But then I mean, who doesn't, right? Right?

4 Things I can tell you about the Sims 4.

1. The first thing I did was make a Sim version of myself, because I am either a narcissist or extremely uncreative when asked to play God, and I'm very pleased that there are finally some options for long hair that don't appear to have been sponsored by Super Glue. You know what I mean, the kind where your Sim looks down and their hair pops up at a 90 degree angle away from their neck behind them? I ain't about that life. I am satisfied with this hair. 

Pale, big hair, vaguely terrified expression, thinking about food? Yep, that's me. 

  2. The click and drag customization makes things a lot easier. I can finally give my Sim thunder thighs like mine. I know that sounds like I'm being self-deprecating but I'm not, "thunder thighs" sounds awesome to me. I took that term and ran with it; named mine Thor and Odin. They dole out punishment to foolish mortals through swift thundering kicks. 

3. The money cheats still work. I'm trying not to cheat though (you'll notice Sim-me up there has just over 4,000 simoleans to her name), so Sim Jacki is dirt poor, just like real Jacki. Yaaay realism?

4. It's also still really easy to set your  house on fire. I know because I did it twice in the first ten minutes I had the game. How did I do it twice, you may ask? Well, good friend, that would be because I did it once, then my game crashed and when I re-did everything I did it again. #skillz. 

     That's my only problem with the game so far, actually: it crashes. A lot. I don't know if it's something that needs to be patched on their end or if my computer is just not having it, but it's really annoying. I mean, I've gotten into the habit of saving my games with neurotic frequency over the years, so I don't ever lose that much progress, but I can only restart the game so many times before I have to walk away making weird angry sounds and doing arm flails to burn off the frustration. 

Anxiety is a hell of a drug.

     Well not really. I just like to sound like a jaded 70s club queen sometimes. Keeps things interesting. So, anyway! I'm back from my adventure! I went gallivanting off to Louisiana to visit mon petit ami, which was a really big test for me to see how far I've come in dealing with my anxiety. As you'll know if you've been reading for a while, homegirl has problems. Problems interacting with people, or being haunted by slightly embarrassing mistakes for years longer than is strictly necessary, or worrying myself to the point of physical illness over all the things that could potentially go wrong in a given situation. So you can see where flying alone across five states and a time zone, with a layover in the middle, could be a bit of a challenge for me. But in the words of the great Meatloaf, I would do anything for love (but he wouldn't do that. He sucks. Ipso facto, I'm a better girlfriend than Meatloaf. Schwing!), so I put on my big girl pants (they're leggings) and did it anyway. And I was really pleasantly surprised by how non-anxious I was! Airports are designed for dum-dums in the first place, so navigating them wasn't difficult at all, and it wasn't even stressful to interact with the people working in them or on the planes, because in a place like an airport, you know the employees have all seen some shit. They are used to the stupidest, most belligerent people on earth; you'd have to do something incredibly, catastrophically, brain-meltingly stupid for them to even remember it. So it doesn't matter if the question you need answered really is stupid. 

     Aside from those sort of organizational, "be in place A at time B" aspects of traveling, it was completely stress-free. That's what makes me say "Anxiety is a hell of a drug." It's so amusing to me that my brain decides talking to the nice old dude at the ticket counter is cause for abject terror, while hurtling through the sky at 500 miles per hour in a tuna can with wings is a totally chill delight. It's like all the fear I was allotted in this life was assigned to people and the passage of time, and there was none left to go towards normal things like fear of, oh, I dunno, literally any situation that could lead to my death. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Brains are funny little things. 

     So yes! I can now officially boast having traveled alone without getting irreparably lost (keyword irreparably. I got lost driving once, but I figured it out, so it doesn't count) or having a panic attack. The only issue I ran into is the part during takeoff where it feels like your head is squashing down like a Barbie face under a shoe. I still don't love that. 

 Yes, like dees.

Lemme tell you a story.

     A story of brain fog. A story of loss. A story of how I'm getting stupider with each passing day and should not be trusted to attempt general life without proper supervision. A story of breakfast. 

