Last week was the “serious” side of looking back at 2023 for Ghost Mike’s Ponyfic Review Monday MusingsTM in review, focusing largely on quantifiable stats calculated in the Archive Spreadsheet. Now it’s time for the fun, goofy side of that – quirky takeaways that don’t mean much except being something to chuckle at.
Hope none of you are feeling the post-Thanksgiving blues too hard. Me, well, it’s an odd holiday to observe from outside America. I’m well aware and tuned in to its commercial reach and importance (when you work in mobile app development you can’t avoid the importance of holiday season targets, plus you kind of notice any American-based companies you’re in collaboration with largely vanishing for a week), but the actual familial reunions and bonding? Doesn’t tend to penetrate my mind too much.
Eventually I’ll have to contend with these yearly anniversaries getting a day further off each time (or two, Leap Year and all), as I started on March 7th. Price to pay for committing to a fixed day in the title, eh? But that day isn’t yet (likely next year, where I’ll have it three days after rather than four before, to be closer). Right now, it’s here. Folks, Ghost Mike’s Ponyfic Review Monday MusingsTM has been going on two years now. 
Discord: "Oh, forgive me, all you Pony fanfiction lovers out there. It’s just my chaos magic is also quite sensitive to interdimensional stress, and I can practically hear the flop sweat as Ghost Mike strains to pick a screenshot or gif for these every week.
Fluttershy: "Oh my… See, this is why we don't like to invite Applejack over for cards night. She makes Rainbow Dash's poker face look believable. And that's saying something. That's why we suggested she pitch in with Ghost Mike's Ponyfic reviews this week. Blunt honesty there is the name of the game."
Octavia: "It took the show one hundred episodes to ‘Jump the Shark’, as it were. We’re not in danger of the same only ten blogs in, are we?"
So, after having paused two episodes before the end months ago, I finally finished my glacial rewatch of Season 5 with The Cutie Re-Mark. And that’ll probably be it. I can admit Seasons 6/7 are just weaker continuations, not the dropping off a cliff of the following two, and something that’s still (mostly) watchable. I still don’t intend to do so with an eye towards reforming definitive takes on the episodes the way I have till now. If anything, I need to redo it for Seasons 1-3 more, my
In lieu of much else to note this week*, I will content myself with the observation that I’m coming up on my 5th anniversary of my induction to MLP, which occurred with the G4 film on October 31st. Not the same as my fandom introduction, which didn’t come until January of the following year, after I’d binged the series, but it’s something.
I don’t really talk about my personal life here, except in the abstract, and that’ll be the same today. But an intro that didn’t mention the below would feel really fake to me right now, like I was trying to tell myself it didn’t matter.
As some of you know, ever since Friendship Is Magic ended, I’ve been gradually rewatching the show. From Season 4 onwards, I’ve more or less kept pace just ahead of Loganberry’s My Little Repeats watch-along. And let me tell you, rewatching Seasons 4-6* at this slow of a pace has proven quite the contrast to how I initially binged the show’s then-seven seasons in 53 days following the release of the movie.
Ghost Mike’s Ponyfic Review Monday Musings #50, you say? How about that. This would make for a good anniversary, but no, we’ll save that for #52 in a fortnight’s time. Don’t want to get too ahead of myself here! I will say that this week will be the last ‘normal week’ for a while, with at least two weeks with special theming to follow, if not more. So keep your eyes peeled for that. 
It was for the best to take Author Spotlights off a set schedule. The last few in June, when they were almost done, came out far better for it, with fics chosen for that purpose and reaching a conclusion about the author’s style over the “eh, five fics that happen to be written by the same guy, why not” approach prior. Some time away reinvigorated the approach, so by that same criteria, here it returns, with Lucky Dreams.
Time’s a funny thing, innit? Today just so happens to be my birthday. And get this: in my first year of doing these Ponyfic Review Monday Musings, it coincides with my birthday being on a Monday. And thanks to the calendar-correcting oddity that is Leap Years, that won’t happen again until 2033. My first year of doing these, my birthday falls on one. 
What are the odds, eh? Must be a sign, me thinks. Honestly, I probably wouldn’t have mentioned it were it not for that overlap.
Last batch of the stories for the Who Crossed Over My Little Pony? contest reviewed today. We’ll be back to a regular menagerie of fics from all over next week again.
First things first: happy thanksgiving to all you Americans out there! Couple days early, yes, but it’s not like I’m gonna have a blog on Thursday to say it then. May not mean to us this side of the pond, but we can appreciate spending time with family and being thankful for what we have for sure.
With yet another August, and thus yet another year about to be added to my age tomorrow, it felt high time, nearly five years after creating an account here (that long? Dear lord… 
), to make a key change. Being honest, this has been present at least as long as I’ve been doing Ponyfic reviews, since March 2022, and further back still in how I present myself. But now it’s official. Eagle-eyed viewers may have already spotted it…
I think it’s telling that only on launch day last Tuesday did I really register that eight more episodes (okay, a two-parter and six regular episodes) of Make Your Mark were dropping. Mirrors the level of enthusiasm I’m seeing in most circles. This, despite having noticed the promos for Chapter 4, up to and including a palette swap of Pipp with frazzled hair voiced by another Disney Channel “star”.
Been a while since an Author Spotlight here, hasn’t it? Well, actually, once every three months strikes me as a reasonable duration between them – not too long that they feel like a false promise, but infrequent enough that you can be sure it’s a justified one. And that certainly applies to this author, a late joiner to Fimfic but one who’s posted very frequently since and delivered a lot of quality writing. Folks, it’s focus time for
March 1st saw witness to a brief but strong (and unexpected, to the ire of the weather people) bout of snow. Which, if you’ve never been to Ireland, is extraordinary rare – the last notable such spell we had was six years ago in March 2018, a cold front so strong it actually shut schools and college down for several days (all your Northern Americans and Canadians are yawning at this, I’m sure 
).
All the recent Everfree Northwest blogs have reminded me that UK PonyCon is fast approaching. I’ve been all booked for months now, but with it only six weeks away, I'm starting to get excited again. Too soon? Mayhaps, but I am an easily excitable spirit, least for the right things. Last year’s edition was the rare holiday for me where I didn’t have a “home sweet home” feeling when it was over, which should tell you how much it meant to me.
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