Invasion of the ankle-biters

I went over to my folks' house last night to help pass out candy and hang out with Mrs. Piddlington before she headed home to the Pacific Northwest. Mrs. P. is inordinately fond of children, which is fantastic, because it means that she'll eventually have some nieces and nephews for me to play with ... and then return.



I've never been a big baby person myself. People would hold up their children like trophies and I'd say, "Oh, yes. That human is very small. Nicely done." And then parent and baby alike would roll their eyes at me.



Sometime in the past two years, though, that's changed.



Now don't get me wrong. I'm not saying I want one. There isn't room in my apartment for one thing, and you can't take them to bars. Also, they're woefully inadequate as conversationalists. And age is no excuse. I have it on good authority from my folks that I was a very witty baby.



Still. I can kind of see what people are talking about now, when they say babies are cute. I've caught myself making stupid faces at them a couple times. This is cool: they'll imitate anything you do. So it you were to, say, throw your hands in the air and yell, "BABY DANCE PARTY!", most likely any nearby babies would toss their wee fists and gyrate around accomodatingly. They're like Furbies, only you can't turn them off.



You can also dress them up in funny outfits. That's why Halloween is great for parents. Five years ago, they were using Halloween as an excuse to dress up like hookers. Now it's a reason to disguise their children as Michael Jackson's progeny.



(We had a lot of Spidermen last night. It reminded me of that creepy veil that Prince Michael the 47th was wearing in all those zoo pictures a year or so back. Anyway.)



Mrs. P and I were going to dress up her friend's baby and use it as bait for our own candy cache, but then we both got colds, and the baby's Mom said we were germy and to leave her baby alone. Moms. Jeez.