Shine On, You Crazy Diamond

     I hate my job.

     No, seriously, I do.

     What do I do?  What job do I have, you ask?

     I work at Sweet Apple Acres, more often than not putting in grueling fifteen-hour days, from milking the cows (where most of my conversations take place -- you wouldn't believe the things they say!) to picking apples (it never stops, I tell you) to anything else that needs attention (like painting the barn and repairing the roof to general household chores -- I'm not even safe from having to wash dishes, for Celestia's sake)!

     The worst part of it is that Applejack has a tendency to pay me a mere pittance of what I feel I deserve, but every time I go to her and ask for a little more money for the work I do, she tells me to stop with the fancy mathematics, despite the fact that inflation keeps making things more expensive.  It's a damned shame how little she pays me.  If nothing else, I consider myself fortunate that they feed me okay, but they take it out of my wages.  When I'm forced to sleep in the barn, they deduct that too.  But I digress.

     Allow me to introduce myself -- my name is Michael Walker, and it was about two years ago when I wished to wake up laying next to Twilight Sparkle in her bed in Ponyville.  When I did, she woke up screaming and attacked me with her magic -- seeing what she had done, she rushed me to the hospital.  She had visited me during the three weeks it took me to recover, apologizing to me every day.  Despite the fact she attacked me, I fell in love with her and proposed marriage to her -- and in a rare moment of compassion, she accepted.  Little did I know just what lay in store for me as a result of that marriage -- I was hoping that she might be as nice to me as she appeared in the show.  I had no idea of just how mean she could be -- perhaps I should have suspected as much from her initial reaction to my sudden appearance in her bed.

     There's a reason they call it the idiot box.

     Even though we had gotten married, she still insisted I sleep in the guest room.  I asked her why I couldn't sleep with her, but she never let me know why and warned me not to press the issue.  Even on our honeymoon, she demanded I sleep in the other room of the suite we had.  I'll talk about that later, though as they say, "What happens in Las Pegasus stays in Las Pegasus."

     Or maybe not.

     I wish I were back home again.  I thought I'd actually enjoy being in Equestria -- as it turns out, this place is nothing like on TV -- well, actually, quite a bit of it is, but -- the ponies aren't as friendly, especially to someone of a different species.  I'm the low man on the totem pole, so to speak -- I'm treated as a third or fourth-class citizen -- even the donkeys get better treatment than me.  My best conversations take place with the cows and donkeys, as both species sympathize with me and the treatment I receive.

    So I do the best I can under the circumstances.  I thought my life back on Earth was hard -- that's why I wished to leave -- but nothing could have prepared me for the consequences of making a wish without forethought behind it.  I hate to belabor a point, but -- this place really sucks.  Perhaps I should go back to Canterlot to meet with Princess Celestia again -- I think enough time has passed since my last visit, and hopefully her attitude towards me will have softened a little.

     What happened the last time, you ask?

    She asked me if I liked bananas -- and I'll just leave it at that.  I'm lucky I didn't end up on the moon.