To the Editor,
Have you ever looked a jellyfish square in the face and thought, “Nah, this review stings way worse”? Let me tell you,dear editor, that’s exactly how I felt after reading your piece on “Swimming Around Britain,” my very own aquatic epic (or “incoherent animation,” as you so eloquently put it).
I won’t deny, my journey wasn’t your typical stroll through Harrods in stilettos. I traded boardrooms for breaking waves,spreadsheets for stingrays, and (admittedly) my sensible office wear for a borrowed swimsuit. Two weeks, or maybe three (time gets a bit fluid when you’re sharing the ocean with a grumpy octopus), I battled tidal waves and rogue lobsters,befriended a chorus line of seals with questionable karaoke skills, and subsisted on a diet that would make a goat raise an eyebrow.
Every salty tear, every jellyfish encounter, every close shave with a particularly territorial pufferfish (that little blighter nearly took my nose), I documented it all. My waterproof camera was my confidante, my life preserver, my Oscar magnet (I envisioned that golden statue, gleaming like a sunbeam through kelp). Then, just as I rounded Land’s End, victory within my soggy grasp, fate (in the form of a feathered fiend with a penchant for shiny gadgets) intervened.
Yes, a pelican, dear editor, a pelican stole my hard drive. My cinematic masterpiece, the documentary that would rewrite history and land me in Hollywood royalty, reduced to a feathered felon’s snack. Devastated? You bet your barnacles I was.But did I drown my sorrows in plankton cocktails? Did I succumb to the siren song of the sirens (though they did have a rather catchy tune)? No, sir. I did what any self-respecting, jellyfish-dodging adventurer would do – I grabbed a borrowed laptop, a questionable online animation tutorial, and a fistful of determination, and I recreated my journey, stroke by wobbly stroke, in technicolor glory.
“Swimming Around Britain: The Animated Edition” might not be Attenborough meets Miyazaki, but it’s mine, it’s real,and it’s surprisingly entertaining (the singing seal scene, I’ll have you know, is a masterpiece of neon pink and glitter). The critics may be calling it “visual assault” and “incoherent scribbles,” but the public loves it! The animation’s gone viral, I’m an accidental internet celebrity, and Barnacle Barry (through an anonymous third party, of course) finally got his money.
As for the Oscar? Well, that one’s still up in the air. But let me tell you, editor, even if they hand the golden fella to a talking squirrel doing Shakespeare (not judging, just sayin’), my adventure was worth every jellyfish sting, every rogue wave, every stolen snack by a feathered kleptomaniac.
So, the next time you feel the urge to criticize a woman who swam around Britain, lost her footage to a thieving bird, and somehow ended up an animation sensation, remember: sometimes, the greatest journeys are the ones that go completely off script. And believe me, editor, mine was one heck of a paddle.
Yours in soggy solidarity,
Fiona Fenwick, Swimmer, Animator, Accidental Internet Star (and soon-to-be Oscar winner, I can feel it)
P.S. If you ever encounter a pelican with a suspicious bulge in its beak, do me a favor – offer it a bag of chips and see if my masterpiece pops out. And tell the yeti in the Scottish Highlands I’m coming for him…on a unicycle. He’ll know what I mean.
