Slide Whistle Given to Child Immediately Returned by Parents
CHICAGO, IL — Mark Donovan, 40, received a surprise when he looked in his mailbox to find a slide whistle that he had sent to his nephew as a birthday gift earlier that week. “I thought it must have been a mistake,” Donovan told us in a phone call after the incident, “so I called my brother, my nephew’s dad, and he told me it wasn’t a mistake.” The parents of Mark’s nephew have requested to remain anonymous. Sources close to the family have reported that Mark’s brother and his wife felt that the whistle was extremely annoying. “He said something like, ‘why the hell would you impose this fresh hell on us?’ or something dramatic like that, I wasn’t really listening. I don’t have kids, so I’m no expert, but I think he should just let the kid be a kid and have fun.” The slide whistle is a novelty instruments that uses an adjustable tube to create a sliding tone. Whistle experts agree it is the most annoying of all the whistles and that it could qualify as a weapon in the hands of a child. “I mean yeah, it was like a dollar and it sounded like shit, and those things don’t sound great even if you have a nice one, but I still think it was rude of him to return the gift.” Legal experts have informed us that, because of the recent increase in parents working from home, introducing a slide whistle into a child’s home could be a prosecutable offense. At the time of this article, Mark Donovan does not yet have any charges filed against him.
