//------------------------------// // Day One // Story: One Of Those Days // by AstroStar //------------------------------// One Of Those Days By: AstroStar Sugarcube Corner. Ponyville’s premier bakery and sweets shop. Inside, Pinkie Pie was finishing up her morning tasks in advance of opening the store for the day. Pinkie considered herself fortunate to work in a place like this. She always liked meeting new ponies, and there was no shortage new ponies to meet at Sugarcube Corner. Pinkie finished setting up the cake display in the store window. The only thing left for her to do was to unlock the front door and officially open the store for the day. As Pinkie opened the store, she couldn’t help but wonder what new ponies she’ll meet today. Moments after opening the store, her first customer walked in. She was an elderly earth pony, a little older than Granny Smith it seemed like. She wore a large sweater and thick, oversized glasses. “Welcome to Sugarcube Corner!” Pinkie smiled at the newcomer. “How may I help you?” “Goodness!” the elderly pony exclaimed. “Have I really found Sugarcube Corner? I’ve been looking everywhere for this place.” “Today’s your lucky day then, because you found it!” Pinkie grinned. “What can I do for you?” “I’d like to place an order for a formal suit for my husband,” the customer replied. Pinkie blinked. Did the customer just order a suit? “I’m sorry. What did you say?” The customer laid out a sheet of paper detailing the measurements for the suit she wanted. “Here are his measurements. Is it possible to get this done by Friday? I want to surprise him for his birthday party.” Pinkie chuckled politely. “I’m sorry ma’am, but we don’t make dresses at Sugarcube Corner.” The customer looked at Pinkie in shock. Her expression suddenly turned darker. “What do you mean you don’t make dresses here?” she yelled. “I was told that Sugarcube Corner was known for their dresses!” Pinkie was taken aback by the customer’s sudden angry tone, but she managed to reply calmly. “I don’t know who told you that, ma’am. If you need dresses, you need to go to Carousel Boutique.” “Now that’s odd. Why would you tell me to go to one of your competitors?” “We don’t compete with Carousel Boutique. They’re a fashion shop. We’re a bakery.” The customer looked around and finally noticed all the baked goods on display in the store. “Oh! I was wondering why there were a lot of cakes and cookies around.” “That’s what you would find in a bakery,” Pinkie noted. “At any rate, since you’re here. How about we try to find the right cake for your husband’s birthday party?” she smiled. The customer chuckled. “Oh heavens, no! I would never subject my husband into eating these bland pieces of cardboard you call a cake!” While on the outside Pinkie kept smiling innocently, inside her heart felt as if it shattered into a million pieces. “Have a nice day!” the customer waved politely as she exited the store. After she was gone, Pinkie sighed to herself. Today was going to be one of those days, wasn’t it? ~~~~~ The day continued rather routinely for Pinkie, despite that first customer of the day. Even so, Pinkie didn’t let that customer ruin her day. Today was Cupcake Day at Sugarcube Corner, which meant that the front display case was packed with different types of cupcakes. Pinkie was busy refilling an empty cupcake tray when a light blue unicorn mare with a purple mane entered the store. “Welcome to Sugarcube Corner! How may I help you?” “I have a question. What do you put in your cupcakes?” the customer asked. “That depends, which one would you like.” “I’m just looking for something without any lemons. I. Hate. Lemons.” “We can definitely take care of that.” Pinkie pulled out a special menu pamphlet for this circumstance. It lists all the different cupcakes offered at the store, as well as listing the ingredients in case ponies needed to know. She displayed the pamphlet to the customer. “This menu has a list of all the ingredients in each one of our cupcakes.” The customer took a look at the menu. After a short while, she put her hoof down and pointed at one particular cupcake. “I want this one,” she said definitively. Pinkie looked to see the customer had chosen the Sunshine Delight special. Unfortunately, the Sunshine Delight was the store’s special lemon-based variety. Pinkie looked to see that the ingredients lists for the Sunshine Delight clearly included lemons on the pamphlet the customer was looking at. “Are you sure about that? The Sunshine Delight has a lot of lemons in it.” Pinkie pointed out. “I said I want this one!” the customer insisted. “But I thought you said you didn’t want anything with lemons in