Banana Fanna

I am used to the toys fast food restaurants give with their kiddie meals being utter junk--why not, you might ask...their food is--but until Kiernan received the above toy with something from Burger King I was not used to them being surreal. I guess I owe Burger King a sort of grudging congratulations for crossing that barrier with their Giant Stormtrooper Head on Top of AT-AT toy.

I must confess I was immediately fascinated with this weird little toy. You might note that on the side there is a little thingy. If you turn that little thingy the toy will attempt to walk. Sort of. It's a pretty sad crawling lurch, in actuality, which further adds to the surreality. Kiernan had no interest in this toy when he first got it. He has no real touchstone with merchandise from the Star Wars films. It wasn't until early one morning when I started doing a goofy voice for this toy that he got interested. He's always looking for new foils for his Planet Heroes to defeat, so we began to play a game where the Planet Heroes had to save the day from this weird Burger King toy.

He asked what its name was. I looked at it, quickly decided against the first name that popped into my head (Hydrocephalic Storm Trooper Guy), and sent the ball back into Kiernan's court. Kiernan is great at coming up with names for his little friends and characters, and usually does so without hesitation. One of my favorites was the name he gave his Build-A-Bear bear. We were in Alabama on business a couple of years ago. The two women Wendy was working with are good friends of hers, and they wanted to take Kiernan to the local Build-A-Bear Workshop store* and treat him to a bear. After the process was complete we asked Kiernan what the bear's name was.

"Clabby Bear," he said, without skipping a beat.

He did not disappoint this time, either.

"You name him," I suggested, holding up the Storm Trooper toy from Burger King.

Kiernan looked at it and said, "Joo-Shaba."

I have no idea where this came from. None at all. He didn't appear to know either. But since then that weird toy has been called Joo-Shaba. Works for me.

I bring all of this up because we are visiting with Kiernan's cousin Dorian and his parents, JoAnne and Mitch. We were having lunch with them today and they were telling us about Dorian naming a little toy dog he received when his dad was on a business trip. Since his dad was away in Chicago, Dorian decided to call the dog 'Cago'. Very cool name, no matter what the context, and doubly cool because of it.

That's all. Just wanted to tell you all about that. Oh, and also, Cago likes dried apricots. In case you were wondering.


[Picture Note: Kiernan leads the Planet Heroes delegation, coming in peace to the bedroom of his cousin Dorian. Dorian's delegation led by his dad, Mitch.]



*This reminds me of a story about Aunt Amy. Probably best left for another time.