DOARS- Week 6 Day 5- The Teddy Bear's Igloo

Welcome back faithful readers!

Is this update exciting? Hmm... I guess we'll have to wait and see. ;) I bet you're excited about it, though, huh? Because last time on DOARS, a long sought after gnome appeared!

Now the continuation......
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dear Diary,

This morning started like most of my mornings do, waking up next to my husband, and then getting up to do laundry. It was at this point that my morning broke routine. There it was. I had been slaving away for the better part of a week (or had it been a week already?) and my efforts had paid off. We had a gnome ambassador.

Did he look like a teddy bear? Yes. Did I think that one of the kids brought a random teddy bear home from school? Yes, I did, actually. Did I realize he was a gnome at first? No. I mean, when you first saw this guy, did you think he was a gnome? I'm used to little pointy hats and big beards, both of which are missing on this one.

If you think about it, though, it does kind of make sense. He is after all an ambassador, so having a different look that is more similar to things that we sims see everyday might actually be brilliant. I'm sure I'll be more comfortable with him than I would be with a real normal looking gnome.

I wasted no time in approaching it, and calling on its ambassador skills.


"Who left their teddy bear here? I bet it's Hector's that boy just does not pick up after himself. I'm totally not going to make his bed, today. He can do that himself-" I was muttering to myself, but then out of no where (ore more accurately from right in front of me on top of the dryer) came a squeaky little voice.

"Are you done?" I think I probably choked and sputtered for a good minute before responding.

"You're a gnome! OH MY GOODNESS, you're a gnome! Are you the ambassador? I'm so sorry that I thought you were a teddy bear, that's so embarrassing!" I'm pretty sure my face was about 5 times redder than normal. The only time I had ever been almost as embarrassed was when I first went to Cycl0n3's house... and you're familiar with that story, I'm sure. Anyways, back to this story.

"Let me start over. I'm Lynn Sw0rd, humble doer of gnome laundry," I properly introduced myself. Now, I know, I know, I perhaps could have been a little more honest. Humble? Pretty sure that's never been an adjective used to describe me! BUT, I was really surprised, okay? I mean, how would you introduce yourself to a mythical gnome that you had just accused of being a teddy bear? Okay, now that we got all that cleared up, I'll go on with my story of this morning's events, which is about to take an abrupt turn.

The little gnome coughed, or snickered, or made some little noise that obviously meant he wasn't impressed and disappeared. Which didn't impress me very much. "Hey! Wait a minute! I have questions! What are you doing here? What do you want from me and my family! How are the aliens involved in this? Are we in danger? Are you in danger? Answer me! Please! Just answer me," I called into the darkness. Of course, he was gone. All of that work and I had scared the little guy off, or something. I don't know.

I'm sure you can imagine how I felt though. The answer to all of my questions was sitting in front of me and before I got anything it disappeared. I felt like I'd been punched in the gut, like the wind had been knocked out of me, like everything I'd ever worked towards was gone. I know, I probably overreacted a bit, after all, I don't know where the gnome went, or what he was doing. I don't know what he was assigned to do. I don't know if he even wanted to talk to me or if it was Hector that he needed to speak to. It probably was Hector, though. Everyone wants to talk to Hector, including myself of course. Not that I'm jealous, I'm not. that much. I have a pretty special son, is all, and with a little patience I'm sure I'll get all the answers I need.

Now let me tell you, I've been telling myself that for a while now. It's getting a little old. I'm not the most patient person, you know. So, you should really be impressed that I managed, once again, to talk myself into being patient after the gnome disappeared. Got that? Be impressed.

I carried my disappointed and patient carcass back to my room, where Cycl0n3 was working on his assignment. I plopped myself down and leveled with him. I was done with being kept so much in the dark, he's my husband and by george, I wasn't going to let him not tell me whatever he knew. Which wasn't much. Basically, he'd been approached in the supermarket one day by a cloaked individual who somehow convinced him to start learning how to command an army and to find the specific coordinates of the closest inhabitable planet. And since the initial meeting he'd met the man one time to report back some of the information he'd gathered.

Now, don't misunderstand what I'm about to say, okay? That's more information than I had, so I was grateful... but... really? That's all he had?! He had let some random (and possibly insane) stranger give him a weird mission and he didn't ask any questions?
To Cycl0n3's defense, though, he said that he got a brief glance at the person's arm and it was green, so my husband, the science fiction loving man that he is, he didn't need much convincing. I'm trying to accept that, I really am, but it's a little frustrating. I'm sure you would agree if you were in my position.

