From Rowan's diary
Winterfest is approaching, and also our family is entering the usual festive atmosphere.
Rowan: Hi. How is your vacation going?
Gaia: It's great. I slept all morning! By the way, what are you doing with that piece?
Rowan: The computer started randomly switching off, I think the RAM needs to be replaced. Do you want to give me a hand?
Gaia: Seriously, can I?
Rowan: Why not.
Gaia: Okay, sure!
Rowan: You see, it's not difficult, you just need to...
Gaia has been buzzing around me whenever she sees me with a screwdriver in my hand since she was very little. Until now, I had never let her do anything alone because I was afraid that she might hurt herself with tools or get an electrical shock, but the more she grows the less valid this excuse seems. Thinking about it, in fact, I wasn't much older than her when I learned to fix the most disparate objects, so why not teach her too?
Rowan: Now that I think about it, there would be some work to do also with the rainwater collectors. We'll have to climb onto the terrace and use the wrench. It doesn't sound bad, right?
Gaia: Don't joke, are you serious?
Rowan: Do I ever joke?
Rowan: You see, I was thinking of replacing the collecting tube with a larger diameter one, by doing so we should manage to make the collection during heavy rain showers more efficient.
Gaia: Cool!
Rowan: Please be careful with the wrench, it's quite heavy.
Gaia: I'm perfectly capable of holding it, don't worry!
Gaia: By the way, when did you learn to do these things? Listening to you, it sounds like you were always studying!
Rowan: Well, life in Sulani was very different than here in the city, it's quite normal to learn more about DIY in there. I learnt this when I was in the scouts, we often helped people fix things with what was available.
Gaia: (joking) It's always so weird to imagine you in Sulani... Think about it, it would be so much fun to show your students photos of when you were a kid and climbed palm trees!
Rowan: C'mon, they only photographed me once…
We had a lot of fun that afternoon, and Gaia didn't complain or say she was bored even once. Thinking about it, this is one of the few hobbies we have in common, perhaps this could be a good way to spend some time together. Don't you agree, my dear diary?
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A few days later, Winterfest
Juno: What a good smell!
Gaia: Hurray, pancakes!
I don't know if it was the pancakes, knowing that we were about to open the presents or the week off from school, but Gaia was in a great mood that day. And Juno and I were no different.
Gaia: Jingle bells, jingle bells…
Nacho: Meow, meow, m…
Juno: (laughing) Nacho, are you singing along too?
Nacho: (interrogative) Meow?
Rowan: Rather, who wants to open presents?
Gaia: (incredulous) Wow, how did you find it? It's the very last book in the series, it should be out next week!
Juno: You know how it is, one of my old friends from college works at the publishing house, and when she heard how passionate you are about those books, she decided to give us one copy "as a preview". But don't tell anyone about it before they start selling it in bookstores, okay?
Gaia: Of course! And thank you very much!
Without saying anything else, she grabbed the book and ran to read it. Knowing her, I don't rule out the possibility that she might finish it before the end of the day.
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Inexorably, the Winterfest vacations passed. The new semester in college will start soon and, with it, also my lectures.
I received assignments for two different courses: one involves the introduction to the Sim Nation legislation, while the other is about environmental laws.
Teaching the basics of the subject to a new generation of lawyers will undoubtedly be thrilling, but I don't think I need to write that the course I'm most eager to start is the latter.
I have been working non-stop for weeks to draw up programs, collect study material and so on, modestly I think I've done an excellent job. And I really hope my students will think the same.
Well, I guess it's showtime. Can you keep your fingers crossed for me too, my dear diary?
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From Gaia's diary
What a shame, the school break is over already... I really don't understand why I have to study in that very difficult private school. From what I hear from the other kids in the area, we get double the homework as they do!
It's so boring, between homework and lessons I barely have time left to do anything else! Now I just get some time for reading right before picking up my bike and running to school, it's so unfair!
Yet this book I received as a present for Winterfest contains so many details, it would take me a whole day to find out all the little secrets hidden in between the lines. On Winterfest I rushed through it, I wanted to understand how the story ended, but I have the impression to still be missing something important, especially in that enigmatic chapter 8 which...
Juno: Gaia, hurry up, or you'll do late for school!
Gaia: I know, I'm almost ready! (to herself) What a drag, though...
So I wore the school uniform on the fly, and then I rushed to school arriving just before the bell rang, I put up with the usual series of very boring lectures from the teachers, I waited with trepidation for the end of the lessons and then ran away again on my bike.
