Lead Baby

No image this week -- there isn't one that fits all of this just right. But I am thankful for laughter because we've been laughing a lot these days.


Here are a couple reasons we've been laughing lately ---


The other day a woman I work with asked if I wanted to stuffed raccoon.

She had won it at a local grocery store, they were having some sort of promotion she had thrown her name in.

"A stuffed raccoon? Really?"


"Yeah, it stands about 3 feet tall. It's standing on its hind legs, but it falls over now and again."


"Humm, that's pretty tall. Is it scary? Does it smell?"


At this point another co-worker chimes in "Taxidermy doesn't smell when it's done right."


"No it doesn't smell, but it does need to be vacuumed now and again. And it has a 3 foot tail."


You can imagine what I'm picturing -- a raccoon on its hind legs, snarling, teeth bared with a huge tail attached to some type of wooden base.


"I bet Victor would be interested in the racccoon for a little while. Could we give it to the daycare or the environmental center once we're done having it around the house?"


That's when she understood that I had misunderstood -- "Marie - this is the raccoon from the movie from the movie Pocahontas."


I was a little dense, I suppose "Wow -- a raccoon from the set! That's really cool, a real movie set animal. You got this from the grocery store? You live in the country, so they have taxidermists that give things like this away -- Cool!"


"Marie - Pocahontas - the Disney movie - a cartoon."


Light bulb goes off....we aren't talking about a stuffed, formally alive raccoon...we're talking about a giant stuffed animal -- a toy.

Not the balding taxidermy raccoon I had pictured but a happy stuffed raccoon, known as Meeko from the Disney movie.

On the day Jean brought Meeko to the library (where I work -- in a corporate library for an international leadership organization, not a place where large stuffed animals normally appear), many people stopped by and laughed about my confusion. We had Meeko doing story time with the favorite Wikinomics, although most patrons requested the nap time and cookies session Meeko was going to lead @ 1pm.

Needless to say, now that Meeko is home, Victor is completely in love with Meeko and greets him each morning with a hug and a happy "Good Morning Meeko!".

Edited to add: Felecia was reading this at work and said, "Marie, you forgot about the eye! That's when I joined the converstation."

"Really? What was being said?"

"You asked something like -- humm what's the eye made out of, glass? Is it safe? And Jean said, oh they are large plastic eyes, totally safe for kids."

Needless to say we laughed until we turned red, again....and I like it that way.