• Published 2nd Sep 2015
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Apple Honey's Perfectly Ordinary Day - Admiral Biscuit



Apple Honey has a perfectly ordinary day.

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Evening

Apple Honey’s Perfectly Ordinary Day
Chapter 3: Evening

“I don't get it,” True Blue said as Apple Honey started putting her harness on. “We've gotten wagons stuck on the farm before, and it's usually not that hard to get them out—they'll probably have it out before we get there. Unless everypony's standing around drinking and talking about it instead of doing something.” She made a face. “Our farmhooves do that all the time.”

“What do you do when you get a wagon stuck?”

“First, we unload it, to make it lighter. Most of the time, that's all it takes.”

“Yeah, that's a good starting point. You can leave the breeching strap off—I'll be taking my stone-boat out there, and I sure won't need it for the fire engine. So what happens if you can't unload the wagon?”

'You mean like if it's full of barrels or something and we don't have a ramp? We just . . . oh.”

“The only way they can make the fire engine lighter is if they dump all the water, and they can't do that unless the boiler's all the way out.” She grimaced. “I wouldn't want to be in the chief's shoes right now.” She looked up at a weather pegasus flying northeast, pushing a raincloud. “No rain scheduled for today . . . I bet they're bringing extra water, and maybe stocking some rainclouds around town, just in case. That's going to mess up the weather schedule.

“I wish somepony in town had a donkey engine.” She glanced at the collection of ropes and pulleys in her market cart. The load was light enough for a filly to pull—which was a good thing. She hadn't told Blue about that task yet. She'd figure it out on her own.

“It'd probably get stuck, too.” Blue looked at the market cart, slow comprehension dawning in her eyes. “The stone-boat won't fit in that cart, will it?”

“Nope.”

Blue sighed. “I wish I had a proper harness, instead of just a breastcollar harness.”

“You're still a growing filly,” Apple Honey reminded her. “That's all you need right now. When you're bigger—“

“Yeah, yeah.” She unenthusiastically pulled her harness off its peg and began climbing into it.

Apple Honey helped her fasten the straps, then hooked her to the market wagon. She'd already checked the balance when she loaded it, but she still took the time to lift up on the shafts to make sure that the proper amount of weight was carried by the backstrap. Too much, and Blue would wear herself out; too little, and she risked being yanked off her hooves by the wagon.

It was much simpler to hook up to the stone-boat—instead of rigid shafts, a pair of chains were attached to the front of each runner, and it tracked far enough behind her she could easily clip them on herself.

She had to unhook herself to close the front door of the shop, but it was only a moment's work before it was trailing behind her again.

“What do you want the stone-boat for, anyway?” Blue asked as they made their way through town.

“Two reasons: We'll be in a field, so if we need to hook up pulleys, we'll need something to anchor them to. We can load it with rocks once we get there, for weight.”

“Won't that make it sink in the mud?”

“Hopefully. The deeper it sinks, the more firmly anchored it will be.” She glanced over at Blue, and took the opportunity to make sure that her apprentice's harness was riding correctly. “Even if we don't need it for that, it might be easier to pull the fire engine out if we can get the wheels up on a couple of stone-boats.”

“Because . . . because once it's out of the mire, it will still want to sink in the mud.”

“Yeah. I hope we don't have to do either, but I'd rather have it and not need it than have to go all the way back in town for it.”

• • •

Pepperdance's farm was buzzing with activity. Apple Honey took the lead, dragging her stone-boat under the archway and around the house, with Blue right on her tail.

Even if she hadn't known the layout of the farm, it would not have been any trouble to find where their task was. The job of freeing the stuck fire engine had turned into an impromptu party, with all of Pepperdance's neighbors and kinfolk along to help. A hay wagon had been turned into a makeshift banquet table—one end was covered with food, while the other held the promised bottles of ale. Heather Rose was standing by them, making certain nopony opened a celebratory bottle until after the fire engine was extracted.

The fire engine itself was being attended to by a pair of glum-looking volunteer fireponies. Both of them had shovels and were attempting to dig a sloping trench in front of the wagon. No doubt they imagined that they could hitch up to it and pull it out forward.

Judging by the muddy soil sloughing off their shovels, that was a fool's hope. The coils of rope attached to eveners told the story well enough—they'd probably managed to shift it forward a few ponylengths, but they'd be there until Hearth's Warming if they thought they could get it out that way. The land sloped slightly down, so all the ground in front of it would be saturated.

Besides, everypony knew that the best way to pull a wagon out was to reverse the course it had taken to get stuck. It seemed more difficult, since wagons weren't meant to be pulled from behind, but it was always quicker in the long run.

