Cworgs.

Last Friday at Mission Center, Kathleen (age 7) and I had the following conversation while walking home, after seeing a dog with no tail on our way to Mission Center:

Kathleen: I'm sure glad I'm not a dog with my tail cut off!
Me: What if you were? What would you say?
Kathleen: I'd say "woof! woof! woof!" [laughs]
Me: [laughs] Really? I'd say "WOOF!!! WOOF!!! WOOF!!!" I wouldn't want them to cut off my tail! I'd be scared! [laughs]
Kathleen: [laughs] Oh, me too!
Me: What if you were a little dog, like a chihuahua? What would you say?
Kathleen: "Yip! Yip! Yip!" [both laugh]

Conversation continues with other animals getting their tails cut off: cats ["MEOW!!! MEOW!!! MEOW!!!], birds ["SQWACK!!! SQWACK!!! SQWACK!!!'], lambs ["BAA!!! BAA!!! BAA!!!"], cows ["MOOO!!! MOO!!!! MOOOOO!!"], horses ["NEIGH!!! NEIGH!!! NEIGH!!!"], zebras ["MMMMM!!! MMMM!!! MMMMM!!!"], giraffes [neither of us were sure about that one, so we decided they would just move their necks around a lot], and worms [again, not sure. We discussed whether they had a tail, or whether their whole body was a tail].

Me: Kathleen, what would you do if you saw a cow with a dog for a head and a worm for a tail?
Kathleen: [laughs] I don't know!
Me: I think I would scream... like this! [yells; laughs]
Kathleen: [laughs] I think I would too!
Me: What would you call it? You can't call it a cow because it has a dog head. You can't cal it a dog because it's attached to a cow. And you can't call it a worm because it's connected to the cow body and dog head!

[Come up with various names: cog, worg, dow, etc.]

Kathleen: I know! I'd call it a CWORG!!! [both laugh and marvel at the brilliance of the name]

For the record, this is a cworg: