Chicken Apple Frog Piece Pie

little kid still works a lot and often complains about scheduling conflicts between work and school. He found an old phone handset today and said he needed to make calls to his boss, a work friend and a work friend's mother.

"My boss is Moe. I gots to call him 'cuz he's never at wook," he said, while waiting for Moe to answer.

"Sounds like my boss," Mr. Ashley answered.

"Well, he's at my wook sometimes but he's like walkin' around and stuff. I can't talk to him, so I gots to call him on a phone."

"That's a manager for you," we commiserated with him, laughing. Moe never did answer.

I almost arranged a meeting with these elusive work friends one day when little kid tentatively mentioned that I had never seen or heard any of his friends from work and I must be sad not to have met them.

"Yeah. Why haven't I met them?"

"Uh, 'cuz they's busy a lot. Wookin' and stuff."

"Maybe we could have them over for dinner one night." He laughed and then looked a little nervous when I smiled back, waiting for an answer.

"Oh, yeah. Hmmmm. Maybe we could do 'at." He studied the ceiling and then began picking at the carpet near his feet.

"When? What night is best for them?"

"Ah. Uh. Here's a thing--" He looked up from his carpet picking. "They only eat chicken and apple pies." He scrunched his nose, like this disgusting entree was obviously a deal breaker.

"Hmm. Well, I can cook chicken pies! I could just add some apples. That might be good actu--"

"...with frogs. Chopped up pieces of frogs. Like all bloody and gooey and stuff? It's all they eat. But you's don't got to chop up any frogs, mine mumum."

"Gross."

"Yeah, so maybe no dinner. You can meet 'em maybe later."