Damndest thing...Last night I went into the lot where Meadow is living and even though I hadn't changed anything (taken out any hacks or moved her), she could clean up the plates. I have no idea why. 

There is a great hack by dizzy2 on VS for serving only as many sims that are actually hungry (therefore not wasting any food) . Here's the link: http://www.variousimmers.net/vsimforum/showthread.php?t=2002
I use it in my game and think it's wonderful.

"1. asshat--One who has their head up their ass. Thus wearing their ass as a hat." urbandictionary.com

This is one of my all time favortie words

Same here. I've had dozens of sims have "dream dates" and nothing, da nada, except roses.

I recall seeing something about that on the BBS, that they were going to use real people and their games for commercials. You had to submit a lot of personal information and there were people upset over the fact there wasn't an age requierment or something, so kids would be giving out their real addresses/names/phone numbers, etc.,
You know, I've heard people talk about commercials for the sims but I have never, not once, actually seen one.

sagana and I are apparently living parallel lives  .  I work 8-5, 40 hours a week and all the various duties that being a mother of 2 includes. I get to play around an hour or two at night after everyone is taken care of for the day and depending upon how tired I am (or how annoyed my husband appears to be at seeing me on the computer "again" ). Sometimes I get 4-5 hours on the weekends, usually staying up til the wee hours to get my play time. And I have to admit that it's really hard to pull the plug during the weeknights when I'm in the midst of a storyline.....like staying up til 1 a.m. last night because it seemed imperative to get Meadow Thayer to break off her engagement with Joe Carr so that she could be with George McCarthy, after all, she IS pregnant with his baby!

Hmmm..that's odd. I bought TS2 in late February, had it only a few weeks before the first patch came out and I don't think I played Strangetown prior to patching it but I could be wrong. Anyway, my point is, my sims were always able to interact with the Bella in Strangetown (I even had Nervous Subject engaged to her), long before NL.

Well don't I feel like a dork? I do have Uni and I never even thought of that!  
What I'm really wanting is to figure out a "fix" for the problem rather then a workaround though because it's highly annoying. I seem to be having a lot of bugginess in my game lately and this is just one of the problems. blargh.

edited because spelling counts.

Hmmm...that is really odd. I've been either using "moveobjects on" to delete the table and buy a new one, which is a pain considering how many times in a sim day that needs to be done or having Meadow invite other sims over, making them selectable and then making them clean up the dishes.
Thanks for replying phyllisp and lynda...at least I know I'm not alone.

No kidding. They are selling TS2 w/holiday content to people who didn't buy the original game when it first came out for around $40.00 USD but I am penalized because I already bought it and to get the holiday stuff I have to shell out another $15-20? So I'm paying $55-60 for something that other people will get for $40. Does that smell like bullshit to anyone but me?
Of course companies do that all the time. I was looking at Amazon.com the other day and saw that the HBO Sex & the City series is now coming out with a complete boxed set for less then what it cost me to buy each season individually. There were some very unhappy posts being made about that little event.

I have about -0 degrees of interest in getting the holiday pack, it just doesn't appeal to me.
I agree with that. I would love to have more things for babies/toddlers/children to do and more interactions for them with adults. Having an adult be able to sit down and rock the baby/toddler would be a good begining, I recall doing that quite a bit when my kids were small. In TS1 they had that cool jungle gym with a slide for kids, I would like to have that for TS2. Not to mention, why can't children fix their own darned cereal or sandwiches?
I would also like to see something geared for men as well. I spend a lot of time trying to find hair and clothing for the men and teenage boys, there doesn't seem to be a lot out there.
As far as ordering it goes, I prefer walking into walmart then paying s&h charges for what I consider to be overpriced items in the first place. I think the best idea is what Motoki said, sell it as a download. Of course for those that don't have internet access for whatever reason, that obviously wouldn't work.

I second that! (or should I say, Me too! Me too! lol) And thanks for the link to AllenABQ's website, Brynne.

You're not worried that will then lead to wanting to marry the cow?

Actually I think the book you are referring to is "From a Buick 8" by Stephen King. If I recall correctly, Christine was a '50s model Ford.

