Live Blogs From the Lerkim on top of my store (okay, my bedroom), I liveblog Seuss Celebration!

Nyperold2013-04-16 09:55:07

This is in the "The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat" menu with the next thing I'll be liveblogging in this space.

The Grinch is asleep in bed. He wakes up and yawns.

The Cat in the Hat is driving a yellow car.

Some... magenta? ...birdesque creatures form a balancing sculpture.

In some kind of town, a rooster is heard crowing. The narrator tells us it was a beautiful morning, with the sun coming up glowing and "glitzeling". When the dawn broke, the witzel birds all woke up witzeling. Apparently, that means "whistling". There seem to be a few colors of them.

Okay, we saw the Grinch wake up. But the narrator wasn't telling us how unusually beautiful the morning was last time. Even the Grinch woke up witzeling. His dog, Max, under the bed, was amazed, as this is unprecedented, at least in his experience. Now the Grinch is showering behind a curtain. Max finds this "gooder than good" (correct comparatives? Who needs 'em?) and grander than grand. The Grinch passes by a decorative catcus, plucks a flower, and inserts it into a vase. There's peace in his heart; therefore, peace in the land. He combs his hair and gives a very good morning to his reflection. His reflection is more grumpy, and scares Max. The real Grinch thinks it seems so, but his reflection doesn't see anything to witzel about, and considers him out of his head. And so, he wants the real Grinch to repeat the Grinch's oath with him.

Both: A Grinch is unhelpful,

unfriendly, unkind,

Mirror: with ungracious thoughts

Real: in an unhealthy mind.

Mirror: A Grinch is uncheerful,

uncouth and unclean.

Now say this together:

B: I'm frightfully mean!

My eyes are both shifty.

My fingers are thrifty.

R: My mouth will not smile.

M: Not half of an inch.

R: I'm a Grinch.

M: I am a Grinch.

The real Grinch declares himself a Grinch. Now the proud reflection wants him to go prove it. Max, who had been so happy at his master's change of disposition, hides away when he passes. As the Grinch leaves, "Prove it!" echoes through the halls.

The Grinch takes his blue-purple car down the winding roads. He first passes some witzeling birds, but then stops, says "Prove I'm a Grinch," and pulls a knob, causing a cloud of noxious exhaust to temporarily surround the birds, causing them to cough and totally not be in the mood to continue. With an "And a witzel to you" and a laugh, he drives off again.

Now we see a house of some sort whose driveway spirals around and around it, with a spiral of lawn separating one loop from another. Inside, someone is singing:

Oh, the bees are busy buzzin'

in the beezleberry vine

Just before that last line, we see that it's the Cat in the Hat, removing food from the refrigerator.

while the beezleberries sweeten

in the good old sunnyshine

He throws up his food, literally.

It's gonna be a sunny,

buzzy, beezleberry day

It joins other food on the table. He wraps the food in the tablecloth and puts it in a nearby picnic basket.

A day when cats

put on fresh hats

He takes off the one he has, and tosses it onto a rack with other hats of the same kind, then takes another out of a hat box and puts it on.

When cats put on their picnic hats

and go outside to play

He uses the hook of his umbrella to grab the picnic basket, then he slides down a striped pole and into a yellow car, which leaves. We skip the spiral driveway and see him outside the walls of his estate. He drives under a bridge

Oh, the leapfrogs are a-leapin

and they're leapin' mighty fine

and they're beepin' while they're leapin'

in the good old sunnyshine

It's gonna be a beepin', leapin' moo-moo of a day

A buzzy berry, beezly very, lulu of a day

The Cat parks the car on the far side of a hill, and ascends it. At the top, he sticks his umbrella into the ground and whips the tablecloth-picnic blanket out of the basket. Because this is a cartoon, everything falls nicely without making a mess or showing signs of having been bundled the way he did. Now he actually opens his umbrella and sticks it back in the ground. He extracts a vase from the basket, then picks a flower, deposits it into the vase, and gives it a good whiff.

Near that selfsame hill, the Grinch drives, and apparently crashes into something. Apparently, it's the Cat's car, and no wonder; it has been parked in the middle of the road. That's where you park cars, right? Not off to the side somewhere like some loser who doesn't want his car crashed into. Neither car seems to sustain damage, though it's not for the Grinch's lack of trying, as he rams it again. As the Cat looks, the Grinch tells him to get "this crate" out of his way. The Cat apologizes, then realizes he doesn't know the Grinch's name, but says that he seems to be blockerizing and obstructivating his mobility. The Cat has him hold his hot dog whilst he deblockerizes and deobstructivates the roadway, allowing him to sally forth. ...Cat, you don't have to put your picnic away, just move your car! Anyway, he deeply deplores any inconveniencialities he may have caused Mr. ...Greenface? The Grinch breakinates the forkifier in angermentosity, but the Cat reclaims the part with the hot dog (before the Grinch can throw it down), thanks him for his patience, and wishes him a felicitous resumption of his journey — here, the Grinch's car speedily backs up — towards his ultimate destination to... The Grinch is still mad about being called Mr. Greenface, and as the Cat drives away, the Grinch gives him chase. The Cat witzels along with the background music, and signals by hand that he's turning left. The Grinch is going too fast to react, and crashes through a sign and into some mud.

