We’ve been through this too many times. We take Grandma’s whistle, then she cries and begs and promises she’ll behave, and the second we give it back to her, she’s right back to her old tricks. We can’t let her keep playing us like fools. Here are six reasons why we need to take away her whistle privileges for good.

1. It’s not even her whistle

She stole it from the neighbor’s garage. Rodney caught it on his Nest camera and everything, and when we confronted Grandma about it she just blew the whistle really loud and pretended not to hear us. So why do we feel bad taking it from her if it never actually belonged to her in the first place?

2. It does not help her “see” better with her glaucoma

Grandma seems to think that the whistle has a sort of echolocation effect that helps her detect walls and stuff, but that is obviously bullshit. Blowing the whistle constantly while she’s maneuvering around the house does not help her in the slightest, and if her glaucoma is really as bad as she claims, she should take the eyedrops the doctor prescribed her.

3. If she uses it to impersonate a crossing guard again, someone could get killed

Last time she impersonated a crossing guard it was thankfully in the middle of the day when there wasn’t much traffic, but next time we might not be so lucky. Between the whistle and the orange vest she dug out of the box of Halloween stuff, her crossing guard getup is pretty convincing, and I doubt a busy mom pushing a stroller would think twice if Grandma waved her into oncoming traffic. It’s a serious liability.

4. She has a clarinet she never touches that she can actually play beautifully

Why do we put up with her terrible-sounding whistle when she could instead be playing music that’d actually be lovely to hear? She used to be in a symphony orchestra, for chrissakes! She says she doesn’t play the clarinet anymore because the mouthpiece hurts her lips, but considering how swollen and bloody her gums are from blowing her whistle 14 hours a day, I seriously doubt pain would be an issue.

5. Every time she blows the whistle outside, the backyard fills with deer

I have no idea why this happens, but the whistle sound makes deer show up by the dozens, and they’re absolutely wrecking the yard. They’ve eaten all of Mom’s flowers, they’ve torn up all the sod. We can’t even set foot out there anymore without our shoes getting caked in deer shit. The deer are a nightmare, and it’s unsettling how responsive they are to Grandma. Once, she blew the whistle at them and they all ran over and started headbutting the grill. That’s a learned behavior. She must’ve taught them that. And honestly, she’s pretty much the last person I want to see wielding power over nature. She just can’t be trusted.

6. The whistle serves literally no purpose

None. All it does is make everybody miserable. It’s seriously the worst fucking sound in the world. And it’s disgusting! Grandma never washes it, and it’s just gushing with spit. I mean, there’s a real odor to it—you can smell it halfway across the room. Not to mention it’s a legitimate safety hazard. Grandma’s swallowed it twice now, and one of these days Dad isn’t gonna be around to give her the Heimlich.

There’s just no real reason for her to have a whistle, especially if she’s gonna keep being a dick about it. She never obeys her 9 p.m. whistle curfew. She blows it menacingly at children. And she’s made it so none of our friends want to come to our house anymore because it’s impossible to have a conversation over all her whistle racket. She’s just so goddamn inappropriate with it all the time, and since she doesn’t pay rent or help out with house chores, we truly owe her nothing. She says she’ll go on a hunger strike if we don’t give her the whistle back, but who cares? Let her throw her stupid tantrum. We should just throw that awful whistle in the garbage and move on with our lives. Good fucking riddance.