A good friend of ours has a cool pirate map tattoo on a good portion of his scalp. Michael (4) thought this was super cool and wanted a pirate map on his head too. Our friend told him, "You already have one. Everyone has one. You just can't see yours because of your hair." Michael was delighted and thought this was super cool.

The other day, he came up behind me while I was sitting down and starting picking through my hair on the back of my head like a scene out of "Chimps of the Gombe". He confronted me, "Hey, you don't have a map on your head!" Sensing a there-is-no-Santa moment coming, I put on my most sincere face and said, "Sure, it's there, it's just hard to see because of my hair" and stood up quickly so he couldn't check again. He paused for a moment and then walked away happy.

Great. On top of Santa, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy, I need to perpetuate another great lie. Somehow, I think Michael will be more bummed when he finds out he doesn't have a pirate map on his head than he will be when he learns about the other things. I'm not looking forward to that day.