11:52 a.m. | 2004-03-14 Favorites. Hyde called me last night and asked me an intriguing question. Actually, the question was posed by his child (Little Hyde), but was asked of me by his father. This is that. (H:) LH asked me to ask you a question. (CI:) Um, okay. (H:) What�s your favorite animal? (CI:) Was it a more specific question? I mean, there are lots of animals in the world. Does LH mean household animals, wild animals, barnyard animals� do I have a category? (H:) No. You don�t. What�s your favorite animal in the whole world? (CI:) Yikes. That�s tough. However, I�m really partial to meercats. But, I don�t know that they�re my most favorite in the whole world. I mean, outside of cats, dogs, dolphins, whales, chameleons, elephants� um, that�s a tough question. (H:) Heh. LH asks me these questions all the time. Welcome to my world. (C:) Picking a favorite� does that mean all other animals would have to go away so only my favorite is left. Like, this is THE only animal left in the whole world? (H:) Yeah, pretty much. (CI:) Wow. That�s tough. However, since I know that no other animals are gonna disappear tomorrow because of my decision, I�ll stick with meercats. I�m guessing it�s the same with favorite colors and foods. (H:) It is. See, in my house, the world is orange, contains only giraffes and everyone eats pizza. (CI:) Heh. In that case, at the moment, the world is red, contains only meercats and everyone eats bacon. If our worlds collided right now, it�d be bright, odd and tasty. See now, Hyde writes me letters. In the old fashioned way. Pen to paper. Remember that? Frankly, I love it. Even better, he often writes on papers that LH has drawn on. LH is a great young artist. Outside of the �pokeymawn whatevers� that he sketches, he has a penchant for rendering depictions of dinosaurs. I�ve recognized his dinosaurs, questioned him about the others and complimented him on all his sketches. He�s quite good. Can you see where this is going? If you can, you�re a much smarter person than me. I learned about that tonight when Hyde called me again. This is that. (CI:) Hello? (H:) Hey. How�s things tonight. (CI:) Cool. (H:) Um, there�s something I didn�t tell you last night. It was gonna be a surprise but, uh, it won�t be now. (CI:) What? (H:) Well, you know how you complimented LH on his drawings? (CI:) Yeah. (H:) I asked him to draw you a picture. That�s why he wanted to know what your favorite animal is. (CI:) Oh my god. (Depictions of meercats aren�t common, just saying. At least, on this continent.) Why didn�t you tell me that? I would�ve just said a cat or dog or elephant or pig� or something easy to draw. Did you look it up on the internet; I�m sure it�s on the internet. (H:) Yes but we didn�t find anything. It�s spelled miurcats, right? (CI:) Uh, no. Sorry. It�s spelled meercats. (H:) Oh, duh. I should�ve known that. It just sounds like �miur� when you say it. (CI:) I�m sure it does. But tonight, try looking up meercats. I forget that I�ve lived in five different states. Hence, five different accents. For the most part, people don�t hear any difference in my voice in MyState. However, folks that have lived in or come from other states do. They can actually identify the particular states. The people here? They just tell me that it sounds really �cute� when I say this or that. Well, and I tend to mumble. Just for the record, mumbling isn�t considered �cute�. No. That�s considered annoying. your thoughts? seed flower