He's able to get enough traction, though, and backs out, leaving all of the mud back at the mudhole. He backs up to the intersection, and makes the left this time. He starts ramming the rear of the Cat's car. The first two rams are unnoticed, but the third is significantly harder, and it bounces that Cat a bit. The Cat looks behind, and the look on the Grinch's face scares him, so he speeds up. The Cat makes a turn into his driveway, and the Grinch speeds past. The Cat feels he can relax, and eats the hot dog. (No, it's not Max.) This time, we see him drive up the driveway, singing again.

In this world of complexitous complicatation

In this world of peculitous puzzleazation

In this world of vordunculous rufulization

There comes a time for relax...ification

The car can be inferred to have been parked, and the view goes up the building to a platform onto which the Cat emerges, playing a three-stringed instrument.

Your life's full of boulders

but shrug your shouldolders

Just shrug your shouldolders

Relax

He takes his own advice on a lounging chair.

In this world of com—

At this point, there's a sound like trying to play while still in fast forward mode. A couple of yellow wavy lines cross the screen. The sound startled the Cat, then he looks sheepish. He tries again, and it happens again. He tries a third time, and it happens yet again, making him fumble his instrument and fall off his chair. The Grinch, hidden in the shadow of the Cat's doorway with only his eyes visible, asks if he's having problems. The Cat nods, and the Grinch bids him enter, which he does, for some reason. Once inside, the Grinch shows him his "acoustical antiaudial bleeper", otherwise known as his vacusound sweeper. The Cat realizes that that's what's making the sound sound stupid. The Grinch explains that it sucks every noise and sound out of the air, and gargles it for a range of 50 miles. The Cat considers it impossible, implausible, unreasonable, and "unlawsible". He figures things like that don't happen in the midday, and he ignores them if they do. I suppose a degree of skepticism is warranted; after all, he only experienced it at maybe 5 yards. The Grinch sets it on him, gargling his sound. I guess it can be directed, as we hear the Grinch laugh. He declares that the Cat will only hear what the Grinch wants him to.

On again, off again

make the sound cough again

I am the boss of what everyone hears

The sound of your voice

is the sound of my choice

I am the master of everyone's ears

He takes the Cat outside, pushing the AAB along.

With a flick of my thumb

with the greatest of ease

If I wish, I can stop

all the buzzing of bees

He does, though without the sped-up sound accompanying.

And as for your lovebirds,

I can't stand their chirping

So I just my button

Your lovebirds start burping

He demonstrates, though it looks more like he induced actual burping.

The sounds that you make

are the sounds of my choice

I can make you sound better

or make you sound "woice"

When your bull goes out wooing

there'll be no more mooing

Sounds like a fire bell and siren.

When I wish to hear moos

I could hear them from youse

"Not from me," says the Cat, as if he thinks himself immune after it's already been demonstrated otherwise. The Grinch proves it again.

I can fuzzle the sound

of what everyone hears

I'm the puzzle, the master

of ev-ry-one's eeeeeears!

After a "Ha-HA!", he leaves, literally busting down the Cat's front gate, then laughs as he speeds down the road. He speaks the last sentence in his song as he drives up to his place. He calls for Max, and Max tries to flee and hide, but the Grinch pulls him out, telling him not to hide. He drops Max, then tells Max how he snurgled the Cat's sound, and will do even more. He has Max take the AAB up to the 39th floor. I like that idea, having a dog pull a mechanical device up hard stone steps, especially so far. Although if it isn't durable enough, Max had better be. It is the Grinch's intention to make the Cat suffer.

Said steps are on winding staircases flanked by nothing, with nothing but your own sense of balance to keep their climbers on. Which means that if the AAB goes over the edge... well. Max goes with it. The workshop is something of a mess.

This is the liggle gear

and As You Know

It goes 'round and it makes

the biggle gear go

and the biggle gear turns

the elliptical scrunch

which in turn is attached

to the dratsital thrust

which rotates the flange

of the salamar gotch

and that decompresses

the spatulet springs

which fluctuate 'round

in the rabulous rings

which heats up the pongs

as they heat up the pings

and that brings about

Max barks.

the most horrible things

The Grinch laughs, then notices Max slinking away. He picks him up by the collar, and asks if he knows what a lighthouse is. Max doesn't, so the Grinch sort-of explains that a lighthouse makes light. So, the Grinch built a darkhouse. He pushes a button, and casts darkness around the Cat, who is back relaxing on his chair with a book, such that he can't see his mitten in front of his face. Not that it's all that dark for us. Because plot, he stands up and walks toward the open edge, trying to feel something in the air. Dude, that doorway that was to your left? It still is. He very nearly falls off, but regains his balance, the spotdark following him. He runs through the house, and into the door, and he and lots of hats lay there on the floor. The dark spot casts through the ceiling. Back at the workshop, the Grinch laughs at the Cat, but you can tell by Max's growl he's not happy about that. The Grinch decides to contact the Cat through his darkhouse to taunt him by asking how he's doing. The effect radius for his gloom is twice that of his sound scrambling.

