You can pick your nose.... you can pick your friends.... BUT you can't pick your friend's nose!

I hand out band-aids at recess, soothe hurt feelings and send kids in for ice when they have bumps on the head.  In class I ask people to shush, answer questions about commas and adjectives, prefixes and suffixes,  wield power over drinks and bathrooming but I was asked to do something TOTALLY out of line the other day at work.  We all have our boundaries right? Here's one of mine.....

I'm in Kindergarten and this child starts  howling hysterically....

"AHHHHHH!!!!  WAHH!!!!! It smells bad! It smells really really bad!!!! 

I rush over "what is wrong?"  "Joey told me to smell the new eraser and it smells really bad and I can't stop smelling it! WAHHHHHHH!!!!!  

I smell the eraser.  It's not so terrible.

I try to calm her down.  It's not working.  The eraser in question is not the pink rubber kind, it's the somewhat crumbly light tan gum kind and I wonder if a crumb broke off and is up her nose.  I ask her to blow.  She does.  More wailing.  The teacher asks me to take her to the office til she calms down as the whole class is riveted on her.  We go sit in the nurses office and continue to blow and cry hysterically about how "IT'S STINKY!!!! I HATE IT!!! IT SMELLS REALLY REALLY BAD!!!!!  After about 10 minutes she begins to calm down and I say I bet you blew it out of your nose.  She, whimpering a little and lifting her chin, says "I think we should check.  You need to put your finger up there and check."  

** Now that's where I draw the line****

I said as nicely as I could "I'm NOT checking.  You're welcome to check but I'm Not checking."

She did.

All clear.

Back to class.

Just so you understand the TYPE of wailing going on.  The little girls voice in this green bean video was about the same volume, tenor and level of shrill we were dealing with over the stinky eraser. Good times.