That huge gray plastic barrel at the curbside in which you mindlessly threw out the nice gift that the child down the street worked so
hard to create for you. Said innocently-trusting youngster then happens upon said container before the
trash-
man has carted it away, of course his tenderly-impressionable eyeballs observe said callously-discarded gift, which of course painfully marks him for life and shows him what a shameless lying a**
h**e you actually are to have praisingly told him how much you appreciated his gift and all the
work he'd gone through to create it for you.
Here's how to avoid having your Rubbermaid™ brand
lie-detector make mincemeat of your
stellar reputation with the neighborhood children. First, be sure to prominently-display
anything they give you --- such as
paper-artwork or a
clay sculpture --- inside the front room of your house for at least two or three weeks, so that if the young creators of said "masterpieces" happen over to visit, they will always have their happy pride of your appreciation
re-affirmed by seeing their "treasured gifts" still visible for all to see. Then after
maybe a month or so, try moving the exhibits further along down the
wall or into another room, so that if a child happens to notice the absence of his creation in its "customary" spot, you can just hastily show him that you have merely moved it, but that you do
indeed still have it on display. Then, if the youngster doesn'
t comment any more on the object's absence during subsequent visits or go to the other spot to look at it, you can safely assume that he has lost interest in said object, and so you can then put it away in a desk drawer or someplace else hidden, but where you can still hastily retrieve it again if necessary. Then if there is still no reference to said object within a couple more weeks, THEN AND ONLY THEN can you probably safely discard the item, BUT ONLY IN A MANNER THAT DOES NOT RISK THE CHILD'S SEEING IT...
don'
t just toss it "openly" into a trash can where it can easily be seen by anyone just moseying by!
