So I was sitting at my computer the other day, and my father walked past and quite randomly asked me if I was a brony. I have no idea what prompted this. I've been pretty quiet about my interest in the show and the fandom -- not secretive, just not exactly open about it, y'know? -- so I was more than a little surprised. Maybe he noticed my Octavia and Vinyl Scratch figures and finally put two and two together? Anyhow, he seemed genuinely curious, so I cautiously said, "Uh, yeah, I guess." He

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Isn't "y'all" plural? Call me crazy, but I always assumed it was a rustic elision of "you all," which would indeed make it plural. I don't understand why so many people write Apple family dialogue with "y'all" as a singular form of address.

Makes sense:

"Hey, girls," said Applejack, "y'all ready to go?"

Doesn't make sense:

"Twilight, y'all got a book on raisin' barns I could borrow?" asked Applejack.

Word uses curved quotes and apostrophes by default. FimFic uses straight quotes by default. Ergo, you can tell where someone wrote his/her fic by observing the style of the quotation marks. You can also tell if they copy-pasta'd it from Word to FimFic and subsequently edited it onsite.

...and wow. Just wow. I'm sorry I didn't read it sooner. It isn't perfect, but it's still really, really good.

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I swear, it's a disease tech people have.

[/knee-jerk grumbling]

So I finally got a chance to sit down and watch the finale. I'm . . . disappointed, but not really surprised, I guess. The well-done and nicely nuanced cutie mark swapping sequence got my hopes up at first, even when things started marching inevitably towards the Twilicorn transformation bit, but then . . . ugh. I just don't know what the point of this episode was. There was NO plot, NO friendship story, and NO meaningful character development -- seriously, slapping wings on Twilight doesn't

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Dear everyone who treats "flank" like a ponified version of "ass":

Seriously, though. Check out the actual definition of "flank":

flank (flæŋk) — n
1. the side of a man or animal between the ribs and the hip
2. (loosely) the outer part of the human thigh
3. a cut of beef from the flank
4. the side of anything, such as a mountain or building

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I expect I'm late to the party on this, but the new episode definitely seems to be suggesting some connection between the Ponyville fiddler and everyone's favorite cellist. I never noticed it back in 2.4 (low res vid, distracted by cute bearded Twi, etc.), but the fiddler is basically a yellow, violin-playing version of Octavia.

IDEA! Incoming maudlin fic about musical sisters torn asunder!

Warning! Pedantic semi-rant incoming!

Here's a bit of sample dialogue:

"I'm so glad to be here," smiled Rarity.

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You know what ruins a fic involving Luna? Bad Luna-speak. I don't know why so many writers have such a hard time getting the old-fashioned speech right (or at least passably close), but they do, and it's MADDENING. If nothing else, I'd appreciate it if more people understood that "thy" and "thou" aren't interchangeable.