A Voyeuristic Squirrel with Some Road Kill Soup

Recently, while I was home, I was having a lovely time with a dear friend and it has recently come to my attention that a squirrel was watching us from the workout room in his basement.

While I don't mind being the center of attention, the fact that this pervy squirrel was watching us and did not make himself known makes me feel a bit odd.  It makes me wonder about the nature of animals versus the nature of humans.

At the mall where I work there is this pet store where the dogs lie in shredded newspaper in topless cages.  Everyday, masses of people traffic in and out of this pet store and squeal over the inane cuteness of these defenseless puppies.  I will admit that I am one of them.  I'm a sucker for a cute face, a soft coat, and a friendly disposition.  Most of these puppies fit the bill.

While I do enjoy trumping through the store and pushing past the little brats to get right up to the side of the cage, I feel sad too.  How would we as humans feel if it were reversed and a variety of fat ugly dogs paraded through a store where we were being held against our will in topless cages?

The topless cages are great for people like me who love to pet the puppies, but these poor animals must feel so cheated.  The larger of the puppies (like the male husky who has been there for weeks!) is tall enough to get his paws over the side and see out into the freedom that is the mall, but he is not strong enough to jump over it and wreak havoc in the food court.

I thought about working at a pet store once because I love the sweet animals, but I always feel inclined to steal them and take them home.  Considering I don't have a pet friendly apartment and am also allergic to most animals, this would not be an ideal part time job.  I also have the sneaking suspicion they would notice if a puppy went missing after every shift I worked.

Back to this peeping-tom of a squirrel.  Squirrels- like puppies- are quite cute so I decided to use my favorite web resource- Wikipedia- to see what they have to say about them.  According to wikipedia, they are generally clever animals who like to chew things.  Their nests are called dreys and they ignore fake owls.  Also- in some places in the continental US, squirrel meat is considered a delicacy.  I for one will not be eating squirrel on purpose any time in the near future.  

My dad told me he once found a squirrel on the side of the road (fresh roadkill  if there can be such a thing) and made a soup out of it and fed it to me and my sister.  For awhile I didn't believe him, but have reversed my thinking on the matter upon discovering that he recently whipped out his shotgun to gun down a coyote in our yard and proceeded to mount it on our wall.

Perhaps the squirrel that spied on us was simply seeking revenge because I ate his great uncle in a road kill soup.

A Fairy Tale Ending?

I'm Selina and the thought of having a blog frightens me.  I swore I would never write about my life on the internet for anyone to see, but after talking to a few people, I've decided that maybe this is the boost I need.

I'm 20 years old and I'll be 21 in a little over a month.  I'm an English Major, Classics and Sociology minor at the University of New Hampshire.  I want to write fiction 

someday, but as I am terrible at actually keeping up with writing, I'm hoping some brilliant idea will fall in my lap and I'll be unable to keep away from it.  I was

 complaining about my lack of motivation to write and my friend Neil told me I should start keeping a blog and that I should write in it every day.  Typically, I'm bad at taking advice, but I thought this sounded like a good idea, so here is is.  

I'm at work right now in Dover and I have such a difficult job that I am able to spend copious amounts of time writing blogs and searching for random stuff on wikipedia.  Right now I'm particularly intrigued by the fairy tale by Hans Christain Andersen entitled "The Steadfast Tin Soldier."  

It is a fairy tale story that I somehow missed when I was younger and I just recently stumbled upon it while rereading Inkheart.   Anyway, there is mention of this fairy tale and I had no idea what the story was so I went on wikipedia to see what happened and the story (quickly summarized from wikipedia) goes as such...

On his birthday, a boy receives a set of tin soldiers and arrays 

them on a table top. One soldier stands on a single leg as there wasn't enough metal that was used to cast the set of soldiers to fully form him. Nearby, he spies a lovely paper ballerina with a spangle on her sash. She too is standing on one leg and the soldier falls in love. That night, a troll, a "black bogey" in the form of a Jack-in-the-box among the toys angrily warns the soldier to av

ert his ardent gaze from the ballerina, but the soldier ignores him. The next day, the soldier falls from a windowsill (presumably the work of the troll) and lands in the street. Two boys find the soldier, place him in a paper boat, and set him sailing in the gutter. The boat and its passenger wash into a sewer, where a rat demands the soldier pay a toll. Sailing on, the boat is washed into a canal, where the tin solder is swallowed by a fish. When the fish is caught and cut open, the tin solder finds himself once again on the table top before the ballerina. Inexplicably, a boy suddenly throws the tin soldier into the fire in the stove. A draught blows the ballerina into the fire with him, and she is consumed at once; only her spangle remains. The maid later discovers the tin soldier has melted into the shape of a heart.

I don't know why this story is something that I have been thinking about a lot.  I have always and will always love fairy tales, and although this story does not end happily, it is a tale that has endured for over 200 years.  The latest version of the story takes place in Fantasia 2000 and is a pretty good representation of the story, but ends happily, which kind of bugs me.

One of my favorite quotes from my favorite show One Tree Hill is "There is nothing wrong with fairy tales- they all live happily ever after."  Although that saying is simple enough and generally true, is there ever such thing as a fairy tale ending??

I like to think there are two different types of fairy tale endings.  There are the types that emerged with Hans Christian Andersen which do not always end well (Steadfast Tin Soldier, The Little Mermaid) and then there are the sugar coated Disney Fairy Tale endings.  Both of the above mentioned stories were optioned by Disney and drastically changed to fit their mold of happily ever after.  In both tales by Andersen, the main characters die and the world goes on living.

This is not meant to be pessimistic by any means, just realistic.  As a little girl I always dreamed for my own fairy tale happily ever after, but I guess the original fairy tale did not always end well.  Judging by the two stories I have read by Andersen, I think I'm going to take some time and read what else he wrote. 

I think the paper ballerina serves as a tragic heroine.  Not only does she die tragically in a fire, she has a pretty sparkly sash which she uses to attract the attention of the pervy jack in the box as well as the soldiers.  I have decided to name my blog after her because in my head, if all it takes to be a heroine is a sparkly sash and not speaking, I would be the best heroine there ever was.

 Nothing like reading some literature for children to gain some perspective on life.