I moved Meadow Thayer in with one of my families just long enough to age her into an adult, call the taxi and move out. I moved her into a very small starter home where she's living alone, found her a job and set up house, so far, so good. Here's the problem: every time after she cooks and then eats, she can't pick up the plate to clean up. I can't even click on the plate, the arrow is just greyed out. I have deleted the dining room table, moved the table to another part of the house, nothing. If a plate is on the counter, the only option I get is to "grab a plate" or "eat", there isn't a "clean up" option. Out of curiosity, I had Joe Carr come over, made him selectable, had him prepare a meal for just himself while Meadow was napping, he ate and then I was able to click on the plate and him clean up (same table that Meadow couldn't clean a plate off of) the plate. He left, had Meadow prepare a meal, etc., same thing, she is unable to "clean up". I moved her out and back in but it didn't make any difference. Clearly it's some kind of issue with her and not the lot. Anyone ever have this? By the way, I turned on debug mode and not one error popped up. Ideas, anyone?

I was wondering where I could find your work? And also, if you or someone could make the full beard/big mustache look more realistic, that would be great! I never use those because they look so fake, like a little kid wearing a costume for a play or something and I would love to be able to use them.
In regards to Remington the Pizza Dude, he and Brandi Broke paired up in my game and had some really great looking kids

Brynne, he really is a good looking sim (please don't shoot me, I didn't say I had the hots for pixelated person! lol), you should clone and upload him somewhere.

I had to laugh when I read that because over the last few months I have been thinking the exact same thing. I drive a compact car because it was affordable and gets good gas mileage. I am often blinded by the lights of an oncoming or worse yet, directly behind me, SUV. Not to mention the HUGE attitiude that apparently comes factory installed along with the SUV itself. For someone in a smaller car the drivers seem to exhibit a "move or I'll run you over" attitude. I also have to admit that during our quite snowy winters, I get a chuckle over the amount of these vehicles I see slid off on the side of the road because their owners are under the impression that having a 4WD somehow makes it easier for them to STOP as easily on the snow as they would on pavement. God forbid they should have to actually SLOW DOWN in deference to the actual driving conditions. 

That's funny Brynne, I've never seen a sim roll up wants to be married to 3 different sims at the same time. After reading your posts, why do I get the feeling my sims are boring? 

I had noticed that before about sibilings sometimes havng negative scores towards the new baby and put it down to a jealousy factor. However I found it very annoying that when I created a family a couple of weeks ago (a mom, a teen brother and two teen sisters), moved them into a new house and their very first interaction with each other had the two sisters with negative relationship scores. I mean they were still outside on the sidewalk for pete's sakes! I wish we had the option in CAS to not only set the family tree but to set the relationship scores with each sim accordingly. I have had to work really hard to get those sisters to just get along and believe me, they still don't like each other. That was not what I had in mind when I made the family, for them to be a pain the posterior.

Hehehe, I had wondered if that avatar was suppose to be you, Trepie.  I actually have never made a "ME" to play in any of my neighborhoods but hmmm..maybe I will. I had been very much looking forward to NL but ironically since I bought it I have had very little time to play; a half hour here, 45 minutes there, which as anyone knows, seems to not be any time at all.
I used to play Pleasantview most often but I have been feeling overwhelmed by how many families I have there so I haven't been playing it as much. I've been playing Strangetown and my own custom 'hood more often. I'm not very good at thinking out "storylines" so I am finding that I get bored quickly. I need to start coming up with some plots and shake things up. I tend to get stuck in a rut of having my sims skilling, going to work/school, meeting a significant other, having babies, ad nauseum. Reading other people's posts on MATY has given me some inspiration to start trying some new ideas.

I would like to give it a peek also.

I'll have to wait until I get home tonight and see how it goes....stupid work, lol.

Thanks Missdoh and Motoki. 

Would moving a nanny in cause weirdness and/or possibly a BFBVFS? Out of curiosity I aged one of the nannies (Kendal Lawson to be exact) into an adult last night while I was playing on Don Lothario's lot (he has an adopted daughter in my game), made her selectable using the InSim and directed her to talk to Don; they really hit it off. I considered having her move in as a love interest for Don but was too paranoid to actually save the game before asking people More Awesome Than I, if this is a bad idea. I have moved in other NPCs before playing the Legacy Challenge but never a nanny and I didn't know if there was some kind of weirdness associated with her like Mrs. Crumplebottom.