Origins

It's been months since the scandal over lead-paint tainted toys from China raged. I remember having to cull through the Thomas the train toys and track every new recall announcement to find out whether we had such toys.

I'm not sure who started it, but the strategy being taught in many local families was to discuss that you should never put toys from China in your mouth. Of all the discussions we had with our 5-year-old, that lesson seemed to stick.

Just last night, though, the subject of Chinese toys came up again. And there was a new element, the fact that my son can now read, and can therefore identify which of his toys was made in China.

At bathtime, he read the label on his squeegee dolphin. Made in China. Then the sleek bottlenosed dolphin. Made in China. Then the plastic crab. The lobster. The orange fish.

We were done with his bath so he stepped out and I started to dry him. But he was a boy obsessed.

He stepped away from me, still undressed, to the little toy bin under the bathroom sink containing his other bath toys. He wanted to read each and every label.

We quickly figured out all the normal hiding spots for the information. The bellies of the whales and fish. Sometimes their back fin.

But time and again, he recognized the word China.

Finally, I urged him to stop since it was getting late and I needed to get him dressed. He growled: "All these toys from China are making me grumpy."