When my oldest daughter was a little girl...

...she would get really emotional if she would see an animal that had been hit by a car laying beside the road.

For many, many years I would tell her, "Oh that wasn't an animal...that was just a crumbled up paper towel."


And that worked pretty well for a long time, but then she got older and caught on that crumbled up paper towels didn't really look like dead animals, and I had to discontinue the practice and deal with the hours of crying that would follow a 'viewing.'

So...

The other day I was on a busy freeway and suddenly I encounted dozens of rolls of paper towels smashed in the road. I saw a truck ahead of me that looked like the bed was filled to the brim with a two hour shopping spree at Costco, so I figured an especially bounteous warehouse-size package must have fallen off the back of the truck.


I really, really wanted to take a picture, to prove to my daughter that sometimes some of those animals might have been actually paper towels, but there was too much traffic.

After I got on a less busy road, I called my daughter and told her, "You would not believe how many squashed up rolls of paper towels I saw on the freeway. There had to be at least 30!"

And she let out a little gasp. "Mom," she said in a very alarmed voice, "What happened? Who hit them all?"

I explained that they fell off the back of a truck and she let out a big sigh of relief. "For a minute there, Mom, I thought you meant there was a whole bunch of squished squirrels or chipmunks and I wondered how they had all gotten there."

...

...

Now aren't you glad you stopped by today?

Seriously.

This has to be one of the most highly intellectual posts I've ever written.

...

Huh?

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Oh, of course, you're welcome! You don't have to thank me so effusively. No problem, whatsoever.

Nothing defines my blog more then 'Off on my Tangent!"

Sigh...