noise."Pumpkin Spice Season is upon us! · 1:44am Sep 25th, 2018
(Cue downvotes from everyone who hates pumpkin spice)
(Although she’s darned cute)
Mostly I’m just running out of blog titles. Feels weird to re-use them.
Anyhow!
First things first, hehelover translated “I Don’t Like Cats” to Chinese! Here’s the link for anyone who happens to read Chinese. I know I sure don’t.
Second, I’m on the cusp of publishing a new four-part series on horse-powered farming. I did a lot of research, including a tour at a friend’s farm where they had lots of horse-drawn equipment. There’s sort of a long story behind that, which I might get into after the last blog post (did I say four part? Well, it might wind up being five, just so we can have a conclusion).
Odds are that I’ll space them out a week apart, but I might publish quicker. The whole series is written as of now, but not entirely edited, nor are pictures added. [Fun fact that y’all might not know, it actually sometimes takes quite a while to track down all the right pictures for a blog post.]
As it happens, purely by coincidence, he just put up a video of one of those pieces of farm equipment in action: a corn binder, which (according to his description) is over 100 years old. It’s also totally the kind of equipment ponies might use to harvest their corn (the binder, not the crawler tractor).
Thirdly!
My cheese may have got moved again.
One of the guys at work--at the other shop--quit today. Which means that the second guy we had at our shop (not the manager who knows everything; rather a mechanic who I like)--has to go back to the other shop.
We’ve been behind and of course this won’t improve matters. I guess from an overtime standpoint it will; my paychecks will get bigger, but the amount of time I have for writing ponywords might go down.
Then again, this particular guy has quit before, so maybe it won’t last.
Also, I got a new keyboard today. It’s not to replace my DasKeyboard; rather, it’s a second one for when I don’t want to be bound by the USB cable my Das has. It’s wireless and mechanical and that’s all I know about it so far.
I’m also getting red keycaps because I have a bad habit of missing the home row with my right hand wkock tirms tjo,s omtp gonnorsk, and that should help me see where my hands are. Odds are I’ll just grab a couple handfuls and stuff them in the right place, not caring if it repeats letters that are already on the keyboard.
Fifthly, something that FTL brought up in the comments on TTWU 2:
Wow! Who says SoL is boring and fails to seize the attention of readers? Yet again you have a massive discussion occurring centred around a story of some ponies having an issue buying some real estate and building some homes.
I once said that part of the reason I chose to write on this site was because of the interesting discussions in the comments. In this story, as in many others, I’ve done further research for comments, and learned stuff from my readers. Plus, reading through the comments there are plenty of plot hooks for other stories, involving things like pony Superfund site cleanup crew or civil lawsuits between ponies and the real estate office, or the EPA getting involved. Not to mention ponies having to comply with laws about parking spaces or staircases, or finding ways to get exceptions to the rules.
I guess what I’m saying is that y’all can find inspiration anywhere, and even a kind of silly story can prompt all sorts of serious discussion. 
The Spice Must Flow.
You put a picture of Applejack getting annoyed at her keyboard and right then you say "I got a new key board". I made a link.
Anyway, I always end up at least reading your fic's comment. Interesting stuff heppen there.
Even when I am not interested in the story or, like in this case, when I was not able to fully enjoy it since I knew all along what was going to happen.
Use a Logitech Unifying Receiver-compatible keyboard. Accept no others.
Pumpkin Spice flavoring is gross. A Pumpkin Spice Pony, I reserve all judgement.
It makes me sad that there aren't communities like this for most fandoms.
Though actually I've been having surprising luck with comments lately on AO3 with my Zelda fics. Even one person left me a comment that gave me an idea that completely changed the ending of the story he left it on.
Feedback is nice. Mostly. Sometimes it's dumb. But I still would rather have it than silence. That is the worst thing about my current focus on original writing. No feedback.
I think a lot of pony authors have no idea how spoiled they are by the brony community and this site in particular.
