Government Ponies, Just Doing Their Jobs · 3:03am Jun 22nd, 2013
Tales of the Canterlot Deportation Agency
Just to waylay some hypothetical fears, I'm not planning on turning my blog (and thus my followsphere) into an all signal-boost / no content situation. Please be assured that the next "Cadance of Cloudsdale" joint, entitled "The First Time You See Her", is in active production; just combing out a few snags in my attempts to distinguish Shining Armor's narrative style from Cadance's. That having been said, signal-boost time again.
Fans of my other major web project will probably realize that I am more than usually fond of stories involving government workers going about their extraordinary jobs with an even mixture of heroism, boredom and dedication to protocol. It's what attracts me to stories like Ghost of Heraclitus's Civil Service tales and Kwakerjack's quite excellent "Flash Fog". I was delighted, therefore, to see an author named Estee applying this lens to the old painfully melodramatic "Human World / Pony World Dichotomy" chestnut that has been aching for a good deconstructing for some time now. Estee's "Tales of the Canterlot Deportation Agency", depicting a jaded security force watching over the thin spots on Equestria's metaphysical borders for those pesky humans, may lack Ghost's inimitable turns of phrase and Kwakerjack's raw polish, but there's a really appealing narrative here that I think warrants watching. See if you agree!
Curse you and your nefarious finding-new-stories-for-me-to-read schemes!
Oooh. That was good. Thank you for pointing me at it.
But...I just got started working on my backlog again!
Okay, at the risk of looking stupid, I demand to know what is a turn of phrase?! Define these mysterious terms before you use them for months and months I say!
Thank you.
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It is defined in numerous other places.
Wiktionary has, in my opinion, the best concise definition: "(idiomatic) An expression which is worded in a distinctive way, especially one which is particularly memorable or artful." (note that this is distinct from an idiom or figure of speech, in that calling something a turn of phrase implies originality, while an idiom is pre-existing)
Excellent recommendation, that was a really interesting story.
...oh, so this is what the heck happened around here today...
(ETA this from a post elsewhere: possibly a good time to mention that I was introduced to the world of FIM fanfiction because a friend burnt a DVD for me of what was described as the choicest selections from the site. As you might guess, one of the very first things I therefore opened concerned a certain Princess and her hatred of a notorious beverage. I should have said that earlier, but insomnia.)
Well, first off: thank you. For the readers I just picked up, for the page views,
possibly for some of the ones who are going to come after me with torches and pitchforks (actually, that's my fault and I knew it might be coming when I wrote the thing),for comments and redirections and the lot of it. Thank you very much.And second: clearly this was the most I'm ever going to accomplish on this site. I should probably retire right now.
You do realize my first instinct upon seeing the title was to think that somehow the Canterlot Civil Service had developed a department strictly for fashion enforcement, i.e. Deportment.
"Halt right there, miscreant! Those shoes do not go with that hat, and your necklace is just dreadful! I'm afraid I'm going to have to take you down to the station spa and get you properly attired. Have you considered a nice off-yellow to go with your mane?"
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Ah, so that's it. Well, when I become king of the world someday the first thing I'm going to do is to change its name; turn of phrase suggests--to me, anyway--flipping something on its head. You know, inverting it. Taking a well known cliche and turning it inside out, that sort of thing. The phrase isn't very self-descriptive, harumph.
And oh, I know the definition's out there in the web haha, I'm just too lazy to go look it up. Quite shameful really. I should do something about that. Perhaps tomorrow.
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What, and disappoint your new followers?