Dunes

Yeah, I think they work pretty well. I'm not sold on Heartstrings yet, but someone mentioned "Lyra Heartstrings" up there and that makes it a little better. And I can see "Carrot Top" being a nickname that stuck, either because Mz. Harvest doesn't like it and everyone knows it, or she keeps it up 'cause she doesn't like her real name. I do think Berryshine sounds like something that could be alcoholic and I therefore approve. At least it still starts with "Berry"!

Nightmare Derriere Gaiety

Crystal Towers had not been expecting the sandstorm. It made sense, really. They were on the border of a desert, and they'd had wind even back in the city. Despite the research she'd done (all four hours of it), it just hadn't occurred to her that sometimes wind and sand might get... really friendly. She was an earth pony, not a pegasus! She didn't spend a lot of time thinking about wind. Well, this was what she'd signed up for. Her mother had tried to convince her to start her venture out somewhere easier. Somewhere closer to home, like Saddleveil Plains. “At least they get rain there, sweetie,” her mother had said. “But chili peppers are spicier when they're grown in hot, dry places!” Crystal had replied. It seemed like a good rationale at the time. There had been some ruckus and hurrying when she'd got off the train; perhaps she should have paid attention. She'd just assumed that ponies greeted relatives really enthusiastically here. Occasionally she heard someone shout, “Get inside!” But she had just thought that it was intended for one of the hoof-ful of other train passengers, and that the next garbled phrase she heard over the wind was something like, “Get inside! It's time for pie!” She had been rather groggy at the time. Perhaps she should have tried to get some sleep on the train ride down. She'd gotten about quarter a mile out of town, towards her newly-purchased plot of land, when the sandstorm struck. Fortunately, if growing up mostly indoors had taught her anything, it was how to build forts out of whatever's available. She was currently cowering under three suitcases and an overnight bag, forming a three-sided shelter with a roof. This left one side open, with her purple, chili-pepper-marked flank sticking out the end of it. She rather hoped the wind didn't change directions. The wind picked up for a moment, and Crystal braced her makeshift shelter. “This is going to ruin my Poni Vuitton luggage,” she grumbled, trying to pretend it was her biggest problem. The wind slacked, and after a minute or so, Crystal could swear she heard hoofbeats. It was either that or it was her eardrums pounding after all that wind. Not daring to peek out of her safe haven, she called out. “Hello? Is anypony there?”

Oh, I agree the part of the appeal of the community is... the community. I personally do watch the episodes several times a week (though admittedly, it's often while I'm doing something else - adorable background noise for coding websites!), but I also really love seeing what the community comes up with. (Uh, some of the time. I find it weird that "clopfic" is even a term, to start with.) It is a really enjoyable show! I think it succeeds in balancing conflict and character development with lightheartedness. It establishes an emotional connection between the audience and a set of characters, while at the same time hinting at a larger world that it doesn't much delve into, and there is a lot of creative potential there. After all, if there's this much story revolving around these six ponies and a baby dragon, what other stories are there in the background ponies? All the while, it's just... fun. There are a lot of other series that I'm a huge fan of, that are probably better in some ways than FiM, but they are nowhere near as fun. I love Doctor Who with all my heart, but it doesn't do nearly as much to get me out of a bad mood after a hard day at work as ponies having adventures. (Doctor Who has made me cry on several separate occasions and that is just not what I need when I'm already anxious!) And participating in a community based on that, and seeing and creating material based on that, is just a way to extend that fun beyond the 30-some episodes there are.

I'm Team "Celestia and Luna get along forever, but are forced to sign the Mane-gna Carta and eventually are relegated to figureheads with the rise of Pony Parliament." Though since Celestia (and presumably Luna?) has the power to banish people to the moon, the rise of democracy seems unlikely.

