Tinker; First Post!

Howdi,

My name is Tinker.

Why 'Tinker'? I have no clue.

What do I like? Uhm well.... 'Them'... no you will not find out who.

What are my favourite things? Well uhm...err... music.... and fairies, that's about it, well and of course fantasy

(fantasy movies, fantasy books, etc.) And my mates.. and not just the ones that write on this 'thing' either, sorry Nou, Sheena, and Mary Sue, I have mates out side our 'circle of five'... *coughfourcough*

What else? Not really anything.... Not any thing I can think of at the moment.. Well I HATE horror movies ((heheeh horror movies)), I can't sleep if I see them... Yes, I get nightmares. I do very much like London ( well want to visit it any way). I REALLY want Winklepickers. I love those shoes.... I like eyeliner, hardly ever wear it though..... Oh and I have black hair. Other than that there is nothing really worth mentioning... not that anything I've said so far was but hey, I was suppose to empty my brain.

Without love, or anything else for that matter,

Tinker

Howrse; Mary Sue

(Note to howrse contest judges: This is a shared blog between me (username: Ishiibanora) and my friends. I have their permission to use our blog for this purpose. All names mentioned are invented for safety reasons)

Well, I've told my friends multiple times that I do indeed spend a lot of my free time playing horsey games. They think it's silly. But believe me, it's fun! Today, I'll introduce a horse breeding and showing SIM called Howrse. There's currently a blog competition running on there, so I figured I might as well give it a shot. I asked Tinker, Nou and Sheena for permission, of course.
Basically, you have your own little horse breeding farm. You start out with one foal, play with it, raise it, train it, take it for rides, enter competitions, and eventually breed it. Eventually, you start buying more horses to increase your breeding spot. It's confusing at first, but once you've gotten the hang of things, it's great!
I myself have specialized on Thoroughbred racehorses. A friend of mine gave me a double-greenstar (explained below) TB mare. Have a look at her, isn't she gawjus?
Soon, I started breeding her. Breeding is one of the main parts of howrse. Each horse has a specific Genetic Potential (GP) for each stat (Stamina, Speed, Dressage, Galloping, Jumping, Trotting) expressed as a numerical value. The higher, the better! DoubleExtreme (my TB mare) has a galloping GP of 110.08, which is quite incredibly high. Not as high as the top Thoroughbreds, which are somewhere in the 114s last time I checked, but still excellent. If a horse has a GP of more than 100 in a stat, it is awarded with a greenstar, if it has more than 110, it is awarded with a double greenstar.
Of course, there's more to breeding than just potential. The more you train a horse and enter it in competitions, the better it's offspring will be. This is measured in BLUP - the higher the BLUP, the better the foals. The maximum BLUP is 100, and this can only be reached if:
-All training is complete
-The horse has won at least 20 competitions
-At least 3 stats are 'bolded', i.e. as high as possible. This means that rides have also been completed.
It's quite a lot of work to get your horse to 100BLUP, but believe me, it's worth it!

Luckily, DoubleExtreme already had 100BLUP when I got her. So I started breeding her right away! I used stud offers put up by other quality Thoroughbred stallion owners. Some of her foals I'm most proud of are She Calls Me Tater and The Green Monkey. Cute, huh? The Green Monkey is going to be my main stud.

Of course, there's more than just Thoroughbreds! Here's some pictures of other breeds: (Clicky links)
Appaloosa (Foal)
Connemara Pony (Foal)
Hanoverian(Foal)

On top of the normal horses, there's also Pegasi and Unicorns. How amazing is that? Here's some piccos. (Click the links)
Arabian Unicorn Foal
Standardbred Unicorn
Australian Pony Pegasus

And to finish it off, some more general screenshots of the game: (Clicky links again)
Basic Log-In Page
Horse List/Barn
Mailbox (Yes, I actually talk to people. Astounding!)
Horse Auctions

And the best of all is, howrse is completely free to play! You can make an account without paying a cent. It is possible to purchase passes using real money, but it only gives you benefits, it isn't actually neccessary. So what are you waiting for? Why on earth are you still reading this? Go join www.howrse.com today! (And please refer to Ishiibanora as your referrer. Why not? I get something for it =P)

Sheena; Winklepickers!

Today everyone was out watching football, so I had the computer to myself for a few hours. I decided to go look at some shoes, winklepickers in particular, because I had heard of them and I thought they looked great.

Now I am completely in love with them! Here are some of my favourites: