# If "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" were written by someone else **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 13, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756 "2015-08-13T18:04:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/1 "2015-08-13T18:04:01Z")
[This thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=764882) has a link to an imagining of _If You Give a Mouse a Cookie_ if it were done by Ayn Rand. Wikipedia gives the [entire text](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_You_Give_a_Mouse_a_Cookie) for the original. Those who’ve been around a while know that this board has or had [some brilliant mimics](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=138905). So, what if _If You Give a Mouse a Cookie_ were written by someone else? Charles Dickens’s _If You Give a Mouse a Cookie_ The mouse had a cookie to begin with. Mind! I do not mean to say that I know the full source and provenance of the cookie, only that the mouse had it and there was no cookie seller standing by waiting to snatch it back from those tiny, grasping paws as if to say that the mouse had not paid its mite to have the cookie for its own. So I will repeat, if you will allow it, that the mouse had the cookie and having it and having nibbled at it the mouse fell into a state of such thirst it turned about looking for someone, anyone, to provide a glass of milk and a straw with which to drink of it, the mouse being very careful of its whiskers and knowing that milk would clutch covetously to those whiskers which the mouse had been so very proud of through the years! For it is by whiskers mice are known hereabouts and by whiskers mice should be known evermore. He came by a glass of milk. Again, I know nothing of the provenance but it was milk and cow’s milk at that in a tall, clear glass, twice the size of the mouse himself. And how the mouse could drink such a quantity of milk and stand by looking around as if to say that he would quite contentedly having another such glass of milk, his eyes so bright and crackling with a certain spirited fire that passersby would marvel if they saw it, but their eyes were cast down to watch their feet on the greasy cobbles, not looking around and peering through windows at a girl and a mouse and a boisterous fire. The straw preserved the features and whiskers so well the mouse looked quite gentlemanly and clean and sleek! He turns then piping up in that shrill voice to ask for a mirror and a pair of neatening scissors and trims and adjusts that glory of whiskers. “Oh! I am tired,” the mouse said suddenly. “Oh, are you?” replied the girl. “I am.” The fire spat and hissed a bit as the rain which had been lowering and growling earlier in the day kicked up a rumpus again. The girl started then nodded and picked up her candle. She took him up a long, grey, creaking staircase and they climbed and climbed, the mouse sometimes climbing on his own small feet and sometimes resting on the girl’s shoulder ever upward lurching almost as if she were a slow ship in a high waving sea! Then the mouse settled into bed and plumped up the pillows and sneezed with the dust that had gathered along the velvet hangings and pulled out a little sketching pad and sketched. The girl looked at the drawing in surprise. “Why that looks precisely like a glass of milk! But what is that next to it?” “Oh!” said the mouse. “A cookie is always what’s wanting when there is a glass of milk. Never to have a cookie with a glass of milk! Who has heard of such a thing?” * * * Gertrude Stein’s _If You Give a Mouse a Cookie_ If you give a mouse a cookie. If you give a cookie. He would like it the mouse would the mouse would like it would he like it. If the mouse if I told him if I told him he would like it he would like it he would like it. Eat. Please eat. Please eat now. And now. And the mouse says now there’s milk and the mouse says now and there’s milk the mouse says and now the milk says nothing the milk says and there is a mirror and the milk and the mouse and the mirror says the mouse says the milk says it looks like milk. Rinse the glass. Trim and brush. Draw. Drink. Repeat. Repeat exactly. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2015, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/2 "2015-08-13T18:35:01Z")
I have eaten the cookie that was on the table and which you were probably saving for yourself Forgive me It was delicious so sweet and so chocolatey Got any milk? ---
**Author:** ![Tangent](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tangent/32/3098_2.png) [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2015, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/3 "2015-08-13T19:10:54Z")
Donald Trump’s _If You Give A Mouse A Cookie_ Mice are losers and thieves and rapists. And some, I assume, are good people. But they’re always begging for handouts. “Ooh, give me some cheese, give me a cookie.” I’ve never made cookies before, but if I did, they’d be the best cookies. They’d be classy. I’d be a terrific cookie-maker. I have a plan to make the greatest cookies ever. My cookies will huge… like Rosie O’Donnel. Megyn Kelly will eat so many of these cookies she’ll have crumbs coming out of her nose and her… _wherever_. Let me tell you–my beautiful wife, Melania, she makes the most luxurious cookies. I think women will really love her cookies. Trust me. Rand Paul makes terrible cookies. I mean, his cookies are the worst. He’s a loser. Nobody likes his cookies. But we’ve got to keep the mice away from our cookies. I’m going to build the biggest, best mousetrap ever, and I’m going to make the mice pay for it themselves, because mice are losers. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2015, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/4 "2015-08-13T20:22:52Z")
Wee, sleekit, cowran, tim’rous beastie, O, what a panic’s in thy breastie! Thou need na start awa sae hasty. You beg the tiniest favor, I wad be laith to tell ye “nae”, When ye ask for Oreo or Nilla Wafer! I’m truly sorry Man and boy Has given ye nae Chips Ahoy, Or Pepp’ridge Farm or Keebler. Which would make thee happy, With me, thy poor, earth-born companion, Then ask for milk. I doubt na, whyles, but thou may drink; What then? poor beastie, thou may think! A straw would be a sma’ request: I’ll gie thee a napkin too, An’ never miss’t! Thy wee mousie face, too, in ruin! For a milk moustache ye’ll be viewin’. A mirror, now, to look for ane, O’ messy hair! A call for scissors will be ensuin, A trim will make him debonair. Thou see the floors covered up with hair. A broom you’ll ask me for, and fast, You’ll sweep around, and when you’re gassed, You’ll ask a bed be brought you there, To crash on, til your nap has passed And that’s your affair. Then wee mousie may, if able, Beg to hear a bedtime fable! I find a Grimm book on the table, But when he sees The pictures punctured by a staple Will fain draw one of these. Then Mousie, smaller than a midge, Will tape his picture on yon fridge. The best artwork of o’ Mice an’ Men, Gang smooth as silk, An’ lea’e him asking “Hey man, Didj Ya save some milk?” ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2015, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/5 "2015-08-13T21:48:09Z")
We STILL have brilliant mimics. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2015, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/6 "2015-08-13T23:57:00Z")
**QUENTIN TARANTINO** (Read in the voice of Ving Rhames) You give a mouse a cookie, the motherfucker’s gonna hit you up for all kinds of shit: milk, a straw, a napkin to wipe his motherfuckin’ mouth… FUCK THAT SHIT! You givin’ him a cookie, that’s just bullshit! All that “cute” shit, that’s just messin’ with your head! You don’t let the motherfucker fuck with your mind! Some mouse hit on you for a cookie, you don’t contemplate no “ifs.” You POP A CAP IN HIS ASS! We cool? You my nigga? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2015, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/7 "2015-08-14T04:01:03Z")
Well, I may as well copy/paste this one over: Mickey Spillane’s _If You Give a Mouse a Cookie_: I was in my grimy oven-box of an office on the 15th floor of the Flatiron with the Anvil Chorus playing an encore in my head. I’d engaged their services at O’Grady’s the night before, with the friendly bartender happy to act as conductor. The sudden scratching noise of somebody trying and failing to sneak around the blurred edge of my awareness put the .45 in my hand. I liked its reassuring wrecking-ball weight and snapped back the hammer with the sharp click of an bank vault opening on foreclosure day. “I don’t wan’no trouble!” squeaked the intruder. I narrowed my gaze on his beady eyes and pointy nose over a mess of unshaven whiskers. “Well, everybody wants something,” I muttered, more gravel in my voice than an underworked quarry. “I, uh, t’ought… maybe a cookie?” I closed my eyes briefly as the anvils crashed. “There was a guy named Fritz who wanted a cookie from me in the Ardennes. He ended up dancing a _Schuhplattler_ on the end of my bayonet. I got a medal for that, which I traded for a double bourbon the day I got back to the States.” I put the automatic down, letting it rest on my desk while still pointed at the intruder, its barrel yawning at him like every bored V-girl he’d tried to make in his entire miserable 4F life. I traded the wrecking ball for the reassuring cold curve of my reserve bottle and took a drink to quiet the chorus and send them on their way, positive review promised for tomorrow’s _Herald Tribune_. ---
**Author:** ![RobDog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f07891/32.png) [@RobDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RobDog)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2015, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/8 "2015-08-14T07:12:28Z")
**Dr Samuel Johnson** > [@](#): > > MOUSE. \*plural \*mice. _n. f._ [mus, Saxon; _mus_, Latin.] The fmalleft of all beafts; a little animal, lymited in dimenfions though not in appetytte and INDOLENCE, which like a FRENCHMAN when given an INCH will take a MILE ---
**Author:** ![swampspruce](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/swampspruce/32/261_2.png) [@swampspruce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampspruce)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2015, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/9 "2015-08-14T17:44:10Z")
Bravo! Anyone want to try Hemingway? I don’t think I could pull it off… The Mouse- By Edgar Allen Poe Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tugging, As of some one gently tugging, tugging at my pant leg by the floor. `'Tis some tiny visitor,' I muttered, `tugging on my pant leg by the floor - Only this, and nothing more.’ Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December, And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the cookie plate. Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to take From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Oreo - For the rare and radiant biscuit whom the angels name Oreo - Nameless here for evermore. And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before; So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating `‘Tis some visitor entreating treats from me upon the floor - Some late visitor entreating treats from me upon the floor; - Tis this, and nothing more,’ Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, `Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came tugging, And so faintly you came tugging,tugging at my pant leg by the floor, That I scarce was sure I felt you’ - here I looked upon the rug before me on the floor; - A mouse sat there, and nothing more. Deep into the mouse’s eyes peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered words, `chocolate chip please' This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the words, `chocolate chip please’ Merely this and nothing more. Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning, Soon again I felt a tapping somewhat harder than before. `Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice; Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore - Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; - ‘Tis the wind and nothing more!’ Open here I flung the shutter, when, while many a flirt and flutter, The mouse crunched contentedly upon the floor. Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched upon my floor - Perched upon my hearth rug just so upon the floor - Perched, and sat, with crumbs galore . Then this grey furred mite beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, `Though needest milk and straw,' I said, `to quench your thirst Eternal, napkin and mirror provided and ablution needed wandering from the nightly shore - Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!’ Quoth the mouse, `Nevermore.’ Much I marvelled this ungainly beast to hear discourse so plainly, Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blessed with seeing mice a sweeping - broom in slight hands, furiously sweeping, With such name as `Nevermore.’ But the mouse, mopping up the last remains, spoke only, That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing further then he uttered - but a yawn then he motioned - While I divined his intention `Other beds I've made before - On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.' Then the mouse said, `Nevermore.’ Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, `Doubtless,' said I, `what it requires is a bed beside the fire, And the book of lost lore’s story, illustrated in golden glory Followed fast and followed faster till his thoughts one burden bore - He gestured for coloured media and paper, and drew his at his leisure Of “Never-nevermore.”’ The mouse still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling, Straight I wheeled a chair,desk and pen in front of mouse and fridge and door; Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous mouse of yore - What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous mouse of yore Meant in squeaking `Nevermore.’ This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the mouse whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er, But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er, Artwork on my fridge-Nevermore! Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls on the floor did slip. `Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - all my scotch tape Cello - cello and 3M from thy memories of milk and cookie plates! Quaff, oh quaff this bovine bliss, and forget this lost chocolate chip!’ Quoth the mouse, `Nevermore.’ `Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if mouse or devil! - Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted - On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore - Is there - is there more cookies near the door? - tell me - tell me, I implore!’ Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.’ `Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if mouse or devil! By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adoreo - Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Boulangerie, It shall clasp a bag of cookies whom the angels name Oreo - Clasp a rare and fabled box, whom the angels name Golden Oreo?’ Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.’ `Be that word our sign of parting, beast or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting - `Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore! Leave no grey tuft as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the cookie plate near my door! Take thy claws from out my heart, and take thy form out of my door!’ Quoth the mouse, `Nevermore.’ And the mouse, never splitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the hearth rug seated placidly upon the floor; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming, And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor When in his terrifying timorous squeaking I hear him ask,“Got any more?” Quoth I to the demon mouse,“Nevermore!” ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2015, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/10 "2015-08-14T19:13:08Z")
by John Lennon * * * Picture yourself in a house in the kitchen With milk in the fridge, some nice Chips Ahoy Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly A mouse with kaleidoscope eyes Cellophane crackles, you pass him the treat Towering over his head Next thing you know he wants milk in a glass And a straw Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies, ah When he is finished he’ll ask for a napkin A mirror to see if he has a mustache Now he needs scissors to trim off his whiskers That grow so incredibly fast Give him a broom now to clean up the mess Maybe he’ll sweep the whole house Climb in a box for a nap, pillow fluffed And you read Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies, ah Picture a mouse now with paper and crayons He needs pen and tape now to finish his work Suddenly someone remembers he’s thirsty The mouse with kaleidoscope eyes Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies, ah Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies Mice are in your house for cookies, ah ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2015, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/11 "2015-08-14T20:14:38Z")
_The Mouse not Cookie’d_, by Robert Frost Two thoughts diverged at the London School, And sad I could not study both And be one student, made a rule To look at each as deep as I could To where it led all the nation’s wealth; To each by need seemed kind of fair For a mouse, a cookie’s minor claim, Simply endowed, his wanted share; And the other half of the common pair The state, his ability claim, But what the mouse achieved by day Served no goal and did no work He little more than ran and lay And knowing sloth will ne’er make hay He’d eat his cookie with a smirk. I thought instead of markets free Where honest men can rewards carve With capitalist bourgeoisie, No Prole-like slaves on bended knee And the mouse can earn his keep or starve. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2015, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/12 "2015-08-14T20:29:45Z")
**ERNEST HEMINGWAY** I don’t know how to describe how hot it was that day. It was hot. Very hot. A hot day in August. So I took my reel and other gear and went fishing down in the valley. It was a lazy day. The insects buzzed around me in the high summer haze. I ate some sandwiches I had brought with me and dozed on the riverbank. I caught some fine trout. I packed them in my creel, which I had lined with a bed of ferns. Then I walked back into town. I greeted the concierge as I walked into the lobby of my hotel. We exchanged pleasantries before I walked upstairs to my room. I locked the door. I decided to take a bath. I caught a brief glimpse of myself in the mirror as I climbed into the tub. I lowered myself carefully into the cool water. When I was finished, I got out of the tub. I toweled off. I put on fresh clothes. I left the hotel and walked down the street to the nearest cantina. I was friendly with the owner. I gave her the trout to prepare for my supper. I sat down at a corner table and ordered a carafe of red wine. The serving girl brought it to my table and poured it for me. It was delicious. I thought of my friends who were coming the next day. Perhaps we could rent a boat and go rowing on the lake. Then I noticed a mouse perched on the edge of my table. I watched as he stroked his whiskers. He looked at me hopefully. “Hello, little fellow,” I said. “What can I do for you?” He stood on his hind legs and sniffed the air. I asked, “Would you like a cookie?” He stared back at me. I called the serving girl over. I said “Maria, would you bring my little friend here a cookie? And maybe a glass of milk?” She replied “Si, señor. And perhaps a napkin, too?” I answered, “Give him anything he wants.” ---
**Author:** ![swampspruce](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/swampspruce/32/261_2.png) [@swampspruce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampspruce)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2015, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/13 "2015-08-17T19:06:22Z")
Nice! ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2015, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/14 "2015-08-17T21:12:48Z")
**Mark Twain** You don’t know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Fountainhead; but that ain’t no matter. That book was made by Miz Ayn Rand, and she told the truth, mainly. There was things which she stretched, but mainly she wouldn’t do nothin’ to compromise her principles. That is nothing. I never seen anybody but lied one time or another, without it was Howard Roark, and is all told about in that book, which is mostly a true book, with some stretchers, as I said before. Now the way that the book winds up is this: Howard goes to trial and he is in awful trouble when he makes his self a speech about bein’ true no matter what. Then jury called him not guilty and he was a big hero and married Dominique. Then Dominique she took me for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me; but it was rough living in the house all the time, considering how dismal regular and decent she was in all her ways; and so when I couldn’t stand it no longer I lit out. I got into my old rags and my sugar-hogshead again, and was free and satisfied. But Howard Roark he hunted me up and said he was going to build one more skyscraper, and I might join if I would go back to Dominique and be respectable. So I went back. So Dominique she cried over me, and called me a poor lost lamb, and she called me a lot of other names, too, but she never meant no harm by it. She put me in them new clothes again, and I couldn’t do nothing but sweat and sweat, and feel all cramped up. Well, then, the old thing commenced again. She rung a bell for supper, and you had to come to time. When you got to the table you couldn’t go right to eating, but you had to wait for the widow to tuck down her head and grumble a little over the victuals, though there warn’t really anything the matter with them,—that is, nothing only everything was cooked by itself. In a barrel of odds and ends it is different; things get mixed up, and the juice kind of swaps around, and the things go better. So I ask her for a cookie. . . ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2015, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/15 "2015-08-17T21:18:51Z")
We should submit this thread to _ **MAD Magazine** _. They’d love it! 😛 ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2015, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/16 "2015-08-17T21:20:04Z")
Someone should do Dr Seuss next! ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2015, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/17 "2015-08-18T02:50:15Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > **ERNEST HEMINGWAY** > > [snip] > > “Hello, little fellow,” I said. “What can I do for you?” > > He stood on his hind legs and sniffed the air. > > I asked, “Would you like a cookie?” > > He stared back at me. > > I called the serving girl over. I said “Maria, would you bring my little friend here a cookie? And maybe a glass of milk?” > > She replied “Si, señor. And perhaps a napkin, too?” > > I answered, “Give him anything he wants.” Oh, that’s quite good. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2015, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/18 "2015-08-20T17:32:25Z")
Sing to me, O Muse, Of the mouse who appeared by the rosy-fingered dawn, Seeking but a cookie. Shouldst thou grant the cookie, denying not his hunger a fair portion, Would he not boldly request a goblet of milk besides? Were ye then to grant this boon, As surely as Aeolus sends the fair winds, He will beseech thee for a straw. Thy generosity not sating his covetousness, Doubt not that he shall desire one of thy napkins. Upon this, it taketh not the wisdom of bright-eyed Athena To foresee that he shall want thine looking glass, For though young and not yet blessed with the beard of a man, The milk may create on yon rodent’s whiskers a moustache of sorts. ---
**Author:** ![Eutychus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)\ **Post date:** [August 20, 2015, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/19 "2015-08-20T17:33:58Z")
Am I going to have to create another website here??? ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2015, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756/20 "2015-08-21T14:41:17Z")
When I had me a mousie I heard a wise man say, `Give milk and straws and brooms But not Milanos away; Give pens away and scissors But keep your Keeblers hid.’ But I had me a mousie, And knew not what I did. When I had me a mousie, I heard him say again, `The Hydrox from out the jar Was never given in vain; ‘Tis paid with demands a plenty And sold for endless rue.’ And I have me a mousie And oh, 'tis true, 'tis true. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-if-you-give-a-mouse-a-cookie-were-written-by-someone-else/727756.md?page=2)