Crystal Towers // Earth Pony // Female // Young Adult // Profile Here //Threads - The Storm [Open] - Akila // Zebra // Female // Young Adult // Profile Here //Threads Sapphire Shores // Earth Pony (FiM Cast) // Young Adult // Profile Here //Threads - (Not) Facing the Music [Open] Madame deLucky (Chouette deLucky) // Earth Pony // Adult // Profile Here //Threads Tasha Howlite // Diamond Dog // Adult // Profile here //Threads

AHH. Another classic Who fan?! I have a lot of friends who like the new series, but I seem to be the only one I know IRL (other than my parents) who loves the classic series too. I went as the 4th doctor last halloween, complete with scarf I knitted myself. All of one person got it. Everyone else said, "Omg, are you Harry Potter?" Netflix has been putting more and more of the classic stuff up. I saw they even had a few of the first Doctor's episodes up! But they've yet to put up the Sunmakers, which is one of my absolute favorite Tom Baker episodes. But, as for other TV, we don't get cable at my house. If I want to watch Big Bang Theory I usually have to go visit my parents. I've been watching a few series on my computer lately, like Pan Am, Nurse Jackie, and Dead Like Me (i know that last one's been over for a while; I'm only just now watching it for the first time). I was watching Avatar, too, but then Ponies happened. At some point I'll get back to it.

Trashy club music. Like, I want to hate Katy Perry. Her lyrics are tasteless and often gay-negative in ways I'm not gonna go into (because it would take me paragraphs). But ugh, I listen to this on repeat for hours and dance around like an idiot.I also genuinely enjoy a song called . (Despite the title, the video's only PG-13 for language.) Sometimes I reflect on that, and despair.

This is my first pony, so critique away! Name: Crystal Towers (possibly? I have an idea that relates to her backstory with it, but I'm open to suggestions) Sex: Female Age: Mare Species: Earth pony Coat Color: Light-ish purple Mane/Tail/Markings Color & Style: Mane and tail are a medium red, and are naturally wavy and poofy. (She has to style it to keep it from looking like a matted mess, but she's reluctant to let on about it.) Has some light lavender socks on her front right and back left feet, and a matching star on her forehead. Eye Color: Magenta Cutie Mark: A pair of red chili peppers Physique: Naturally a bit stocky, but with all the muscle tone of a wet spaghetti noodle. Origin: Born and raised in Manehattan, but she's looking to relocate to Appleloosa (or somewhere more suitable for farming, not sure yet). Roleplay Type: Mane Occupation: Farmer, with a particular fondness for growing spicy things and rare varieties of vegetables. Motivation: To be like the rugged frontier ponies and run a successful farm, despite her cushy city upbringing. Likes: Open spaces, growing obscure plants, figuring things out for herself (even when she hasn't the slightest idea what she's doing), making spicy chili (bean-based, naturally). Anything she associates with the countryside and/or frontier, regardless of how true or stereotypical it is. She also likes soft beds, fancy clothes, and many of the trappings of city life that she's leaving behind, whether she'll admit it or not. Dislikes: Reading (though she'll make an exception for botany), having to do math, ponies she perceives as snooty (oblivious of whether or not she's coming off as a snob herself), being seen as a city slicker Character Summary: Crystal was born to a well-off family in Manehattan. Her father was a famed artist, and her mother a shrewd businesspony. They were busy, but loving. But as the eldest of four, Crystal was encouraged to be a good example for her younger brothers and sister. And while she did enjoy caring for her younger siblings, she had absolutely no interest in her parents' idea of being a good example. School bored her, the music lessons fell flat, and she never seemed to be able to draw anything more complex than stick-ponies in art class. She was excited for dance lessons, until she figured out that she and her mother had completely different ideas of what dancing ought to be. She loved her parents and did want to set a good example for her baby brothers and sister, and so she developed the habits of a successful Manehattanite. But as time went by and she learned the ins-and-outs of society life, her cutie mark seemed reluctant to appear. To her horror, her brother Malachite, a whole year younger than her, got his cutie mark before she did! Utterly despondent, and now even more the target of ridicule at school, Crystal took to skipping class and wandering around Manehattan instead. But during one of her excursions, she came across a salespony with a stand full of potted herbs and vegetables for window gardens. She was amazed by the idea of actually growing her own food. Her family had always just bought it! She only had enough money for one, so she picked the prettiest plant she saw - a bright red chili pepper plant. She was so excited, she ran straight home, forgetting that she was supposed to be at school for another three hours. After weathering her father's lecture on responsibility, grades, and her future, she did something she'd never willingly done before - cracked open a book. She knew all about which course to eat first at a formal dinner, and how to address city officials, but she didn't know a thing about keeping a pepper plant alive. Despite all probability (and her father throwing it out once), the little plant lived and her collection grew. Time she had been spending feeling sorry for herself, listening to her sister's melodic voice lessons and seeing her brother's masterful paintings, she was now spending caring for her window box. She was happy enough doing that, but she was even happier when a pair of bright red chili peppers appeared on her flank, after using her home-grown peppers to make 3-bean chili for her family. After that, Crystal made a decision. City life was for her, no more! The countryside was calling, and she was determined to head out and start her own farm, just like the country ponies! Her mother was even more determined that she stay home until she was a full-grown mare, though, so she is only just now heading out to make her dream come true. In the meanwhile, she's had a few years to fill her head with ideas of what farm and frontier life is like, from plays, drawings, and books (she prefers the short ones with pictures). She has no idea how to tend a piece of land that you can't hang outside a window, and has only seen drawings of plows, but she isn't going to let that stop her! So, yes. Her name isn't related to her cutie mark at all; I wondered what would happen if a pony's parents named them according to family conventions and they ended up being completely unlike the rest of their family. But if y'all think it would be better changed, or if a pony would be likely to change his or her name in this case, I'm open to suggestions! I'm also super tired right now, so I'm marking this as WIP for now so I can come back and read it when I'm less bleary-eyed. EDIT: Got some sleep! Added a couple of sentences but don't see a whole lot else I'd change, barring critique, so I'm marking this as final now. (Also feel free to critique the design I've come up with. I favor obnoxious colors in my artwork sometimes, but I don't know if it looks any good for a pony.)