     Picture it: Virginia, 2014. Jen called and woke me up bright and early to tell me, basically, "GET READY NOW AND COME TO MY HOUSE THIS INSTANT." So I put on the things most closely resembling actual clothes I could find (basically a transition from jimjams to slightly more acceptable loungewear), made a quick but unenthusiastic attempt at taming my hair, and was just about ready to go when I realized wait! I hadn't eaten breakfast! The most important meal of the day (Trailed closely by second breakfast)! But I didn't have any time; the alarm was set and you have 30 seconds to get out of the house before your presence will alert the hounds after you set it. So I figured I'd grab a Toaster Scramble out of the fridge in the garage and toast it at Jen's house. 

     Then my old arch-foe, packaging showed up. No matter how hard I pulled apart that stupid plastic baggie they come in, I could not gain access to my savory tasty breakfast. But I didn't give up. I just kept pulling. I channeled my inner athlete to gain dominance over this bag. But I guess I channeled a little too much, because I went full Hulk-hands and absolutely EXPLODED the bag open, sending Toaster Scrambles flying in every direction. One on the floor, one on the hood of the SUV next to me, one that I managed to catch mid-air. I swore a blue streak, but picked them up within five seconds (Hi, I'm disgusting and don't care about floor germs) and shoved them back in the box, then got on my way. 

     Then this morning I returned to the scene of the crime to see if today I couldn't fetch myself some breakfast without catastrophic failure. I noticed there was one less in the box than there would have been if only the one I had were eaten, but figured someone else must have had one. 

     Halfway through the day yesterday, my mom walks up to me and drops a Toaster Scramble in my lap. "Guess where I found this?" she asked. I shrugged, but had a feeling I was about to be in trouble. "Behind the bug guard on the hood of the car" she said incredulously. This was yesterday, I remind you. The exploding bag incident was on TUESDAY. Which means I left a Toaster Scramble on the hood of a car for two days. And it stayed there through two days of driving! I showed that Toaster Scramble more sights than it had any hope or expectation of seeing. I gave it a good life. Showed it the world. 

     I don't even know how it managed to stay there for two whole days. That seems like it ought to defy physics or something. Like we're lucky it didn't come shimmying up the windshield after a short stop and scare the shit out of someone. Or like if nothing else, a tenacious bird should have run off with it. 

     How do these things even happen to me? I don't even feel like there's a lesson to be learned here. Don't use your Hulk-hands on breakfast-food packaging? Always check your car's exterior for stray pastries? Maybe it's a metaphor for perseverance? I DON'T EVEN KNOW YOU GUYS. 

I bet Yoshi makes a lousy pet.

You know how when people are trying to get to know you they'll ask what your biggest pet peeve is?

     Well I have a lot. Like, more than is probably normal. Just to name a few...

WHEN YOU'RE TRYING TO OPEN A TUB OF SOMETHING AND THIS HAPPENS TO THE PLASTIC ON TOP 

 WHEN MY TECHNOLOGY GETS INSOLENT WITH ME

WHEN PEOPLE MISUSE THE TERM "PET PEEVE" (YES I HAVE A PET PEEVE ABOUT PET PEEVES. LET'S GET META)

So I guess the moral of the story here is...don't ask me about my pet peeves unless you have a good chunk of time to kill. 

"So Jacki, how was your weekend?"

(Jen had a cookout. I played with babies. Lots and lots of babies.)

"I don't want to LOSE money by not buying this..."

     Just a little doodle for you on this fine Friday because honestly my brain keeps flying faaaar away (specifically to the beach I'll be at in a few weeks. My brain is taking an early vacation, I guess). 

No moving parts: A true story.

     Alternative title: I have issues. (Also the title of the autobiography I'm not ever actually planning to write.) 

I mean, this may be a slight exaggeration. But it did feel pretty weird. 

I can't decide...

     ...whether I hate vultures for the way they insist on hanging out in the middle of the road, even when I'm sitting two feet away honking at them, or if I kind of admire their attitude. 

The majesty of nature. 

