So Anyway, Come To Ciderfest! · 1:45am Nov 10th, 2023
Do you like ponies?
Do you like cider?
Do you like Milwaukee?
Than come to a con!
That's right, Ponyville Ciderfest is happening in Milwaukee soon! November 17-19, in fact.
Now, you might be asking yourself what's in it for you? Well, let me tell you.
Ponies, Merch, Community Guests, Music, Panels, Free Apple Cider, Charity Auction, Karaoke, Poetry Slam, G1, an Iron Author competition, Cosplay, your favorite writers, artists, actors, musicians, and even Admiral Biscuit!
There's gonna be an official con book with brand-new stories by authors you've heard of and maybe some that you haven't.
Plus, there's gonna be a bookstore, and I'll have books for sale! So many books! Some are brand-new, never-been-printed-before, and some contain stories you've never read before!
Am I gonna give you a teaser for some of my stuff you'll get to read if you go to the con (and if you at the very least flip through the sample copies at the bookstore)? You bet I am!
Am I gonna give you context for any of it? Not a chance, have fun! See how many characters you already know from other stuff! Tell me in person at the con and get a free Admiral Biscuit t-shirt (they're comfy and easy to wear)!
Watching jets nearly head-on was deceptive; they looked like they were a long ways away and hardly moving at all, and then all of a sudden they zoomed across the runway threshold and screeched down on the pavement. The bigger ones had buckets that came out from the engines, giant air anchors to slow them down. Some of the smaller ones did, too, while others just used the brakes on their landing gear.
This one had air anchors; she watched them fold out right after the wheels touched the runway. Some airplanes looked silly when they landed, with flaps and slats and spoilers stuck out of their wings, with the silvery anchors folded up behind their engines. Their helicopter might not be as fast as a business jet, but it could land wherever it wanted to.
The jet got clearance to the main building from the second taxiway, and she watched its anticollision lights turn off onto the taxiway before she lifted her own radio. “Pegasus FALX to Teeside, requesting low-level clearance direct to Saltburn-by-the-Sea with a departure from Great North Air Ambulance.”
A pond with an inoperative fountain is just a pond; an artificial pool could have its own aesthetics as well, although a “Fountain Out Of Order” sign doesn’t really help you appreciate them. Point is you’ve seen fountains and you’ve seen broken fountains, but you’ve never seen a fountain in the process of being repaired, as this one is.
Turns out fountain maintenance is its own draw; you’re not the only one watching as a brown-furred unicorn works on its mechanism.
Lavender Fritter also called an early night. She did go down once, and still has some mud caked on her belly and in her tail. She didn’t spend long enough in the pond.
“I’m beat.” She sticks out her tongue.
“Spend too much time lazing about in the summer?”
“I wish. No, Rosemary wasn’t pulling as hard as she usually does and I had to do extra work.”
Albatrosses were the best birds, they could fly forever. Even over the ocean, they could just soar and soar. All the other birds had to land sometimes to rest their wings.
She had to land sometimes to rest her wings. She’d graduated from being towed by Mom to free flight, and she was getting good at it, but didn’t have the endurance older ponies did.
One day she would; one day she’d fly with the weather patrols and ship patrols. One day she’d be big enough to fly over the ocean or all the way to Baltimare or maybe even Canterlot.
She hop-flew out the front door and looked around to see where other ponies were. She and Mom used to spend more time together, before Spindrift came.
The parking lot isn’t crowded. One day, it’ll be so uncrowded that you get a prime spot in the front. Today is not that day, and you park by a cart corral. Cinder hops out as soon as the car is stopped and examines the carts, hooking her hock over the handle on each and tugging it back and forth to check for wheel rolliness.
Three carts in, she finds one that meets her approval and pulls it out, then pushes the rest back in. Unlike some humans, Cinder Glow knows how to live in a society.
You’d seen ponies around before—there’s a nearby Taco Bell that they visit—but you’d never seen one driving a car.
Does she even have a driver’s license?
Instead, you ask: “So you don’t have a card, Cinnamon, or it doesn’t work in the machine?”
“I don’t have one. I’m so used to Harper driving through the car wash, I just forgot which one I should bring. Never paid that much attention to her putting the money in, just which buttons she pushed.”
She hopped and glided down to each landing, and then waited for Dusty to catch up. Some of the pegasi occasionally tried to glide all the way down, banking sharply around the landings—in some cases, planting their hooves on the wall and then jumping off again. Stormbreaker had the current descent record, which ended in ignominy when he got going too fast and crashed into a wall, tumbled most of the way down a flight of stairs, and fetched up on the next lower landing.
As the two of them pushed open the ground-floor doors, they could both hear the thump of hooves several floors up—another pony was coming down.
Dusty hesitated, the door half open. “Rocky?” he finally asked.
Paradise nodded. Dusty had been learning how to tell the ponies apart by their hoofsteps, which he used to think were all the same.
Hope to see y'all there!
Regarding the teasers above . . . I know I'm not always the best at posting the associated stories in a timely manner. All of these are already published and/or printed on paper and you can get them at Ciderfest!
I wonder how many people mistake Ciderfest as a hard cider festival? I guarantee it's happened before.
5754314
They do have a pub crawl, I've heard.
Its a real pity that just as Pegasi are managing to get round to visit, they only get to see bland Bus, having missed pretty much all the greats.
Rainbow Dash just wouldnt get over being beaten by the Earth equivalent of Celestia, unless she aknowleges it in a similar way.
Alicorns dont count.
They cheat.
Its fast, unique , full of luxury cake and makes the sun rise. Of course Concorde is the equivalent of Celestia.
I'll unfortunately not be able to attend, but I wish you the best!
Sadly still living with my parents
Living between Seattle and PDX, it's just too damn far away.
I work in a very in demand job (that doesn't pay nearly well as demand would have you believe it would) and don't have the time or spare cash to attend.
I will be there!
I'm most likely gonna attempt to attend the 2025 or 2026 one. I don't have my license or a job yet
5754318
There is a pub trot Thursday night at 7. Unfortunately it is sold out, they try to keep it to a reasonable number of people. As for cider there are plenty of chances to drink cider a a number of events. Charlie love makes sure there is plenty of non alcoholic cider available for free to attendees if nothing else.
5754310
Looking forward to the con this year. I have always loved your stories so will have to by a book there!
5754310
2 of them sound like sequels to fics you've written in the past.
I'll know most of my problems are solved when I can find myself considering going to a con as though it's a legitimate possibility. Today is (still) not that day.
Looking forward to the post-con blog post!
No
Ah, if only the trans-Atlantic airfare wasn't so dang spicy...
I can't attend conventions. I'm simply here because I saw Applejack on a motorcycle and thought it was going to be involving a story based on the artwork.
Can't wait for Ciderfest! It looks fun!
Karaoke? Okay, sold, I'll be there!
CIDERFEST WOOOO
I leave for the con
tomorrowtoday technically! :DAnd I can confirm the shirts are nice, assuming mine isn't some sort of outlier, at least.
5754321
Oh, sorry; I hope whatever you're busy with instead goes well!