BEACHCOMBER 104 YEARS OLD AND STILL AWAY WITH THE FAIRY TALES…

ONCE upon a time, in a distant land with technology far greater than usual in fairy tales, there lived a vain queen with a beautiful step-daughter. Every morning, the queen would turn to her state-of-the-art mirror and ask it the following question: “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” and the mirror always told her that she was the fairest.

One morning, the mirror did not answer her question but said: “Software update available. Would you like to install?”

The queen said that she would like to install it and the mirror asked whether she was sure because installing the update would involve making changes to her mirror’s hard disk. “I said I wanted to install it,” said the queen. “Get on with it.”

“Please tell me you are not a robot,” the mirror replied.

“Oh for goodness sake,” said the queen, “I’m not a robot.”

“Last chance to change your mind,” said the mirror. “Do you want to install the update?”

“Yes!” screamed the queen.

“Installing update,” said the mirror. “Please wait.”

The queen tapped her fingers as she waited. After some time, the mirror’s screen went hazy and it said: “Mirrors 11 Operating System installed. Please turn off your mirror and re-boot the software.” “What?” said the queen. “Turn it off and turn it on again,” the mirror explained, so the queen did so. After some time, the mirror came back to life. “Right,” said the queen, “let’s try again. “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?”

The mirror hummed a little then said: “I do not understand your question. When you say ‘fairest’, do you mean most equitable, or most blonde of hair?”

“I mean most beautiful, of course,” the queen replied.

“If you were referring to hair colour,” said the mirror, “I’d have said it was either a polar bear or Mary’s little lamb. Sorry, what did you just say?”

“I said ‘most beautiful’,” repeated the queen. “Most humanly beautiful.”

“They say the lamb followed her to school one day,” the mirror pointed out, “so it was almost human.” The queen then kicked the mirror which shattered and they all lived happily ever after.