     

Apologies in advance...

... to whoever is going to send me an email some time in the future that I have apparently already deleted? That's obviously why I have negative one emails right now. I deleted one I haven't even gotten yet.

Total protonic reversal.

     Or maybe I shouldn't apologize because apparently the content of this future email is so incredibly dangerous that I either invented time travel myself in order to come back in time and delete it before I could read it and alter the timeline in some personally devastating fashion, or the Men in Black got word of it and came in and screwed around with my emails to prevent catastrophic and universal devastation. Which is pretty impressive because most of my emails are just Groupon offers and sale alerts from the Gap. Maybe I was going to buy a really, really tragic pair of pants? Like boyfriend jeans, maybe? And future me was like "girlfriend who are you kidding, no." I don't know. I guess I'll never know. 

Oh yes it's '80s night, and the feelin's right.

     So remember on Friday how I said I'd be doing something silly and taking pictures for you to laugh at over the weekend? Well Saturday was '80s night at a local bar, so me and Amanda got gussied up in our flashback finery and headed on over. She kind of put me to shame with her outfit (Jem and the Holograms sweatshirt, graphic print leggings, neon jellies, CRIMPED HAIR and neon makeup) but I think I still held my own (high waisted "mom" jeans turned shorty shorts, My Little Pony t-shirt with the old ponies, before they made them all skinny and weird [was disturbed to discover I own not one, not two, but THREE My Little Pony shirts -- what is my life], suspenders, pink high-tops, vintage earrings, and...well, for '80s hair I realized I didn't actually have to do anything different, since huge hair flipped to the side is my day-to-day look. That was...unsettling, but whatever. 

I like how we look like the day and night or good and evil versions of each other. That's a pretty accurate description of us, actually. 

     Here's a classic early 2000s style bathroom mirror selfie for you, just to throw an extra decade of nostalgia in there and show you my outfit. I guess I was going for more casual Teen Vogue '80s than Amanda's glam-rock '80s. Probably cause I'm lazy and didn't want to have to buy anything new for this outfit. You can kind of tell, too, because I could go out like this in Richmond and no one would even bat an eye. 

     And of course I would be cheating you all if I didn't share a shot of the majesty that was Amanda's outfit. 

     It is a thing to behold. Finally, let me just show you one last cool thing: 

     Glowing drinks! This one is Amanda's (if you couldn't tell from the crazy leggings at the bottom of the picture), since I don't really drink much anymore so I always volunteer for designated driver. It's not a moral thing, so don't worry, I'm not about to lecture you about the evils of alcohol, it's just that deep down I'm a little old lady and I'd rather sip on a ginger ale, have a nice time, then go home and wash my face and watch Golden Girls and check on my Animal Crossing town than go out and get drunk, then feel crappy the next day (and I always do when I drink even a little -- as my anxiety got worse over the years it gave me a weak stomach, so anything that makes me even slightly nauseated, I avoid like the plaaaague). Plus when Amanda gets drunk it's really humorous, so I like to be sober so I can clearly remember all the hilarious stuff she does and then tell everyone about it later (I'm a good friend). 

     Anyway, it was a pretty good use of a Saturday night, if for no other reason than I won Redneck Bingo pretty much the second I got out of the car (welcome to the country, folks).

Fact of Life #3435

     On a scale of exciting surprises from 1 to 10, with 10 being "winning the lottery when the jackpot's up high enough to make it onto the news every night," I'm not gonna say that finding Chik-fil-a sauce in my purse is better than the lottery...but it's right up there. Like at a 9.74. Solidly holding its own next to things like "successfully panning for gold at the creek in your backyard."

IT'S REALLY FREAKING GOOD, Y'ALL. 

Friday Favorites: Super Incohesive Edition!

     Since last Friday's favorites post was kind of a weird one, I thought I'd do a normal one this week. But then I remembered nothing I do is normal, so this ended up just being a jumble of things that I found really, really, disproportionately amusing. 

FAVORITE #1: MY PLANT IS GROWING! 

