Characters
Frank and Julie, the central characters in this Sims neighborhood, are also the main characters in the stories the proprietor’s children beg to be told at bedtime…or when in the car…or at mealtimes…or whenever, really.
Frank
Frank Monaghan is a Family sim with a modified Aquarius personality. A native of northern Alabama, Frank attended the University of North Alabama, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice. He makes up one half of the police force of the small town of Cardinal, Georgia.
Frank is never afraid of adventure; but he is more than happy to hang out at the police station, read the paper, and eat doughnuts if adventure doesn’t seem close at hand. Easy-going and good-natured, and a lifelong resident of smaller towns, he can display a bit more naïvete than one might expect from a policeman.
Gadgets and gizmos bring out a boyish enthusiasm in Frank. As a former teenage aficionado of import video games, he has a special fondness for the latest in Japanese technology. At the start of his police career, he made a special trip to Japan to acquire a variety of advanced, cutting-edge, and mysterious policing tools… as well as his first house, which created quite a stir in Cardinal the day it arrived via cargo container.
His fascination with the Orient notwithstanding, Frank does relish the familiar. Not a restless soul, he takes comfort in familiar places, familiar foods, familiar people, familiar habits. Wherever he finds himself in the world, whichever day it happens to be, and whatever might be going on around him, he will go to great lengths to indulge the most indispensible of those habits: beginning his day with a doughnut and the comics page of the newspaper. On slow mornings, Frank will also stop by The Comics Curmudgeon for discussion about the day’s strips. (He does not, however, follow any doughnut blogs.)
Frank has settled quite contentedly in Cardinal. If he were to leave, it could only ever be for one of two reasons: losing his job, or no longer being able to stand the fact that he cannot find proper Alabama barbecue anywhere in north Georgia.
Julie
Julie Thompson is a Knowledge sim with a modified Cancer personality. The other half of Cardinal’s police force, she is a native of middle Georgia, and a graduate of Georgia Southern University with a Bachelor of Science in Justice Studies.
Some family members say that Julie has always been something of a tomboy; others argue it’s more to the point to say that she’s a down-to-earth girl, who has never had any patience for drama or manipulation. She does enjoy being female, in her own unfussy way; and despite her independent nature, she will allow herself the luxury of playing the damsel in distress every once in awhile (she tells her friends that it’s only for the sake of Frank’s ego). She’s plenty tough, but never feels the need to display toughness for its own sake, or to prove some sort of point.
Julie is typically willing to try new things, but only on her terms and when she’s decided she’s ready for them—she hates surprises. She tries her best to stay on an even keel when surprises come anyway, and usually succeeds; but on those rare occasions when she fails, the results can be catastrophic.
Skeptical by nature, and far from a technophile, Julie regards Frank’s gadgetry with a mix of bewilderment, suspicion, and contempt. That is especially true of her partner’s prized early-warning computer, which she has a habit of blaming for each and every unpleasant occurrence that it successfully predicts. Julie is no fan of soothsaying…nor of the supernatural more generally, unless and until it winds up staring her in the face. At least as of the beginning of this game, Julie does not believe in aliens, or vampires, or werewolves.
Julie likes to tease Frank about being a creature of habit, but she can get rather crabby herself if she ever winds up without her morning crossword and coffee. And she seems equally content to stay in Cardinal permanently; though if you ask her, she will tell you that it’s not due to habit or attachment—any particular place is, she says, remarkably like any other place—but simply because moving is such a tremendous hassle, to be avoided whenever possible.