I dunno how ethereal/spooky you want this to be, or if you'd rather this be more of a fun-sounding thing, but Dead Can Dance has a lot of songs that I think sound pretty haunting. Like or or . A lot of stuff from their "Within the Realm of a Dying Sun" album sounds like that.

I have friends who tell me that Superbad and the Hangover are the funniest movies ever, but these are also the friends who thought Anchorman and Napoleon Dynamite were the funniest movies ever, and gave me shocked looks when I said I hadn't seen them. I eventually gave in and was left with the feeling of wanting those 4 hours of my life back. So I just tend to not see movies unless I'm already interested in them, or if someone else is paying. I don't end up seeing a whole lot of movies!

Heh. All I can figure is the crowd has to be entirely little kids, and parents who are either pleased they don't have to be chasing their kids around whatever fair that is, or wondering how discreetly they can take a nip out of their flask.

Hah! Me either. Having all of my friends tell me I NEEDED to watch that movie sort of killed any drive I had to see it while it was still in theaters. I keep meaning to watch Amelie and Chocolat. They roll by on my Netflix suggestions and I think I should watch them, but inevitably opt for some Doctor Who or Buffy instead (both of which I've watched all the way through at least four or five times by now) so I can doodle or wander around while it's on.

Not really, but then, there's not nearly as big of a stigma for us ladyfolk. (Though I avoided My Little Pony like the plague as a little girl, because they were all pink and sparkly and didn't look like real horses anyway. I much preferred my dinosaur toys. Funny that it took me until I was 23 to get over that.) The mere fact that all y'all fellas either feel like you have to hide the fact that you like something "feminine", or you admit it and get flak for it, is one of the many reasons I'm a feminist. Something being "girly" shouldn't make it shameful! Guys have just as much right to enjoy an awesome show that just happens to have ponies in it as the girls do. Besides, after the whole, "Mom, I'm gay," conversation, admitting I like a kid's show hasn't seemed like nearly as big of a deal.

Heh, after I made a series of MLP/brony posts on Facebook, my great aunt messaged me to say she had no idea what a "Brony" was, but after looking the term and the show up, she was going to try to be one with her great granddaughter (who apparently loves the toys but hasn't seen the new show). So I might have ended up getting my great aunt and one of my kid relatives (what do you call the great granndaughter of your great aunt? I have no idea) to watch the show. Score!

