Week 48: '10 Ford Shelby GT500

The above Shelby is tearing down the road...well, in a pretend kind of way as it actually is only the size of a Snicker's fun size and doesn't actually house an internal combustion engine.

Pretend, however, is good at Daddy's Tiny Cars, and this week, and hey, let's say heretofore all subsequent weeks featuring a Shelby, will be be officially dedicated to the art of pretend.

Today's focus: Karate Kitty.

I'm allergic to cats, so we don't have any, and at this point have no pets at all, so in a type of spontaneous evolution of pet need, my kids have begun pretending one of them is a cat or dog. The other day the youngest was the cat, and for almost an hour my two-year-old stayed in the role and spoke only in variations of Meow.

This was a bit odd, but it became even more interesting when his four year brother initiated a game of of pretend superhero, and Baby G was dubbed Karate Kitty.

The general setup, as I can see, was this -- Racer A (I didn't discern a superhero moniker for him) and his cat worked at a local ice cream shop (the pretend ice cream shop is always behind the brown chair in the living room), and when bad guys came around, they fought them with their sweet, sweet karate moves.

While not fighting crime, Racer A would mix up new flavors of ice cream and frequently send Karate Kitty off to get supplies, cream or sugar, usually. Earlier he had asked me (over and over) to tell him the ingredients found in ice cream, so of course this new found knowledge was integrated into the game.

When bad guys came, however, they sprung into action, each striking a type of Charlie's Angels silhouette pose before launching into a "Yaaa, yaaa, e-yaaa" battle cry. That is, the superhero leader yelled that -- Karate Kitty yaaa yaaa'd in his native language of meows, and I can tell you that not once did he break character. Impressive, really.

After fighting a variety of  bad guys, they were hit with ghosts, which my son explained in an out-of-breath kind of way was a problem because their karate moves just went right through them. To fight them, they needed ghost spray, which, it turns out, is kept above the TV.

The ghost spray worked, and all was fine until the zombies attacked, and with a look of what seemed real panic, my son explained they had run out of zombie spray (which, he informed me, was twice as strong as ghost spray). Things were looking bad.

"Ka-watie Kitty, get to the stowr and get mowr zombie spray. Herwie!" (He still has a slight problem with the r sound.)

Going into defensive mode, he dodged the clumsy attacks of the zombies, and, as a type of off-screen narrator, I asked him if he couldn't take out a few zombies with his karate moves. He assured me that would not work.

Paddling back on all fours, Karate Kitty arrived and with a hearty MEOW!!! stood up on two toddler paws and handed over the zombie spray. Those zombies never had a chance.

The zombie apocalypse averted, a boy and his cat went back to their ice cream store to mix up a batch of banana split flavored ice cream. Baby G brought me a bowl.

"Thank you very much," I said.

"Meowww!" he answered, with the slightest hint of a smile.

The world was again safe for ice cream.


Photo of Zippy Ford Shelby, likely speeding away from zombies, courtesy of Phil Pekarcik.