"I've got gadgets and gismos aplenty, I've got whosits and whatsits galore..."

Have you ever seen The Little Mermaid? I saw most of it on piratedmoviez.com (don't do it - quality sucks), and I think a lot about her. The girl with the beautiful red hair and her loving devoutness to her prince. We have a lot in common, despite that I'm a guy, I don't think I had red hair, and if I had a father, I wouldn't treat him half as poorly as she treats hers. And yet... neither of us can walk or speak (lucky dog, she got it eventually - I suppose I'm getting it now with this blog). We're both part of strange worlds that don't get us, and we both have to make a deal with the sea witch to get our freedom.

Though I'm fluent in English, you should know that it is not my first language. Before my sickness, before my permanent connection to the internet, I lived in a rickety two-story house on the coast of Foassel. On warm days, I used to delight in teaching my baby sister new words from our language, Foasselish. I was a smart kid, and so was she! I was speaking loads and even reading by the time they plugged me up.

I was so thrilled to find the internet! Boy was I a fool. The numerous worlds, the escape from my mutilated, worthless body, the knowledge that I could keep participating in my world in an almost normal way, it was all so enticing. I once thought I was lucky to be here, on the internet, sharing in these worlds. My sister was so jealous . We didn't have a computer at home, didn't need one I guess, and anyways, who really had internet back in '94? Not me nor my family, but the boy who used to sail in and stay with us sometimes had a computer on his houseboat and knew all about everything it seemed. I thought I'd be just like him. Cool, suave, you know.

The real truth is that I couldn't even navigate the internet when I first got here. I didn't know a word of English, except the boy on the houseboat once taught me the word, "Hello." When Doc first plugged me online, I found myself deposited at Yahoo's homepage, unable even to find my way around. I dizzyingly made my way to the empty box below Yahoo's bright, shining red logo and almost instinctively wrote my name, my language, my hometown in the box, but nothing came up. When I typed in "Foassilish," Yahoo took me to the mythical world of fossils and dinosaurs. Only six years old, without my mom or sister for the first time, and I was lost.