The same thing happens every night.....

(I guess I never posted this 10 years ago???) 

Erin, who is old beyond her tender age of 12 (at least in her own mind) likes to find any excuse to stay up later than 9 PM.

Whether it is the call of nature (such calls include a book, and thus they usually last longer than a major ice age--and modesty forbids mentioning where she learned this), reading in bed, or just fooling around, she is often not in bed until well after 10 PM. Which suits her jest fine!

Last night was no different.

She goofed around with Cameron until we were able to finally extricate him and shoo him to bed, then she read in her room. At 10:07 as I was just getting ready for bed, Erin knocked on the bedroom door.

“Erin!” I gently hissed, “Why aren’t you in bed?”

“I need to ask you a question.” she replied.

After a deep sigh (I seem to be doing this more and more often!), I gave in. “OK, what is it?”

“Okay, Dad. So....when do you get your tonsils out?”

As I was pondering the deep significance of this obviously pressing question, she continued, “I want to have mine out.”

Being the ever-gentle father, I benevolently replied, “Yeah. Right. Uhuh. Well, to answer your question, probably NEVER! I’ve never had mine removed! NOW GET TO BED! NOW! NOW! NOW!”

(Cindy later explained to me that Erin had watched a Brady Bunch episode where Cindy and Mrs. Brady had both had their tonsils removed. And one of her cousins has also had hers removed. I deduced from this info that Erin was really just interested in getting lots of ice cream to eat, and this was as good a way as any to get it!)

Anyway, someone woke me up at 10:45 PM as they noisily bustled into the bedroom on the way to our bathroom, where they fiddled about in front of the mirror for 5 minutes. It was only when I saw the hulking silhouette as they came out that I realized it was Erin.

Her machinations had again achieved spectacular results!