I would like to introduce you to the newest member of our household, Piney Porky McHedgypants.

Piney arrived on a cold December evening, shortly after Christmas, wrapped in a massive amount of leftover Hanukkah wrapping paper from our beloved Uncle John (who, interestingly, is neither an uncle nor a John). After a fierce debate about whether it was a boy or girl porcupine or hedgehog, and why the hell didn’t it have any pants on, the kids settled on the name Piney Porky McHedgypants. Obviously.

Don’t let his painfully adorable smile and whimsical little ball nose fool you. Piney is kind of an asshole and has scared the shit out of me twice now: once when I checked on my daughter in the middle of the night and found him sitting in her rocking chair (I swear the chair was moving), and once when I walked by the kids’ bathroom and found HIM SITTING ON THE TOILET. The kids promise they did not put him there, and I totally believe them.

After that second scare, I had a brief, horrible thought of “losing” Piney the way certain noisy or messy toys seem to always get “lost” in my house. Whoops, mommy threw them away by accident, my bad. But LOOK at him. I can’t imagine seeing his sweet huge face staring up at me from the trash can, surrounded by empty juice boxes and banana peels. Or worse, his nubby, soft arms reaching out for a hug from the garbage man right before he chucks him in the back of the truck.

So I’ve asked Piney to start running errands for me. He’s been extremely cooperative.

But the little bastard sucks at laundry. I told him he’s got two weeks to figure out how to use the dryer, or I might accidentally misplace him.