Couldve been worse, you couldve got an infestations of Pssthpok.
That cornbinder was strangely hypnotic to watch, and an impressive feat of gear work. Though I was just as fascinated with the crawler itself. That machine had the look of something fit to work for decades.
Apple pie spice > pumpkin pie spice
Heh, can't wait to see a what you have to say about gang plows.
That ol' binder has seen better days, but it's still ticking along. And that Ollie... I remember crank starters, and hope I never have to use another. My Ford is bad enough when I have to break out the handle.
What if those games are about sharks? If a game goes unplayed long enough, does it become about sharks?
See I only have that problem with my phone and while playing games. I touch type normally on both but my thumbs sometimes fat and hit other keys- my google search history is full of word.wprd word.woed. And I miss WASD a lot so I'll be slapping the wrong keys trying to do something and have to look down.
4943338
I get a lot better feedback now on Tales and a lot of thoughtful feedback on Path than I ever did when I wrote Fallout Equestria stuff.
i'm not a fan of PSL (or coffee for that matter). But she's cute so no downvote.
i'm looking forward to it.
You know what? She is cute. I needed that adorableness for today. Thanks, Mr. Biscuit!
4943415
Jaws on NES is pretty old. And I think you can say not many people played it. James Rolfe had some unflattering things to say about it, and you have to cringe that you spend more time killing harmless rays than sharks.
https://www.wcs.org/our-work/species/skates-and-rays
4943415
You either die a hero, or live to see your game be about sharks.
If you stare too long into the shark, the shark stares back into you.
Sharkwin's law: As a game franchise goes on, the probability that a sequel will include sharks approaches 100%.
i.imgur.com/DDSAGzb.gif
media.giphy.com/media/ap6wcjRyi8HoA/giphy.gif
4943377
I had the fortune of running a gang plow behind a 60-90 twin city prairie tractor. Quite the experince! Also saw the new 150 horse case traction engine pulling a 24 bottom gang.
4943704
I've seen them in action. Traction engines, horse teams, mule teams, gang engines (two or more tractions coupled), I've seen them plowing with gang plows. The biggest I've helped man was a fourty bottom pulled by a pair of Case 60 crawlers. That was something to see.
That, and ten horse combines. Mechanical marvels.
4943745
Its crazy to think about how they got things done back in the day, even more insane to experince in person much less actually help out. Id like to see a big mule team in axtion one day, just see what they can really do.
4943332
Indeed it must.
lh3.googleusercontent.com/-gtXMdNa-gBk/VByAEDJ8u8I/AAAAAAABAvI/d-aW-Es7x-8/w530-h459-n/IMG_0955.JPG
4943334
For better or worse, my old keyboard didn’t get smashed by a horse or a pony.
I like for my comment sections to be fun and interesting.
4944238
Bite the fire out of you for starters, then kick you back to the moldboards. That was my experience. But, he did have the harness twisted up between him and the next on the team.
4943337
I’m not sure what kind I got. If it works out okay, I might spend more money on one with better keys. I played with this one a bit and it’s kind of mushy, IMHO. Compared to my DAS, anyway.
I’ve never tasted any of the modern pumpkin spice flavored stuff, so I don’t know how gross it is. Nor, for that matter, have I ever licked a pumpkin spice pony.
4943338
Agreed.
I know that if/when I go to real writing, that’s something that I’ll really, really miss.
4943339
I’m not sure if that’s worse than an influx of idiot customers or not . . . I suppose if nothing else, I can still go home at the end of the day and read or write ponyfic.
4943415
Presumably, they get more sharks in them.
Yes.
4944251
So far, all the pumkin spice stuff I've tasted were too sugary.
I don't mind the flavor, really, but a part of me is wary at this point.
4943423
You’re lucky. I’m a bad enough typist when my fingers are on the correct keys . . . it doesn’t get better when they aren’t.
4943445
Really, practically everything is better with a pony.
