The Glove Gremlin

The boy has been missing a pair of gloves for, well, most of the Winter now.

They are a fingerless glove with his name on them. The Wife actually got 3 pairs of them: one for her, one for the lass and one for the boy. She labeled them all so there would be no arguments about whose was whose.

Labeling them also had the side effect of letting us know who took care of their gloves.

The amusing thing is that, at some point this Winter, each pair of gloves was lost to its owner. The lass lost hers back in January and the Wife found them. The Wife lost hers and I found them, sitting on the bottom of our coat rack. The boy lost his and no one found them.

Until today, when the boy discovered them in his backpack.

“Didn’t I tell you to look there when you first lost them?” the Wife asked.

“Yeah, you did and they weren’t there,” the boy insisted. “I don’t know how they reappeared, but they did.”

“I know what happened…” I started. I looked him straight in the eye and went on “The Glove Gremlins got them. Glove Gremlins are famous for stealing gloves and using them, then returning them to a spot where you’ve already looked. It’s actually a good sign they returned them since it must mean that warmer weather is coming.”

“Huh?” the boy asked.

I continued “Glove Gremlins are close cousins of the Sock Gremlins, who go into drawers and make sure socks are either mismatched or missing their pair. I hate Sock Gremlins…” I trailed off.

“Wait. Are you being serious? Are there really Glove Gremlins?” the boy asked.

At that point I was tempted to do with something like “Alright, you got me. There are no Glove Gremlins, but the Sock Gremlins are their for sure. They leave a fowl odor behind that smells like…” But I didn’t. Instead, I tried to play it straight.

“Are Glove Gremlins real? Do you think I would make something like that up? Who would come up with something so ridiculous as Glove Gremlins?” I asked.

“You would,” he replied as we turned and walked away.

Oh well, guess he knows me well enough by now. But I had him going there, for just a moment.