In the mid-70's, between ages 4 and 7, my sister and I had a very mean older woman for a baby-sitter. Mrs. Dowswell had thin wiry red hair and she clearly hated children. Though she was able to present herself to parents as a reasonable woman, as soon as the door shut she bacame a sort of terror of criticism general cruelty.

One of her favourite torments was to ask you if you brushed your teeth. Of course we truthfully answered yes, but Dowswell would drag all the kids into the bathroom and brush your teeth for you with painful scrubbing, often leaving your gums bleeding.

One day a new kid arrived. He was about four years old, pudgy, silent, and he always dressed in this little childrens three piece suit. Thomas Burger never said a word, but he looked pretty sharp in that suit.

After the second time Mrs Dowswell brushed Thomas's teeth Thomas wordlessly stared at my sister and I so we followed him as he got up from in front of the Spiderman cartoon and marched to the upstairs bathroom where he gathered two handfuls of Dowswell's toothbrushes and dropped them into the toilet. When he flushed the toilet he adjusted his tie and quietly left the house and never returned.

To this day we refer to this event as the Thomas Burger Rebellion.