“I hope Pepperdance is willing to treat everypony to a trip to the spa once the engine’s out,” Apple Honey muttered. “Go ahead and pull your wagon around to Pepper's shed, then get unhitched. It'll be out of the way there, and it'll keep the blocks and ropes close to hoof. We're going to want to stretch a pair of lines to the back axle.

“You two.” She motioned to the fireponies. “Might as well stop digging—you're never going to get it out that way. Is the fire still up in the engine?”

“Yeah.” The bigger stallion wiped his brow and looked at her. “Chief said to keep it up, 'cause it takes hours to cool down.”

“How stable is it?”

“It's not. Boiler makes it top-heavy. The water tank helps weigh it down, but it can get sloshy, especially when it's low.”

“Alright.”

The downside of extracting a wagon from a field was that there wasn't anywhere to hook a block and tackle. In town, it wasn't so bad—there was always somepony who got her wagon stuck after a rainstorm, and Apple Honey could just tie off to the nearest house.

She could appreciate how nopony standing around had wanted to take responsibility—if the engine tipped over, it might explode. They were all content to let the fire department take the lead, even if there were mares in the crowd who knew better. A lot of the older ponies in town still had a distrust of steam-powered equipment, and they'd passed that on to their offspring. The Lavender sisters in particular kept their distance, always with a wary eye in its direction.

“Does anypony have a set of drags?” she asked, loudly enough that the crowd could hear her.

"I do," Lavender August offered. "Back at my farm."

"Could you get them please?"

"Sure!" She rounded up her sisters, and the trio hurried off.

“What good will those do?” True Blue waved a hoof at the wagon. “It doesn't need extra braking.”

“They'll add a bit of surface area to the wheels, maybe enough to get it free,” Apple Honey explained. “I'm not sure we'll actually need them, but they might come in handy.

“You there.” She pointed to the bigger firepony. With his helmet and turnout coat on, she didn't recognize him, and the pervasive stink of burned compost masked his scent. “Get your shovel and dig under the engine far enough to clear the bottom of the boiler. We're going to pull it out backwards.”

“Front wheels will turn sideways and tip it,” he protested. “Once you start pulling—that's why it's got to come out forwards.”

“I've got a plan,” she told him. “Blue, start getting out the rope and threading it through blocks. Hook 'em to an extra doubletree; we’ll hitch everypony to that.” She took a quick glance around the field. “Figure . . . twelve ponies pulling. I'll drag my stone-boat about there, and we'll nose it into the ground and start piling on rocks.”

• • •

It took about an hour to widen the ruts, set boards down in them, and get the rear end of the wagon shoveled free enough to get the ropes set up. By then, all the ponies standing around had gotten into their harnesses, and while there was a fair bit of jostling for position, she'd finally managed to wrangle everypony into her spot, making sure to keep the Lavenders at the front of the team where they'd feel safer.

She and Blue went around checking all the fasteners. It was a bit of a gamble on the eveners, but she had a pretty good idea who the strong mares in town were.

The two fireponies were harnessed to the tongue of the engine, facing backwards. They'd ensure that the front axle didn't pivot and tip the whole thing over. She probably could have gotten better use out of the big stallion, but it was his fault that the thing was stuck to begin with.

A set of tackles was chained to the doubletree Pepperdance had provided, which in turn was attached to the firmly anchored stone-boat. A second set was short-chained to the axle of the fire engine. That would quadruple the pulling power, although everypony would be halfway across the field by the time the engine got to solid ground—if it did.

Apple Honey's stomach growled at her. Normally she'd be at the Prancing Pony, gossiping over dinner with all her kinfolk and fretting over Apple Leaves' youngest. Instead, here she was, coated from fetlocks to poll in mud and sweat.

“On my call,” she shouted. “Pull until I say stop. Don't let up, especially when it starts to get easy. Don't let the ropes slack out. If we do it right, we can have this thing out in one tug. If we don't, we're going to have to get some unicorns to lift it.”

She waited until the discontented muttering had died down. The very idea of needing unicorns to pull a wagon loose was practically a mortal insult, and it had the intended effect. “Start slow,” she advised. “Get the stretch out of the rope first, then give it all you've got.”

“Will this work?” Blue asked quietly.

“Yes.” She checked the scene one more time, making sure that all the ropes were free and that there weren't any obstacles in anypony's path. “Now! Pull!”

The ropes jerked tight, springing up slightly then settling back down. As the fibers compressed, muddy water dribbled out.

She glanced up at the dozen farmponies—all of them had their heads down and hooves dug into the soft soil. It was going to take Pepperdance a couple days of hard work to level her field again, but that couldn’t be helped.

For a heart-stopping second, she thought it wasn't going to work. She saw a clod of earth get kicked up as Heather Rose's hind hoof slipped, and the mare struggled to get her balance back without slacking any of the chains that tied them all together.

Then the wheels of the fire engine began to turn, slowly at first, their spokes dragging on the loose mud at the sides of the rut. They didn't have any bite, not yet. The bottom of the boiler was digging into the loose earth, scraping up a small wave of dirt around its circumference.

The wagon moved a few feet, rising slightly as it hit the boards they'd placed in the ruts, then sinking back down as it drove the ends of the wood under the mud. She was glad that nopony was looking back—they might have lost heart. She'd been expecting that to happen—the saturated ground had let its water out in the ruts, and softened them even more than they had been when the wagon first got stuck.

A few feet later, the fire engine began to rise again, leaning slightly to the right. Her biggest fear now was that it would drop on one side and tip over, but as it came further and further out of the ground, it began to level.

“More! Keep pulling!” she shouted. Already, the team had moved a fair distance down the field, and the gap only widened as the engine kept coming.

She watched the ever decreasing distance between the doubletree and the axle. If her calculations were wrong, it wouldn't be on solid ground before the two met.

Even if it made it all the way out, she wanted to get as much distance as they could between the fire engine and the sloping ground. Ideally, there would be enough room that the fireponies could pull it forward and away, but a quick estimate of the rope remaining told her that that was just a pipe dream.

“Whoa!” Right towards the end, as the load had lightened, the rope had fed through the blocks with frightening speed. The smaller firepony stopped faster than the dozen pulling from the other end and was dragged off his hooves; his partner dug in and helped bring the engine to a stop.

The ropes went slack, then tightened again as the fire engine tried to roll back into the hole it had just come out of. “Stand where you are,” Apple Honey shouted at the farmponies. “Don't let it slide back.”

She hurried over to the engine and looped the drop chains around the spokes, then hooked them securely into the ringbolts.

When she was sure the engine wasn't going to go anywhere, she let the pulling ponies put slack in the line, and went with True Blue to help them unhook. Everything had gone so well so far, and she didn't want the night to end with somepony being taken to the hospital because she'd tripped over a chain.

• • •

Spirits were high after everypony had gotten unhooked. One by one, the farmponies went over to the wagon, but they all waited until Apple Honey came over to break into the ale. They let her have the first bottle, then pressed the second into True Blue’s hooves. Unnoticed by everypony, the fire stallions slunk off, their muddy fire engine in tow.

“I don’t think I can finish this,” Blue said, setting her half-empty bottle back on the wagon. “Heather Rose won’t be mad if I don’t, will she?”

“She won’t mind,” Apple Honey assured her. “How late can you stay out?”

“Well. . . .” The filly looked around uncertainly. “Mom’ll be kind of mad that I missed dinner, but since it was for work it’ll be okay. I don’t think she’ll be happy if I stay out partying with the big ponies, though.”

“Grab a bite to eat,” Apple Honey advised. “Try some of the pepper soup—it’s really good. It’ll fill your tummy.”

“We’ll have to pick up all the ropes and stuff when we’re done eating, won’t we?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you think anypony will help?”

Apple Honey looked around at the clusters of drinking and gossiping ponies. “Once we’re done eating, yeah. I’ll round everypony up, and we’ll get everything put back in the market wagon. Then we can all rinse off in the pond, and you can take the wagon back to town and head home. Just leave it in front of the shop: I’ll put it away when I get back.”

• • •

Finally back at the shop, she slid the door open and dragged her stone-boat inside. It would have been easier to leave it in the middle of the floor, but if she did, she'd have to put on her harness first thing in the morning to move it. It was easier to do it now.

She did leave the market wagon inside—it wasn't that difficult to push along with her snout. Regrettably, it was going to leave a fair bit of mud on her floor, but that could be swept up in the morning, after she'd rinsed off the ropes and the tackles.

One of the nicest things about summer was that even after her late day, it was still light out. In the winter, there were days where she finished work by lamplight, although she did work a lot of half-days then. There wasn't much call to repair farm equipment when the fallow fields were under chest-deep snow. A few smart farmers had all their tools repaired then, since they could do without them, but most of her clientele wasn't as interested in preventative maintenance as they should have been. Spring and fall were hectic . . . but summer was just the right blend of steady, with a reasonable amount of free time.

On her desk, the beehive was still where she'd left it. It would keep until the morning, she decided. It was too late for Bumblesweet to set it up now, and besides, she was getting such a good deal on the thing, she could wait an extra day. She covered a yawn with her forehoof, and decided that she was officially done with work for the day, and could move on to her evening chores.

Out in her yard, she leaned down and tried to nuzzle Tom as he twined around her legs, but this time, he was too quick for her, and all she got was a nose full of fluffy tail, then he was off, making his evening circuit of the perimeter.

Apple Honey worked her way through the kaleyard, tugging up every weed she came across. There weren't many—she paid close attention to her garden. Behind her, the chickens pecked at the newly-uncovered earth, searching for any fresh bugs she'd revealed.

Before she'd gotten Tom, she'd had to herd the chickens back in their coop for the night, but now she could just leave them out without fear of predation. They'd go back to their roost when they felt like it, and she was sure they were happier if a pony didn't impose a schedule on them.

Satisfied that her day's work was truly done, she walked over to the side of her shed, where a showerhead was mounted above a stone-flagged patio. The dip in the pond at Pepperdance's had rinsed off the worst of the mud, but she wasn't properly clean, and she aimed to fix that before she retired for the night.

A stallion had sold it to her a few years back, claiming that it would save her a bunch of bits at the spa, and he was right. Now she only visited once a week, except in the winter, of course.

Like most farm mares, she got cleaned up at the end of day—while unicorns felt it was proper to bathe at the start of the day, they never worked up a sweat like an honest earth pony would.

She opened the valve and stepped into the water immediately—it was better to do it that way, rather than move in slowly. Tom watched her from a safe distance, confused at why she would willingly get herself wet. To drive home his philosophy, when she lifted a hoof to rinse the mud off, he raised his own paw, licked it, and rubbed it across his forehead, then glanced back at her to make sure she got the message.

Once she'd washed the sweat and mud out of her coat, she lifted each hoof and cleaned them with a stiff brush and a hoof knife, making sure to get all the dirt out of the crevices around her shoe and frog. That also gave her a chance to inspect her shoe nails.

She shut off the shower and shook herself off, then headed inside for the night with the pleasant feeling of a day well spent. She could spend an hour in the little nook off her kitchen reading a chapter of The Mystery of the Manehattan Musical Mare Mixup, which would give her mane and coat time to dry, and then head upstairs to bed. Get a good night's sleep, and she’d be ready for another perfectly ordinary day.

Author's Note:

For the link to the story notes, click HERE

Comments ( 63 )

6396258
They're not that bad, really. It's just that the Germans have their own weird way of doing things.

As for the MGs (or any British-designed car), keep it away. They're even more special than German engineering.

6396584 Germans build space toilets that scream at you on Namekian ships.

The Internet has taught me this.

Not a bad chapter, I gotta say. What do you plan to write on next?

Crevasses are in ice. You mean crevices.

This was really neat to read.

Good Story. Need more like it. :twilightsmile:

And Pony Planet is... ?

Also, grats on the probably short-lived feature.

6396751
Celestia Sleeps In by Admiral Biscuit
Then
Onto the Pony Planet by Admiral Biscuit

Enjoyable story. I'm glad you addressed the 'why not just have a unicorn do it' factor, as i had that thought just a few paragraphs before. I still think it would be hilarious if Twilight had just happened to walk by in the middle of their preparations, and solved the problem in a few seconds.

Also in regards to this:

“I wish somepony in town had a donkey engine.” She glanced at the collection of ropes and pulleys in her market cart. The load was light enough for a filly to pull—which was a good thing. She hadn't told Blue about that duty yet. She'd figure it out on her own.

I'm still not sure what she meant by "that duty." Care to enlighten?

6397007

To have to pull the cart herself.

As I've previously said, this is lovely slice of life story.

I liked all the various ponyism's in it, I really liked that Apple couldn't recognise the firepony not just because he was covered in his uniform but because his scent was hidden as well. It might be interesting if he was her crush, he might even like her taking charge.

I've not actually read the core Pony Planet story, do you have a reason for the stallion / mare divide? A fair few stallions appear in the story but it does seem that the majority of characters are mares. Particularly when they're pulling out the fire engine it seems to be the entire team are mares and the fire ponies are stallions and not helping.

A common reason given for the lack of stallions in Ponyville is that they're working in the fields, which given the action takes place out in the fields is not the case so I guess in your world there is a significant disparity in gender numbers (or possibly they all move away, again I've seen situations where it's said they're all conscripted into the guard). Is there a cultural thing about keeping stallions away from more physical work? Most of them (with a few exceptions, Big Mac and Trouble Shoes) seem to be about the same size as mares) so there might not be that much of a difference in physical strength.

