The other day I walked in the living room and found Remy sitting on the floor reading The Necronomicon. I have to remember to quit leaving that thing lying around. He looked up at me. "Monsters?"

"Yes, monsters. But those monsters are a bit advanced for you. Those are a bit advanced for me."
I put it back with the DVDs and we went off to find something else to do.

My mother took them to church with her on Sunday. I'm not a huge fan of church, but one thing the Catholic Church does pretty well is monster hunting. The Old Testament is wild times; there are magical creatures, talking animals, curses, and there was magic, real magic all over the place. Any king worth his salt mine had a few soothsayers, a couple of magicians, and at least one ancient evil chained up in the dungeons.

Jesus hunted monsters too. Well, more demonic force types, not the corrupted nature monsters we deal with nowadays. Jesus cast demons out of people all the time. He makes it look easy, but ripping a multi-dimensional entity off without destroying the soul is hard. It's not like you just show the demon the door and out it goes.

Jesus was something of a contradiction as a monster hunter, since there is at least one documented case of him creating the undead. Maybe he trained it or something, but I can't say I approve.

The Catholic Church may prepare them for monsters conceptually, but their methods are obsolete. Demons and devils and fallen angels and all that died out a long time ago. They had their heyday, but humans have gotten pretty good at this evil stuff all on their own. No demand, no supply. Capitalism strikes on the spiritual level.

Maybe this is why the Catholic Church is so intent on retaining its own monsters.

So no Necronomicon for the twins. They're not yet four years old. Then again, this may be the time to focus on the transdimensional stuff because they're nowhere near ready to engage any physical monsters. Mostly I teach them identification and evasion. Like the kelpie, common to Scotland and Ireland but they can turn up in any body of water.

The foolish wikipedia page does not say how to escape when you are stuck to their glue-like skin (besides cutting off the body part). The solution isn't pleasant, but a far sight better than being drowned and eaten. If you are stuck on the back of a kelpie and it is heading for water, you must soil yourself. You should be pretty terrified; use this to your advantage. Vomiting will also work.

The kelpie responds pretty much the same way anyone else would. Once you are tossed from its back, get as far away from that body of water as possible. Most kelpie can't get too far from the water. The kelpie is vain and will be furiously cleaning itself so you should be fine.

Have I mentioned this before? I may have. I have been focusing on monsters that are particularly dangerous to children. You're next, Church.