Meet The Mares: Sweetie Swirl · 1:54am Dec 2nd, 2022
There’s only so much that can go into a story, especially one with as many characters as 16 has. So I’m opening the floor to asking these characters questions. Post your reply with any questions you have and Sweetie Swirl will be happy to answer them (I’ll be editing this blog to add those questions).
Sweetie’s our sixteenth, and final, interview subject. All interviews remain open, and I encourage everyone to ask more questions. I really do enjoy answering them! Furthermore, you never know when something brought up in one of these interviews might influence the overall story.
Interview subject #16: Sweetie Swirl
Source: https://www.deviantart.com/avarick/art/Sweetie-Swirl-327554214
Cutie mark?
Source: https://www.deviantart.com/durpy/art/Cutie-Mark-Blind-Bag-Sweetie-Swirl-309184963
To clarify, is that an ice cream cone, or cotton candy?
I hate getting asked that question. It’s ice cream. Specifically, it’s a blueberry-raspberry concoction I came up back in Equestria. It proved so popular that the shop named it after me: the Berry Sweetie Swirl. Though, for the record, ‘berry’ isn’t part of my name. Lickety-Split just added that part to clarify what’s being swirled.
Thanks to Feathermay, I discovered that pony names don’t translate to English quite as well as everyone originally thought. What’s the most direct translation of your name?
She Who Swirls The Sweetest Ice Cream.
You were on the very first busload of ponies brought to the consulate the day the portal opened. Is that correct?
Yep! I needed a change of scenery and Earth was just what the doctor ordered. Good riddance, Horsey!
Relationship status?
Lonely. I’m not what one would call a herd pony, or as humans put it, a people person. I have a hard time making friends, let alone love connections. I also tend to push ponies away when I’m feeling down, which is frequently.
Favorite part of living on Earth?
X-Box.
You’re a gamer?
Very much so! Snowcatcher calls video games a waste of time, but I think she’s just mad that I always beat her.
What’s your favorite game?
Grand Theft Auto 5.
I suspect that’s going to throw our readers for a loop. Isn’t that a little violent for most ponies?
Probably, but I’ve always been a bit of an iconoclast. My taste runs counterculture to mainstream. Besides, I work customer service. After a long day of catering to the whims of our guests, this is therapeutic.
Do you have any hobbies?
Needlepoint. Which, by the way, I can do simultaneously while playing video games. I find it’s calming, which comes in handy when playing video games so I don’t get upset when I lose. Though, admittedly, the ones I’m working on while playing intensely stressful games often have to be redone. That doesn’t bother me so much, as it’s really more of something I enjoy doing.
I think my coworkers are tired of getting tissue cozies and decorative wall hangings. These days I send them home with guests.
What’s your favorite song? Specifically, your favorite song that our audience on Earth might know?
Stayin’ Alive by the BeeGees.
Favorite TV show?
Garfield And Friends.
Favorite movie?
Demolition Man.
Favorite color?
Violet.
What do you miss about Equestria?
Earth, Equestria, is there really that big a difference between them? Humans here, ponies there. You’ve got Manhattan, we have Manehattan. You’ve got Journey and Fleetwood Mac, we have Journeigh and Fleetwood Tack. Really, the biggest difference is Earth’s technology and the lack of Equestrian magic. So I guess I’ll say magic. As a unicorn, it’s odd not to have all the ambient spells in the background. There’s magic in everything in Equestria, so it was jarring not to have it when I first came here. But I’m used to it now.
Do you have a car?
Source: AlwaysDressesInStyle
I do, a 1973 AMC Gremlin X with the Levi's interior.
Emil: What was the favorite food/drink that you discovered on human-Earth?
With apologies to Lickety-Split, as an ice cream historian and connoisseur, I’ll go on the record as saying Earth’s ice cream is better than anything I’ve had in Equestria.
Of the premium brands, I prefer Häagen-Dazs to Ben & Jerry’s. They’re both very good. But they also come in tiny little servings, and if, like me, you eat the entire container in one sitting they’re about as healthy as running up to a noose and sticking your head in it. They’re also expensive, and I’m not rich.
On the more reasonable end of the price scale, Baskin-Robbins is paired with Dunkin’ Donuts, and I love to get a strawberry frosted doughnut with one scoop each of chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry ice cream to make a Neapolitan doughnut.
I’m also quite fond of Friendly’s. Their food’s decent, but the best part of eating there is dessert.
Cold Stone Creamery is another favorite, but the place I go to the most though, the one that hits the sweet spot between taste and price, is Carvel.
I wish I could say I liked all of the ice cream available on Earth, but… Dairy Queen gives me the trots. Every. Single. Time. And I won’t even dignify the dreck they serve at McDonald’s by referring to it as ‘ice cream’. It’s… something. Something awful. You know the food’s bad when they have to bribe kids with toys to get them to eat their Happy Meals. I cringe whenever a guest wants to go to either of those places and try to steer them toward other, better options. Usually Carvel.
Then there’s gelato, which I was introduced to by a guest who insisted we get some Talenti at the grocery store. Very, very rich. Exquisite flavor. They do a blueberry crumble that I can’t get enough of.
