Shirly was born 9 years and 6 months before me.  I am the baby of the family.  When I was small, she took me everywhere with her.  In fact, I distinctly remember being smacked in the back of the head while walking to our adopted grandparents house one summer morning.  Mom made her take me with her.  SMACK-"You always have to go everywhere I go" SMACK-"You're such a brat!" SMACK- "Tell Mom you want to stay home next time!"  I never did of course. She knew too many things for me to miss out on an adventure with her.  Our adopted grandparents had grandkids that stayed with them in the summer who matched our ages.  Grandma & Grandpop Sowers lived on a farm.  Complete with horses, cows, barns, creeks, orchards, and all manner of places we could find trouble to get into with.  Cathy (the grandkid my age) was not nearly as adventurous as the rest of us.  Plus, she was the biggest tattle-tale.  We hated to take her along with us on our daily activities.  Basically, she was a cry baby.  Shirly and the grandkid matching her age-Penny  were always plotting ways to either get away from her before she knew what was going on, or causing her to run screaming to Grandma.  The former preferred over the latter. Secret dirty tricks were played on her without her knowledge all the time.  We used to chip off salt chips to carry around and suck on all day.  First, Shirly and Penny chipped off the parts the cows had licked on to get to the fresh salt, then they chipped off a piece for each of us.  Except they always gave the cow licked chip to Cathy.  This caused us to giggle every time she took a lick, confusing her, and making us splutter and roar with laughter.  Sometimes this would cause her to huff off because we wouldn't tell her what was so funny.  Another time, after jumping down all the hay bales in the barn-a forbidden thing for us to do- Grandpop could be seen coming up the hill to the barn.  Cathy and I were quickly hidden in some of the loose hay while Shirly and Penny climbed up into the rafters.  Wise old Grandpop took a pitchfork and started stabbing around in the hay coming closer and closer to our hiding spot.  Terrified he would stab us , do you think Shirly would speak up- HELL NO!  She wasn't about to get herself caught.  Eventually, us un-stabbed, Grandpop left, loudly muttering about kids tearing up all the hay making it useless.  Did I feel betrayed?  Nope. Too stupid I guess. We used to build small fires under the creek bridges by our home to cook hot dogs, or whatever else we decide to make.  Once we took all the ingredients for pudding, cooking it and letting it cool.  Then a mean older neighbor boy came and peed in it.  We were helpless to defend ourselves as he was a big bully.  But Shirly knew how to get even.  She peed a little in a cup and added that to a batch of home-made brownies.  Then, she dragged me to his house.  His mother answered the door and told her I had made him a batch of brownies just for him- my first batch ever made in fact.   His mother, ohhhed and ahhhed and called him to the door.  "This little girl has just made her first batch of brownies just for you!" she gushed.  I proudly held them out to him.  "I don't want any" he told me.  Seeing my disappointed look, his mother grabbed him by the ear and said;"You will eat those brownies this little girl went through all the trouble making them for you!  Now eat them!"  Red- faced, he gave us a murderous look and we watched as he ate a brownie.  He didn't know what we had done, but he knew we did something.  Shirly's satisfied smirk told him so.  We had a few more run-ins with him over the next couple of years, but nothing food related again.