Chapter 2 - Gen 5 - Mason

This is where I work - Doo Peas Corporate Tower in Riverview.

At the moment I am on level 2 of my Journalist career, I work Monday to Friday as an Automated Spell Checker Checker and earn around $300 a day.  I still have a very long way to go to achieve my Life Time Wish of becoming a Star News Anchor.

Being a celebrity, I have an agent who is constantly bugging me to do this that and the other, most of it promotional work, for businesses or myself.  I really don't need to promote myself I am already a five star celebrity, I really don't need or want any more attention than I already get.  The only reason I do all this promotional work is for the money - promotional work pays pretty well!!  Like today after work, I am going to record a radio commercial, here in my work building, for lama musk perfume of all things - an hour of my time earns me $5,000 - not bad really is it - worth an hour of anybody's time I would say!!!

Being a celebrity of course I have a paparazi stalker - every celebrity has one - one particular pap that follows you around where ever you go - mine is called Tanisha Culpepper.  She used to follow me around when I lived with my parents and now that I have moved house, she has followed me here and is constantly camped out on my doorstep.  I find this quite amusing, because I know how it works being a journalist myself,  I can see the situation from both sides, so sometimes I have a little fun with it, Tanisha quite often walks away in disgust!!.  But I must say, we have a mutual respect between us, I am kind to her, she is kind to me, I give her something nice to write about and she keeps those public disgraces off my back.  A public disgrace up to yet is something that I have not had the unpleasantness of experiencing!!  How lucky am I!!!!  It has been known for celebrities to fall in love with their stalker Pap - my Grandmother Faith being a perfect example - actually come to think of it my Grandad Lee had a career in journalism - maybe that's where I get my journalistic anchoring from.  Anyway, back to falling in love with your stalker pap - there is no fear of me falling in love with mine any time soon - that is something I am very certain of!!!!

I am pretty down at the moment - still in mourning as you would say!!  My Aunty Dawn.  Such a waste of a young life!!!!  I was at Mom and Dads when Dawn came round to visit.  I had been getting pretty close to her I used to talk to her a lot on the phone, I classed her as a best friend as well as an aunty and I feel a little guilty that it was actually me she had come to visit.  Her husband, Uncle Justin died years ago from old age, but Dawn was still just a mature adult.  She came round to visit, she had not been there long when she died of starvation!!??  Nobody would have stopped her from going to the fridge for plasma juice, so why didn't she???!!!  My Dad was and still is absolutely devastated - its bad enough having to watch your sister die, but he has had to go through this before and he does not understand why.  First his half brother Tommie, died, then his Sister Taylor died and now Dawn.  Out of the five of them there is only my Dad and Uncle Liam left.  Grandma Faith has had to watch three of her children die before her - how bad must she be feeling!!

 It feels pretty weird for me at the moment, having to adjust to living alone, having a big house to rattle round in on my own when I am used to having my parents and my two sisters and three brothers around me all the time.  There was always someone to talk to or to get annoyed with - right now I am even missing Marco, even if it is just for some wind up entertainment.  But if I get too lonely and I want to chat with someone I know Tanisha will be outside lurking around somewhere or I can just turn on the pc and chat online.

Out of the two bedrooms I chose to sleep in the black and white room with just a single bed.  Not that vampires dream but if I was to sleep in that pink room I would probably wake up having nightmares.  When I can afford it that pink needs to go and the two other bedrooms furnished.

It is only the company of people that I am missing at the moment, I have plenty to keep me occupied and I am always on the move with work and my agent, other opportunities that come my way, then there is this house and odd jobs that I want to be doing.  Since becoming a young adult I have grown a liking for DIY, which is also helping me build up my handiness skill.  At the moment I am planning to upgrade everything to either self cleaning or unbreakable - starting with the sinks.

I got promoted at work today, I am now a Freelance Writer - it is Friday and I have the weekend off, so when I return to work on Monday, I have a new job to do.  A new part of my job is conducting interviews which I can make a start on over the weekend, I can also get Articles published now which can earn me extra money in royalties.

