I think it's fairly common for parents to wonder what their children will be like when they grow up. For instance, LeeAnn and I have a strong feeling that Mary Poole will be called to be a cheerleader in her high school years. We base this assumption on the fact that she has a generally fun-loving demeanor, a winning smile and a paint-peeling yell that is sure to inspire weary fans and deafen opposing teams. It seems to be natural fit. From watching Perritt play in the kitchen we've surmised that, in a house full of good swimmers, there's a better than decent chance that he may be the best Sharks and Minnows player in the Smith family.
LeeAnn and I have fond memories of playing Sharks and Minnows growing up but we'd never seen a land-based variant of the game until we saw Perritt spontaneously create one in the kitchen about a month and a half ago. The way Perritt's version works is that he is the all-time shark and LeeAnn and I are the all-time minnows. Mary Pool is the disinterested lifeguard. While we're all hanging out in the kitchen before or after a meal, Perritt will silently call a start to the game and then, almost inaudibly, say "Minnows In!" At this point, the game is on and no one knows it but Perritt . . . that is until you hear the thunderous hand and knee fall of his bull-rush as he stampedes toward you and subesequently pens you into the corner despite your evasive maneuvers. You know you've been tagged right away but Perritt likes to make sure you're aware of your captured status by pulling up and hugging your entire leg . . . indefinitely. I think if you'd let him, he'd probably stand there smiling with one hand affixed to your leg all day.
This situation is a little dicey because once you've been captured in the midst of cleaning the kitchen or whatever, you don't want to move too quickly and knock this cute little shark onto the tile floor. However, he's so tenacious that he can't easily be detached from his death grip. These days the tagging process can also be quite painful for me because it's getting to be shorts season and leg hair makes excellent scaffolding upon which the shark can scale a leg. Clearly, as in the pool version, the object is to avoid the shark as long as possible.
However, while Perritt can be easily dodged once, I challenge anyone to dodge him repeatedly. Trust me, you don't stand a chance. To make it more difficult, Perritt has declared that there is no drain base like there is in the aquatic version. So what you end up with is an "Avoid the Shark" scramble in the kitchen which ends with the humorously small shark sinking his teeth into the enormous minnow he has carefully cornered. This is followed by the minnow carefully extracting the tiny carnivore and relocating the little guy across the room and attempting to distract him with a toy so the minnow can get about 5 seconds more work in the kitchen done.
It would surely be helpful if John Williams would be kind enough to provide us with a score like he did for Jaws - so at least we'd know when we were under attack.