Either way, you probably can guess what I did after that.






















If you guessed that I sent Cycl0n3 back to the store to find that man, then you're right. Good job. Want a cookie? It's been a while since I directly referred you to my agent, so it's time for me to renew that. If you want a cookie for guessing right, then present proof of that to my agent and pick the cookie of your choosing.

Cycl0n3 was not able to find him, there, sadly. Oh well, to be quite frank, I didn't expect him to. I mean, that was just the day I was having, of course the man wouldn't be there, he and the ambassador probably got together and threw a 'lets-not-tell-the-athlete-formerly-known-as-Lynn-Winslow-anything' party. What? Too self-centered? You're right, there could be lives in danger, races in peril, and I'm pouting about not knowing something that I probably don't need to know. Ok! I'll try not to let it get to me, but I make no promises.























Now, I've known for a while that my little girl loves the snow and the cold. It was pretty obvious when she was younger, because she'd always kick her blankets off and try to run around the house naked (events that I did not feel the need to photograph), so I wasn't surprised that she built an igloo, which she named "alternative dwelling for sim and other life". But I was surprised, because when exactly had winter started?

I guess sometime during the night, had I left the house this morning or during the day while my kids were at school, I'm sure I wouldn't have been as startled when my daughter ran inside excitedly proclaiming that she'd discovered a suitable dwelling for sim and other lifeforms in icy environments. I probably should have noticed that she didn't come in after school, but I had my mind on other matters... and I had been hunting that darn gnome for the majority of the day. Not that I really want you to know that, because that makes me look like I'm really not trying to be patient at all... but well... it's better than you thinking I don't care about my daughter's whereabouts.























Anyways, she left just as quickly as she ran in and said something about making a guard for the new dwelling. If you're guessing that her assignment had something to do with learning how to survive in winter, then you're thinking the same things that I am.

Now I know I said I'd be patient, but let's just think about what we know/ can guess.
Cycl0n3 is learning how to lead an army and find a habitable planet.
Raquel is learning how to survive in cold weather, finding a potion for something, and also searching the sky trying to find coordinates.
Hector is focusing on potion discovery, but he has his fair share of sky searching too, and he knows more than the rest of us, though he's been quiet as a mouse about it.
And I have paved the way for the gnomes to have a dialogue with someone, possibly myself, though more likely someone else in my family... ok, Hector. I've paved the way for Hector to talk directly with the gnomes.

All of this added together looks an awful lot like a civilization preparing for intergalactic war, natural disasters, and relocation, and possibly chemical warfare? So who's fighting who? Are the gnomes and the aliens fighting each other? Or are they teamed up against a different malevolent influence?

I tried to ask Hector, but he kept brushing me off in favor of homework. Well, if I have to get brushed off for something, homework is an ok thing to brush me off for. Though, if we're being honest I think he was using that as an excuse not to talk to me. Was he ordered to keep me out of it or something?




After dinner the kids helped me clean up, which was nice, even though they both stayed silent about anything aside from the normal things families talk about. We talked about the weather, Raquel being the happiest about the snow, of course. We talked about their least favorite teacher at school, and Hector warned Raquel about a certain science nazi that she'd be sure to meet once she was in high school. It was rather mundane and oddly comforting. Sure, I would have liked to glean a little bit of useful information, but it was nice that in the midst of this intergalactic scheme we were able to enjoy a quiet, normal, mundane evening.






















Later that evening I helped Raquel with her homework, although she didn't really seem to need my help. It made me feel better, though. And it was nice to spend some time just me and her, it had been a while since we'd had any mother/daughter time, you see.






















Hector spent the evening working on his lab station, which you might notice had been remodeled slightly. Or the room had been remodeled anyway.






















Actually so had out living room, apparently someone was collecting ugly rocks to display. I'm not sure if that was from the gnomes, or if Hector had something to do with it. Either way, I hope that these rocks serve some purpose, because they don't really fit my idea of good decoration for a family room.























Then the day was over. We all went to bed, and I tried to forget about everything that I didn't know and just enjoy falling asleep next to my husband.

Perpetually confused and curious,

Lynn Sw0rd






















~~~~~~~~~~~

Okay, okay, you probably noticed that one of the pictures was out of order, but try to ignore it, and sorry about the wall of text in the beginning, but let's chalk both up to plot issues, huh?