Thank Grog It’s Firday!!
And Thank God It’s NOT Black Friday Or Cyber Monday!
I’m writing this early, because I am actually going to be on the road on Friday (today…but not really today). I am still reveling in the reality of escaping Black Friday and Cyber Monday almost completely unscathed.
I had an “insider’s view” of how this all works, as my daughter Ali, who lives in San Francisco, and is in management with Gap Inc. (the online division), was actually working remotely on her Thanksgiving visit. It was amazing to watch…as she checked sales, comparative numbers, and then calmly stated “it’s looking like a record year for sales, and my business (women’s knits and action wear) are up almost 75% over last year.”
Yikes. Now THAT is a turnaround. Gap Inc. also has a ton of other well-known brands, including Old Navy…and there was a huge turnaround in Brick and Mortar stores this past Holiday Shopping Frenzy…with online sales also breaking records on Cyber Monday. Amazing. How “up” can you keep going?
Meanwhile…in our games…Black Friday and Cyber Monday were mostly like shopping at a casino…hoping to get the payout you wanted, when you dropped a few donuts.
I mostly skipped both incarnations… Did I feel Un-American or like a CrankyOldTSTOGuy? Nope. I felt relaxed…
I have been Donut Farming for a couple of weeks in prep. I had (and still have) around 500 donuts, and growing. But, the fact is…I am just not the kind of guy who takes a chance on MAYBE getting what I want…even if it is a “great deal.”
I did buy two of the “Future Monuments” because there was a huge rebate, and they only ended up costing me 30 donuts for 1.5% total multiplier…which is pretty good for a large phallic symbol that pretty much looks out of place, no matter where you put it. But, that was it. I just didn’t care.
Same goes for Christmas shopping this year…gift cards…gift certificates…and Uncle Patty’s Caramel Corn will have to do. I’ve lost that spending feeling…
But, that doesn’t mean I am against bargains…or deals…or specials…for other people. From what I was seeing on the road (while driving to the golf course on Friday), there was LOTS of activity around the shopping malls and big box stores.
Me? I just did my best to ignore it, with a round of golf with my Son In Law and Grandsons…
…While trying to work off some of the huge Turkey Dinner we consumed the day before.
22 lbs of golden brown goodness!
Below…what I call the perfect “brown and red” meal. Turkey, mashed potatoes and stuffing…all smothered in fresh cranberry sauce and topped with gravy! Why ruin perfections with vegetables?
For those who will ask…my drink of choice this Thanksgiving? Deep Eddie Cranberry Infused Vodka…with soda water. Mmmmmm….
But, I KNOW there are some of you who really bought like crazy…
TELL US ABOUT YOUR FAVORITE DEALS…TSTO and CHRISTMAS RELATED. Tell us about your meal! Tells us what rocked your Thanksgiving weekend!
Did you stand in line? Did you do most of your shopping on the internet? Did you do like Sandra, and fill her town to bursting with “great deals” after weeks of stockpiling donuts? Let us know!
I’m ready for the FULL Christmas Update… rEAlly ready!! Bring it on. Make us smile! Give us the kind of content that is worthy of our hard earned donuts! Make this Christmas “less magical” than Halloween…and full of the real Christmas spirit (even if it looks like the Aliens might invade it)! Can I get an “Amen?” Can I get a Quesildorf? (Alien for “Amen”). Can I get you to turn on all of your house lights? Let’s hear from all of you!
Gotta say I’m not a fan of the new boxes of randomness. There’s never more than one thing in any box that I want, and the reason I don’t have the other things is not wanting them. Donuts cost money and I’m not willing to spend them on just the ‘chance’ I’ll get the thing I actually want.
During Black Friday, I filled my town with everything in the boxes including 10 buildings (3 with characters), 5 characters (3 with 2 buildings + 1 decoration) and 8 decorations (1 with a character + 1 with a costume). My favourite box was the character one because I got Herb, Dia-Betty and Anger Watkins which I passed on the first time since they were really expensive and getting a character + building/decoration at 80 donuts was a really great price. I also turned on* all the Christmas lights and bought the ones in store yesterday for the Skinners House and the Wiggums House while during the weekend I will be placing Christmas items from the inventory into my town for Tuesday.
* By turned on I meant used the Light Plunger I had since 2014 to activate all the lights on the buildings.
I emptied the character box. Cost me pretty much all my in game cash. I used the XP collider and bought rest trap lorries.
Homer is on the 1d8h task as part of the boxing skin I had sitting in my vault for Drederick Tatum. It was great to see the tasks stacking up, just like when I started playing and always had multiple quests running.
