According to officially gathered statistics, I am Belle (from Beauty and the Beast) on the Facebook “What Disney princess are you?” survey.

For the record, this means:

You’re an intellectual and pride yourself on it. You know that your mind will lead you to great things - and it will also lead you to a better understanding of those around you. Like, say, a beast.

I wouldn’t go as far as saying that either Belle or myself are intellectuals… but this is Disneyland (and Blogland) so I’ll just let that one slide.

Guillaume is Ariel, which has got me thinking about the troubled past of Copenhagen’s Little Mermaid statue. Since the 1950s, she’s been blasted off her rock with dynamite, painted numerous times, and even had her arm sawn off in a drunken amputation.

The first time she lost her head was a political/artistic act by Danish artist Jørgen Nash and the Bauhaus Situationniste group in the 1960s - but the culprits of the second decapitation remain a mystery, although her head was anonymously returned to a Copenhagen TV station on the promise of an unpaid reward.

This iconic though diminutive statue draws plenty of non-vandal crowds to Copenhagen harbour’s Churchill Park too, including yours truly… on one very cold, early December morning. It was just me, her, and a field mouse. One of those magical pre-breakfast moments.

The Little Mermaid is a story from the beloved Danish fairytale author, Hans Christian Andersen, written in 1836 and not a product of the late 1980s Disney imagination. The image of the mermaid is common in Slavic folk mythology, and there are elements of Andersen’s tale in Dvořák’s opera, Rusalka.

How’s that for your daily trivia fix?