Cookie Czar

At the grocery store when the jolly cashier holds out an animal sticker, Lyla glances up with head slightly lowered, making her eyes look like they got stuck mid-roll. "No thank you," she says, barely audible with a dash of attitude.

I love the way she remains basically polite without compromising her standards of good taste. Animal stickers are, like, so first grade.

Nevertheless, one could argue that it's important to learn how to be socially adept with strangers. I'm speaking theoretically, of course, not from any personal knowledge or skill set. Barely audible with a dash of attitude is fine when you're 8 and rejecting a dopey sticker, but it won't get you a job.

Enter the Girl Scouts and their cookie cult.

It was Lyla's idea to fill up the bike trailer and drag it around the neighborhood like the cutest mule on Earth. Pretty good business plan, if you ask me; most people took one look at her and just grabbed their wallets. For the others, I believe her spiel went something like this: "Ahem, do you want cookies?" For a kid who does not love mindless pleasantries with random people, being the neighborhood cookie czar was excellent practice.