King Tut Race

Yesterday, I received my detailed painting in the mail from Jolly Redd. I took it up to the museum, and Blathers confirmed that it was authentic.

Detailed Painting - June 24th, 2021 - Donated by Jeff

At 5:00, I started rounding up some racers for my King Tut Race. I had three authentic paintings to give away as prizes, so I planned on holding three races. Samzyy, João, Adrian, Xavier, Abdoulaye, and Alec came over. We hung out at the oasis while I tried to find an 8th player to join.

Seven King Tuts hanging out at the oasis.

I wasn’t having much luck, so I decided to start the races with just 7 players.

King Tuts racing and falling.
Run. Fall. Repeat.

I really enjoyed the races! It was funny seeing all these Tuts running around and falling every few seconds. 😂 We raced twice, and Xavier won both times! Congrats, Xavier! He won two paintings.

I was finally able to get an 8th player, and Chuck joined in. When we raced again, I actually won the race. 😛 Since I didn’t need my own prize, we raced a 4th time. This time, Adrian won. I also gave him an authentic painting as his prize.

Here is my video showing two full races (plus a few bonus clips from the other rounds as well):

A bit of trivia: Wonder why I used bamboo stopblocks in some areas? I made an effort to keep the course three full spaces wide for basically the entire race. But space was a little tight in some areas, and the stopblocks only take up one-half space of width, while fencing uses a whole space. So that allowed me to keep those areas wide enough to allow people to run around a fallen Tut.

Today, Leif had a stand set up at the plaza, but I didn’t buy anything from him. And I noticed that after 10 p.m., he was already gone! Most of the special characters stick around longer than that (even if they stop selling things), so that surprised me a bit.

I did find Wisp in town tonight, and he asked me to gather up his five spirits. After a full trip around the outer part of my island though (basically everything except Peach Park), I only found two spirits! So three of the five were in (or near) Peach Park. 😛 When I took them all back to Wisp, he rewarded me with an essay set.

Bones asked me if I noticed a really good smell the other day. He said it was Apollo’s shampoo, which smelled like apples and yogurt parfait. I was tempted to ask why he was sniffing Apollo’s “hair,” but he is a dog after all, so his strong sense of smell provides a good excuse. 😛

Bones: Amazing! Science made a shampoo that smells like yogurt parfait... Way to go, science!

My race course is a large area to keep fully enclosed, so I added a couple of openings in the fence (with stools added) to function as escape hatches. The idea is to allow me to pass through relatively unhindered, while keeping the openings inconvenient enough to deter any potential cheaters from trying to take a shortcut during a race. I could also dig holes on race days to further discourage cheaters.

An escape hatch in my King Tut race.

And if you watched the video, you saw that the pitfall field caused some problems. In particular, some players were glitching/lagging through the pitfalls unscathed, while everyone else was blocked by the Tuts already in pitfalls.

So this is how I plan on changing the pitfall area. I’m not removing the pitfalls, but they will be spaced out so they don’t completely block traffic.

Planned changes to my King Tut Race course.

Here’s another bit of trivia, courtesy of Samzyy, who pointed it out to me: My frog race video was posted one year ago today. That was a lot of fun, and it’s been my 2nd most popular New Horizons video to date. (My top ACNH video so far was Wi-Fi Moments #1.)

The Bug-Off is coming up tomorrow! I hope I remember to play before 6 p.m., because I tend to play later. Good luck with your bug-catching, everyone!

Like a Tiger

Yesterday, Gulliver was in town, washed up on the beach as usual. I collected his communicator parts and returned them to him.

Tybalt asked me for a new catchphrase to replace “it’s scary,” which I taught him way back in October. 🎃😱 So I told him to say “like a tiger” instead.

Tybalt: Thanks to you, I feel like a new dude. I've been reborn! Like a tiger!

Apollo was saying that I should promote his good ideas, so that they can start inspiring people. This dialogue reminded me of something they’d say in New Leaf when someone would recommend a new public works project (PWP) to the mayor. 😛

Apollo: I bet if you talked up my good ideas to everyone on this island, they'd start gettin' inspired right away!

Last night, Xavier came over to test out my new race. He shared his thoughts with me, and he sent me an item I added to the course. Thanks, Xavier!

Today, I received my reward from Gulliver: He sent me a geisha wig. I snatched it from the letter and put it in storage…even though I can’t imagine ever using it.

Jolly Redd was in town, at the north beach. He had a fake scary painting, a fake famous painting, a scenic painting that looked fake, and a detailed painting I wasn’t sure about. However, the detailed painting was different from the five other detailed paintings I’ve seen in the past. So I thought my odds were pretty good, and I bought it.

Poor Eloise was sick with a cold. Actually, Margie has been sick in my Wild World town lately, so I’m wondering if there’s some elephant disease going around. Perhaps it’s a pachyderm germ, or maybe they just have their trunks in a funk. 😛

Eloise: Ugh... Oof... I feel horrid. Oh no, is the room dimming? Is this the end? Goodbye, cruel world!

I gave her some medicine, and she rewarded me with a baby romper. What, she wants me to dress up as a baby? 😕 At any rate, I hope she starts feeling better soon.

Eloise: I do hope you like it. It's a baby romper.
I’m insulted and I’m leaving. Don’t expect me to come crawling back, either.

Midge is continuing to use her recent catchphrase, saying that it’s good to unexpectedly bump into a friend…in the air.

Midge: It's so good to unexpectedly bump into a friend, in the sky.
That’s something you’ll never hear a pilot say.

Then I worked a bit more on my race course. I probably spent at least half an hour adding a new section that only adds about five seconds of length to the race. 😂 But the final stretch was too basic, and needed to be spiced up a bit.

Speaking of the race, I plan on hosting it Thursday at 5 pm Eastern time for people on Twitter. For more info, see my tweet.

However, I’m probably not going to have Friday Night Forest this week. But I’ll be back with another entry soon!

Burned Water

Last night, Wisp was in town. He gave me a gray-striped wall for collecting and returning his spirits.

Hippeux the hideous, hideous hippo was at the campsite. I was not interested in feeding him. I mean, inviting him to town. Neither of those things.

Hippeux: So far, I like what I'm seeing. 100 percent of Hippeuxs would rate this campground highly.

Today, poor Midge told me that she fell into a pitfall the other day. The worst part is that it took her all morning to climb out of it! 😮

Midge: The other day, I fell into a pit and it took all morning to climb back out.

So she cheered herself up by fishing…in the sky.

Midge: Half my day was ruined! I decided that it might cheer me up to try fishing for a while, in the sky.

When I visited Bones, he told me he’s such a bad cook that he has even burned water!

Bones: One time? I accidentally burned water! A lotta folks don't know you can do that...
You must have been steamed.

Flick was in town, and I had a bunch of bugs in storage to sell him. He gave me 170k for the 31 insects. Summer is the ideal time for Flick; I wish he could show up more often in summer. There are so many bugs to catch and sell!

Flick: Ahem. Can I offer you, say, 170,250 bells for the bunch of them?

Celeste was in town tonight, and at first she didn’t give me anything. But then I realized my pockets were full. Oops. 😛 Once I made room, she gave me a DIY recipe for some sci-fi flooring.

I worked on my race some more, and it’s probably about 98% complete now. It just needs a few cosmetic changes. I’m tentatively planning on revealing more on Wednesday, and then hosting the races possibly on Thursday afternoon (if the weather is sunny in Forest). But the timing is still subject to change.

See you all next time!