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Before I tell my little story, THANK YOU to Karen Wagner for being a superb oboist and presenter at Symphony Storytime. She had a wonderfully easy and personal way of communicating with the kids. I loved it!

Lately I've told some stories about the funny things kids say to me at Storytime. I got another one last week that I promised to tell you about, even though it's slightly, um, indelicate. But to me that's the whole point - when we look at it from the child's perspective, it's perfectly innocent and honest.

Here's the story - At Toddler Time I had called the kids up for a story. They all sat (on their bottoms, feet in front of them) and I introduced Come Along Daisy. I pointed to Daisy Duck and Mama Duck and told them what "Come along" meant. The little girl in front of me blurted out, "Do you poop in the toilet?"

Several things ran through my mind. Do I answer her? Will the other kids want to participate in the conversation? If I don't answer her, will she repeat the question louder until I do answer? Since no other kids seemed to have heard her, I decided not to answer, and fortunately she didn't persist.

This got me thinking about "impertinent questions." Between her and the boy a couple of weeks ago who asked what I smell like, I've thought about a child's perspective, and how at that age they really have no concept of a rude question. They honestly want to know. The girl is probably in the midst of potty training, and her mom tells her all the time, "Everybody poops in the toilet! Your parents do, your friends do, the clerk at the grocery store does!" So she looked at me and wondered, "Does Miss Teresa too?" And she asked.

No need to be offended or reprimand her. I know her mom didn't hear her, but if she did, Mom could just say, "That sort of thing is private, and we just talk about it in the family." We get upset when they do something they know they aren't supposed to do, and that isn't the case in these situations. The hardest part for me is not cracking up!

A great funny story this week! A couple of weeks ago I told you about the little boy who thought it was so funny when he touched my feet. This week he did it again - touched my feet and turned to the boy next to him giggling. Then he looked at me and said, "I wonder what you smell like?"

My Book Launch Party is this Thursday at 6:30 in the Community Room. I hope to see you there! My daughter Sara and I brainstormed some great interactive ideas for the children at the party, which I think will be a ton of fun.

Today at Toddler Time I had finished reading a book about colors and quizzed the children about the names of colors. The end paper had geometric designs in each color, so I pointed to the yellow one and asked, "What color is this?" A tiny little girl (I later found out she's 17 months) immediately piped up, "Yellow!" I was impressed! She's so little and knows her colors instantly! She even beat out the three-year-olds! I pointed to the green shape. "What's this color?" "Yellow!" the little tyke says. (There are giggles from the moms.) I point to the blue one, "What color is this?" "Yellow!" Ah, now we get it. And so it went, "Yellow! Yellow! Yellow!" Very cute.

What a fun week we had - enthusiastic kids, parents who participated with their kids, great books, and big crowds!

This one didn't happen at Storytime, but I haven't been able to stop laughing about it all day since I heard it.

A few weeks ago, we were moving along with "Animal Action" from Greg and Steve, pretending to be horses, birds, frogs, etc. We came to the "move like a lion" part and got down on all fours, prowling and roaring. I think it's fun to add a little excitement by picking out a little friend who comes often and is very comfortable with me, then saying "I'm going to eat you!" I very gently pounce on him/her and say "Yum yum!" This time I guess I chose the wrong little boy. He ran to his mom's lap and hid his face. Mom smiled and let me know she wasn't mad. Whew!

This has been a week of oddities. The following events have all taken place in the last even days:

