Metaphorically SpeakingView OnlineLike a BossMetaphorically SpeakingTwilight awoke, a droplet of milk being expelled from the enema bag of unconscious slumbers into the anal sphincter of the living world. She yawned and stretched her forelegs more vigorously than a politician would the truth. She opened her eyes--bright orbs of knowledge intake that they were--and welcomed the chariots of light that sought entrance to their portals. She smiled like a happy dog you've just given a treat to: this day was going to be perfect! She rolled out of bed like a Wonderbolt mid-maneuver, landing solidly with her hooves on the ground. Trotting over to the window, she swung open wide the panes and the frames which held them, preparing to burst out in song, the fat lady in the metaphorical Canterlot Gardens Opera House. But fantasy crashed down into reality like Kuno crashed into Warden's garden, and Spike's half-awake voice of reason reached the would-be petty-criminal just in time: Twilight, no singing loudly before seven! I looked it up once--it's the law!" Twilight grumbled like an empty stomach, briefly considering yelling an epithet of vulgarity concerning the law while knocking over chocolate milk.. Instead, she, a vessel of righteous fury mightier than that of a metrosexual river dragon with a botched mustache, resolved to channel her burning passion against this injustice into something more productive, namely getting some tea. Her urge to sing bottled up like the intestines of a pony on a low-fiber diet, Twilight trotted down the stairs humming quietly to herself. She figured she--the paragon of proactiveness--would just have to make some tea to simultaniously and paradoxically both calm her nerves and wake her mind and body, much like loud music employed by musicians such as DJ-P0N3 not only excites its listeners into a frenzy, but then works that frenzy into an almost calm trance-like state. But to her horror, the more she searched her cupboards for tea, the more she came up empty, and she felt she was an arctic explorer desperately seeking a northwest passage above Equestria, only to find it nonexistent. While the topic of northern topography and geography fascinated her to no end, at the moment she was more concerned with the protestations of her body at not having the caffeinated nectar. Finding no teabags in her kitchen, and having no trees bearing suitable leaves for brewing nearby, Twilight readied herself for the arctic expedition that faced her now. She would have to brave the elements, and this early in the morning, there was no element that terrified her more than the element of laughter. Make no mistake, Twilight loves Pinkie Pie, has almost always loved her since they first met, and will almost always love her until they someday part ways, when Pinkie heads off to the great party in the sky. This is a genuine familiar love, not the love a snake has for a mouse or the love the author has for puns which make one groan like Twilight's stomach was at the moment. That being said, Twilight preferred not to deal with Pinkie's antics until at least her third cup of tea, as if Pinkie were a caustic but fun-loving acid and Twilight's tea a base, with the third cup being the one to finally neutralize the pH, with pH here standing for "Pinkie's Hyperness". Alas, Sugar Cube Corner was by far the closest place that sold tea, and to be honest, if Sugar Cube Corner was Princess Celestia, most of the other breakfast joints in Ponyville were Princess Cadances, that is to say, simply not as impressive, and a bit late to the party. Yes, for this amazing ambrosia, there was only one joint that would do, and it looked like a gingerbread house suffering from gigantism. Her destination decided like a court case, Twilight walked out the door of the library. She fumbled desperately for her key in her saddle bag, like the author scrounging through his homemade trail mix searching desperately for those last few tiny pieces of dried pineapple (This actually happens frequently. I need to buy more dried fruit.). Then she remembered she was a psychokinetic alicorn princess, lower-tier godlike in her powers, and just locked the damn door from the inside with her magic. She wandered over to the sweets shop in a daze, wandering there like a sailor wanders home from a lost war. It being early morning, added to the fact that she never got enough sleep, added to the fact that she hadn't gotten her tea yet, meant that her heart, mind, soul, and body all felt like they had been run over by a riding lawn mower, then stitched back together, then marinated in lemon juice and fed to parasprites. But she would have none of this, and told herself to chin up and not to bet on sinking ships, as if she were a rainbow-maned pegasus giving advice in a FiMFlamFilosophy production. Inasmuch, soon she bounced along the path with a hop in her step, a narcoleptic butterfly skating the ground, only for the cruel mistress gravity to takes its course once more, thus tracing a parabolic arc of sorts. Thusly propelled like a kangaroo, Twilight hopped along the roadway, taking in the sights and sounds of the morning as she did so. As she locomoted from point A to point B, Twilight found herself lost in thought, an explorer trapped in and at the mercy of her own brilliant mind. She wondered aloud whether she, being an alicorn, would outlive her friends, or whether she would simply outlive them because she possessed superior nutritive and medical knowledge, thus being the most gifted from an evolutionary perspective, much like a shark hatchling eating the eggs of its siblings and potential rivals until it is the only newborn pup left, except without all the cannibalism. Twilight found this notion to be depressing, a black hole gobbling up joy in the sea of happiness, and vowed to write angsty fanfiction about it to help herself cope with the existential stink of the whole thing. For her own personal health (she did plan on living the longest after all, and stress, like cyanide, can be highly toxic.), she quickly chose to focus on happier things, like soon having her tea, which hopefully wasn't almond flavored, as that would be highly ironic. Travelling as such, Twilight soon found herself in front of the Sugar Cube Corner, the time having passed by like a library book due date you totally forgot about. Steeling herself for the inevitable whirlwind of insanity, she opened the door... Author's Note To Be Continued...
