my @keys = qw( kittehs weather tailflic );
my $value = unravel_hash(\%meows, @keys );

sub unravel_keys {
    my $ref = shift;
    while (@_) {
        my $key = shift;
        return undef if ! exists $ref->{$key};
        $ref = $ref->{$key};
    }
    # Ran out of keys, so $ref is the requested value
    return $ref;
}