Emil: I wonder why our ice cream is better than the version across the portal.
As suggested by penguincascadia, artificial ingredients are part of it. However, humans also have much better ways of freezing and preserving than we do in Equestria. It’s not that the ice cream in Equestria is bad, far from it! It’s just that there aren’t as many options in Equestria. Each town may have one or two ice cream shops, while there are many more options on Earth. I haven’t traveled around Equestria to find a favorite. I like Lickety-Split’s best in Horsey, and my favorite shop in Damden has unfortunately gone out of business since I last lived there. Equestrian markets are also less likely to carry a product that requires freezing, and I’m not aware of any ice cream available in grocery store in Equestria.
Can you eat an entire Cookie Puss in one sitting?
Yes. Now I’m craving one… I think I’ll have one for dinner.
How are you still alive?
My doctor asks me the same question every time I see go in for a check-up. Ponies have a higher tolerance for sweets and sugars than humans. Go back to my favorite song. Between my diet and sarcastic sense of humor, there’s no rational logic for how I’ve lived this long. I like to joke that I’m a living cartoon character.
You called yourself an ice cream historian. Can you elaborate?
Sure. I’ve never had any luck in making my own ice cream, though that’s something I experiment with periodically. My mark is in knowing a lot about ice cream, and also being a connoisseur, which you can probably ascertain from my elaborate answer to the question about my favorite food.
Since I’m on Earth, I’ll focus on facts about your ice cream industry. Starting off with one that’s fairly well-known, Carvel got its start when Tom Carvel’s ice cream truck got a flat tire and he sold his entire inventory in just two days from a stationary location. This is more impressive when you realize this was in 1934, during the depths of the Great Depression. He bought the land where he’d been parked and opened his first store on the site.
Moving on to more obscure trivia, the founders of Friendly’s, S. Prestley Blake and his brother Curtis, both lived to be over one hundred. 106 and 102, respectively. Good genes – gotta wonder if they had some earth pony in their family tree somewhere. Good ice cream, too.
While known for having ’31 flavors’, Baskin-Robbins has technically created over 1,300 flavors since 1945. Also, Barack Obama worked for them as a teenager.
Steve Herrell created the premium ice cream market in 1973, and is also credited with introducing the idea of mix-ins. Ben & Jerry’s and Cold Stone Creamery both drew inspiration from Steve’s Ice Cream. Steve’s was sold and later discontinued, but Herrell had already started Herrell’s Ice Cream, which still exists in New York and New England. I have yet to make it to one of their locations, so I can’t rank it, but I expect it to be good. Really good.
Snowliasion: Favorite colleague?
Plumsweet – she’s my sister in sweets! One of these days we need to try making our own ice cream, but with so many good options on Earth, it’s not really necessary. Unless Dairy Queen wins the franchise wars… She shudders.
Dan: Root beer floats, yay or neigh? Alternately, birch beer floats?
Depends on the root beer – A&W is the best, hooves down, though Mug is certainly good, and I’m also quite fond of IBC. As long as it isn’t Barq’s.
Birch beer floats are good, and I’m also fond of Coke floats. Coca-Cola or RC in particular, Pepsi not so much. RC floats may be more of a pony thing, especially at the Mareiott.
Dan: From another chronic outsider who acknowledges others as peers reluctantly at best, and feels disdain for many aspects of current education systems, would you like a long hug?
Yes, please. Thank you for asking first. I like hugs, but I don’t like them unexpectedly. There’s a griffin I used to know who likes to hug randomly.
Dan: Are you familiar with the movie The Founder? Ray Kroc was a real scummy crook, but his milkshake mixers did change the business landscape forever.
No, but I’ve had McDonald’s milkshakes before. Not my favorite, though the Shamrock Shake is tasty. I’ve determined the secret ingredient, so if you ever want a homemade Shamrock Shake? Mint and marshmallows. It’s McDonald’s. When in doubt, their policy seems to be ‘add more sugar and/or salt’ depending on which product we’re talking about.
Dan: Maybe you could team up with Daisy Dreams and build a Raspberry Pi-controlled ice cream machine and build a business empire of your own?
While the thought is appealing, to make a quality milkshake that I’d be proud to be associated with wouldn’t be cost effective in the marketplace. Making a better milkshake wouldn’t be the problem, I’m pretty sure between Plumsweet and myself we could manage that. Making them at a price point that folks would be willing to pay… that’s a different story entirely. For those who don’t have Carvel as an option, my best advice would be Five Guys for milkshakes.
Dan: Do you have any interest in early New England history? Was Horsey founded by pony Quakers? Did their Puritan neighbors cause trouble?
Snowcatcher’s the history buff. Equestria doesn’t really have much in the way of religions. Ponies would worship Princess Celestia, but she’s opposed to that for many, many reasons. The last time ponies tried to devote a church in her name she burned it to the ground using the sun. Ironically, I think that just made them worship her more. Suffice it to say, when you’re competing against a mare who literally raises the sun every day, and she doesn’t want to be worshipped, it’s tough to find traction for a religion.
penguincascadia: Because of your interest in the history of food and food production, you might be interested in this article and book on how American military research changed food manufacturing in America.
