A Paul Harvey Moment

If you're not familiar with Paul Harvey, please allow me to enlighten you. Mr. Harvey is approximately 156 years old. He's a broadcaster/commentator/political pundit who has a feature called "The Rest of The Story", in which he begins by recounting an ordinary tale of some random person in their daily life. Then, he shifts gears and announces, "And now, the rest of the story." At that point, Mr. Harvey delves into whatever bizarre and outlandish events have led these poor citizens down the path that found them as fodder for his piece, usually ending in something so wholly unbelievable that you wonder if it could actually be true. The rest of this particular story, I assure you, is true.

Yesterday I told the tale of Avery and her recent approach with regard to the Tooth Fairy. What I left out, however, is an entirely different animal. There was an interaction with me the night before the Fairy's arrival that, unbeknown to me, had led Avery to revise her plan of attack. As I explained yesterday, Avery lost her tooth on Tuesday night as she was brushing her teeth. That was the point at which she had scrawled the first note to the Tooth Fairy, and she showed it to us when she was finished. In an attempt to soften the blow of her disappointment, I rationalized why the Fairy might not do what she had requested. This was my subtle attempt at suspending her disbelief, as it were, but I did not expect what she did next.

Apparently daunted by my rationalizations, Avery proceeded to scale down her expectations and wrote a brand new letter to the Tooth Fairy. I guess she figured if she lowered the bar, there would be a better chance of getting anything at all, which was the ultimate goal of the communication in the first place. Even if she just drew a picture of herself, that alone would prove her existence. But as I said, I was unaware of the second letter's existence. Yesterday, after reading my post, Mandi asked me why I hadn't included it. I had seen the note on Ave's dresser when the Tooth Fairy came during Wednesday night's shower, but in my haste to get out of there unseen I simply assumed she had made herself a copy of the old letter. I took the old letter off of her dresser, left her the money but took the tooth, and high-tailed it out of there. Now, knowing all of the circumstances, I can see why Avery was disappointed about the visit. She thought she had thrown the old note away, so she thinks the Tooth Fairy has no note. On the positive side, I suppose that will make the hand-written letter from the Fairy I solicited from a family member seem that much more of a surprise when it arrives. Without further ado, here is the second note, both transcribed and in its original form, for your enjoyment.
Dear Tooth Fairy,
I would like to ask you some questions. Now here they are: where do you get all the money? Why do you give some children less or more money than me? If grownups lose teeth do you take them? Do you take some animals teeth? How old are you? Do you have a mom or a dad or are you just the only tooth fairy? How many houses do you go to almost every night? Is there a few tooth fairies like one in China and you here and everything? How many tooth fairies are there? Can you have babys? I can't think of anything elss, so can you wright other things about you? So can you do that? I'll put paper on my desk. The one that is in my room so you remember.

p.s. Can you please still let me keep my tooth but still give me those coins?

p.p.s. Can you please draw a picher of yourself?


And that, as they say, is the rest of the story.

Dear Tooth Fairy

I present to you the creation of an 8-year-old. I am going to re-type it because the 8-year-old in question has horrible handwriting, and because the looseleaf paper this particular work was scrawled upon was folded enough times to fit inside a small jewelery box.

Dear Tooth Fairy,

I realy probably like you. So, if you could just please do these things for me please! Can you take a picher of you so that I know what you look like . Please tap on me tonight so I can see you. Please when you take the picher don't delete it. Please show me how to fly. Please wright back!

ps: I will not show anybody else your secrete. Please don't take my tooth! Please come here every night. Please even though you don't take my tooth please still give me a dollar coin.

Now that's what I call sticking your neck out and taking a chance. I mean, at 8 years old, she's recognized that she has absolutely nothing to lose by putting all her cards on the table with the Tooth Fairy. I want a mug shot, some money, you need to teach me how to fly, and why not just leave me the tooth too, OK? Did I mention that Avery left her digital camera out on the night stand so the photo op would be convenient? Smart kid I tell you. Unfortunately for her, the tooth fairy came while she was taking a shower, so there was no opportunity for her to wake up and catch a glimpse. That Tooth Fairy's sneaky, I tell ya.

Switcheroo?

Ok, the joke's over. Very funny people. Now will someone please return my child and retrieve this substitute that's been left in her place? I mean really . . is this the best you could do? Seriously, if you're going to switch kids with me and expect me to fall for it, you could at least have found a sub that didn't sleep until 8:30 in the freakin' morning! You don't really expect me to believe that this is my child, do you? It was believable at first . . we just thought she'd turned snuggly all of a sudden. We remember when Avery used to come ask us to "holda me" when she was about this age, so we fell for the Lily substitute that wanted to snuggle after 30 months of being the least snuggly child ever created. However, the one thing about Lily that no doppelganger could ever replicate was her propensity to wake up at 5:50 every morning. And with this one, it finally caught up with her. She acted the part for a few days, and we wrote off yesterday's sleeping-in as recovery from her illness the night before, but two days in a row and I'm calling out this bluff. So come get this vomiting android you've left me and bring back my child. Tell her I got her some PopTarts if you need a bribe.

In The Know

You want to be the "involved dad". You want to know what's going on, what to expect from your pregnant wife. You want to know what your developing baby is doing, how big it is, and all of the other stuff. That's just what guys do. They seek to understand. There are some things, however, that just don't need to be explained in vivid and exhaustive detail.

Today, during Lily's nap, I sat down to read a few of the pregnancy books. At the risk of mis-quoting someone (quite unlike mis-remembering, I'll add), it's one of those "What To Expect When You're Expecting" books, although I can't be bothered to figure out if indeed that's the title. As a quiet moment to read is few and far between for me, I got a little caught up and was reading ahead to the "Week 8" chapter. The first 3 or 4 pages were as expected, full of fetus and uterus dimensions (conveniently in both standard and metric measurements), as well as some anecdotes and a few diagrams. It was neat to see the progression of the drawing from week 7 to week 8, with the little elbows forming and the eyelids gaining definition. What was not neat, however, was what came next: 3 pages dedicated to every possible type and variation of miscarriage known to the medical world. I mean this list was exhaustive. And the thing is, every single one of the paragraphs ended with something generally resembling "there's nothing you can do about it, most of the time it just happens, blah blah yada yada." What's worse, the ones that weren't dismissive (READ: why are they here in the first place), were things like "Miscarriage due to toxoplasmosis", in which they explain that not only is it a bad idea to clean your cat's litter box while pregnant, but that you should also avoid touching the cats and any meat products they may have come in contact with. Just in case you feed your housecats raw meat.

I guess it's just bizarre to me that the authors of this book didn't see how this "miscarriage section" would not be a good idea. In the "Pregnant Dad" book I'm reading at the same time (that's not the title of that one either, but it's written by a guy from a guy's perspective), it's made abundantly clear that a pregnant woman's predisposition is bound to be one of excessive worrying and "what if"ing regarding every action she takes while pregnant. Stuff like this, in my opinion, just fuels the fire. "Go ahead and lump all the possible things that have ever and could ever cause miscarriage into a tidy little section at the end of the 8-week chapter . . that won't cause any more anxiety, will it?" Seriously people, let's get a grip on our audience when we're writing these "guides" and try not to make the problem any worse than it has to be.

Been Busy . . And Sick

I'm disheartened to report that I have nothing of interest to report. Things have been happening so fast and furiously lately that I hardly have the time to spin them into words. There are updates to come on potty training, birding, pregnancy, and sleepovers. I've just got to get my mind around the details and weave them into prose as I so often do. Sunday, the day I really expected to be getting caught up on my posting, was spent battling a mild case of the stomach flu. It was about 18 hours worth of wretched misery that I am hoping to not relive any time soon. My dear wife surprised me by coming to my rescue early from work, which sped up my recovery substantially.

So no, I haven't fallen off the face of the Earth . . I'll be back in the swing of things soon.