anonymous vampire teeth, or, recipe for instant illness

Here's a recipe for a cold and flu epidemic:

Ingredients
8-10 children
4 adults (storytellers & babysitters)
8-10 sets of Halloween vampire teeth
early release day from school
a very small space
recent news that one child is "definitely contagious" with an unnamed illness

Process
Note: It should be assumed that, unless otherwise stated or unless the kids are chewing food, the vampire teeth are in their mouth.

1. The children should be given sets of vampire teeth by the volunteers who made them dinner that night. Then the dinner volunteers (heretofore referred to as "the culprits") flee the scene.

2. The children, whose mouths are already salivating due to their natural preponderance for drooling and the fact that they've just finished dessert, all gather for weekly story time. (Some should run away from the storyteller, others should cry, and still others should sit quietly*.)

3. One child, "Cookie Giver," should suddenly begin to whine about wanting to open a package of mysteriously acquired Nutter Butters. As soon as she opens said package, she will taunt the other children with the contents of the package, thereby destroying what semblance of peace the storyteller and volunteers have maintained thus far.

4. Once the cookies have been dispersed by a sticky-handed child (one with freshly-licked fingers) to those she has deemed worthy, the story-reading can begin.

5. The star of the night, Whiny Deluxe, should recommence moaning and whining right about now. Having finished dismantling and thoroughly licking and gnawing the Nutter Butter, she demands another of the Cookie Giver but is rejected. Whining escalates to the point that Whiny Deluxe is forced to remove the vampire teeth from her mouth to cry more audibly, thereby displaying an oddly thick, somewhat chunky, and ridiculously long stream of saliva from her lip to her hand, where she holds the plastic fangs.

6. Whining and begging and crying continue.

7. Storyteller and co. continue to read books.

8. Two male children decide to switch teeth. The storyteller notices this as it is already too late.

9. Book reading continues.

10. Kids fight over coloring books, removing their teeth to better enunciate. Removal of fangs results in streams of spit over books, carpet, and--in one unfortunate instance--a globule of spit on asst. storyteller's bare toes.

11. After 59 minutes, you will have a thoroughly exhausted crowd of children and adults. None of the children will know whose teeth are whose, and everyone will have been coughed on.





*Note: This is actually never the reality, but it was put there in case you see this reaction and are taken by surprise.