I had promised my parents to stop by mom's new store, I couldn't go back on my word. And then I really wanted to take a closer look at their matter recomposer…
Gaia: How is school? The lessons are so boring, the teachers just talk and talk for hours... A classmate even fell asleep halfway through the Simlish literature lesson, you know?
Rowan: C'mon, Shakespen isn't that bad, is he?
Gaia: If you say so... Still, I have a crazy amount of homework for tomorrow, you know?Even if dad seemed a bit sceptical, I really meant it. I even had to start making some exercises while standing there in the store, can you believe it, my dead diary?
Thomas: Are you still studying? I heard you wanted to take a look at the matter recomposer.
Gaia: I still have to finish this equation, and then...
And then write a five-page essay on Shakespen, study the history of the New Sixam split from the Sim Nation, memorise I don't know how many Simçais verb tenses... What the heck, I'll never be able to finish all this stuff, no matter what!
Gaia: You know what? The matter recomposer is way more interesting than this stuff! Let's go.
Thomas: I really don't understand why people in Sim City are so reluctant to learn how to use it, it's so intuitive! Come, I'll show you...
Tommy is the eldest son of one of my mom's collaborators, his family also has a few other similar stores around New Sixam. Apparently mom met this collaborator of her in high school already.
I don't really like Tommy, he's a bit too nerdy and boring sometimes. However, he knows how to disassemble and reassemble any appliance or device in here. And I want to learn it too!
Matter recomposition is old technology in New Sixam, but this device is just brilliant! It has a huge touch screen on which to select any shape or material, and has an absurd recomposition speed. Looking at it, it seems similar to one of those 3D printers that are so fashionable nowadays here in Sim City, but with much greater potential. I mean, it can disassemble matter down to the atomic scale and then recompose it, with the right raw material I could build anything!
Gaia: So, let's see, is it possible to make a model of a bear on a 1:1 scale?
I didn't have time to import the 3D shape of the bear before noticing an error message appear on the screen. Bad, not to say horrible sign-
It may be very intuitive to use, but probably it isn't as easy as I was guessing...
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I used the accident with the matter recomposer as an excuse to run home, get a shower, and then go out with my friends again. Luckily, my parents now think I'm old enough to go out on my own, as long as I get home by curfew.
???: Gaia, do you really want to stay in the gym all evening? Geekcom is starting right now!
Gaia: One second, I'm close to my record!
? ?: Well, where do we start from?
Gaia: I want to play Blicblock!
???: Well, then you'll have to beat me!
We're a bunch of kids from the neighbourhood, we hang around and just try to have fun. Needless to say, I have a blast with them, and now this became the part of the day I'm really looking forward to.
? : what could we draw this time?
Gaia: Why not a hippogriff?
? : A what?
Gaia: It's a mythological creature, it has…
???: Nerd, nerd!
Gaia: (annoyed) I'm not a nerd!
??? : It's getting late, does any of you have a curfew, by chance?
? ? : I barely have the time to go back home!
Gaia: Damn, it's so late!
Even pedalling at full speed, there was no way I could get home before curfew. We had gone too far, and I had lost sight of the clock for a moment, was it really my fault?
It was even later than anticipated when I reached home, there was no way I could avoid being scolded this time...
Juno: (relieved) Gaia, here you are! We were worried for you!
Gaia: I just lost sight of the clock, I know it's late...
Rowan: But…
Gaia : I'll be more careful tomorrow, I promise.
And then, with them still ranting as I climbed up the stairs, I went to my room. It's not my fault if the little time I get to spend with my friends always seems to pass by so quickly, don't you agree with me, my dear diary?
I like that Rowan even after all his years of city life he hasn't lost his hard-working DIY nature built into him by life in a more remote area. I did worry if he'd lose himself in the city and he hasn't, passing all these things down to his daughter ^u^ It seems Gaia in general is easily bored by a lot of things so it's good Rowan found something she seems to have an enjoyment for.
ReplyDeleteI like that she's very typically a teenager in the sense that she's always home late and never feels like she's got enough time to hang out. Seems she's more extroverted than her father was at her age, more like her mother.
Thanks a lot for the comment, as always!
DeleteWith The Sims skills, once acquired, cannot go down, so I had a constant reminder or all the stuff Rowan learnt over the years! :P
Gaia instead is clearly easily bored and a bit all over the place, it was hard to decide what to do with her when she grows out the "rebellious teen phase"...