You’re going to die, you know

Ah, how grand it is to hear this on a semi-weekly basis — especially from the mouths of children.

Recently I noticed that my niece kept trying to over me cheese all the time. Every time we were at their house, “Here, eat this cheese.” “Hey, try this cheese!” “Hey, dustin: try this cheese and see if it’s bad.”

“No, that’s o.k.” would not suffice as a response.

“NO! EAT THIS CHEESE!!”

Things came to a head when my step-daughter Abbey put a bunch of cheese in my cereal. Naturally, I responded by placing several chunks of cheese in the chicken-noodle soup that she had just warmed up. She was so annoyed and revolted that she refused to touch the soup, threw it in the trash, and berated me. My bemused laughter at her only made things worse…

Eventually I found out someone had told her that eating dairy products is supposed to make smoking taste bad, afterward — so she was actually just trying to help me quit smoking.

While this explained a great deal, all I could think was, “No, actually, if I eat some cheese, I’m just going to think, ‘Well, I’ve just had a meal: time for a cigarette.'”

(But, then, I should really just shut my bloody trap. Shouldn’t I.)