6397183
I believe the gender disparity is explained as a quirk of pony biology, aggravated by certain jobs, such as the Guard, being traditionally limited to stallions.

6396654

I've got something planned for tonight.

6396663
I bet they're very efficient toilets, too.

6396667
Publish my slamjam entries, finish the next chapter of Onto the Pony Planet, and finish a side story for OPP.

6396743
I'm happy to be the guy to provide more like this :pinkiehappy:

6396771
Heh, thanks! It's still there right now. . . .

6396993

Enjoyable story.

Thanks!

I still think it would be hilarious if Twilight had just happened to walk by in the middle of their preparations, and solved the problem in a few seconds.

I think she's been in Ponyville long enough to know better.

I'm still not sure what she meant by "that duty." Care to enlighten?

It's pulling the cart, like 6397068 said. I probably could have phrased that paragraph a little more clearly.

A satisfying end to a simple yet meaningful story.

One of the nicest things about summer was that even after her late day, it was still light out. In the winter, there were days where she finished work by lamplight, although she did work a lot of half-days then.

I wonder how day lengths work out in Equestria. The sun moves around the planet. Wouldn't day length be influenced by the Sun's speed of travel rather than the axial tilt? Lots of implications. Does your Equestra have an axial tilt or is the planet aligned perfectly with the sun?

Like most farm mares, she got cleaned up at the end of day—while unicorns felt it was proper to bathe at the start of the day, they never worked up a sweat like an honest earth pony would.

True sleeping in your sweat is a horrible experience, but some of us can't wake up decent if our lives depended on it.

A good little story. I do wonder when this takes place in relation to CSI. It clearly is sometime before hand but it would be cool to know exactly how all these stories happen in relation to one another.

6397337

Unless I am mistaken, its the same verse.

6397068 6397282
Yeah, on reread with that mention it was clearer. I think the emphasis and it being termed a 'duty' threw me; I tend to think of 'duty' as something a little weightier / more permanent. I would probably have phrased it as 'her part of the job' or some such.

6397337

A satisfying end to a simple yet meaningful story.

Thanks!

I wonder how day lengths work out in Equestria. The sun moves around the planet. Wouldn't day length be influenced by the Sun's speed of travel rather than the axial tilt? Lots of implications. Does your Equestra have an axial tilt or is the planet aligned perfectly with the sun?

In my headcanon, the planet has an effective axial tilt, although it's actually caused by Celestia moving the sun in relationship to Equestria's axis. She does this for the purpose of seasons. Strictly speaking, this might not be needed, since the pegasi can control the weather, but it's probably easier to have seasons if the sun isn't always perfectly perpendicular to the planet's axis.

I don't think you could get the same effect by varying the sun's speed around the planet, unless it went quickly across one side and then more slowly around the opposite. We do know from the season opener that not all days are the same length.

True sleeping in your sweat is a horrible experience, but some of us can't wake up decent if our lives depended on it.

Depending on the job, though . . . I don't really want to take two showers a day, and since the first thing I'm going to do when I go to work is get dirty. . . .

A good little story. I do wonder when this takes place in relation to CSI. It clearly is sometime before hand but it would be cool to know exactly how all these stories happen in relation to one another.

This one I can tell you exactly, since there's a reference to something we saw in canon: Strike's cutie mark.
CSI starts just after Spike at your Service (S3E9), and Strike got his cutie mark in The Cutie Pox (S2E6). I'll leave it to readers to decide how much time passes per season in the show: it's not consistent, and like pony heights, everybody has their own headcanon.

6397271 What do you mean by slamjam entries? And very glad on those last two.:D

6397534
The OC Slamjam was a contest hosted by Obs, where each participant made an OC, and then paired him or her with somebody else's OC in a story. It was an elimination contest, so in each round there were half as many contestants as in the previous round.

Here's the first round.

My character was Heather Rose.

6397451

I don't think you could get the same effect by varying the sun's speed around the planet, unless it went quickly across one side and then more slowly around the opposite. We do know from the season opener that not all days are the same length.

If you are restricted to 24 days then yes varying the speed wouldn't matter. Who says that the sun needs to make one trip around the globe every 24 hours? Day can be broadly defined too. Does it refer only to the daylight hours or are we talking the whole midnight to midnight?

Regardless it gives me a funny picture of teenage Celestia/Luna speeding up the passage of days to get to the weekend faster.

6397183

I liked all the various ponyism's in it, I really liked that Apple couldn't recognise the firepony not just because he was covered in his uniform but because his scent was hidden as well. It might be interesting if he was her crush, he might even like her taking charge.

