September update, plans, and sneak peek.

Okay, so what's going on September?

Work. Not gonna have time for pony stuff, at all. Work's gonna take priority, and it will be bleeding over into normal writing time.

Did get a little bit done, at least: one scene. This is, draft edits pending, the opening scene for my Brass Tack concept.

Scootaloo and The Blunder from Down Under
Scootaloo yawned as she crawled into bed, mind wandering to recent events. It had been a while since she’d written anything in her diary, and those drowsy minutes before sleep had a way of clearing her mind in preparation for a new entry.

Dear diary,

A lot’s happened since last time I wrote anything. Mom and dad came by, they said they had a new job in Shire Lanka. They wanted me to come with them. Obviously I didn’t want that. I tried to tell them I had a good reason to stay in Ponyville, but they didn’t believe me. I guess lying to them and pretending there was something interesting in the Everfree Forest didn’t help. Everypony in town came by to help make them see I should stay.

I hope they don’t hate me for that. That must have been embarrassing for them.

Anyway, Aunt Lofty and Aunt Holiday moved to Ponyville instead, and now I can stay with them fulltime. No more bugging the Cakes to make sure I don’t burn the house down (even though that was totally Sweetie Belle’s fault and it only happened one time.)

She paused at that thought, before clambering into bed. It had been a long time since she’d written anything in her diary, a week or two at least.

Rumble’s been missing school, too. Turns out he was taking pills to make his voice sound deeper. A lot of boys are taking it, Miss Cheerilee said, and it makes them all sound the same.

A pang of guilt jabbed into her chest.

I didn’t even notice. I just thought it was weird he sounded like a grownup all of a sudden. Not like we haven’t had weirder stuff in Ponyville.

He’s fine now, he’s just lost his voice for a while. He’s not supposed to come to school or leave the house, to let his throat rest. If he tries to talk or if he hears too much talking, his throat gets sore. It’s okay, though. I’ve been bringing him his homework after school, since I live closest to him. I mean, I used to, before I moved, but I’m the only pony in class he really knows and who can get to his house, so…

She shuddered. I really need to check the wind before I use that catapult again. I’m gonna hit a pigeon one of these days if I’m not careful.

She lay her head down on her pillow and wriggled under the covers.

Things have been changing really quickly. I hope my mom and dad are okay in Shire Lanka. I hope Rumble doesn’t feel too bad about his voice.

She tensed. It had been too long since she’d written in her diary. With a snort, she hopped out of bed and reached for the book in her nightstand to the right of her bed.

She paused.

The nightstand was on the left of her bed now.

More to the point, the book wasn’t in her nightstand in the first place. Of course it wasn’t, she reasoned: it hadn’t been in her nightstand in six months. It wasn’t supposed to be, either: it was supposed to be in the fancy lockbox her parents had gotten her for her ninth birthday.

She sighed. That lockbox was antique, and enchanted.

It was also broken, though she preferred not to think about how that had happened. It had been so long, anyway.

She stuck a hoof under her mattress.

The diary wasn’t there, either.

She remembered then, in her pre-sleep stupor: she’d put her diary in a secret compartment under her bed, one of the perks of living in a home originally built by Pegasus jewelers who needed a way to keep things safe from burglars.

Her heart sank when she realised.

Her old home had been built by Pegasus jewelers. Her old home had secret compartments for keeping diaries, embarrassing pictures, and the occasional burglar destroyer. The house she was in now was an Earth pony home, and Earth ponies tended to treat burglars with open arms and a steady aim.

Her mind raced.

Floorboards? Pillowcase? Behind one of the closets? Buried under stuffed animals? She drew a blank.

“Where did I leave my diary?”

---

So yeah, not a lot to go on. I did find a nice way to ponify Australia: Ostleria, after the term 'Ostler' or 'Hostler', which means 'horse groom.' So that's one big concern gone. All the other stuff? Pretty much on hold. I'm also going to try for a more literary look and feel for this one, I feel like I've done the cartoony, visual style enough to try and branch out. Here's hoping it works.

Yeah, tl;dr: I'm probably not gonna be able to start writing until October, the way things are looking now. Price of success, I suppose. For what it's worth: all the other things I wanted to get done are delayed now, too. I don't know if I'm going to make it a trilogy again, either. I feel like I'm running out of steam, but that might be work talking as well. We'll see.

Cracker out.