it.” “I know what I said. Just give me this cupcake already!” Pinkie looked around nervously. “We do have other cupcakes that don’t have lemons in them. I can suggest a couple of them if you want.” The customer frowned. “I said I want this one! Give it to me or else I sue this establishment for refusal of service!” Pinkie yelped and went to fetch the cupcake for the customer. “All right ma’am. Here’s your cupcake.” she said, handing the lemon cupcake to the customer. “That’ll be 3 bits.” The customer paid for the cupcake and left the store in a huff. Pinkie was left confused as she carried the lemon cupcake out of the store. “What the hay was up with her?” Pinkie wondered. ~~~~~ “Hello, and welcome to Sugarcube Corner! How may I help you?” Pinkie greeted her new customer, a silver colored Pegasus stallion with a windswept black mane. “Where are the bread donuts?” he asked. Pinkie blinked in confusion. She was familiar with all of Sugarcube Corner’s offerings, but she never had to deal with anything called ‘bread donuts’ before “I’m sorry sir,” Pinkie apologized. “I don’t think I understood what you said. Did you say bread donuts?” The customer nodded. “Yes. Bread donuts! Where are they?” Pinkie scratched her head. What the hay was this guy talking about? “Sir? The only donuts we have here are made from yeast.” “No, no, NO!” he shouted. “Bread donuts! Do you even know what you bake in your own freaking store! BREAD DONUTS!” “I’m sorry, but I’m not familiar with any bread donuts.” The customer stormed off grumbling to himself and made it about ten feet. He scrutinized the store’s breakfast display case. After a short while, he found what he was looking for. “What are you, blind? Look! Here they are!” he shouted. Pinkie went over to see what the customer was pointing to. It was indeed a ring shaped bread product. Pinkie groaned. “Sir, they’re not called ‘bread donuts’. Those are bagels.” A sudden sense or realization came over the customer. He facehoofed and chuckled innocently. “Ooooh! So that’s what bagels are! I thought bagels were shaped like a crescent moon.” “I think you’re talking about a croissant,” Pinkie pointed out. “Geez, when did baking bread get so fancy?” the customer wondered. “The world may never know,” Pinkie snarked. ~~~~~ “Welcome to Sugarcube Corner! How may I help you?” Pinkie greeted her next customer, a younger blue unicorn mare with an orange colored mane. “I’d like some cookies please,” the customer asked. Pinkie smiled. “No problem! Just let me know what kind you want and I’ll take care of it.” She gave the customer the store’s cookie menu pamphlet. The customer looked at the menu in awe. “Oh wow! That’s a lot of cookies,” she remarked. “We have a lot of specialty cookies that you can only find here.” Pinkie explained. “I’ll be glad to let you know what’s in each one.” “Thanks a lot. Some of these cookies look very complicated. Like this one!” The customer pointed at one of the cookies on the menu. “What’s a peanut butter cookie? Pinkie paused for a few moments in disbelief. The concept seemed simple enough to her. At any rate, she answered the customer’s question. “…..It’s a cookie with peanut butter in it.” Pinkie stated matter-of-factly. The customer nodded slowly. “Ok then. What about the chocolate chip cookie? What’s that?” “……..It’s a cookie with chocolate chips in it.” “What’s the difference between the two?” Pinkie felt like screaming in exasperation over the simple question. She managed to calm herself down to answer the question. “A chocolate chip cookie has chocolate chips and no peanut butter, and a peanut butter cookie has peanut butter and no chocolate.” “That’s too confusing!” the customer groaned. Pinkie’s face twisted in bewilderment for a few seconds. Again, she straightened herself out, this time to offer a suggestion. “Here’s an idea. How about I give you one of each.” With that, Pinkie took out one peanut butter cookie and one chocolate chip cookie and laid it on the counter. The customer leaned in closer to scrutinize each cookie. “So how do I know which one doesn’t have raisins?” the customer asked. This time, Pinkie let out a very audible groan. She spent the next 30 minutes explaining to the customer the difference between peanut butter cookies, chocolate chip cookies, and raisin cookies. When it was all said and done, the customer wound up buying a blueberry muffin. ~~~~~ “Welcome to Sugarcube Corner! How may I help you?” Pinkie greeted her next customer, a red Pegasus mare with a silver mane. With all the crazy customers she’s gotten today, it was a miracle she kept up her usual bubbly tone. But even that was beginning to waver a bit. Nevertheless, she