     Real talk, I was like 97% sure all I was going to get out of this was a delicately dressed jar of dirt, so this was a big surprise. Especially because it popped up preeetty much overnight. I was watering my other (already well-established -- I think it's from a cutting of one that's older than me, but I'd have to ask my mom to confirm that, and she's asleep, and it's my blog so...we're just gonna pretend that's right) plant a few days ago when I glanced over and OH HEY, A PLANT. It felt right at the time because it was all nice and springy and we had the windows open, but now that it's 27 degrees again it feels a little out of place. Whatever, it'll make sense again in a day or two, and I'm pleased with the little bit of spring hope it brings to my desk.

FAVORITE #2: I HAVE THE SEXIEST MOST INTRIGUING ARMPITS!

     So I was standing at the deodorant section, staring at all the possibilities and getting so overwhelmed that I was starting to think about just not buying anything and running off to live in the forests like the smelly ape that I truly must be, and eventually I started wantonly grabbing things and smelling them. None of them really spoke to me, but this one smelled decent enough (read: not entirely like straight-up baby powder. I mean whatever, baby powder is an ok smell, but I don't want to smell like a baby, damn it, because that's a weird thing for a childless person to smell like. What am I supposed to be hiding a baby in my armpit?). But then I looked at the label and knew I HAD to buy it. Because SEXY INTRIGUE. That is the actual name of the actual scent of this actual product that you can actually buy. A stick of chemical compounds designed to hide your sweaty smelly armpits to keep everyone from noticing your bodily processes. Called SEXY INTRIGUE. I laughed out loud, alone in the aisles of Target. That is exactly what I want, Degree. Really gonna complete the whole "sexy intrigue" look I rock when I'm dragging my sweaty sun-block drenched ass around in the sweltering heat of summer. People will walk past and murmur to their friends "She looks pretty rough right now, but how about those sexy intriguing armpits, amiright?" That is exactly what will happen. BRILLIANT MARKETING, GUYS. (I may make fun of it, but in the end who's the sucker who bought it anyway?)

FAVORITE #3: WHAT IS EVEN HAPPENING IN THIS PICTURE!

     I snapped this picture because I was sitting on my bed reading about pottery-firing methods of ancient Japan on Wikipedia because I have no idea how to have fun like a normal person and when I looked up for a second it took an abnormally long time for my brain to figure out what I was looking it. It looks like somebody snuck in and pasted a mural of a nice dusky horizon on my window, then when I opened it I revealed the black abyss of a cold indifferent universe lurking behind. In reality it's just a weird illusion of there being a hilly pasture over there that pulls the horizon right up to where my window ends. I mean, the picture is just an illusion. The cold indifferent universe is real. Sweet dreams, kiddos!

FAVORITE #4: I'M REALLY JUST ADDING ONE MORE IN CASE YOU FOUND THAT ENDING TOO SOBERING AND NEED SOME CHEERING NOW!

     This was Bess's face the entire time my mum was vacuuming the other day. The other cats all ran away  but Bess is too lazy, so she just sat there and stared at me like "Getting real tired of your bullshit. Trying to get a solid twelve hours of sleep here." And yes, I am that person who talks for their cat and laughs hysterically while taking twenty pictures in a row of them. It is what it is. 

Never fails. Every time we have to switch clocks one way or another.

     I could never be a Time Lord. Aside from the whole "watching your loved ones grow old and die or get exiled to unvisitable alternate universes or whatever" thing, I wouldn't handle the time shifts well.

     

Friday Favorites: "This is why I can't watch movies in theaters" edition!

     Real talk: I don't even remember what my other favorites were going to be this week, because today Amanda got the Hunger Games: Catching Fire dvd (a day early! I shall not question thy will, Amazon Prime, but merely bask in gratitude) and we watched it pretty much immediately and I cried continuously. You know when you don't get the cap of your water bottle on quite right so it just leaks little by little until suddenly you realize everything's a mess? That was me, leaking tears through the whole damn movie (such metaphor. very writer). I have a really awful headache now, probably from my brain banging on my skull saying "This is FICTIONAL, ya ding-dong. Get it together." But whatever, I get attached to my fictional characters, ok? Anyway, I thought I was doing pretty good holding it together and silent crying with just the occasional melodramatic sob, then my eyes starting burning really bad. So I paused the movie and went to splash some water on my face and THIS HAD HAPPENED.