I work two part time jobs and go to school part time. I work for the university I go to, doing boring security work. I make sure no one causes a ruckus (rarely), steals anything (surprisingly rarely, though someone did try to steal a spinning wheel out of the ceramics lab once), and lock up at closing. Mostly it translates to me getting paid to watch Netflix, or ponies. Cushy student job, really. I also work for a small dental marketing firm as "web support", which means I update dentists' websites, transfer domains and emails, figure out why things are broken and fix them, aaand for some reason design print ads. It's pretty nice, and I'm glad I'll have something on my resume other than "I sat in a building all night for minimum wage, and before that I bathed uncooperative, bitey dogs, also for minimum wage. HIRE ME." I'm seriously considering going to Guildhall for grad school. There are so few jobs in art education now, unless I want to move to Houston or look for a teaching job out of state (I don't).

Aww! He's cute. Mini poodles represent! I have one too. His name is Wesley (like the Dread Pirate, not the annoying Star Trek kid) and they estimate he's 1 or 2 years old. I got him from the pound in June this year. They'd found him hiding under a car in a parking lot, skinny and covered in 6 inches of completely matted hair. Now he's fed and happy. I lived without a dog for about a year, when my roommate and I were in an apartment that didn't allow them. It drove me nuts. Can't even say how many hours I spent staring at Petfinder, wishing I could take one of them home. Now I'm doing the same thing with cats. And rats. God help me when I live by myself; I'm gonna end up with a menagerie.

I'd read quotes from Lauren Faust about it, and seen some of the trailer mashups and figured they had to get the interesting-looking scenes from somewhere. Then I thought, "Well, it IS supposed to be pretty good, for a kids' show... Why not?" Then I remember cringing at the theme song and thinking, "Oh my god, am I really going to sit and watch this?" The next thing I know it is 4 AM and I've watched half the season and all I can think of is ponies.

I confess, I haven't read all the Dune books. I can't bring myself to read the ones Frank Herbert didn't write himself.

*Brohoof!* :3 Dune is the first novel I ever sat and read, cover-to-cover, for fun. It took me fifty pages to even get the hang of reading Herbert's writing style, but I was determined and it was well worth it. I have been known to shout "I AM THE KWISATZ HADERACH!" at the apex of roller coasters. It's highly satisfying! One day, I may even be riding with someone who knows what I'm saying. >

Try looking into that place where you dare not look! You'll find me there, staring out at you! I... I might like Dune too, just a little. >.>

About myself.: Hallo! My name is Kirah, but I picked up the nickname "Dunes" somewhere along the line and I tend to roll with it. I'm a college student, majoring in studio art and art teacher education. I hail from Texas, and other than art, my hobbies are reading, comic books, video games, learning CSS/PHP/that sort of thing, and exploring the great outdoors with my dog. How did you hear about Canterlot.com?: Someone mentioned it on a Brony meetup group and I thought I'd give it a shot. How did you became a fan of FiM?: I thought the FiM trailer mashups were amusing and decided to see what the fuss was about. My one favourite main cast pony?: AppleJack ^... Though Rainbow Dash is a close second. I'm new to My Little Pony in general. Growing up, I knew it existed, but I didn't care for the shows and I preferred toys that looked like realistic animals (I had strange standards as a kid). I really have no nostalgic connection to MLP; which is why my newfound, unabashed love for FiM took me completely by surprise. I don't remember where I saw the first trailer mashup video. I think it was probably "The Elder Scrolls VI: Equestria" that I saw first. I thought it was funny, and then forgot about it. Then I read an article on the show, and why the internet loves it, and thought, "Huh! Cool." Then I forgot about it again, until a few weeks ago when someone linked me the "My Little Serenity" video and I just thought, "Hey, what the heck? I'll watch a couple of episodes. It's supposed to be pretty good for a little girls' show." Yyyeah. A couple of episodes turned into fourteen episodes in one night and me asking, "Whoa! When did 4 AM happen?!" I don't really understand it, or how a show about magic, candy colored ponies learning about friendship has me glued to my monitor for hours on end with a doofy grin on my face. But it does! But I've found that some of my friends are bronies, and that my actual, related-by-blood brothers are bronies, and they get it. I think I may even be converting one of my roommates. Though I'm sure the others feel like they've heard more than enough about the whole thing by now, so I figured I oughta go somewhere and channel all these ponies in my brain. This show has cracked my cynical, sarcastic exterior! I find myself surprised and delighted by the whole thing. PONIES. So, yes! Hi.