Let's Not Forget About Analogies!View OnlineLike a BossLet's Not Forget About Analogies!Previously on Like a Boss: Twilight soon finds herself in front of the Sugar Cube Corner. Steeling herself for the inevitable whirlwind of insanity, she opens the door... And nothing happened, like that time you tried to get it up for that super hot mare/stallion (depending on your preferences), but couldn't because of your serial masturbation addiction. Twilight walked into the empty Pâtisserie like the rebel fleet walked into a trap in Return of the Jedi. In fact, the room was empty, much like the head of a Neighgyption mummy, because the embalmers fished out the brains with a hook and a spoon. Twilight was Daring Do exploring a lost temple--at least that's what she would have pretended, had she stumbled upon an empty Sugar Cube corner when she was, say, eight. Now though, she simply wondered where everypony was. "Pinkie? Are you here, you wondrous sugar-fueled pony-shaped parasprite? Mr, Mrs. Cake, are you here, or are you also missing like three sevenths of a delinquent foal's homework assignments?" All that answered her were mysterious screams coming from the basement, dark stabbings of sound into the body of her awareness. Cautiously, she made her way to the basement, as if this story were about to take a sudden turn into a much overused and dark direction, one that happens to rhyme with "Pup Bakes". She opened the portal to the truth and descended down the steps, the haunting shouts growing louder, her heart growing stiller. She reached the landing, and with abated breath, rounded the corner like a benevolent teacher rounds grades up. What she saw made her gasp; here she was a punctured tire (tyre for you ponies from Eur'Eeyup) throwing away its air like so many bean bags. "Hey Twi! 'Grand Theft Taco Five' just came out! Wanna join us?" Author's Note Sorry for the short chapter. But I figured it was better than no chapter at all for a few days. Someday I'll get my writing mojo back. Today is not that day.
Metonymy or Synecdoche, Does It Really Matter?View OnlineLike a BossMetonymy or Synecdoche, Does It Really Matter?Previously on Like a Boss: Twilight enters the Sugar Cube Corner basement, only to find Pinkie and the Cake family... playing video games? “Huh,” Twilight said, which was something she quite frequently said, seeing how she was a veritable treasure-trove of pithy responses to absurd situations. “…So,” Pinkie said, as if finding her and her surrogate family videogaming in the basement was a normal, everyday occurence, because for Pinkie it was, because if the rest of the world was radio and micro waves, Pinkie was gamma-rays: Extremely high energy and on a totally different wavelength from everypony else, “you gonna join us or what?” As she asked this, her character in the game attacked a Doritos-flavored taco with sour cream, as if she was really firing globules of… something else white. “Well, um,” Twilight started like Windows 98 after you messed it majorly up, that is to say, in Safe Mode, “I’d… really, I’d love to, but the main reasons I came downstairs were to make sure there was no wanton and implausible torture going on down here, and because I want a cup of tea to help wake me up, though I feel pretty awake right now, because if finding your family downstairs was a telecommunications relay, then I must have just gotten a wake-up call.” “Sooo, you’re saying you want a cup of wanna-be wish-it-was Joe, a faux liquid heaven?” Twilight harrumphed, a splash of discontent in a sea of gaming-induced euphoria. “Do NOT belittle tea like that, because everypony who’s anypony knows it kicks coffee’s figurative butt around the block and back. But yes, I would like a cup of it.” Ohhhhh, well then, why didn’t you say so?” Pinkie asked in a singsong voice, fully cognizant of the fact that that line is overused, like your mom, who I’m sure is actually a very nice person. “I did say so, Pinkie,” Twilight said slowly through clenched teeth, before remembering Cadance’s stress relieving technique she had taught her (not as effective as sinking the pink raft (if you know what I mean), but much more socially acceptable to do in public) like Equestria remembers its veterans on Veterans’ Day. “So please, before I do something rash, like contemplate how we are but specks of dust in an uncaring sandstorm of life and death, or not use figurative language in a sentence, please get me my damn tea.” “Okay, I’ll fetch your tea! Woof, woof!” Like a rabbit (which apparently thought it was a dog) doped up on powdered cocaine, Pinkie hopped up to the ground floor to procur some tea, with Twilight trailing behind her, her hooves *click clock clip clop*ing up the stairs. By the time Twilight had reached the landing, Pinkie had already produced a cup of मसाला चा, or masala chai tea, and set it on the counter, the way fate sets us on our path toward death. The moment of truth had arrived like an anxiously awaited DerpyMail© package. Her Royal Majesty Alicorn Princess Twilight Sparkle the Second of Equestria took a sip, and everything else fell away, for the tea was amazing, a whirlpool of exotic flavors spun into bliss. Twilight salaciously wrapped her lips around the savory taste as if the savory taste was horse penis, and she a prostitute (her lips would still be lips in this scenario.). This was heaven; this was paradise; this was finally getting her morning tea, and most importantly, this was her no longer having a latent desire to do something she would later regret to ponies she didn't like. At last, Twilight was as happy as a clam, because Twilight Sparkle had her tea. Launched into a state of higher consciousness by this ambrosia, Twilight ascended to a new plain of knowing. She considered for a moment how fantastically fantastic so many days of her life were, as if she was simply a series of words which together made up a fan interpretation of an alien children's moving picture comic. She chuckled under her breath at the outlandish idea, shaking her head softly as if a senile metronome. She lapped up her tea like a cat and promptly brushed away the absurd thought. Author's Note This chapter was written last night when I was half asleep, straddling the boundary between the realms of awareness and nil, because that's what I do on Friday nights while the rest of you are having sad pity sex. What's sad is that this is the first multi-part story not complete upon publishing I'll actually have finished.