Thank you! Scent is something that the show writers and lots of fanfic writers overlook, and I don't know why. It's an important part of being equine, more so than it is as a human. The big firepony wasn't her crush, although it would be funny if he had been.

I've not actually read the core Pony Planet story, do you have a reason for the stallion / mare divide?

Well, of course there's been lots of fan speculation on that, with some fics going as extreme as it being a 10:1 ratio. I actually counted, back when the list of characters was short enough that there was only one Wiki list, and came up with a 2:1 ratio, which I believe is more plausible.

To kind of jump ahead a bit, I don't think that the explanation that 'they're out in the fields' really works, since the ones who we do see in the fields, we also see in town now and then. Besides, just looking at Apple Family Reunion shows that there are about two mares to every stallion, and from the picture, it looks like there aren't any colts--so it's not just a matter of the stallions being somewhere else.

s2.dmcdn.net/A1Epu/1280x720-tcm.jpg

Of course, that may not be the best example. We know from canon at the time of the reunion that Apple Leaves (who's in the photo) has eight foals, and I believe that in that episode there were some infants, as well as ponies who appeared in some scenes and not others. I haven't done a complete count in the episode, but I believe that the photograph is representative of the gender ratio.

I do think that a lot of stallions take on 'protective' roles, serving in government or in the military, or as police officers. Thus, we have ponies like Sheriff Silverstar, or the whole Royal Guard, which is essentially a large bachelor herd. We also seem to see a larger number of stallions in bigger cities, like Manehattan or Canterlot. That implies, to me, that a lot of them move away from home to take on different roles, and this may be encouraged by having a largely matrilineal society. It's a reasonable guess that land is handed down from mare to mare, and the stallions probably don't get any. It's probably also very hard for them to get a high-up position in society, since nopony would trust a stallion to be in charge of things.

So what we wind up with is a society where the number of stallions--which is already low due to birth rates--is further reduced by many of them moving away when they become adults.

6397754
Well, I was thinking of a day as a 24 hour period, with however many sunrises and sunsets occurred in that period.

What I meant was that I suspect that one of the things which encourages winter is less sunlight/24 hour period, as well as the sun being lower on the horizon. I'm not sure you'd get that effect if you sped the sun across the sky on one half of Equestria, and slowed it down on the other side (for example, had it spend eight hours over America and sixteen over Asia and Europe). I think to get seasons like we have here on Earth, she'd pretty much have to effectively tilt the planet's axis, although that may not be so. Climate science is complicated.

On a different note, why do they have seasons in Equestria?

Regardless it gives me a funny picture of teenage Celestia/Luna speeding up the passage of days to get to the weekend faster.

And getting in trouble from their parents when they're caught, no doubt.

I'm not sure teenage Luna could manage raising the sun. In the comics, she struggles with it. (warning: image is spoilerish)
i.imgur.com/LtBKnt1.jpg

Great story. I'm actually having some trouble visualizing how they arranged the ropes to pull out the wagon. Was the doubletree provided by Pepperdance staked to the ground, or something?

6397779

Climate science is complicated.

Very true. In Equestria's case I wouldn't put anything in stone one way or another without knowledge of large bodies of water, strength/distance of Equestria's sun, the axial tilt (if any) and a list of any magical influences (looking at you windigos).

On a different note, why do they have seasons in Equestria?

Well the easy answer is because the show is made by humans and we have seasons, make what you know. If we are trying to find an actual reason I would hazard a guess that it might have been a method to enforce farmers to not plant, allowing the soil to recover. Or perhaps they didn't always control the seasons with pegasi or magic and they're just doing it out of tradition. I can see the ponies bringing winter to remind themselves of Hearths Warming Eve and the founding of Equestria. Maybe there is a lot of money in the winter business for Cloudsdale and they do it for economic reasons!

That's a stretch though. I really can't think of ANY reason to enforce seasons if you could avoid them. Why any society, especially a pre-industrial agrarian society, would submit itself to fall and winter when you could have endless spring/summer is beyond me. Famine and disease get worse in the winter, avoiding it would be very appealing.

6397801
She had a pair of blocks and tackles chained to the back of the fire engine, with ropes that went to another pair of pulleys on a doubletree. The rope was tied to the doubletree, then went back to the fire engine, then the doubletree, then the engine, and then over the doubletree to a pair of eveners behind the group of ponies pulling.

upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e1/Tackles.png/360px-Tackles.png
So, essentially what she did is the "double tackle" "gym tackle" in the above illustration, with the top pulley hooked to the fire engine, and the bottom one hooked to the doubletree, and the free end of the rope beyond that hooked to the pulling horses.

6397910 the shelf closest to the hinge in every job box we have is dedicated to random fasteners, as well as lonely breakers and excess bushings of all sizes.

