Writeoff.me results: Georg wins the Silver Medal (Plus a sneak peek at the most recent section of Royal Exam) · 4:57am Aug 6th, 2015
Dear Family, Friends, and Concerned Litigants,
The top results of the Writeoff.me for the prompt Best Laid Plans are as follows:
Forever is a Long Time by Rolo
From Princess Twilight Sparkle, President of the Family Reunion by Georg
No Irony Stuff Involved by Skywriter
An Apathetic Apostate by Chris
You may expect Family Reunion to show up on FimFiction once I find somebody to make a picture of the Castle of Friendship on fire to use as cover art, and expand the story a tiny little bit. I would like to thank all of the people who help run the writeoff event, and in particular those who spend so much time writing helpful reviews and offering advice.
Yes, I’m going to pick on two of them, but in good fun. I love ‘em both. (not in that way)
First, Bad Horse, who offered a very professional breakdown of The Frozen Castle of Broken Dreams, which I only now realize I should have titled The Mare in the High Castle. 20/20 Hindsight. Bits and pieces of this will show up in Letters From a Little Princess Monster later, so be patient. Also, Monster does not like the Tantabus.
Secondly, there is a very clever (and should have been ranked higher) fic called The Note (Placed 25th) by TitaniumDragon that Bad Horse swore was mine, triggered by a comment I left from the last writeoff
Darnit, now I'm going to have to write a story about a Royal Guard who gives a letter from his mother to Princess Celestia asking to be excused from the upcoming invasion.
I was almost positive Note was written by Dubs Rewatcher, who had responded to my original comment, and finding out that TD wrote it just blew my mind. He did a much better job with the concept than I ever could have done with a pony royal guard. I’m tempted to try to top it, but I know when I’m beaten. (It’s all the bruising and blood)
TitaniumDragon has done an *amazing* job with the writeoff this time (both writing and reviewing), as opposed to his normal merely fantastic job in reading and reviewing stories. You may not be able to see (I hope you can’t) but I’m standing up here and applauding his good work. Bravo!
And a second standing ovation to the rest of the wonderful people who make their home at the site. Well, not literally. We let them use the bathroom and write on the walls, but they have to go back to their own houses to sleep, if they do.
See you all at the next writeoff!
Sneak Peek at the current writing point of The Traveling Tutor and the Royal Exam
(Please note that the actual timing of how many hours until the wedding may change. I'm shuffling events around a little, and I may need to slide the dates back and forth a little)
The two Royal Sisters paced each other, wingtip to wingtip as they soared through the night sky of Canterlot. Their only major companion among the stars was the Griffon airship, which sat placidly on the end of its tether to one side of the city, with the navigation lights and a few lit windows still showing the activity of its mostly pony crew. It would have been a diplomatic slight to have the Royal Guard shuttling crewmembers back and forth between the hospitalized diplomatic mission and their mobile base of operations, but a number of pegasus ‘volunteers’ from the city had been maintaining a steady back-and-forth transport service since the incident. The fact that most of the volunteers had short-trimmed manes and uniform colors was not remarked upon.
The sisters circled the massive airship once, waving at the watchpony who stood guard on the prow in the place of the missing griffons, before shifting their mutual flight in the direction of home, and a quick bath before their next activities. Celestia was exhausted from the busy day, but not so tired that she did not give her little sister a loving nuzzle up the neck once they had landed, regardless of any leftover smelly splatters.
“Oh, Luna. You can’t believe how much I appreciate having you back.”
“Certes I can, dear sister,” replied Luna with a cautious return nuzzle. “Else, thou wouldst have to deal with these troublesome issues all by thyself.”
Celestia giggled like a schoolfilly and nipped at Luna’s ear. “True, as always. Only two more days, and normality should return.”
“Normal is boring,” said Luna with a roll of her eyes. “You’re just looking forward to spoiling little Clover when she is born.”
“You betcha,” said Celestia with a grin that slowly faded. “Luna. You haven’t…”
“I hath been keeping to my regimen of hormonal regulators with great care, dear sister.” She pouted and cast a cautious glance skywards at where the zeppelin obscured the stars. “Besides, the times are not right for me to bring forth an heir to my powers, no matter how cute and adorable she would be. There are dark nights ahead of us, dark and filled with dangers.”
“True, but on occasion, I believe that our Twilight has stumbled upon a wisdom that has eluded us both. If we wait until the time is right, that time may never come, and our opportunity shall be missed.” Celestia frowned, but with a trace of a smile. “We shall just have to spoil her little ones rotten to compensate for our loss.”
“I call dibs on spoiling our new little niece with ice cream,” declared Luna. “I shall deed thee whatever flavors and types of chocolate you wish, other than ice cream, for I am certain that thy older niece shall wish the entire category of strawberries for her own domain of spoiling.”
“Agreed.” Celestia nodded as she opened the private side-door to the Royal Baths with her magic. “As long as we can share—”
Both alicorns came to an abrupt halt as they walked inside.
The reason was obvious. And pink.
Bubbles filled the Royal Bath cavern almost to the top, foaming up from the collection of bubbling pools below and floating through the air currents like foamy clouds. Somewhere high above, Discord floated in a giant pink bubble of his own, laughing as hard as Celestia had ever heard the god of chaos chortle before, including the time so long ago when he had created flamingos. Both the artificial volcano and the surrounding pools were almost obscured by bubbles, which were also decorating a long stream of bubble-wearing mares, headed for the exit in a long, giggling line. Bubble-manes seemed to be the fashion of the moment, as well as more than a few bubble-covered tails swished proudly behind as the giggling castle employees filed by their sovereign majesty, each bowing or nodding at Celestia and Luna as they walked by. As much as Celestia wanted to find out what was going on, she found it much more relaxing to simply stand by her sister and greet each departing attendee at the foal shower with a quiet “So glad you could make it” or “Thank you so much for your time.”
Shit, I did? Was that the Karl Pilkington video I linked?
I didn't even read The Note, honestly. It wasn't on any of my slates.
And congrats on the silver! I put you at 2nd on my ballot, and I think you very much were worthy of first place--but, as you could probably tell, I had a bit of an obsession with Start Recursion.
I loved your writeoff entry--I laughed so much! Can't wait to see the fimfic version. You probably ought to have linked this blog post to Traveling Tutor and the Royal Exam, though, instead of Little Princess Monster...if people are only following that particular story they're going to miss the teaser! On that note, the beginning of the teaser, with the guard/volunteers flying back and forth, was extremely confusing. I don't know if it's just because there's some context missing or what, but I couldn't make much sense of who was where or what they were doing. Hope that's helpful.
Loved your story, loved Note, loved Skywriter's third place story. The first place winner was a little on the nose.
I'll just leave this here.,
s2.quickmeme.com/img/76/76ccc07e84122935c6f12faab0aeca7a561bd53a43cf54bc79841c7fd25b5dc9.jpg
Oh. My. God. I just read your story!
That was awesome! 
So much chaos and
and Twilight proves her intelligence by having the next one at Shining Armor's. Oh and Spikes mother.
I wish this was an episode. That happens a lot when I read your stuff.
Wow. That Family Reunion story was hilarious