically when they are mourning. I don't really like that mechanic. Now, it makes sense, but for some reason I can't just go home. I have to make them a loser and give them a bad romantic moodlet to make them cry again. I might be going mad...

I discovered that not all vampires learn rapidly. It might have something to do with the genius and bookworm traits too...