It is a mess, but a potentially useful one.

6397844

You might need a winter to kill of pests and predators, things like aphids or even rabbits in the right environment could breed completely out of control without a winter to kill off most of them. Of course that doesn't stop Equestria having a sharp one month winter a year to kill them off and warm weather the rest of the year.


6397772

I don't particularly disagree with you on anything although I'm not sure if the reunion is the best example to use. Oddly it seems to take place during summer or autumn so presumably all the farms needed to keep some workers back home to look after the crops, which could be the stallions. It might be that the reunion actually favours the old and young who could be released with less loss and those who have moved out of farming.

It may even be that stallions are kept 'locked up' at home away from outside company, maybe as part of a 'protect stallions' instinct like shown in Xenophilia.

6397844

Very true. In Equestria's case I wouldn't put anything in stone one way or another without knowledge of large bodies of water, strength/distance of Equestria's sun, the axial tilt (if any) and a list of any magical influences (looking at you windigos).

It's also worth considering how much they control and how much they don't. I think that they said in one episode that they can't control the weather in/over the Everfree, and that implies that there are other places where they can't, as well. Also, Look Before You Sleep suggested that it might be more complicated than just bring rainclouds every now and then--why did they need a storm? Why not three days of soaking rain, for instance? Were the unused clouds getting out of control?

That's a stretch though. I really can't think of ANY reason to enforce seasons if you could avoid them. Why any society, especially a pre-industrial agrarian society, would submit itself to fall and winter when you could have endless spring/summer is beyond me. Famine and disease get worse in the winter, avoiding it would be very appealing.

I think the only reason they'd have to is because many of the native plants and animals need a fallow season as part of their lifecycle, which implies that things weren't always controlled by the ponies. That suggests, to me at least, that things used to work normally there, until somebody (probably Discord) broke the natural systems.

One of my readers long ago suggested that Equestria was a planet which had been designed by an advanced race to be moved across the galaxy to some new location, and it somehow got our of their control, and now the ponies rule it. Since it isn't a natural system, it requires constant maintenance to keep things working.

6397900
Sorry, I wasn't clear. I understood the rope routing, but a block and tackle has to react against something. What is the loose doubletree (bottom tackle in your illustration) attached to?

6397941
It should be attached to Apple Honey's stone-boat, which is loaded with rocks and jammed into the ground. It isn't, because I forgot to mention that in the text.

I really ought to go back and correct that little oversight. No wonder you were confused. The way I described it, they'd just pull the doubletree into the wagon.

6397986
I'm actually sort of glad that you made a mistake. The fact that you said they could "...keep on pulling—albeit without any mechanical advantage..." implied to me that the doubletree was floating somehow. I couldn't see how that would work, and it was really bothering me that I couldn't figure it out. If it's just missing verbiage, then all is right with the world.

6397938

Also, Look Before You Sleep suggested that it might be more complicated than just bring rainclouds every now and then--why did they need a storm? Why not three days of soaking rain, for instance?

Perhaps it is easier / cheaper to let one big storm run overnight. Keeping a soaking rain for 3 days would be more manpower intensive. Maybe they needed to replace the water-table after a period of drought. Or to wash away some contaminate or other? I suppose that is how they could keep the streets of Ponyville clean.

One of my readers long ago suggested that Equestria was a planet which had been designed by an advanced race to be moved across the galaxy to some new location, and it somehow got our of their control, and now the ponies rule it.

It does provide an explanation, but this theory has never sat well with me. The logistics of such a project are so mindbogglingly complex and complicated I cannot see why anyone would go through the effort. I cannot see a need that would require so much effort, that could not be solved in an easier manner. It is science fiction though so I suppose those arguments don't always hold weight. :twilightsheepish:

6397779 haha that pic though....,

6398029 I had that image as well. Thought I was going nuts!

This... didn't show up on my feed... :rainbowderp: :raritycry:

Get a good night's sleep, and she’d be ready for another perfectly ordinary day.

Ah. So tomorrow's when Dale stops in to say hello. :raritywink:

Like most farm mares, she got cleaned up at the end of day—while unicorns felt it was proper to bathe at the start of the day, they never worked up a sweat like an honest earth pony would.

Ah, so I've been and earth pony mare all along... :applejackconfused:

But really, sleeping in bed with all the day's germs and skin oil all over me feels gross. The lab chemicals probably aren't a good thing to let lie either. :twilightsheepish:

She could spend an hour in the little nook off her kitchen reading a chapter of The Mystery of the Manehattan Musical Mare Mixup, which would give her mane and coat time to dry, and then head upstairs to bed. Get a good night's sleep, and she’d be ready for another perfectly ordinary day.

