Gratuitous Domestic Posting

Well, it's not a tale of my domestic situation, but rather my sister's. Children have a way of making these tales more interesting and since she's reproduced, I thought I'd relay a heartwarming tale The Cake Eater Mother told me this morning about my niece, Maggie. Maggie is four, she's got two older brothers and she's a red head to boot, so this should, perhaps, tell you a little something about Maggie's personality. She doesn't take "no" very well, and she'll pretty much do what she wants, and to hell with anyone who thinks differently.

Now, this tale starts with my mom calling the house to acquire the Cake Eater husband's expertise regarding a download. She's pretty leery of downloading stuff willy nilly off the web (this is good) so instead she calls the husband to make sure it's ok. She was looking, said she, for a mah-jongg game. Our family isn't even remotely Asian, so the husband wondered why she'd want one. She said simply, "It's for Maggie," who was over at Grandma's this morning while her mother ran errands. The husband, a wee bit bewildered as to why a four-year-old would be playing mah-jongg, simply handed the phone over to me to get the whole story.

Well, it seems as if Maggie was making the rounds at their parish while her mother was doing some charity work. My sister, apparently, went in one door at the church, while Maggie went in another. Evidently, this isn't a new routine, and per the usual, my sister was waiting for Maggie to come and join her once her rounds were done. Well, Maggie didn't show up, so my sister went looking for her.

She found Maggie with one of their parish priests, sitting in his lap, playing mah-jongg on the computer. Rumor has it that she looked rather determined and was concentrating so fiercely she didn't even notice her mother had come into the room.

The priest admitted flat out that Maggie was kicking his ass.

If there ever was a child who you could say, at an early age, would undoubtedly pick up a gambling habit later in life, it's Maggie. She's just got the ego that's required for successful gambling. I just never thought mah-jongg would be in the realm of possibilities for her games of choice.