4943485
You’re welcome!
Have another adorable pumpkin spice pony. You know, just in case you need it.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2016/11/2/1286750__safe_artist-colon-fluffymaiden_oc_oc+only_oc-colon-pumpkin+spice_cute_hat_jewelry_long+mane_looking+at+you_necklace_open+mouth_simple+backgrou.png
4943531
I’ve watched (on YouTube) Grand Poo Bear do speed runthroughs of it. He can beat the game in less than 8 minutes.
4943541
When you really think about it, that’s what happened with disaster movies.
4943695
...dat opening gif.
4944263
Hnnnnnnggggggghhhhhhh!!!
Dude! This is, like, one of those perks of following people like you!
4943366
That’s what’s always impressed me with old machinery. Lots and lots of gears and shafts, all working in unison.
Yeah, and it’s actually in pretty good shape. I dragged ROBCakeran into that barn just to look at the crawler tractor, since I figured he’d love it (and he did). I think they still use it a fair bit at the farm for all the tasks that you need a crawler tractor for--mostly dragging trees and rocks and stuff.
4943371
To you, maybe. I hate apple pie.
4943377
Surprisingly little, actually; IMHO the ponies are small enough anything larger than a two-bottom is going to be too much for a single team of them. At least, realistically. Given Earth Pony StrengthTM, it could be possible, though. Or places with bigger farms. Or ponies who are smart enough to hire oxen to pull the plows for them.
Last time I saw it (a couple of weeks ago), they were missing some of the parts for the discharge chute. Dunno if they found them or just rigged something up. Anyway, yeah, it’s seen better days, but since it’s over 100 years old, I think it’s doing just fine.
I’ve never been blessed enough to have to crank start anything, and I don’t feel like I’m really missing out.
On the other end of the spectrum, I was watching a video where they were starting a big steam engine, and the starter was a small three-cylinder steam engine with an output gear that could be rested on the geared flywheel of the big engine. That’s the way to do it; use the little engine to start the big one.
4944270
4944255
Look up Larry Niven, Tales from Known Space, and youll see what trick Im using for my character for capabilities and respective curse, and why I came up with him years ago, things keep occuring in episodes that put me off ever writing about it.
If you want to know how runes work, look up microwave strip line and slot antenna. Except those last are for when you really want to go OP, especially when coupled with low temperature plasma antenna.
just how did unicorns manage to come up with the basic light spell without causing the whole of Equestrian spacetime to undergo vaccuum state collapse. Again?
4944277
Let's go in order...
Well, moldboards are typically sized with the horse - or pony - in mind. A larger creature could pull a plow with a larger moldboard, or multiple small moldboards. And a five bottom gang plow can be pulled by four Morgan horses of 14 hands height. If you calculate that per pony one moldboard scaled for a pony can be pulled for (roughly) twice the distance between stops with a six pony team, then twelve times the work has been accomplished within a given time. An Ox can easily pull a two or three bottom plow, at roughly the same speed as a pony. Given two moldboards per Oxen of a team of identical size, twenty-four times the work of a single pony can be accomplished. Now, a pony as we know it can only plow a half acre per day (twelve hours). A team of six can plow six acres and a team of Oxen can plow twelve. Given that the average farm was approximately eighty acres when horse power was in its prime, with half being cultivated fields per year. If these same figures apply to Equestrian ponies, then any farmer with sufficient acreage would find it prudent to either employ sufficient farmers, or outsource labor.
Any machine of that age has very simple parts, and many of of them can be found on newer machines or simply be made to work without them. It's the beauty of ancient machines.
You Lucky son of a biscuit...
That, my friend, is called a "pony-motor"... the irony is sweet.
4944280
I’d assume that it’s coded into Equestrian spacetime in such a way to keep things stable. Or else, pony history repeatedly restarts with “in the beginning, Celestia created light.”
