A Girl...

Status: Bark Now Worse than Bite

Speaking of the Tooth Fairy, guess who is losing his baby teeth this week? Why, it's our big boy, Linus! Two nights ago he was bouncing off the bedroom walls and going completly apeshit berserko while we were trying to go to sleep (same old), but this time I noticed there was a particular fervor to and a peculiar rattling accompanying the freakout, and so when he pounced near enough, I, using my own catlike reflexes, seized him and told him he had some 'splaining to do. That was when I saw the light pink streaks on the white comforter and found what he had been playing with: a teeny tiny fang.

When Eve lost her baby teeth, I thought for sure she had the cancer or consumption or something because, although I'd had a cat (or three) my whole life, I'd never seen any of their teeth fall out. Eve's first tooth loss was especially disturbing because the fang came off while she was play-biting my hand; when she pulled away the tooth remained in place, poking out of my thumb like a grotesque little thorn, all jagged and bloody at the root.

With this kitten, however, I knew what to expect, and so when I realized what was happening, instead of imagining the worst-case scenario, booking him for $300 worth of blood analysis, and measuring him for his cardboard coffin, I performed an adaptation of a song Simon and I had composed the last time Linus was discovered playing with something that had come out of his body. Sung to the tune of "A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes" from Disney's Pinocchio™, the original goes, "A poop is a toy your butt makes / when you pinch one out..." The new version, rated-G for all audiences, is, "A tooth is a toy your mouth makes / when you're five months old."

Don't you wish you lived at our house?