The Most Extreme

Eraser Eater's favorite show is an Animal Planet program called "The Most Extreme". We rarely watch it, but last night since Eraser Eater had completed a full day without whining, I decided to reward him. He was elated. The Girl went to watch too, but the Oldest had to stay upstairs and write sentences because he back talked me in a major way.

I will not back talk. I will not back talk
I will not back talk
I will not back talk
I will not back talk
My sister in law was around to hear him spew out horrors in words ----complete disrespect---and her face went pale and she shook her head, like he just built himself a coffin.

Well, he missed the show. Good. I sat there with Eraser Eater and the Girl and watched the episode of "Extreme Collectors". During one segment of the show there was a greying long haired old man pulling out specimens from some Smithsonian archive. He pulled out some wooden shelf and grabbed a jar full of some white tape like substance. He then poured it all out in some shallow tray and started to poke at it with some instrument. Tape worms.

The Girl could not get the image out of her mind. "Are they rare?" She asked. I explained to her that people can get tape worms and they sit in your intestines and eat the food you consume. She was very frightened by this. "I hate worms," she said. I thought of telling her the story of some man I had heard of as a kid (everyone has heard this tape worm story, I am certain) that wanted to be rid of the tape worm so he starved himself for a week and then put a huge plate of food out in front of him at a table. He proceeded to open his mouth as wide as he could, and since the worm had been receiving no food itself, it would crawl out up the man's esophagus to the plate of food. Now, I know this has to be totally not right. For one thing, Some tape worms can be like fifteen feet long or longer. Can you imagine how the man would choke like crazy to get that sucker out? How did they get those things out?
"So do I."
"I can't stop thinking about paper worms. I mean, worms with tape, what are they called?"
"Tape worms."
She stared bugging Dear Sir about them.
"How do you get them, Rach?" he asked. "I think you get them from going around barefoot."
The Girl's eyes bogged out.
I looked at Dear Sir with unease. Through your feet? No...pin worms go up the anus, I think. Feet? How does that happen? We have a thing called skin.
I went downstairs to my friend Wikipedia and looked up tape worms. Raw meat. Eat some raw meat with the eggs of the worms in it and you can get tape worm. I knew this. I had researched this back when I heard the open mouthed plate of food story. I just forgot. Huh.

The Girl asked me about them again this morning, but hopefully with time she will cut it out. It's like me being frightened of E.T.

When Eraser Eater was brushing his teeth and I was overseeing, he said, "I hope you liked 'The Most Extreme'."

"Yep, it was great," I said.
"You are the most extreme Mom," he said (or something to that effect).
"You are the most extreme whiner," I said.
He whined.
The end.