Also, since I might as well start my own comment... Im really looking forwards to hearing what you think of horse power, in the old sense anyways. i may or may not (baring how ambitious I am) be collecting thoughts for a story that involves farming and all the intricacies of it. Always a treat to read your blogs, very educational and inspiring.
4944324
The short answer is in a world like ours, we’d all be hungry if we were using horse-powered farming. I do like the romanticism of it, and of course in the MLP-verse, it makes sense that authors ought to be familiar with it.
I honestly don’t know if there are many (or any) stories that cover it in depth.
4944294
I think that there’s probably a lower limit for a mouldboard size, since the properties of dirt and the depth to which you have to plow in order to successfully plant don’t change appreciably (well, we don’t know that; pony weeds might have shallower roots than IRL weeds). I’m not aware of anyone successfully plowing a field with dogs, for example; I don’t know if it’s been tried with actual ponies or miniature horses. I do agree that more ponies would make the work go quicker, though, and that two pulling on a plow would almost certainly get more than twice the work done. We’ve never seen that in canon, as far as I know, but it makes sense.
I seem to recall hearing somewhere that a horse or two with a skilled farmhand could do an acre a day--that’s something I should actually put some more research work into.
I’m honestly not sure how much acerage the average Equestrian farmer has. I’d expect them to have higher than typical crop yields, because of Earth Pony Magic; on the other hand, the farms we see in canon are pretty small (then again, I have no trouble departing from canon in this regard). I’d have to look up the numbers again, but I got a rough estimate of how much pasture grass a pony might need to eat in a day, and from there I could extrapolate how much land they’d need to devote to the basic dietary needs of each pony, which I think would give a reasonably good baseline for ponies.
In my upcoming blog posts, I’m more concerned with the tech and types of equipment used than how big the farms are, but that’s actually a good topic to cover as well. I’d imagine that most people haven’t got a very good idea of that kind of thing.
I’m guessing that a lot of them can also be made by a reasonably talented person without terribly much difficulty; from what I’ve seen, most of that old farm equipment isn’t using super-precise gears...
I love it when things work out like that.
4944356
There is a lower limit for plow size, but I'm not sure what it is. The smallest one I've seen had a board measuring nine inches, could reach a depth of four inches, and was pulled by a Shetland with a little girl - about twelve or thirteen, if I remember correctly - on the reins. She knew what she was doing. But field work with a pony is mostly for teaching youngsters and novelty. I based my figures on what she could do.
I know the old rule of thumb was two acres per horse, and a mare will graze three acres clean if she's with foal. But I'm no equine nutritionist.
As for types of equipment, that's a mighty long list: sickle mowers, teder rakes, bale presses, planters, plows, cultivators, wagons of every size, theshers, combines, sugar cane mills, and probably a hundred other doodads are on that list. And a blacksmith worth their salts can make new parts for just about all of it.
My, ain't you a cheeky one? I like it! Ha!
And that's just the way of it, I suppose.
lh4.googleusercontent.com/-NCMbI1xqCpI/VgAdbNiVq7I/AAAAAAAA8zY/yRxpe1TmsVsTbJ3ea-EBHZ860vS8UdnhgCL0B/w1200-h627-no/Pumpkin%2BSpice%2BOil%2BChange-FB.jpg
4944426
It’s also possible that pony plants are appropriately-sized, with their corn being shorter and needing shallower furrows, etc. I kinda decided that the only sane way to approach this was to basically just say how farmers did it back in the day, toss in some speculation about how the ponies might, and leave it at that. Other authors are of course more than welcome to base their decisions on their own headcanon.
IIRC, a horse ought to eat 1-2% of its body weight in pasture grasses every day and from there it’s probably possible to calculate how much acreage each pony would need for their basic diet.
Oh, yeah, totally. As I’m sure you’re well aware, there are entire books devoted to just farm implements. No way I could possibly discuss them all in any reasonable length of time.
4944729
We ought to offer that. I wonder what pumpkin spice does to an engine? Can’t be anything good.