I stopped laughing long enough to put on a tragic face for you guys. You know, for authenticity. 

     They were not screwing around when they labeled this mascara "high drama," y'all. Those are actual STREAKS of it down my face, like I was guest-starring on the Hills or about to come crawling out of your television to murder you. It was out of control. 

     Anyway, I know this may not seem like the most glowing review of the movie, but it is actually super amazing. I may have cried the whole time (except for the break where I came bursting out of the bathroom cackling hysterically to make everyone look at what was happening on my face), but I'm the kind of weirdo who likes to get all my crying done in one big cathartic sitting. That way when life's getting me down later (or, let's be honest, I see a particularly touching Google Chrome ad), I can handle it because my whole month's supply of tears has already been used. Basic biology, totally how it works. 
     

Cat ownership in a nutshell.

     It's terribly exciting. 

The real Farm Hero is the undercover FDA worker filming it all for an expose on the nightly news.

     So Jen got me hooked on this game called Farm Heroes Saga...you may recognize it as the thing that floods your Facebook feed around the time everybody has lunch breaks. She downloaded it on my tablet while she was here one day, then when it finished downloading (about a week later. Have I mentioned recently we have somewhat poor internet here?) I thought, "Well, let's see what all the fuss is about." Cut to me, three days later, mumbling to myself "I hate this damn raccoon, tryna steal all my crops." But the more I played it, the more questions I had. 

     So it's just your standard sort of "shit falls from the sky and you put it in pairings to move on and your funny little brain-parts go 'Wheee! Order! Rewards!' and you feel like you accomplished things" kind of game, but if you stop to think about it, everything about it is so freaking weird. 

     My biggest question is what kind of freaky-ass genetic modification are they doing to this produce to make it all not only sentient, but also squee-incitingly adorable? For one thing, there's no way in hell this stuff is FDA approved. For another, I'm concerned enough about the fact that they're planning to sell giggling apples and onions with the ability to cry to the public for consumption in the first place -- do we need to get some sort of fruit-and-vegetable rights activism going here? -- but that raises the even more disconcerting question of who, exactly, the market for this is. Am I to believe that in the same magical universe where carrots and strawberries smile at you, there is a population of people who say "I could go for an apple, but what I really want is one that will scream and plead for mercy as I bite into it." A population large enough for whatever farm I'm trying to "hero" to be like "Sure, that sounds like a profitable and in no way morally turbulent decision?" 

    Or am I trying to save the produce FROM the farm? Because I do wonder, if this place has the kind of funding and resources available to engineer anthropomorphized fruit, why do I do all the harvesting with a dog pushing a wheelbarrow? Surely we could afford a tractor or something. Am I some sort of rogue super-heroine, saving the fruit and vegetables (and chickens --GOD DON'T GET ME STARTED ON THE CHICKENS -- they're always frozen, which I guess is probably an experiment in cryogenics so all the freaky fruit can live forever? Or maybe they're frozen in order to extract DNA to mix with fruits, thus begetting their cuteness and self-awareness? If so, GEEZ, evil genius hiding behind the front that is this sham of a farm, you're supposed to use the embryos for that, stop freezing already-hatched chickens, that's stupid and mean) from the clutches of some power-hungry mad scientist? Is that why the dog that pushes the wheelbarrow is wearing boots, and the pig is wearing a scarf and aviation goggles (getaway plane driver, I guess)? Because in this alternate universe all living things have gained human-like cognitive skills, and the animals and a select league of humans have banded together to defend the subjugated consumable class? 

WHAT IS THIS GAME EVEN ABOUT. 

"What sort of horrid ice goblin is guarding the thermostat?"

A comic requested by Amanda. 

Don't hate me cause you ain't me.

Please read that post title in your sarcasm voice.