Guyon
I’m tossing up on whether I should get the houseboat and Muntz house Christmas decorations for 10 donuts each (already dished out on pink house, lard lad, church and Wiggum house). What do you guys think?
If you have the donuts and really like the Christmas lights then I would buy them then save the rest for next week.
In the vault there is currently the jet engine bike with 2% multiplier for 20 donuts (30 – 10 back) – and you can buy multiple. Better than all the boxes (at least if you want to raise your multiplier)
Recently I spent 532 donuts buying Mystery Boxes (6 donuts each) and gained 68% (7.82 donuts per %).
Thanks for the heads up. I’ll do that!
BTW everyone’s vault is different. I had the Jet Engine bike last week, while this week I have: Ambulance, Purple Funzo, Mayflower, Stiletto Sculpture
Spent some donuts on black Friday boxes meh!!! Saving most for Christmas event, done a lot of shopping on Amazon but hitting the shops on Saturday, get most of the bigger presses as I have a busy workload till the 22nd, best deal was the chief and casino, 100 donuts and Bouvier for 95 donuts, Quesildorf its Christmas
Add a daily player Haywire06
I arranged a Washington DC mall area in my town using all the museums and using the Future monument at end of mall as the Washington monument. No blowing leaves this year in our towns so hope this does not mean no snow. Here’s hoping for a Christmasy event.
Got everything except gold box including winter stuff!
Justifying purchases since I don’t have faith in the upcoming event so I got the things from yesteryear when the game makers weren’t phoning it in.
And in the real world
Proud that retail sales for Christmas are at a record high
Our economy is booming, proof that the USA is going in the right direction
🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸
This will be my second Christmas spent all alone.
I know how you feel Bryan. I have no family at all after my mom died. Fortunately, I have wonderful friends. Go visit your buddies and it will cheer you up!
Game “A”, bought everything available (1540+520). Game “B” (1970+530), had to use all my donuts to get everything, Game “C” (2700+180) had to use my cash ($13M) buying rat trap trucks.to get what I wanted. Luckily I was able to generate enough donuts to pick up the Christmas items. Now I need some land to spread some things out. Still need a few items to catch up in some of the games (like the North Pole station).
Merry Christmas Charles!; I’ve some space on my 2 games if you need new friends – I’m the Dexterous 1 & 2 – Australian player & longtime neighbour of Iv Ed. Was surprised to find out you are American, the last time you replied to a post I made!
Sent an invite from game “C” (cbrown2666549) to 1, but couldn’t find 2. So why don’t you send invites. Game “A” is jgame666, Game “B” is jgamer667.
Hi again Charles; Sometimes my old ipad just says “No” & can’t send friend requests; But I will try as you are a great neighbour to me & I’m thankful for that (Even though Aussies don’t do Thanksgiving!) If all else fails my daughter can try to add you via her gaming account with EA. She’s a hardcore gamer & tech savvy. Keep Safe & Happy! From Karon.
Seems strange. The only reason I know is if you have reached the 100 friends maximum. I guess you could temporarily borrow an iPad to add new people. I did that once at a store to examine a problem. I used my iTunes account to download TSTO to the iPad first. I had to make sure when I logged out of TSTO I also wiped my iTunes account.
And Merry Christmas to you Karon!
Thank You Charles! I’m under the max friends amount (& need to prune non players); The ipad is old & cranky @ times, yet still I love it! I’ve been offered new for my BDay in a few days time, but I like my old device! Cheers; Karon
I have just added a 10.5 iPad Pro, love it. Everything moves faster.
I went so crazy with the boxes, I had 35 new tasks. Finally finished them.
I purchased solely from the character box. I purchased 14 of the 16 characters…and I am thrilled with the purchases!
I had almost all of them already. But thrilled that you are thrilled!
Went as much in on the character box as possible – Tatum, Bob’s Italian wife, Sherry Bobbins, Anger Watkins, Dr. Hibberts Dead Beat Son, Sideshow Mel, rubby baby lady, AND pageant lady(sleepeazy motel). Bought donuts for coins and more donuts for characters and got the Gold House, Raddish Station(my favorite score), Mars Colony, and The Health Spa(LAME). I will be clearing out this pre Xmas box because I only have the good stuff left in there so – Murderhorn, Funzos(just because I hate seeing them in my vault), Ski Lift and Sexy Ned, SnowGlobe, Ice Palace, and of course the Grumple. 50 donuts for each item separately is pretty good.
I too only bought the monument but didn’t realize you could buy more than one?!??!!??!!
Maxed out the character box, except for one. Took what seemed like forever to get down from 18 tasks running at the same time!!
Whoa!! That is a lot of “new” old tasks running.