kept a positive attitude as she dealt with this customer. “Hey, do you sell any bananas?” the customer asked. “Well, we do have bananas,” Pinkie answered. “However, we need them to make our cakes, muffins, smoothies and stuff”. The customer smiled. “Great! How much for one? I’m in a hurry!” Pinkie smiled nervously. “Sorry, but we can’t sell them to you. We need them. There is a farmer’s market close by. If you go there, they can sell you bananas.” The customer went quiet for a moment, seemingly deep in thought. “Okay… then how much for a banana smoothie?” “It’s 5 bits for a medium, and 6 bits for a large.” “Okay… can I get a banana smoothie, but can you not ‘smoothie’ it?” Pinkie fell to the ground in astonishment. She wound up spending the next five minutes explaining the concept of a smoothie to the customer. ~~~~~ “Welcome to Sugarcube Corner! How may I help you?” Pinkie greeted her next customer, a yellow earth stallion with a striped white and blue mane. “Can I have a slice of fruit pie?” the customer asked. “Yes you can!” Pinkie nodded. “You can have it either hot or cold.” “Cold?” the customer asked. “Like, how cold?” Pinkie took a long deep breath to calm herself down before answering. “Refrigerated. Not quite frozen, just cold.” “Ah, okay. I’ll grab one of those thanks.” “Sure, that’ll be 5 bits.” The customer handed Pinkie the money, and in return the customer took his slice of pie. “Wow! This is really cold!” “Sorry. Like I said, the cold pies are put in the refrigerator. The hot pies are put in the oven.” The customer chuckled. “When you said ‘cold’ I thought you meant, like, ‘sort of warm.'” “Well, we all make mistakes like that,” Pinkie chuckled. She was relieved that this customer wasn’t as bad as the others this day. The customer started to make his way out of the door. “Yeah. I mean it’s not your fault you mixed it up. You mares have absolutely no sense when it comes to cooking,” he grinned. Pinkie stopped chuckling as stood stiff as a statue while the customer exited the store. She felt the urge to say something, ANYTHING to tell that jerk of a stallion off. But by the time she gathered the nerve, he was long gone. Left alone, she sighed in exhaustion. These customers were getting on her last nerves, and it just kept getting worse! She was a pony who loved meeting new faces. But now, she didn’t really want to meet anypony else today. She just wanted to close the store, go back to bed, and forget today ever happened. However, Mr. and Mrs. Cake depended on her to keep the store going strong. Even if it meant dealing with the kind of stuff she’s dealt with today. Pinkie continued sulking as the store’s front door jingled open. This time it was a familiar face who entered Sugarcube Corner. It was Ponyville’s premiere Apple farmer and Pinkie’s dear friend, Applejack. The farmer was carrying two bushels of apples on her back. “Howdy Pinkie! Here’s this week Apple delivery for y’all!” Applejack smiled, putting the bushels down on the counter. “That’s great. Thanks AJ.” Pinkie sighed sadly. Applejack was quick to notice Pinkie was not her usual Pinkie self at the moment. “Somethin’ the matter, sugarcube?” “I’ve been having a bad day today. It’s kinda getting me down.” Pinkie told her. “Sorry to hear that. How weird was today?” “It was super weird!” Pinkie explained. “There was this pony who didn’t know the difference between peanut butter, chocolate chips, and raisins. There was another customer who ordered a banana smoothie WITHOUT the smoothie. There was this lady who thought this was Carousel Boutique! And then this other lady who ordered a lemon cupcake even though she doesn’t like lemons!” Applejack cringed at the explanation. “Yikes! Sounds like today was a whopper!” Pinkie nodded. “And then there was this stallion who said mares can’t cook.” Applejack’s expression darkened. “He said what now?” “Don’t worry about him, AJ. He’s not worth it.” Pinkie said, calming the farmpony down from causing that jerk physical harm, even if part of her felt he somewhat deserved it. “It’s just that, that guy was the last straw on a really bad day.” AJ gave Pinkie a gentle hug. “Trust me, sugarcube. Ah’ve been there. Ah know that feeling.” “Thanks AJ,” Pinkie smiled. Before Applejack could say anything else, the store’s front door slammed opened. The two ponies looked to see a very angry light blue unicorn mare huffing into the store. Pinkie gulped as she recognized this pony as the lemon cupcake lady from earlier. “I want my money back!” the customer screamed. “Hold on ma’am! What’s the problem?” Pinkie asked. “I’ll tell you what the problem is. I ordered a cupcake and I specifically