Faster than slow

Zoë came running when she heard the *zthoop*zthoop*zthoop* of the tape dispenser.

"Why are you taping that book?" she demanded.

I rolled my eyes a little and said, "Who are you—the book repair police?"

I know taping books isn't good for them but little fingers, likewise, aren't good for books and we have a lot of little fingers around this place. Taping books makes my book repairing brother shake his head but the last time I asked him what I should do instead of taping a book up he said, "Honestly, I would just buy a new copy. The book isn't worth the cost of the materials or time it would take to repair it."

And so I tape my books. Because I'm not buying new copies of everything that gets destroyed.

I'd rather not have to tape my books up, but we have a book monster living with us. He is faster than fast and is drawn to books like flies to honey. They were the one thing that could convince him to try to crawl. His main method of locomotion was squawking his head off until a big person came to pick him up and I'm not sure why we felt the need to motivate him to be independent but we did. He learned to crawl and now he's constantly attacking books (also he refuses to walk and when he gets bored of crawling with squawk his head off until a big person comes to pick him up; we keep coaxing him to walk on his own (I'm sure we'll come to rue the day he does)).

One of his more annoying habits (aside from ripping full pages out of books) is taking a board book, opening it to the middle of the book, and then trying to close it against the spine, inside out. He has snapped a handful of board books completely in half this way and it drives. me. nuts.

Zoë was still waiting for a proper answer so I sighed and said, "I'm taping this book because Alexander destroys books faster than..."

"Slow?" she asked.

Yes, my dear. Alexander destroys books faster than slow.