Scam? Also, other random Lucy conversations

On Friday evening, at about 7 pm, our doorbell rang. A woman showed up at our door, offering us a free carpet cleaning. She claimed they were opening a business nearby and wanted to give us a free trial. She handed me a coupon, and then said it was only valid RIGHT NOW. It was 7 pm on a Friday night. Seriously? I mean, I know we're pretty lame, but are people really clamoring to get their carpets cleaned at 7 pm on Friday evening? I declined and she took back the coupon and left.

Earlier in the week, while I was taking a walk with Carter on the leash and Lucy in the stroller, four little girls came running after me. I stopped and said hello; I don't know their names, but I recognize them as some girls who live on our street. They were carrying shiny brochures and folders. The youngest one held out a pile of papers to me and said "can you buy some things?" Uh, no. Sorry. I'm out for a walk. They were not even able to explain why they were selling things, or what exactly the things were (it looked like a giant catalogue of junk). They looked very surprised and totally disappointed, but I kept walking. My mom tells me that recently in her town, a group of kids were going door to door with a flyer trying to sell cookies, but in fact there were no cookies. I think these girls might have been involved in a legitimate fundraiser for something, at least in as far as any of those fundraisers are legitimate, but man, I hate those things. And I say that as a former Girl Scout cookie seller, as well as a former band kid who sold pizzas, ham sandwiches, and candy bars.

OK, end of my scam rant. There's not much to report at the moment from 83 Durant. We're pretty busy at work, and Lucy is busy at school. Her very best friend, Ruth, is now going to the same school as her two days a week, so that has been great. Here is today's conversation:

Lucy loves my sticky notes, which are really these thin strips of paper with sticky stuff at one end, which I use to mark relevant passages in books that I'm teaching. Today she took two of them and stuck them on the back of her teddy bear. She then held him up and said

"Look Mom, he's a fairy!!"
And indeed, if you squinted, I suppose those two small tags of paper on his back might look like wings. But here's the thing: I have never before talked about fairies with her. How does she know what they are? Or how to make one? I'm sure this came up at school or in a book something, but I'm just shocked at the things she comes up with sometimes.

Lately she's been talking a lot about her dreams in the morning when she wakes up. Following is a reconstructed medley of recent dream conversations:

Parent: So what did you dream about last night?
Lucy: Crocodiles! But they were nice crocodiles! They ate all of Carter's food.
Parent: Uh oh! Well, what will Carter eat?
Lucy: They shared. They were nice crocodiles!
Parent: Oh, that's good.
Lucy: There were nice crocodiles and mice. Mice are already nice.

This is a mash-up of her conversations with both Jake and me. I particularly love the "mice are already nice" bit, which it seems is her explaining why she doesn't need to modify "mice" in the same way she does "crocodile." That's my girl.