Late to bed, late to rise.....

Last Sunday, I was sitting on our bed, ear to the cell phone, participating in this year's fantasy baseball draft. I've been in this league for more than a decade. Everyone else is in Texas, but they have graciously allowed me to stay in the league even though I live several states away.

All of a sudden, I hear a commotion on the other side of the house. I interrupt the bidding on whatever player we were debating with, "Excuse me a second, I have a five-year-old situation to deal with."

Rachel doesn't want to go to bed. Rachel needs to go to bed. Maybe it's partially due to a recent bout with strep throat, but her teacher has told us she has been extra cranky lately. And like all five-year-olds, she can be plenty cranky without strep.

"Rachel! You need to go to bed!" I tell her.

"But I'm not tired!" she counters.

"It doesn't matter!" I reply. "If you don't get to bed now, you're going to be tired in the morning and your teacher is going to tell us you were tired all day because you went to bed too late the night before!"

"But I'm not tired!" she repeats.

"Look honey, here is what you do," I tell her as I herd her back to bed. "Lie here, close your eyes and count to 50. You'll probably be asleep by then!"

"But I can count higher than that!" she said, exasperated.

Cute, intelligent and sassy. A real triple threat, this one.