• Published 25th Feb 2016
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Silver Glow's Journal - Admiral Biscuit



Silver Glow takes an opportunity to spend a year at an Earth college, where she'll learn about Earth culture and make new friends.

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January 27 [Resolution]

January 27

This morning when she was getting dressed, I asked Peggy if she knew who God was. She gave me a sort of funny look, and then asked why I wanted to know, so I told her how I was learning about Thomas Aquinas and what he'd said.

She said that some people believe that He created everything, and set down laws which mankind was to follow if they wanted to be rewarded in the afterlife. Then she said that some other people don't believe that He exists at all.

I asked her what she believed, and she said that she wasn't sure. It wasn't an easy question, she told me, and a lot of people wouldn't want to talk about it, and some people would want to talk about it too much.

That wasn't a very satisfactory answer, but it was pretty obvious that this was something that Peggy really didn't want to discuss with me, so I asked her who I might talk to if I wanted to learn more about God.

After a little bit of thought and some muttering to herself, she suggested that I could talk to one of the religion professors about it. She didn't know for sure where their offices were, but she knew that there were offices in the basement of Stetson Chapel (which is the building with the bell tower), and probably anyone in there would be able to tell me.

I thought about asking everyone else at breakfast, but then I decided that if Peggy didn't want to talk about it, maybe nobody would either.

I sat between Crystal Dawn and Luke again in climate class. One of the things the professor does is put the forecast for the next week up on the board, along with a pressure map. Despite the difference in symbols, it was about the same as the ones we used in Equestria, and it hadn't taken me too long to figure out how it worked. There'd probably be low, scattered cumulus clouds Friday morning, and I was going to get one and bring it in. It was either that or wait for fog, and Peggy told me fog didn't usually happen here until spring.

Since we'd moved beyond most of the basic basics, the professor started a lecture on how humans collected climate data. That was actually rather interesting.

It hadn't occurred to me how difficult it would be for them. They had people at remote outposts writing down messages about the weather, and then they'd get the report to the nearest telegraph station and send it off. They had special balloons which flew up and saw what was up there (those are called radiosondes or just weather balloons), they used radar waves which bounced off moisture in the atmosphere, and they had even flown kites to find out if clouds make electricity. There was still a lot that they didn't know.

At the same time, I got the impression that they knew some stuff that we didn't. Because they can't control the weather very much, they get as much data as they can so that they can make accurate predictions as to what will happen next. We usually have more basic information, and the local weather teams make adjustments as needed. Sometimes that doesn't work—rainclouds don't always work like they ought to. There was a really bad summer where most of the moisture calculations were off, and some places got nasty storms, while other places got rainclouds that didn't rain at all. It turned out a journeymare had mixed up a couple of columns in her report, and nopony caught the error until it was too late. There were a lot of unhappy ponies on the ground because of that mistake.

In philosophy, we learned that Thomas Aquinas had seen that a monarchy was the best form of government. That's what we have, and it works very well. Technically, it's a diarchy, but the principle is really the same. Both sisters take their turn being in charge—sometimes two heads are better than one. And then littler towns have their own leaders because it's okay for them to change without as big a plan as Princess Celestia and Princess Luna have for Equestria. They had to think about the whole nation and our mayor only had to think about our town, so she could focus on the little specifics which are too small for the Princesses to have to worry about, like whether we should add another dock to our harbor or just make do with the ones we have.

I talked with Lisa and Becky and Meghan some more in Equestrian class. The professor is still having us in groups, but she's having me just move between the four groups rather than stay in one place. That's better 'cause everybody can learn more that way.

Everyone started reading Daring Do and the Forbidden City of Clouds, and I came around and helped them with concepts that they don't understand. I thought that I'd be pretty bored, but it turns out that there was a lot they had trouble with.

It was kind of funny to watch a bunch of college students struggling with a novel. But I couldn't laugh at them, because nopony is laughing at me when I struggle with Aquinas or e e cummings or anything else that humans understand and I don't.

Meghan said that she was having some trouble, and wanted to know if I could come over to her dorm room and help her out. I said I couldn't tonight, but that I would tomorrow night. So she gave me her room number and telephone number as well.

At dinner, Peggy and I discussed what we were going to tell Mister Salvatore to do about the angry man. We maybe should have done it sooner, but I think it helped both of us to take a little time to think about it. Sometimes in the moment you want to just rush into something and you wind up doing something dumb but if you have time to think it's always better. We like to get a feel for feral storms before we go fight them, 'cause even if it gets a little bit further while you're thinking you do better against it if you know the best places to hit it.

I decided that I would abide by her choice. She's the one who had her clothes ruined, and she knows humans and the law better than I do. To my mind, there wasn't any point in pursuing it further. He was gone, and if I saw him again, I'd know to stay away from him. It wasn't much different than seeing a predator; you avoid it, stick a little closer to your friends, and then there is no problem.

Peggy grudgingly agreed. She said that there wasn't any point to making a federal case out of it. So when we got back to our room, I typed a computer letter to Mister Salvatore saying what we'd decided, and Peggy read over it as well, and then I sent it.

Either Mister Salvatore spends a lot of time at his computer, or else I just have very good timing, because he sent me a letter back right away and said that he would respect our decision and not pursue the matter any further unless it became necessary, and then he asked if there was anything else I needed.

Well, I thought it would be fun to meet up with Aquamarine some weekend soon, and wondered if he might be able to give me a ride, if she was interested in spending some time with me. He said that he would, so I also wrote a letter to her asking if I could come out and visit, or if she wanted to come here (because Peggy thought that would be really cool).

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