Brickel Bush

From "What was I Scared of?" by Dr. Seuss (a favorite book around here):

"...I ran and found a Brickel bush
I hid myself away.
I got brickels in my britches
But I stayed there anyway..."

We spent some time at the park yesterday, during a small window of decent weather. While I sat on a bench and read a magazine, the boys spent quite a bit of time walking around in the grass. I didn't know what they were doing, but they weren't fighting and it looked like they were having fun. So, as we were leaving the park, Aidan was walking awfully slow. I turned around and he was staring at the ground, walking in a kind of zig zag, erratic pattern. I asked what he was doing, and he said, "I don't want to step on a brickel bush!" I said, "There are no brickel bushes around here." Ethan said, "Yes there are Mom. Right here." And he pointed to a dandelion weed (no flower yet). I explained that those aren't brickel bushes, just weeds. They spent the rest of the walk to the car pointing out weeds and pointedly stepping on them. (P.S. This picture is of a dandelion weed, not some other kind of "weed"!)

Then today we went out and played in the grass behind our parking lot. Both boys were still talking about brickel bushes vs. weeds. I actually found a "brickel bush" in the grass and pointed it out to the boys...I don't know what they are really called, but if you stepped on it while barefoot you would be sorry. They both walked up to it, gave it at least a 2 foot berth, and leaned in to stare at it. Then Aidan spent quite a while walking away from it, then walking back to it and walking around it like it had the plague, all the while talking about brickel bushes. I don't know if I should thank Dr. Seuss for giving these weeds a name, or curse him for making my kids worry about getting hurt by brickel bushes!