Sims 3

Siobhan's a big Sims fan and when Sims 3 came out, I just kept quiet and hoped she wouldn't notice. That's because it happened a few weeks ago while I was deep in the worst part of the relentless crush of work and stress, and I couldn't afford to lose her. So instead I promised (well, not out loud, mostly to myself) that once things started to ease up, I would buy it for her for her birthday, and the other half of the gift -- the expression of appreciation for all the extra work she took on to help ease my burden, and my stress, and for putting up with it -- would be that I would not mind if she then disappeared into Sims 3 for a while.

Of course that means just as I'm coming off the crush, instead of getting to kick back and relax and recover, I will have to resume my normal work level. But that's not so bad. While I wouldn't mind a week to do nothing, frankly I get a little antsy when I try to do nothing anyway. So instead what I'll get is, once work can live without me, a week off from work. I'll spend it at home doing stuff, but the stuff I want to do.

After we bought Sims 3 at Best Buy this weekend, and I was thinking about the likelihood that Siobhan would vanish into it for a while, I realized an extra benefit. For maybe the first time in my life, there's a game I want to be playing, and sometimes when I'd like to, I can't because the TV is already occupied. If Siobhan vanishes into the Sims, I will have the TV to myself!

Of course, the falling-down point turns out to be that Siobhan's computer needs a reformat and reinstall of everything, which we started this past weekend, to get it stable enough to run Sims 3 (and anything else). It's been a long time and several hardware changes since it was last wiped and reinstalled. And that process is bogged down because of Microsoft having its collective head up its collective arse about validation (it insists our perfectly legitimate authorization code, which is still printed on a sticker on an OEM computer case in our house, isn't valid). But when it's done, she should have both Sims 3 and everything else a lot more stable and clear of the cruft that accumulates in the nooks and crannies of Windows.