said no lemons in it. Guess what? It had lemons!!!” “If I remember correctly," Pinkie tried to explain, "I tried to tell you that cupcake you ordered had lemons but you threatened the store to give you one.” “You think that’s my problem?!?” the customer scoffed. “Look. Here’s my receipt. Give me my refund!” Pinkie sighed. “Ok, look. I’ll tell you what I’ll do. Just give me the cupcake back, and I’ll give you the refund.” “I already ate it,” the customer said matter-of-factly. Both Pinkie and Applejack blinked in disbelief. “You ate it?” Applejack asked, trying to confirm she wasn’t hearing things. The customer nodded. “Yes. I ate it and I wasn’t satisfied. I want a refund.” Pinkie sighed. “I’m sorry ma’am. But I can’t refund your money if you already ate the cupcake…” Any other words Pinkie tried to say were cut off as the customer got in Pinkie’s now frightened face. “Listen, you worthless excuse of a dirt pony” the customer yelled. “Don’t get smart with me! I’m a lawyer and I know my rights! And if you don’t give me my money back, I’m not only going to sue this establishment for refusal of service, but I'll sue the living daylights out of YOU and your pathetic existence for discrimination!!!” Pinkie was now on the verge of tears. She began to reach for the cash register when Applejack separated them. “Hold up a second, partner! Lemme see that receipt there.” Applejack said. The customer frowned and handed the receipt over. Applejack took a few seconds to look the small piece of paper over. “Ma’am, the store’s return policy is clearly printed on yer receipt. They cannot take back goods that has already been used, or in this case, eaten.” “But–” the customer tried to cut in. “FURTHERMORE,” Applejack continued. “When you made yer transaction here, you accepted the store’s return policy as a contract that you agreed to abide by.” “I–” “And by BLATANTLY trying to dodge this contract, nopony's ever gonna rule in yer favor. As a lawyer, shouldn't you have known that?” “But I–” “FINALLY, the simple act of coming up to a store and threatening them to unjustly hand you money would really be closer to an attempted robbery by you than refusal of service by her!” The customer fell silent. Her anger was now replaced with fear. Applejack slowly walked towards the customer, backing her into a corner. “If you really were a lawyer,” Applejack continued in a low tone. “You would be fully aware of all that. And by claiming to be a lawyer when you are clearly NOT, yer committing fraud. Between that and the attempted robbery, we can call the police right now and have you arrested for both.” “I’m… I’m sorry! I won't do anything. I promise!” the customer squeaked out. Applejack gave the customer a deep, threatening glare. The customer cowered and braced herself, fearing for her life. Then suddenly, Applejack backed off and smiled a friendly smile. “Glad to see we got everything straightened out!” the cowpony grinned. The customer, now white as a ghost, scrambled back to her hooves and ran out the store. “Y’all come back now, ya hear!” Applejack called out to the fleeing customer. “That felt good!” she sighed to herself. Seconds later, Pinkie ran over to Applejack and gave her a huge hug. “AJ, that was amazing!” Pinkie beamed. “How did you do that?” “Ah’ve dealt with idiots like that all the time at the Farmer’s Market.” Applejack admitted. “Man, I could have used a little of that earlier today. I thought I was gonna go out of my mind!” “Listen, sugarcube. Ah know there are some customers out there that make you wanna pull yer hair out. But sometimes they mean well and are genuinely confused. But othertimes, you get idiots like that lemon lady, or that stallion chauvinist.” “Tell me about it.” “Despite that, most of the ponies you deal with everyday weren’t like that at all, are they?” Pinkie chuckled. “No, they aren’t.” “Well, there ya go! Ya can’t let a few ponies ruin your day like that, Pinkie.” “I know, AJ. Today’s just been one of those days, you know?” “Ah know, sugarcube. It happens to the best of us.” At that moment, the store’s front door jingled open. The two turned to see a very freaked-out Apple Bloom enter the store. “Applejack!” Apple Bloom shouted in alarm. “Ya haveta get back to the farm right now! Rainbow Dash broke into the cider storage barn again!” Applejack’s face fell in horror. “Ah thought we changed those locks!” “We did! But she still broke in anyway!” “Ah’m sorry, Pinkie. But Ah gotta go!” Pinkie didn’t even have time to wave goodbye as Applejack and Apple Bloom rushed back to Sweet Apple Acres to save their cider supply. Pinkie couldn’t help but chuckle. Today’s just been one of those days.