Technical Difficulties

What with the whiny princess feet, I've been thinking a lot about the Little Mermaid recently.

I should say clearly, btw, that I hate Hans Christian Andersen. Terry Pratchett is on record as hating Lewis Carroll, and the way he feels about Carroll, although completely antithetical to my experience of Carroll, is pretty much word for word the way I feel about Andersen: "I didn't like the Alice books because I found them creepy and horribly unfunny in a nasty, plonking, Victorian way. Oh, here's Mr Christmas Pudding On Legs, hohohoho, here's a Caterpillar Smoking A Pipe, hohohoho. When I was a kid the books created in me about the same revulsion as you get when, aged seven, you're invited to kiss your great-grandmother."

Except, of course, that Andersen has no particular sense of humor.

As alert readers of the Doctrine of Labyrinths will probably have noticed, there is one Andersen story I like: "The Tinder Box." But "The Steadfast Tin Soldier"? No. "The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf" Hell, no. "The Little Mermaid"? No no no.

I should also say that, while (having a weakness both for musicals and for animated films) I enjoyed Disney's Little Mermaid, I was aware from the beginning that it was a cheat--quite literally the Disneyfied version. In many ways, it's a more satisfying story than Andersen's, but Andersen seems to have been quite deliberate in his choice to tell UNsatisfying stories. (N.b., I am not and do not pretend to be an Andersen scholar; I'm only going on my memories of the stories of his I've read.) And, you know, I do genuinely respect that as a choice, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

( spoilers for Peter Straub's novels SHADOWLAND and THE THROAT )

So I'm trying thecoughlin's advice for whiny princess feet (thank you, btw!), which means there is a towel draped across my footstool (stubby little legs to go with the whiny princess feet), and, periodically when I feel warm enough to take my slippers and socks off, my bare feet kneading it.

This would be the unparalleled glamor with which the life of a writer is filled.

It took Catzilla a couple days to notice (Catzilla, while nowhere near as dumb as my beloved first cat Richie, is nevertheless not the brightest porchlight on the block), but then this evening, he was all, "Dude, what are you doing?"

"It's not for cats," sez I, by rote.

"Dude," says Catzilla, unimpressed as ever by this line of reasoning. "It's totally for cats. Here, lemme see."

We then had to have a discussion about whether or not this was a game (the cat voted yes, the biped voted no) and whether or not the biped's bare toes were cat toys (the cat voted yes--"Dude! They're moving!"--the biped voted no), and then, philosophical in his defeat, he curled up on the spare stretch of towel, just close enough that I can feel his body heat on my right foot, and sacked the hell out. ("Dude, I told you. Totally for cats.")

Catzilla is the epitome of the annoying younger brother, for both the bipeds and the other cats, but he is, when all is said and done, a very sweet kitty.

I will try to remember his sweetness when we have to have this same discussion all over again tomorrow.

ETA 9:57 P.M.: My toes just got licked.

ETA 10:08 P.M.: The biped was just completely discombobulated (i.e., I broke all records for the sitting high jump) by the cat's cunning introduction of a milk jug ring into the field of play--I mean, the towel. Notice the way in which this achieves the feline goal ("totally for cats") while staying technically within the previously promulgated rules (which may be boiled down to, "No attacking my toes, fluffybutt.")

And in conclusion, totally for cats.