 Someone phoned me from the Science Facility, I am ashamed to say now I can not remember the reason why I was asked to do a painting for them, all I can remember is that they wanted me to contribute a painting worth $1,000 or over. So I spent my Friday night in celebrating my promotion, painting - I know pretty lame!!  Like the painting - my first attempt was also lame - it was only worth $760 - not good enough, Ill have to try this one on another day!!!  The painting is now hung up on the attic wall.

My mother is a stress head!!!  She is constantly on the phone sometimes twice a day, checking that I am ok, I know she gets a little neurotic sometimes, but she should not have to worry over me now, I am a young adult and am quite capable of looking after myself, but I suppose I should not complain it is nice that she cares enough to worry!!

My agent phoned me and asked me to go down to the theatre and do a cameo in a play, nothing else on, so I went down to the theatre straight away.  After a few hours I came out and was $5,000 richer.  When I walked out of the Theatre the scene that I walk out to made me realise something - there are way too many Swans in this town and I was related to them all in one way or another!!  I could see my Grandmother Faith, My Cousin Kian and his son (my second cousin) Jake, then Lacey who is also my second cousin and my Moms Aunty Susan.  Like I said, I was related to them all and come to think of it I hardly know to anyone in this town that I am not related to somehow.  Romantically, this could quite possibly be a disater - I had to think about it long and hard - the only females in this town as far as I can see I am either related to or are elderly - I can only actually think of one person who does not fit into either of those two groups - and that is Tanisha, and like I have said before I am not going there!!  Obviously I don't know everyone in this town but if there are any illegible females for me - they are going to be very few and far between!!!!

I can not believe that my Grandma Faith is still working at her age.  I thought she would actually make a good interview candidate, a five star celebrity, world renowned surgeon, founder of the Riverview Swan family,  maybe I should make her my first victim, I am sure she won't mind!!

"Mason is that you, you have grown so big!!"

"Yes Grandma"

"So what are you up to these days?"

"I am a journalist - a Freelance Writer"

"Interesting - your Grandad Lee was a Journalist before we got married"

"I know - I was wandering - can I interview you?"

"Yes of course you can - so what do you want to know?"

So my Grandma Faith became my first interview victim and of course she did not need to worry because she knew I would be writing a possitive article.  She had plenty to say and by the time we had finished doing the interview - we were smoking and not because of what she had been telling me because of the sun.  We had been standing out in the sunlight for so long.  Needing to go indoors I decided to go back into the theatre and while I was on a roll I would review the latest movie.

 Walking out of the theatre, I was in for a shock, busy with my thoughts, it was the commotion of the screams that made me look round.  Not far away from me Priscilla Nolen one of the paparazzi had just ran of time.

 Even though I only knew Priscilla by name and not personally, it was still upsetting to watch.

While I was watching the Grim Reaper coming to collect his victim, I spotted my brother Marco, who was also stood watching.

Marco looks so different and grown up since he has had his birthday.  While we were chatting and catching up on some gossip I spotted Kandice coming out of the theatre.  Now there is an idea!!!

I could not help myself, this woman, my cousin the notorious Kandice Swan.  She might be a sports legend but she is more famous for her bedroom activities than anything she does on a sports field!!  I had to giggle when I saw Tanisha appear glaring at me for getting to interview her, Kandice doesn't do interviews apparently, but I am family so that's different.  She is not going to like me very much after this though, she just does not know it yet!!

Spending hour after hour infront of the computer trying to compose something that others might find enjoyable to read can be kind of stressful - especially when you get writers block!! I finally finished the article on my Grandmother Faith Swan, which she enjoyed and was grateful to me for writing, but unfortunately nobody else found it of any interest which surprised me a little.

I also managed to write a short article called - don't laugh!! - "Pocket Lint Composition of the Rich and Famous".  It might surprise you to know that this article was actually an instant success and I will receiving $80 a week in royalties for it.  Not a bad start I thought!!  The article on Kandice, I am saving for a rainy day!!

When I get over stressed like I do when I have done hours of writing or working too hard at work -  I tend to like to meditate.  I mastered the martial arts skill when I was a teenager, and miss not having a sparing partner these days.

It felt pretty strange to be reading in hardback something I had written myself and had published.  This spurred me onto making a start on writing my next article, this one I was taking a little more seriously on a subject a little closer to home about living the life of a vampire.

I managed to finish that $1,000 painting for the Science Facility.  When I finished it it was valued at $1,180, now I just had to find the time to get it delivered.  Its a pity really I quite like this painting, it would look nice hung on the living room wall!!!

I was really excited this morning when I got up I had been sent an Ironic Jam guitar by the manufacturers.  I know you are thinking little things please little minds, but if you are a guitarist and you have ever played one - you will know where I am coming from!!  My Dad has one which he guards with his life and if we ever touched it and he found out - boy were we in trouble!!!

So excited in fact I did something stupid for a vampire - went running outside and stood in the sunlight playing away.  Not even caring when I started frying, too wrapped up in the music.  It was only the sound of the carpool honking that brought me back to my senses.

I was still smoking when I got out of the carpool and walked into work.  I had over exposed myself to sunlight, which makes vampires very slow and exhausted, this put me in a really bad mood for the rest of the day.

I was feeling pretty miserable when I got home from work, you could say my mood was definately in the red, my earlier stupidity of over exposing myself to too much sunlight could affect me for up to three days.   I desperately needed something to drastically raise my mood, before it started to affect my job performance like it did today.

My agent gave me some promotional work to do dancing for three hours at the local night club - night club - drink and dancing just might lift my spirits - but first I had another opportunity to complete.  First I went over to the Science Facility to deliver that $1,000 painting that they wanted.  I was in fact pretty shocked when they actually paid me $4,475 for the painting instead of the £1,180 that it was worth!!!

So I made my way to the local dance club.  It was pretty quiet, dead infact, I could only see one other person in the place Leon Swan.  For me I have always had a problem with my not so immediate family, working out just exactly what is their relationship to me in the family tree.  Leon is one of those, that is blood related to me from both my Moms side and my Dads side, the lines in our family cross through marriage.   Leon for example - on my Moms line he is her half brother, My Grandad Chase's son, making him my Uncle - Yet, on my Dads line, his Mom Kandice is my Dads Neice, Kandice is my cousin which makes him my second cousin.  So Leon is both my Uncle and my Second Cousin - which one do I treat him as, this I have always struggled with - but you can safely say - we are definitely related!!!

Now I was here, I did not think I even had the energy to dance for an hour let along three.  I wandered over to the bar hoping the mixologist was capable of mixing something that would wake me up.  No such luck whatever the mixologist gave me was just nice and that's all I could say about it.

Someone took the seat at the other end of the bar from me.  I was actually waiting for the mixologist to concoct another drink for me, when I looked over at the new occupant I was pretty surprised to see her sat there smiling at me.  The last person you would expect to bump into at a night club - yes my Mom!!

I did try to dance for a while - yes with my Mom - go on laugh, cause I know you are dying to!!  I did not last for long - I was becoming exhausted.

I stumbled out of the dance club, before I collapsed from total exhaustion and made my way home to bed.  Tonight had been a very bad idea,  instead of making me feel better it made me feel a whole lot worse!!  There was only a few hours before the carpool would be honking for me to go to work - at the moment I could not really see me getting up at all in the morning!!

 When I did finally wake, only half refreshed, it wasn't the carpool that was honking, no that was long gone, I had overslept and was missing work, it was the house phone that actually woke me.  When the house phone rings, you can guarantee it is never going to be good news - and the news I received was the last thing I wanted to be hearing this morning.

Faith Swan, my Grandmother, passed away from old age today.

R.I.P Grandma

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Chapter 3

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I am such a sap!!!!  I actually got upset when Mason answered the house phone and I got the pop up telling me that Faith had passed away from old age.  I have to say through both of my wishacy's (and as you probably know she has been a big part of both)  Faith is probably one of a few sims I have got really attached to and as far as I can remember she is the only vampire sim in both of my wishacys that I have had from birth through to death from old age - being a vampire that is over 2000 sim days of life!!  Most of my vampires generally die of starvation before their time when they are not being controlled in the house I am playing.  I am really glad that Faith lived her whole life!!