My daughter, the animal lover.

Remember the cartoon Tiny Toons? Okay, so maybe you don't. But my husband and I do. And if you do, do you also remember Elmyra? The little girl who loved animals sooo much that they were smothered by her, and fled in terror? And she would skip along, happily oblivious, singing la la la la la la.

Well I gave birth to Elmyra. Only we named her something else. But it's still the same girl. I swear. My daughter - who is a loving child, very merry, and very smart - tortures animals. No, not like in a future-serial-killer way. More like tortures them with the depths of her love. She loves them, hugs them, and sings to them. But the animal feels only smothering, and hears only shrieking. It's scary for the animal, funny for us.

Wait, before anyone alerts PETA, know that we do not let her torture animals... much. We once had a dog who fell victim to her. She loved that dog so much. My daughter would want to brush her (i.e. smack her repeatedly with a brush,) feed her (i.e. shove food at her and demand EAT,) and hug her (i.e. squeeze so hard that her eyes nearly popped out.) And the dog, bless her, patiently sat through the torture until one of us could rescue her. Now that dog is gone. (And by gone, I mean went to live with Grampa, where she express the kind of love learned at the hands of my daughter. Sorry Grampa.)

Last night, my daughter was happily playing in the backyard when she came upon a caterpillar. She was fascinated by the caterpillar, and watched it for the longest time while happily singing a song to it. Then she thought she would dazzle it with her scooter riding skills. (Because caterpillars LOVE to watch children on scooters, didn't you know?) All was fine until, oops, she ran over it. And severed the tail end. Then she came to tell us that - wow - he was still moving! Don't worry, she said, he's okay.

Then later, when she came back inside, she said he was dead. I said that maybe he was just resting, or playing dead because he was scared. No, she said, he was dead. How do you know, I asked. Well, she said, she knew because she stomped on him.

Elmyra strikes again.