Disney princess quiz makes napping impossible
May 29—I had a headache, not that it seemed to matter much to Arlie.
"You know what we're going to do while we wait for Mama to get home?" my 6-year-old daughter said as we entered our kitchen through the carport door.
"I don't know what you're going to do ..." I told her as she kicked off her boots in the middle of the kitchen. "... But I have a headache. I'm going to take a quick nap on the couch."
"OK, Daddy," she said, as she spun in tight, dizzying circles for no particular reason other than childhood insanity. "But while you're napping, let's play a game."
"That's not really how naps work," I told her. I dimmed the living room lights to prepare for the brief respite I already suspected would not happen.
"Here's what we're going to do," she continued, her plans undeterred by my own. She was pacing the living room floor, moving her hands up and down in sharp motions to emphasize her points. She looked as she might be explaining something extraordinarily complicated to something extraordinarily stupid — religious eschatology to a duck, for instance.
"You're going to lie on the couch ..." she started.
"Sounds good to me," I said as I scrounged around the coat closet for a specific blanket among the pile crammed inside.
"... and while you do that, I'm going to do some voices, and you're going to guess what Disney characters they are."
I plopped down on the couch and spent a few agitated seconds violently struggling to untangle the blanket and cover myself.
"Arlie," I said. "Work was exhausting. I have a headache. I'm tired. I just want to take a 10-minute nap. Why don't you go play or watch YouTube or something?"
"No way, Daddy," she said, still upbeat. "I want to play with you. OK ... who am I?"
Her voice dropped into a deep murmur.
"'Poor unfortunate souls ...'" she sang, the notes low and off-tune. "'... so sad, so true ...'"
My eyes were closed, face buried in a pillow, so I couldn't actually see what Arlie was doing, but the way her voice bounded around, I could imagine her spinning theatrically throughout the living room.
She mumble-sang a few more bars, the actual lyrics impossible to decipher, and then crescendoed into the finale.
"'... AND do I help them? Yes, indeed.'
"OK, Daddy," she said, returning to her normal, perky tone. "Who was I?"
"Olaf, the snowman from 'Frozen,'" I muttered into the couch cushion.
The gasp that followed told me my daughter was appalled by her father's stupidity.
"No, Daddy," she said. "It's Ursula. From 'The Little Mermaid.'"
She put special emphasis on each word of the movie's title, just to stress how obvious the answer should have been to anyone who isn't a complete moron.
"OK, here's the next one," she said.
Once again, I protested.
"No, Arlie. My head hurts."
"This one will be easy," she continued, then sang at the top of her little lungs, "'A whole new world, don't you dare close your eyes. Hold your breath, it gets better. A whole new world.' Who am I, Daddy?"
"Batman."
This time, she growled in frustration and stomped her foot against the hardwood.
"That's not even a Disney character, Daddy."
"Give it a couple of months," I said.
"It's Jasmine," she said. "From 'Aladdin.' Try harder this time."
The unlocking of the kitchen door spared me continued torture. Arlie, delighted because her favored parent had arrived at last, dashed into the kitchen.
"What's wrong with your daddy?" Mandy said after some momentary fawning over each other.
"I don't know," Arlie told her in a sing-song way. "He says he has a headache."
"You have a headache?" I heard Mandy say, light concern in her voice.
"Bit of one," I answered.
"OK," she said, and I swear I could hear her grinning. "This guitar will help."
Arlie gasped as Mandy fetched her acoustic.
"Can you play Disney songs, Mama?"
"No, but I can try," Mandy said, sort of strumming the first few chords of some beloved Disney tune from memory while Arlie accompanied her with the misinterpreted lyrics of a completely different song.
As I nestled deeper into the couch, the throbbing of my temples seemed to keep time ... a metronome for my family's off-kilter lullaby.
ADAM ARMOUR is the news editor for the Daily Journal and former general manager of The Itawamba County Times. You may reach him via his Twitter handle, @admarmr.