The Cat says the Grinch is psychopathic, and tries to figure him out. After trying to figure it out in his imagination, he decides to go to the Grinch himself. The Grinch, however, makes it hard to see where he's driving, and he stops. He tries to look around, but the Grinch increases the spot's radius. He reverses course a bit and takes another route, trying to keep ahead of the darkness. A couple of turtles a couple of feet withdraw at his passing. You know, Cat, if you don't look in the direction you're going, then it doesn't much matter whether or not you would be able to see. At any rate, the dark catches up, and the Cat speeds right into a dead end. He comes back onscreen, holding the steering wheel and riding a tire by standing on it and moving his feet backward.

The Grinch decides to mix it up a bit by casting persimmon pink instead. The cat runs into the Casa Casatta. (Ooh, could this be an instance of una palabra cromulenta perfectamente?) The entire outside is in colored light (dark?). A waitre d' brings him to a table and suggests the sizzling chef's special. The Cat says he's not hungry. (So he brought a lot of food, then almost immediately packed it away without ever eating most of it, and he's not hungry now?) The man says it's an excellent choice. The nearby musicians suddenly find their instruments playing themselves for a few seconds, changing from classical to what the caption says is big band. A waiter brings the special out. It appears to be a sunny-side-up egg, fish on a bed of lettuce, and tomato slice. The Cat takes a good whiff and decides to enjoy it anyway.

The Grinch decides to mess with the Cat some more, this time with a "double gadiggle flomax deluxe". He gives the egg spots of pink and green, putting the Cat off of it. Another ray, and the Cat is patterned blue. It fades after a few seconds, though. He keeps running without looking where he's going for some reason, though, and sets a cart with some lettuce in a bowl into motion with him on it, while a waiter drops the lettuce he's taken onto the floor. The cart goes through a door and crashes in the kitchen.

The Grinch laughs at him, and gives them a triple ringsits arunduggum geshlop, with a marshmallow sauce and a cherry on top. Some Dixieland jazz plays, and rainbow bursts of light shine, which the Cat dodges. Out of the last burst come waiter replicas: a green one with an orange-yellow towel and platter and orange dish cover, a purple one with blue towel, platter, and dish cover, and an orange one with orange-yellow towel and platter, and a green dish cover. They assemble in front of a man, and when he opens it, colored rings fly out. The Cat has his umbrella open, and the rings deflect off. Some fall around a woman. A man's chair and table dance. The entire Casa Casat(t)a dances, and the town in blackened with colored outlines, as if it was an inspiration for Moonside. The pots, cups, and plates in the kitchen dance as the confused chef looks on. The chandelier dances itself loose from the ceiling. It goes dark, so the Cat strikes a match. He is immediately rewarded with intersecting arcs of white on a blue background, then horizontal stripes of color. He runs, and, ack, so hard to describe this. Then, waves of color. The cat's face appears in each one in turn. He decides he's got to make him stop somehow. He figures there must be a soft spot of some sort. He chooses several patrons and staff to help him ungrinch the Grinch.

The Grinch asks his reflection how he's doing and gets a response of "Magnficiently". However, they then hear singing, and look for the source: at the end of his steps outside his door!

Soften your heart

Remember your mother

The Grinch runs upstairs.

Everyone, even a Grinch

had a mother

who taught him of love

between one and another

Remember your mother's warm arms

as she held you

Remember your sweet mother's eyes

The song starts bringing tears to the Grinch's eyes, and he's unable to bring hiself to whatever he was going to do (use the AAB, most likely).

She adored you

Remember how hard

mother worked to afford you

How she patted your cheeks

While you sat on her knees

Remember your wonderful

Grinch mother, please

He fights himself, trying to do something at the controls, but finds himself unwilling.

Wherever she's now

her eyes are still looking

The Grinch smiles, not a wicked one this time.

looking down at you

and wondering what's cooking

deep down in your brain

Must you give her more pain

Please soften your heart

Make Mom happy aaaaagaaaaain

The Grinch blows his nose on a pink handkerchief. Max tears up, too, and the floor in front of his chair is wet. The Grinch's mother speaks from the pool on the floor, saying everything's going to be all right, and tells him to be a good boy and clean up his room. He has Max get him a wrench.

The dark goes out, and it's once again a beautiful morning, with the sun glitzeling. The Grinch is disassembling his terrible machines, and the witzel birds are witzeling. Now, the inside of the Grinch's place is gilded rather than bare stone. The Grinch runs by the mirror, but stops to say a very good morning to his reflection. The reflection replies as before, but Max AABs the reflection instead of letting the Grinch's oath be said again.

Next time: The Hoober-Bloob Highway!

Comments

Vorhelleberg Since: Dec, 1969

Mar 15th 2017 at 5:15:12 PM

One correction: "So I just push my button / Your lovebirds start burping"

Vorhelleberg Since: Dec, 1969

Mar 15th 2017 at 5:21:37 PM

P.S. The burps of the birds actually sound more like hiccups.