Fresh from the groaners listserv.

Today my boys and I did yard work. And being rural, when we get in side we check for ticks. And found one. The cats and the dogs are medicated for ticks and flees, so I know it didn’t come from them. Anyway, the actual conversation went like this…

“Mom! Is this a tick?”

“Yes. Kill it by pressing it between your thumb nail and another nail.”

“Ewww! It popped!”

“That’s how you know it is dead.”

“Mom, are there other kinds of ticks?”

“There are lots of different types of ticks.”

“Like what?”

“Well, there is the tick that is long and skinny. It is used in some cultures to hold things together, and in other cultures it is eaten. It is called a Tick-Tack.

“But they only eat the last digit on the parasite’s foot. It is a delicacy called Tick Tack Toe.

“And there is the long bent tick, as you may guess it is called a tick-L.

“To be sure of it’s type compare it to a test tick-L.

“You have to do this because it is very similar to the straight parasites which imitate the twigs of trees. They are simply called sticks.

“Of course there are the ticks that Noah saved from the cold. They are called Arctics.

“And the small ones that dance and caper about are called anticks.

“If you look closely you can account for the difference between the mathamatick (often found in groups) and the egyptinan variant with the indicipherable writing on it’s back, called the cryptick.

“And there are the small ticks that if you have you get into the movies. Those are called tickets.

“And the ones that only come out during the full moon are lunaticks.

“Did you know there is an oral variant that comes around from the internet? It is called an E-liptick.

“The ones that are very judgmental are called criticks. They are closely related to the scepticks, but are paid more.

“The burning ones, which cause a lot of expensive damage, are best left alone. Those are the ones we call causticks.

“The ones with a strong tendency to point north are called magneticks. When they get old they don’t point north all the time, and then they are called eraticks.

“Some are found in small pricey shops, they are called boutiques.

“The ticks that you find beneath the roof are called atticks.

“The big ticks that are ground up and used as glue are called masticks.

“There is even a skirt wearing Scottish variant called a keltick. Be careful, as this one looks like a buff version of the narcissistick, which is a very vain animal.

“There are a couple of musical ticks, the operatick and its close cousin the acustick. Both belong to the artistick family. Don’t confuse either with a guitar pick, that is a different animal, flat and about thumb nail sized.

“The ticks from Italy are called Romanticks. These are often confused with eroticks, which are not ticks at all, but a type of love bug.

“And there are the kinds ground up for medicine, called narcoticks.

“I heard a story that another name for this animal is an antickdote, but I haven’t been able to verify this.”