Evidence that a couple of replaced consonants can ruin the reputation of a fairy tale princess for good

Snot Whine and the Seven Dwarfs

Once upon a time, in a land whose residents were often made uneasy because of rumours about a malicious consonant replacer, lived a family of three.  There was the King, whose first wife, a smashing woman, had snuffed it, to the great delight of the Brothers Grimm who were looking for material for a new story.

There was the King's new wife, an evil stepmother type, who was yet more evidence that fairy tale kings always make rubbish second-wife choices.

And then there was the daughter from his first marriage, Snot Whine.

Snot Whine was a beautiful, nay, ravishing girl.  But she had two problems.  (Three, if you include her name.)

Number one: she suffered from perennial rhinitis and her nose constantly streamed.  She made a god-awful racket in the mornings using one of those nasal inhalers, but it made no difference.

Number two: she never stopped moaning.  She moaned so much, she could have entered a 'Make the Noise of the Wind Coming Down the Chimney-Breast' competition and swept the board.

(Number three: Her name.)

Snot Whine and her evil stepmother did not get on.  This should not come as a surprise.  The sentence 'Snot Whine and her evil stepmother loved each other dearly' was just never going to convince.

One of the reasons they didn't get on was that, despite the continual sniffing and the complaining about every single bloody little thing, Snot Whine was a cracker of a girl.  And the evil stepmother, although beautiful in an evil-stepmother kind of way, was always paranoid that Snot Whine was better-looking.

She had a mirror into which she gazed day after day, saying to it, 'Mirror, mirror, mirror of mine.  Who's better-looking?  Me or Snot Whine?'

And every day the mirror would reply, 'You and Jordan are a dead ringer.  Compared to you, Snot Whine's a minger.'  Which made the evil stepmother very happy.

Until that fateful day when the mirror replied, 'Shame about the wrinkles, eh?  Snot Whine is the winner today!  You look mingin'.  She looks fab.  Get to the gym and lose that flab.'

It wasn't the best start to a day the evil stepmother had ever had.

She took swift action and called her guards.  'Guards,' she said, as they stood before her, trembling.  'This story has gone on long enough, and Fran reckons everyone will have stopped reading by now, because blog posts this long aren't a good idea.  Take Snot Whine to the forest, lose her there, and leave her to die.  Pronto.'

Later that day, and missing out a whole section to get her there more quickly, Snot Whine suddenly found herself in a little house with seven dwarfs who had just arrived home. This is the conversation which ensued.

Snot Whine: It's not fair.  I never wanted to come here and live with seven dwarfs.  It's not fair.  Wet sniff.

Happy:  Cheer up, love.  A smile never did anyone any harm, my dear.

Snot Whine: Bog off, shorty.  Wet sniff.

Doc:  That's a nasty cold you've got there, young lady.

Snot Whine:  I've had it for years.  It's not fair.

Bashful:  [still hiding behind his hands]  I haven't had the courage to look at her yet, but she doesn't SOUND like the fairy tale princess in the Disney film.  That one sang.  If this one starts singing, I'm outta here.

Dopey:  Eh?  Woss going on? Woss going on?

Grumpy:  Some snotty whiny female's arrived.  She seems to have lost the plot.  Hasn't she meant to have tidied up the place before we came whistling home from while we worked?  Typical!  Nothing ever goes right round here.

Snot Whine:  Tell me about it.  Wet sniff.  It's not fair.

Sleepy:  I don't care if she's made the bed or not.  Yawn.  I'm off for a nap.

Snot Whine: I'm not making anyone's bed.  Who do you think I am?

Sneezy:  Well, we thought you were this girl who was meant to turn up about now with a load of birds and butterflies flitting round her head, but there must have been a mistake with the agency.  Anyway, now you're here, would you like to borrow my Nasonex?

Snot Whine: Give it 'ere, then.  Might as well, s'pose.

It was not the most auspicious start to the relationship between Snot Whine and the Seven Dwarfs.  But it wasn't going to be a long relationship anyway because the story dramatically sped up from there for reasons the narrator has already mentioned.  The next day, the evil stepmother turned up disguised as a witch with a poisoned apple for Snot Whine and was met at the door by seven dwarfs who, having had the plan explained to them, fell over each other in the competition to put it in a crumble and feed it to Snot Whine.

Snot Whine had just died from the effects of the poisoning when the prince turned up (not expecting the story to have proceeded so rapidly, and therefore turning up too late).  He would have gone away disappointed, except that the dwarfs invited him in for a glass of champers and they were only to pleased to comfort him that, yes, he may still be single, but anything was better than sleeping next to a mucus factory who could moan for England.

As the dwarfs carried Snot Whine's body off to the mines to chuck it down a mine shaft, Sneezy was particularly miffed.  'She never gave me back my Nasonex,' he said to the others.  'What a cow.'

The mirror was relieved that the evil stepmother no longer felt she had to compete with Snot Whine's beauty, although it had to admit, she seemed to have let things slip rather quickly as a result.