Thank you for the link! It makes sense - they say an army travels on its stomach.
Culvers is best. Though frozen custard is different from Ice Cream.
There are few games more overrated than GTA. I'm mostly salty about them repeatedly screwing over modders after promising they wouldn't, and I hate games that require a separate launcher program and log-in.
I'm extremely excited for Dwarf Fortress to finally get a commercial release.
Huh. I wonder why our ice cream is better than the version across the portal. Would've expected the opposite for most of our mass-market production, like maybe H-D or B&J was equivalent to the typical hoof-made small-batch product.
Sweetie Swirl sounds clinically depressed and might benefit from a psychiatrist.
"I like to joke that I’m a living cartoon character." Oh Sweetie you're a snark and since I only proofread and edited half your story yet I'm not sure what to ask you yet besides the standard question: Favorite colleague?
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One possibility: Modern mass production comes with better quality control techniques and artificial flavoring that largely does the job better then natural, non actual ingredient flavorings can.
Root beer floats, yay or neigh?
Alternately, since real sassafras was banned (and the "studies" involved used pretty suspect methodology), birch beer floats?
If you ever travel elsewhere in the country, there's a place in my town called SPIN! Pizzeria that makes their own gelato in house. Pizza's pretty good too.
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Thank you for the questions/comments - these have been answered/addressed in the blog.
On a side note, her first (of two) chapter will be posted sometime today. I'm just putting together the blog and then it'll be ready.
From another chronic outsider who acknowledges others as peers reluctantly at best, and feels disdain for many aspects of current education systems, would you like a long hug?
Seriously, even in college, I was disgusted by classes mandating Microsoft Office instead of OpenOffice and LibreOffice. And schools are still indoctrinating kids with locked-down ipads. Back in the day, you could just set the system clock back to keep the trial period from expiring, but by that time, I had to set up VM with Office so I could roll it back and keep using the trial. That probably won't work anymore, with the Microsoft pigs forcing people to register online accounts and tie everything to it.
If it were up to me, they'd all be given Raspberry Pis and taught to use them. Of course, the RP foundation has been having long-term shortages for quite a while now, with most of the ones produced snapped up by businesses who have become reliant on them.
Flashing a local linux environment to a Thin Client form factor might be a decent alternative. Though without the GPIO pins, wouldn't be quite as useful as project test bed.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/11/used-thin-client-pcs-are-an-unsexy-readily-available-raspberry-pi-alternative/
Microsoft is pushing harder than ever to indoctrinate kids and keep them ignorant, with the filthy UWP store black boxing programs, such that you can't even view the folder contents without invoking some admin super user tweaks.
Are you familiar with the movie The Founder? Ray Kroc was a real scummy crook, but his milkshake mixers did change the business landscape forever.
Maybe you could team up with Daisy Dreams and build a Raspberry Pi-controlled ice cream machine and build a business empire of your own?
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Thank you for the additional questions!
These have been answered in the blog.
This was very cool! Thank you!
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You're welcome!
Because of your interest in the history of food and food production, you might be interested in this article and book on how American military research changed food manufacturing in America: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/07/31/427854425/cheetos-canned-foods-deli-meat-how-the-u-s-army-shapes-our-diet
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Thank you for the link! It makes sense - they say an army travels on its stomach.
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You're welcome, and thanks for your stories on this site!
Recently recieved a new cookbook based on Youtuber Max Miller and his channel "Tasting History" where he does recipes from around the world as far back as Ancient Babylonia. Thought Miss Swirl might be interested.
Also, if it helps any at all I too kinda know the feeling of the chronic outsider, I went to 3 different elementary schools and then changed towns for MS and HS, mom didn't want me to go to the local college at the time so yeah, its not easy. I currently have a parttime job on aforementioned campus with coworkers 10 years my junior, live at home, and if the option to do a transfer to Equestria was really an option Id ask for application paperwork right this second. The big problem is that travel is so gosh darned expensive that even going to the sumner ponycon isnt likely especially since I didn't plan well in advance (a weakness of mine).
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Don't ever fall into the trap of mistaking Spam as a Hawaiian product. Plus, musubi slices are best marinated with sesame oil and some liquid smoke. Not sweet mirin marinades like teriyaki or tonkatsu sauce.
Also, Minnesota Hot Dish originated during the Great Depression and the War. The perfect use of rationed frozen veg and tater tots and condensed soup.
I guess the mares wouldn't like Spam, but I bet the pegasai would enjoy a Christmas Lutfisk Supper.
Also, canning/tinning food has been around since the late 18th century, but it wasn't always done very well. But don't tell any of the mares about the gruesome Franklin Expedition.
Fun fact, the HMS Erebus and HMS Terror both previously participated in the Battle of Baltimore, firing on Ft. McHenry. And the HMS Resolute of desk fame was dispatched on a search and rescue mission, only to get trapped in the ice the same as the others. But the provisions had been soldered a bit more carefully and the crew were able to survive.
(And thanks for this blog post. :))