1. My daughter was shopping at Target and overheard a man on his cell phone saying, “It’s only your belly. Don’t be afraid of your belly. Just look down and see it. It’s just your belly. Now don’t make me come out there and tend to this. I said don’t be afraid of your belly!” HUH? OMG!
2. I have been preoccupied lately as usual. A couple of mornings ago, I went to make my fruit shake after my workout. I took the pits out of some cherries (this is a lot of work), cut up an apple, and put it in the blender with some almond milk and a splash of honey. Then I went to the freezer in the laundry room to get some ice to make this concoction more like a shake. Rather than reaching in the freezer to get ice, without thinking, I managed to reach into the dog food bin and put 2 heaping scoops of Buffalo Blue dog food into my shake. OMG. (Needless to say, I had to start all over and throw it all out.)
3. My daughter drove to the park to go rollerblading one afternoon. She came home and said she had put her cell phone on the roof of her car, sat on the seat to take of her skates and then forgot to take the pone off the roof of the car and drove away. So she and I raced back to the park to look for the phone. It was nowhere in sight. No one turned it into the office. So we drove back home looking on the ground, with no phone to be found. When we got home, my daughter stayed in her car while I used the house phone to call her phone. She could hear it ringing somewhere outside. Lo and behold – that damn phone had slid down the rear window of the car and got wedged in between the window and the trunk. The funny thing is that she has a thick Jesus sticker on the phone, and we believe it helped the phone stay in place. It made through all that driving and over speed bumps and around corners, baking in the hot Florida sun. OMG! Literally.                               
4. I won’t name names, but someone I know went to a wedding in San Francisco. That someone did not pack enough fresh underwear, so he had to travel home commando. That someone had to go through the new x-ray security screening! He got some interesting looks from the security guards. HAHAHAHA. OMG.
5. I was out walking the dog today. Two teen girls pulled over, almost hitting me with their car. They were overwhelmed by Darwin, had to pet him, invade his personal bubble and take his picture. They asked me about 100 questions, struggled with their cameras, put their faces in my dog’s face, let him lick their mouths over and over again. It was a bit weird, but things got weirder when a man stuck his head out of his truck and said, “Is that some kind of a bear you are walking?” Inside and out, this truck was full to the top with junk. The only view out was a pumpkin-sized hole out of the driver’s side of the front window. The side and back windows were oozing with junk. There was no visibility out. I assumed he just lived in there, and the truck did not run; I was wrong. The guy started to drive away with that one small clearing in the front window! If I had a cell phone, I’d have called the police. OMG!
6. I was contacted about a month ago by a journalist through another writer friend to be interviewed for a long article in a national weekly news magazine. My name was not used. One of my daughter’s friend’s Mom sent me an email to tell me she read a most interesting article I should read. It was the one I was interviewed for. What is the likeliness of that? Of all the thousands of articles out per week, this was the one I was interviewed for, but there was nothing in that article that revealed I was one of many people interviewed!!! OMG.

Weird week.

This song has been on my mind since my fifth grader danced to it in her summer camp lyrical performance. I had never heard it before then and the lyrics were haunting. I thought that it might be new to some of you as well, and works as poetry — at least in my opinion. In any case, it’s certainly a better choice than the other song that she danced to — Fire Burning on the Dance Floor.

Human
by The Killers
I did my best to notice
When the call came down the line
Up to the platform of surrender
I was brought but I was kind
And sometimes I get nervous
When I see an open door
Close your eyes
Clear your heart...
Cut the cord

Are we human?
Or are we dancer?
My sign is vital
My hands are cold
And I’m on my knees
Looking for the answer
Are we human?
Or are we dancer?

Pay my respects to grace and virtue
Send my condolences to good
Give my regards to soul and romance,
They always did the best they could
And so long to devotion
You taught me everything I know
Wave goodbye
Wish me well...
You’ve got to let me go

Are we human?
Or are we dancer?
My sign is vital
My hands are cold
And I’m on my knees
Looking for the answers
Are we human?
Or are we dancer?

Members of the Kidlitosphere are invited to submit stories from their reading lives. Your submission can be an anecdote from childhood, a recent experience around books or reading, a memory from school (good or bad), a vignette about learning to read, the impact of a particular book — anything about your life as a reader.

When my oldest daughter was five, she asked me to play house. “I’ll be the mommy and you’ll be the little girl,” she said. I agreed and prepared myself for my role. Meanwhile, she sat down on the couch, opened a book to read, and looking over the top said, “Go play with your sister.”