And then the sky exploded. The end! :trollestia:

6398155 It was Mongol.

Go read the last 1/4 of "The Death and Life of Superman" for reference!

Or maybe it was the Daleks and this was another "Stolen Earth"!

Buuuuuut , really... none of the sci-fi explanations for Equestria ever bother to explain the little thing called 'magic' which makes the entire thing implausible. The warning 'magic and science don't mix' isn't a principle and more a comment on how difficult it really is to write a story where both are supposed to coexist. with the laws of physics somehow still intact.

Therefore, most stories that try it just brush off the problem of magic somehow existing in a universe dominated by fixed physical laws the ponies (and a ton of other things in Equestria) mercilessly sodomize with utter impunity and leave the rules sobbing in a dark alley.

Except for that one story that has the Diamond Dogs as basically Space Nazi Saddam Hussein Stalins with a dash of Doctor Doom here and there. That one actually does weave magic into the thing nicely. Though, they don't move the planet around.

Fox

An extremely mundane SoL fic that I'm disappointed to see ending so soon. Paint me impressed.

It also has the side effect of upping my respect for Apple Honey; she may not be able to write, but she seems like an alright mare otherwise.

6397938 Well, on Earth winter snowfall is important to avoid drought.

I've been trying to learn old-school drafting (it'll help me do some other stuff at work, and I admit to being fascinated by old construction drawings). After re-reading the story, I decided to try to sketch up the fire engine recovery. It came out alright in pencil, but I kind of screwed it up in inking and lettering. Anyway, I figured I'd throw it up here.
farm1.staticflickr.com/644/22835954067_e448789f98_z.jpg scannedDoc - Copy by Cat Cube, on Flickr

6660199

I've been trying to learn old-school drafting (it'll help me do some other stuff at work, and I admit to being fascinated by old construction drawings).

I did some of that in college for theatre lighting plots and some stage design. Always did them in ink, 'cause I couldn't do line weights to save my life. Never did tell the professor that I drew them on legal pads first, then traced the pencil drawing, then taped it to the desk and traced over it on the vellum. :pinkiehappy:

After re-reading the story, I decided to try to sketch up the fire engine recovery. It came out alright in pencil, but I kind of screwed it up in inking and lettering. Anyway, I figured I'd throw it up here.

Looks real good! And a lot better than what I originally described, where the pulley wasn't tied off to the stone boat.

6667147

I believe tracing to the vellum was one of the processes sometimes used, depending on the office. It does mean that you don't lose your original pencil drawing if a pen explodes. We've got a few pencil originals on the wall at the office, so they weren't always inked.

If I had to turn in a hand-drafted drawing today, I'd probably do it in CAD and trace over it onto the vellum. For all the charm of drawings done on the board, it's a hell of a lot less efficient. I did two sheets today before lunch from blank paper to final drawing, including a couple of isometric views. That'd have been a couple of days by hand.

I'm actually debating doing the embassy (at least in plan), if there's enough detail in OTPP. I've been skimming through it again to see if the description is enough to come up with something.

6667214

I believe tracing to the vellum was one of the processes sometimes used, depending on the office. It does mean that you don't lose your original pencil drawing if a pen explodes.

Yeah, I could see that being a process in a legit office. Since we were doing it for theatre, we didn't really have to worry all that much--most of the drawings were guidelines, anyways, and the stuff we built only had to last for a few days and look good from twenty feet.

The truth is most of the shows didn't really have actual drawings for most of it. The director just gave the set designer a sketch of what he wanted, and that was that. I never did a light plot for the Dalton theatre, and I don't think we did them for the black box theatre, either.

For all the charm of drawings done on the board, it's a hell of a lot less efficient.

True for so many things. I've written some stories with pen and paper (even parts of OPP) when I didn't have access to a computer, and it slows me way down, not even counting that I have to re-type it later.

I'm actually debating doing the embassy (at least in plan), if there's enough detail in OTPP. I've been skimming through it again to see if the description is enough to come up with something.

And I see that you have! :pinkiehappy:

6680269

And I see that you have! :pinkiehappy:

My original intent was to do it pen-and-paper, but after spending a lot of time (and crumpled-up paper) with cut-and-try, I said "fuck it" and fired up Microstation. I need to learn how to use the workflows and sheet construction tools in it, anyway. My office has provided a non-commercial copy for our home computers, but we can't do any paying work on it and this is as good a project as any to learn with. I may actually do a pen-and-paper copy later, anyway, as I want to work on that and (again) this is as good as anything.

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