Today I awoke to being well rested and in a social mood. It doesn't happen too often, but I get the urges not to be alone in my igloo. Getting up, I look across the yard at the clock on the patio. It's 6:45AM the sun is just rising and today doesn't feel so bad. Being an armadillo didn't cure my antisocial tendencies but it helped not having normal social expectations place upon me anymore. Breakfast was usually given to me at 7AM so I didn't have long to wait to be let out of my pen. I could easily escape the pen if I wanted to. The only reason I stayed in it was to assure my sister that I was safe in my plastic igloo in her back yard. All sorts of wild animals could wander by and bother me. She already has enough to worry about with the kids so I let her have that comfort.

Caitlyn comes walking out the door with the food right on time and I greet her at the gate "Good morning Tio Amadio" she says completely butchering my name. She's still in her pajamas so this means it must be a weekend. I wag my tail at her as she opens the gate and I walk out towards the house. She smiles excitedly knowing this must mean I want to join her for breakfast. She quickly comes springing after me as I hop up over the threshold of the doorway. I walk towards the living room and see Hunter sitting on the floor in front of the coffee table eating a poptart. He smiles and waves it at me when he sees me enter. Caitlyn sets my food bowl down next to Hunter and I start eating it as she goes to the kitchen to retrieve her own poptart.

Jessica smiles weakly from the kitchen as she sees me making an effort today. "Are you going to be careful with your uncle armadillo today, Caitlyn?" "Yes mommy!" she replies with a mouth full of poptarts. Cartoons blare on the TV as the kids stare at it like giggling zombies while they slowly take bites of their poptarts. 

I glance back towards the kitchen and see my sister staring at me. She turns away as soon as she sees me looking back. I finish my food and grab the edge of the bowl in my mouth and carry it over for her to put in the sink. "Thank you." she says as she takes it. "You didn't have to do that. You know you get a free pass on stuff like this now." I shrug at her and she fingers the bowl lost in thought as I walk back to the kids.

When the show ends Hunter grabs a toy firetruck and starts pushing it across the floor. He comes to me laying there watching him and beeps its horn. I ignore it and look away. He beeps it again and slowly inches to it towards me. He makes crashing noises as it hits me in the side. Caitlyn says "uh oh" and grabs an ambulance. She pushes it towards me, it's toy siren quietly wailing. When the ambulance arrived at the scene. she opens it's back revealing a pile of plastic army men. Hunter picks up the ambulance and dumps the army men at my feet. Hunter and Caitlyn quickly stand them up facing me while while making gun noises with each one they touch. 

Wow, I think to myself, did they purposely use the firetruck crash as a ruse to unleash an attack squad on me? I knock a few army men over with my paws and Caitlyn makes screaming noises as she loads the injured soldiers into the ambulance. Hunter swoops in with a news helicopter while I swing at it with my tail. He holds the chopper daringly close to me as i miss. Laughting he keeps pulling it away before my tail can connect.

Caitlyn comes back with a stuffed tiger about the same size as me. Now the military has moved on to unleashing their own monster to fight me! I mime pain as we pretend it's biting and scratching me. I'm getting a few good hits in on the tiger too. The military has lost control of it's tiger as we kick armymen around the room circling one another. Doing a spin, I tail sweep a few soldiers into Kaitlyn and Hunter surprising them. Squeeling with laughter they drop the tiger as they raise their arms protectively. I clench the victory by hopping on top of the lifeless stuffed toy. Wiggling side to side I'm dancing on it's body.

Jessica pokes her head into the room and looks at the mess we've made of the living room. She crosses her arms and glares at me. I get the hint and start grabbing Army men in my mouth, piling them one by one beside the ambulance. Maybe I should have picked a quieter game to play. 

As we pick up the toys scattered across the room I notice the bag of crayons on the edge of the table. Once we finish picking up and are alone again, I stand on my hind legs and poke at the bag on the coffee table. Caitlyn opens the bag for me and sets down the waxy broken knock off brand crayons on the floor for me. She opens a coloring book in front of us and hands the other one to Hunter. She flips through the book and finds an uncolored page. It's an armadillo that looks just like me. Did I get her this coloring book or is this just her Dad's sense of humor? I pick up a green crayon in my mouth and hand it to her. She looks at me as I indicate with my claw the tree. She begins to color the leaves green. I have a taste in my mouth from my tongue touching the crayon. Why did it taste so good? I nose through the bag to find a color to give Hunter. He already has a brown one and is going to town on a picture of a fish. Disreguarding all of the lines, he is making broad strokes across the entire picture. 

While watching in fascination I absentmindedly start chewing on the broken half crayon in my mouth. As I swallow I realize what I just did! Good thing Crayons are non toxic. I wipe the crumbs from the corner of my mouth on the back of my paw. I look down to see bright pink. Great, now I just have to remember to hide my neon pink poops from my sister.