Tom love

I was watching a Tom and Jerry cartoon with a young cousin recently when I realized, I was on Tom’s side – I wanted the cat to come out on top in every situation and swallow the mouse before the popcorn got over. Perhaps I have finally attained the maturity my parents and close friends thought I never would. Or, perhaps, I was rooting for the underlog, or in this case, the undercat. It is also possible that I am heartily sick of my resident mouse which eludes capture and lives off my collection of rare cheese, books, clothes … sigh!

My cousin hasn’t spoken to me since, and refuses to talk to me till I transfer my affection to Jerry again. I called up a few friends and discovered that nearly all of them are now Tom-friendly and Jerry-haters. How did this happen? How did a whole generation that thrilled to the adventures of a mouse suddenly switch sides? I think the answer has something to do with turning 25? There is nothing more tacky than a 25-year old mouse supporter who thinks its cute for a cat to get its head knocked off while chasing a rodent around the house, which the rodent might – if left unchecked – reduce to a shambles. One of the Tom-lovers told me that if you have a Papa mouse and a Mamma mouse in your house on January 1 of any year, by December 31 of the same year, you would have around 800 mice. They multiply faster than a computer.

In London (don’t stop me if you have heard of this one before, but you are never more than ten feet from a rat in that city), the friendly neighborhood shops are full of simple gadgets that use glue and get a passing mouse or two stuck in their folds. I saw many people pick up these gizmos and laugh their heads off because these said that once a mouse is trapped, it must be disposed off in a "humane" way. Humane? How? Sing songs while drowning them?

As far as I am concerned – and my thoughts are echoed by my hastily-surveyed friends – the only good mouse is a dead mouse or one that helps the cursor on your computer move. But how do you explain that to a young cousin? He thinks there is nothing more touching than a mouse that somehow manages to find its way into a cake baked for the family, for instance, or one that peeps out from behind a bookcase.

No wonder they say television is ruining the young generation. And our young cousins.