I admit it: I'm not always a "positive" influence on small children.

What exactly is "positive" anyways? And who's to say that teaching a four-year-old girl to French-kiss my girlfriend is not a "positive" thing anyhow?

Before you give me that look, let me explain.

This was years ago, with my first girlfriend. Some family friends were visiting. My girlfriend and I were elected to baby-sit their little daughter.

Eager to impress my girlfriend with my "sensitive-side," I pulled out this monkey puppet and gave a hilarious puppet show. There was drama. There was conflict. There was a lot of bumping into the wall in mock-puppet pain.

The kid was tumbling all over in laughter. Puppet antics apparently go over well with four-year-olds. Then again, so do androgynous pastel-colored aliens with TVs in their bellies, so I really have nothing to brag about.

My girlfriend, on the other hand, was highly impressed. She gave me a hug and smiled a smile that could wake up a coma patient. So I kissed her.

And perhaps it could be argued that the kiss I gave her wasn't exactly the kind of kiss you should give in front of a four-year-old.

Then, well, you know, monkey see, monkey do. After the kiss, the kid crawled onto my girlfriend's lap, put her hands on my girlfriend's cheeks, stuck out her tongue, and drove it right into my girlfriend's mouth.

Had the kid been twenty years older, this scene would have been totally awesome.

As it were, the scene was more of an utter shock. My girlfriend recoiled in horror. I rolled into the floor in laughter. The poor kid watched us and tried to make sense of what these wacky adults were so upset about.

We never told my family friends about this. We just returned their daughter to them as if we had a highly cultured and proper afternoon reading Dostoevsky. Probably a bad analogy, but you know what I mean.

I am so going to Hell, aren't I?

. . .

Have you ever been a bad influence?