The Gay Uncle’s extended family had a banner meeting this past weekend, when his boyfriend Tal’s brother Marty went down to the Keys with his daughters to meet up with Gunc’s sister and her two girls. Marty can be something of a wild card (you might remember him from this piece, and this one) and while his children are generally delightful, putting four kids in the same room always has the potential to degenerate. So the G.U. was pleased to hear that there was no name-calling, fistfights, eye scratching, or other forms of smackdown. Not that he really expected anything like this (though maybe for the sake of this column, he hoped for a bit more conflict.) The girls discussed school, activities, and recent films in a very refined manner, the only blip being an eruption over a noise-making, squishy, duck toy, the incessant squeezing of which caused the Gay Uncle’s sister Roxy to lose her shit, and scream at Marty’s older daughter. “Enough with the duck!” (This blow-up also resulted in his niece Amber taking her mom aside for a gentle scolding, “Mama. I think you went a bit overboard with the whole duck thing.”) Gunc couldn’t figure out why this summit had such a polite temper, until Roxy revealed that its wheels had been greased by the presence of the ideal (children’s) social lubricant: immense bags of Halloween candy. Apparently, the girls all had their booty-satchels with them and spent much of their together-time laying out their collections, sorting them by shape, size, color, ingredients, and brand (and presence or absence of razor blades), and then performing sophisticated swaps and trades. Though Gunc recalls the delights of this practice with his three siblings–all of whom had staked out very different confectionary preferences– he’s not exactly sure what the exchange rate is anymore on Reese’s, Snickers, Twix, and Dots. Are Three Musketeers plummeting with the dollar? Is Toblerone rising with the Euro? And what about Swedish Fish? Anyone have any ideas?